The Roe Thing - Written in Tears

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Fortunately, I’ve been pretty busy and preoccupied with the task of moving my youngest out of state this weekend. I haven’t been able to spend inordinate amounts of time watching the news after Roe was overturned and scouring Facebook for all my friends’ reactions.

But the little bit of each that I have seen has depressed me. No, that’s mild. At moments, it has absolutely enraged me. And it enraged me to the point that I got out my laptop in the hotel room this morning to type out my response . . . we’ll see if I end up having the courage to post it.

Let me start with my pro-choice friends. I understand your grief. Really, I do. But please hear me out, people. There are legitimate, honest, Christ-honoring reasons to be against abortion that have nothing to do with trying to control women and take away their reproductive rights. Nothing. NOTHING to do with that. Maybe your views on this issue have been informed by significant pain and trauma in your life – that’s understandable, and I ache for you. But my dear friend, recognize the inadequacy of your perspective and own it. If you truly can see no other possible reason for a person to want abortion to be illegal other than toxic biblical patriarchy and an oppressive power structure, you are part of the problem here. That perspective is too limited to be helpful to this conversation – do the work to be the open-minded, intelligent human being you actually claim to be. With all due love and respect, your words belie your claim.

And now to my pro-life friends. Again, I love you and respect you. But stop celebrating. STOP. Roe v. Wade was NOT the problem. Abortions are not going to end now. I strongly suspect they may even increase – and women making choices for dangerous abortions will most definitely increase. The battleground for this “war” should never have been in the legislature. If your concern really was keeping babies from being killed in the womb, you picked the wrong weapon. The number of abortions do NOT go down when they are illegal. Abortions decrease when we empower mothers (and hopefully fathers) with the resources and support to give birth and raise babies. Abortions are reduced when we influence our culture to see sex as a profound and sacred thing, not as a casual form of entertainment. (Yes, I know it feels like that ship sailed long ago, but isn’t it worth trying?) 

People CAN be pro-choice and be a Christian. I actually saw a meme yesterday that said, "If you claim to be a Christian and you're angry that Roe v. Wade was overturned, then your salvation is fake and you are lost." What the hell??? If you can't see any possible reason for opposing this decision other than being an agent of Satan, your perspective is warped and you are part of the problem.

Seriously, friends. All of you, from both sides. Stop. STOP! Stop with the ridiculousness. Stop with the witty platitudinal memes that get you virtual high-fives from the people on your side. Stop feeding the division that is KILLING the church and rendering it completely ineffective in our world. For the love of everything . . . if you can't say better things, STOP TALKING.

Listen. Seek to understand -- to truly, genuinely understand the view from the other side. Sympathize with the grief and anger. Look for commonality. It is there, and it is where we need to sit with each other. And we desperately need to be sitting with each other.

Sweet Jesus, have mercy on your people. We have so lost our way . . .

Comments

  1. AnonymousJune 26, 2022 at 11:48 PM

    Thankyou for having the courage to write, and post, this.

    ReplyDelete

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