How can you assume that we conservatives do not care for the children after they are born?
I grew up in a large family, poor…but my family never received a welfare check or went hungry. We learned early how to work. We helped tend a large garden for food. Brothers worked their way through college. Those who did not go to college, went to work.
We went to church every time the doors were open and God had a way of sending someone with some used clothing or other provision when we had a need and we never went asking. As Christians, who do we believe in? God or the government?

As for the abortion issue, when Republican policies become consistently “pro-life,” I’ll take them seriously on this one. War, environmental destruction, turning away from the poor, healthcare, putting the interests of big business above the poor, tax policies that favor the super rich… their policies on all of these issues and more lead to the death of thousands. It isn’t enough to be “pro-life” before birth if you aren’t afterwards.

Moving on . . . what of John Kerry’s complete support for the radical pro-abortion agenda? He supports partial-birth abortion – a procedure that is horrid. Have you actually seen what they do to these fully developed babies? It is horrid. How could anyone support such a procedure? Do you? Additionally, he voted against legislation that would charge any person who injures or kills a pregnant woman, thus leading to the death of her unborn child with murder of that infant. Why would he do such a thing? Does this not bother you? Would you support such legislation? It is one thing to vote for someone who does not have any ability to shape public policy on abortion. Were my residency in Louisville I would vote for the Democratic candidate for mayor. He’s been a good mayor and his personal positions cannot shape public policy on issues like abortion, thus it wouldn’t be inappropriate to vote for such a candidate. With that I can agree with you. But when someone is actively influencing policy, and doing so in a way that he or she is catering to a radical pro-abortion agenda, then there must be a line drawn. Certainly being complicit in murder is morally reprehensible, if not morally equivalent. But are you saying you would not vote for any candidate who had an abortion? What about one whose wife had one?

Now, as a good pro-choice advocate you brought up every exception to the rule regarding abortion. First, death of a woman is basically obsolete in this country. There are many, many medical options out there that make it virtually impossible for a woman to die from pregnancy. At risk pregnancies are caught much earlier these days and the odds of dying from a pregnancy where abortion would have prevented it are so slim that this defense is weak at best. Additionally, rape and incest is less than a 1 percent of all abortions in this country (according to Planned Parenthood’s own Guttmacher Institute).

Regarding that article and the possibility of such a situation, I think if we cultivated a culture of life in this country where children in the womb were not treated as accidents, we would look at this situation much differently. I don’t like how the Catholic Church reacted to this. However, I do not think two wrongs make a right. Killing an innocent life conceived in sinful behavior doesn’t right the situation. That might sound unloving and ungracious, but what about the life inside of her. Isn’t it unloving and ungracious to kill this life created not by its own volition, but by a great miracle of God? After all every single pregnancy is a miracle, not an accident. And as a Christian we can know that for a fact, because of Scripture’s clear teaching on the sovereignty of God.

Regarding aborting because of possible defects – I think this is the biggest fraud in all of this. First, there is a percentage (albeit a small one, but at least in proportion to the percentage of cases of rape and incest to the overall abortion total), of cases in which the infant in the womb does not display the effects of the diagnosis upon birth (and with medical science being as it is, not many of these conditions can be treated in the womb). This actually occured to one of my former SS teachers. He and his wife were faced with the choice of abortion, yet when the child was born there was no birth defects at all. It was a miracle, yes, but possible in hundreds of other cases nonetheless. In addition, one must define what birth defects are worthy of killing the infant and which ones are not. Apparently, Down’s Syndrome is enough for many to choose abortion, and we see that reflected in an unfortunate number of Down’s Syndrome children being aborted every year. That should break anyone’s heart, especially given the great capacity of these children for love and affection, and now a growing ability to thrive in contribute greatly in our society.

Now, I did not mean to morph this into an abortion debate, but I think these issues need to be dealt with and not thrown around as if they deliver a crushing blow to the anti-abortion lobby. Laws can be ammended to allow for certain situations and in many states already there are provisions in place (and that is what laws in the States are there to do – but a wholesale “Constitutional position” in which abortion is accepted in toto is not only unacceptable, it’s not Constitutional either – even Harry A. Blackmun has stated that Roe v. Wade was not meant to provide abortion-on-demand and the Court did not desire that to be the effect of their ruling). Some of these provisions are too open to interpretation and give doctors and patients leeway to abort when the prognosis does not match the law. People have distorted “life of the mother” to mean “health of the mother”, when in fact statistically, women suffer much more emotionally when they have an abortion than when they go to term and give the child up for adoption.

