Pro-Life Hypocrisy
A couple of days ago I posted this sentence as my Facebook status, “Eric is saying if you’re Pro-Life you should be Pro-Life in every aspect. This means anti-death penalty, ANTI-WAR, and anti-assisted suicide.” I got a lot of response from it; some agreeing, some disagreeing and some confused on whether this view is Democrat or Republican. To me, it’s neither Democrat nor Republican, it’s Christian.
I personally believe it’s hypocritical to be Pro-Life and not against the rest of these issues I listed. Genesis 1:26a says, “Then God said, “Let us make humankind in our image, according to our likeness…” and Genesis 1:27 says, “So God created humankind in His own image, in the image of God He created them; male and female He created them.” Life has value not because a person is good or bad but because that life (every life) is created in God’s image. It doesn’t matter if you’re a baby, a serial killer, a dictator, a Christian, a Muslim, a senior citizen, “The Enemy”, an atheist or a friend. But let’s put some faces on the image of God; Sudom Husain, George W. Bush, Britney Spears, Joe the Plumber, Timothy McVay, Osama bin Laden, Bono, Hillary Clinton, Barack Obama, Paul Newman, Adolf Hitler, John McCain, or Martin Luther King Jr. These people were all, whether you like them or not, created in God’s image.
Some people are pretty upset about the new movie W. because director Oliver Stone, who is known to be very liberal, presented President George W. Bush as a real human being with struggles that we should sympathize with. I agree that George W. Bush is a horrible president but he’s still a human being and I applaud Oliver Stone for presenting him as one. I think we loose sight of truly following the way Jesus when we stop looking at people as created in God’s image and start seeing them as something else. Shane Claiborne says in his book Jesus for President, “If you want to see the image of God, look in a mirror.” I agree with that statement, but I would add, “or look at the person sitting next to you on the bus.”
David Bazan sings in his song Backwoods Nation sarcastically, “Calling all rednecks to put down their sluggers. And turn their attention from beating the buggers. To pick up machine guns and kill camelfuckers, backwoods nation.” I find it interesting that some (not all) of these people that want to kill these so called “camelfuckers” are some of the same people that are Pro-Life. I just don’t understand it. Especially, when Jesus said in Matthew 5:44, “But I say to you, love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you…” and the writer of Proverbs 25:21-22 says, “If your enemies are hungry, give them bread to eat; and if they are thirsty, give them water to drink; for you will heap coals of fire on their heads, and the LORD will reward you.” I don’t believe it’s our job to kill “good” or “bad” people. I believe it’s our job to love them and see them as a creation of God, in His image. This is one man’s opinion, what do you guys/girls think?
Tags: anti-assisted suicide, anti-death penalty, anti-war, Backwoods Nation, christian, David Bazan, Democrat, Facebook, George W. Bush, Jesus, Jesus for President, Oliver Stone, Pro-Life, Republican, Shane Claiborne
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October 28, 2008 at 3:34 am
I wholeheartedly agree. I loved your first sentence, and I actually pointed that out to one of my friends who was professing the same hypocrisy that you describe here: he told me that the difference in abortion and war was that babies are innocent and Iraqis are not.
I think it shows how much our nationalism is mixed in. Very few Christians would disagree that we should save the life of a baby, but when we associate that with saving the life of an Iraqi or of Osama bin Laden, nationalism warning flags go up and say that “those people” threaten our freedom, our democracy, “they” attacked us, etc.
Do you think it’s hypocritical to be anti-abortion (because you’re a Christian) but not be anti-war?
October 28, 2008 at 4:18 am
I just want to give you mad props for using “camelfuckers” on a blog with the word evangelical in the title. (That’s pretty creative too–I never would have thought to put camel alongside such a word!)
Umm, a more thoughtful comment…
I will be interested to see how globalization continues to affect our dehumanization of the “other.”
I don’t think the “other” will go away or that we will stop dehumanizing him/her. But if you think about the current dynamics, more and more, we have contact with people around the globe, whether in person or through their youtube videos. Will this increased contact help us to remember that Ecuadorians and Putin and Jamie Lynn and al Qaeda are all human?
I’m hoping it does. But in that case, I’m sure there will be a new way to pick “others.”
October 28, 2008 at 4:19 am
Oh, and I just noticed… apparently you’re a man, but we’re just guys and girls? Ouch…
October 28, 2008 at 6:15 pm
Thanks for your thoughts on Pro-Life. For me, it is such a relief to have this definition widened. Evangelical politics has been paralyzed for some time by narrow views on issues and we need to be held accountable for allowing ourselves to become hog-tied. (To carry on the animal imagery.)