I will save my talk about the political situation for my next post.

I’m not a single issue voter. I have voted for a pro-life Democrat in the past and would do so again (if in PA – I’d vote for Bob Casey Jr. in a heartbeat). Growing up in Georgia, abortion was not a huge issue. Many Democrats were pro-life at the state & local levels.

A vote for a candidate with a pro-choice position does not necessarily translate into more abortions. In response to Alan Keyes statement that “A candidate who favors abortion should be disqualified from receiving a Christian’s vote” – Christianity Today wrote that “in some cases, voting for a pro-choice politician may be morally acceptable (especially if the pro-life opponent is otherwise incompetent). But, when we think in terms of single issues, we marginalize ourselves. The NAE’s Call to Civic Responsibility stated that while individual persons and organizations are at times called by God to concentrate on one or two issues, faithful evangelical civic engagement must champion a biblically balanced agenda.

Let’s move past single-issue mindedness and focus on a cluster of dominant issues such as justice for the poor, care for creation, peace, freedom, church-state relations, racial justice, and of course the sanctity of human life.

I’m not trying to pick a fight, I’m really trying to understand your thinking.

I’ve gotten sick of the hypocrisy in the Rep. party for sure. But, I couldn’t vote for a pro-choice candidate if I had a choice. How can a believer vote pro-choice.

Again, I’m not trying to be difficult, I’m trying to understand. Thanks in advance.

Abortion should be permissible in certain circumstances though – to save the physical life of the mother, in case of rape or incest, if baby is expected to die of congenital/developmental defects, (etc.)

Stories like THIS are heartbreaking. It’s unconscionable to force an 11 year old girl who was raped by her own father to carry the pregnancy to full term. Girls like that deserve the right to choose (without the consent of her rapist father).

Now, regarding being a one-issue voter – I don’t think I am one. The problem should not be “vote for the pro-life candidate”, it is that there is usually only one pro-life candidate. I would love to actually have a decision to make between two candidates, but there is none, because when one is willing to kill children, he or she is disqualified from my vote, and should be disqualified from the vote of any Christian that respects the life that only God can give. Christians especially should know better than support an agenda in which children are sacrificed on the altar of human freedom. It’s a form of idolatry and one we cannot afford to support in this country.

So it’s not about being a one-issue voter, it’s about upholding the very fabric of what it means to be human – respect for indefensible life.

And while Dave can talk about being both pro-life and pro-abortion, I have yet to see one live that out (and doubt very much it can be done), especially when it means they support the right of a person to slaughter their own children after that individual made the choice to act in such a way that conception becomes possible. That is the height of a hedonistic society. No individual should have the right to kill the child growing in them. It’s infanticide and supporting it is truly an unBiblical position.
Appeasing people who want to kill their own children by supporting their right to do it is simply incompatible with the Bible.

And so that is where I and other Evangelicals stand. If Dems want to appeal to us then stop supporting the radical pro-abortion agenda, which is bent on partial-birth abortion and absolutely no parental consent consessions. What Dave and others who think they can be pro-life and pro-abortion should do is begin to rally other Christians to support ministries like “A Woman’s Choice Resource Center” and oppose all candidates that support partial-birth abortions and no parental consent. So far I haven’t seen any Dems willing to run on those issues and haven’t seen any left-leaning Christians addressing them.

BTW, great thread guys. Would that more people (potential voters) were informed and not ignorant of the candidates.

Grace and peace,

PTL

I would like to see a Gore/Edwards ticket.

So it appears some Evangelicals are one issue voters: Abortion.

To that issue I say this: There are those of us who are both pro-choice and pro-life. I believe the Constitution protects the choice of the woman, yet I would support education and other economic means to lower the overall abortion rate. Like most issues, there is more than side to the story. If we could stop the politicking and work from two different starting points, I know we can arrive at the same goal: less abortions.