One thought regarding the war and a newly defined Pro-Life stance. Would it really be Pro-Life to pull our troops out now? No matter your view on whether or not it was Pro-Life or Image of God going into the war in Iraq, what about now? Is it showing a value for Iraqi human life to stay and help clean up the mess we have made? That is something I worry about. From what I know, the problems that surfaced in Afghanistan with the Taliban can be traced to the US pulling support from one regime leading to its fall and then the eventual swooping in of the Taliban. It we had stayed and cleaned up the mess in Afghanistan would the world have ever had the Taliban as we know it? We’ve made our bed, now don’t you think we have to lie in it in Iraq? Just wondering there are any men/women, gals/guys that worry about this.
October 29, 2008 at 9:09 pm
Watching American movies I have noticed how they differentiate the value of lives of good guys and bad guys. The life of a bad guy is simply worthless, at least compared to the life of a good guy. I suspect the movies both reflect views in the American public, and feeds back to sustain this highly un-Christian differentiation.
November 4, 2008 at 6:21 am
God clearly killed (and ordered people killed) in the Bible. He’s very specific of the penalties for different crimes committed, and this often meant death. Cherry-picking versus doesn’t help your cause. Here’s the problem with your argument: It is not debateable (from a Biblical perspective) that abortion is wrong. It IS debateable whether Christians should be pacifists or not. It IS debateable about whether or not Christians should support the death penalty (which is what war is in many cases). I’m not talking about Iraq; but I am saying that I would gladly see Osama Bin Laden put to death. Just as I shed no tears of Hitler. It is true that we are made in God’s image; but we also make choices, and those always have consequences.
November 4, 2008 at 7:16 pm
Conservative, I hold the orthodox or conservative Christian belief that the Bible should be read in light of the the message of and the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus Christ. So far that has lead me to view abortion, AND death penalty as wrong. I am also something like 99% pacifist, meaning that I think there are extreme cases where military action to save many people can be defended, but in general I am anti-war.
If you (or anyone) can defend death penalty by reading the Bible through the lens of Jesus Christ, I may very well change my mind. But so far the Christian arguments I hear for capital punishment and war fail to take Jesus’ message and example into account.
November 4, 2008 at 7:28 pm
Andre, I read the Bible as it is meant to be read…in it entirety. Every verse of every book is equally important. Jesus came to being the sword, remember. And I think you are making the mistake (that most liberal Christians make) by ignoring the concept of the Trinity. You cannot separate the God of the OT from Jesus without denying thousands of years of Christian teaching and the Bible itself.
November 4, 2008 at 8:20 pm
Thanks for your response. It highlights what I view as a non-orthodox approach to the Bible that many who call themselves conservative use. I agree that the Bible must be read in its entirety. But the Bible is not just a revelation of God’s rules for us, it contains a story of God redeeming the world, and with Jesus the world did change. Therefore we cannot properly understand what the OT is saying to us today without having the Christ-event as the anchor for our reading. And this is not a liberal point of view, it is a conservative approach to the Bible supported by Augustine, Luther, and Calvin.
I regret that the Fundamentalist movement abandoned this conservative and orthodox approach to the Bible for a rigid word-for-word reading or hermeneutics, inspired by modern academics, where much of the structure and development of God’s redemptive activity was ignored.
November 4, 2008 at 10:57 pm
Of course the Bible is meant to be viewed through the lens of the NT, this is what makes us Christians. However, that doesn’t mean you can throw out the entire OT, which is exactly what you’re doing if you expect me to accept that God wants us to be pacifists.
I reiterate my point…war and the death penalty are controversial (God practiced both) and abortion is not.
November 5, 2008 at 5:07 am
Conservative,
First of all, “Thank You” for responding to my blog. I was wondering from your point of view, what would be a just reason for war? And what would justify the death penalty for someone?
November 5, 2008 at 6:44 pm
I take it case by case. I agree with the “Just War Theory” for the most part, but I dont’ think it’s perfect by any means. Wars of defense. Wars that would save lives. You’d have to make some case about it beinga greater good. The death penalty is trickier. Anyone who takes another life purposefully, premeditated, should be considered for the death penalty. This would not includes lives taken for the purpose of saving another lfe. I think a case can certainly be made that there are other crimes that deserve the death penalty as well (i.e. child rape; as used to be the case in Louisiana).
I understand your point Erichall, half my family are pacifist Christians (and extremely anti-abortion). However, it isn’t “hypocritical” to be pro-life in regards to aboriton and support the death penalty in terms of war. Simply because on one side the life is innocent and on the other it is not.
December 11, 2008 at 4:29 pm
Conservative,
I think we will have to agree to disagree.