One of the hottest issues before the U.S. Congress is the so-called partial birth abortion bill, previously vetoed by the President. Congress voted to override the veto and sent the measure to the Senate where the final outcome is uncertain. What is certain is that the overall issue of abortion with its numerous debating points is going to be one of the hottest ones before the American electorate in the imminent and subsequent elections.

Dominating the headlines and capturing the imaginations of thousands is the ongoing FBI manhunt in North Carolina for fugitive Eric Rudolph. Rudolph-a virtual folk hero to some and the embodiment of evil to others-is accused of bombing an Alabama abortion clinic in January of this year, killing a policeman and injuring a nurse.

Reaction to the Rudolph case demonstrates how sharply split the country-including its churches-is on the subject of abortion. "The search for an abortion clinic bombing suspect...has created a moral dilemma for local clergy who feel a mixture of support and disdain for fugitive Eric Rudolph. At least one religious leader said he would understand if someone helped the 31-year-old survivalist elude authorities" (© 1998 The Associated Press).

In July, other extremists dumped butyric acid at three clinics in Houston where abortions are performed. This "terrorism in the name of morality" mimics similar attacks on abortion clinics in Florida and Louisiana earlier this year.

An egregious act committed at a Phoenix abortion clinic in late July fueled the already complex controversy as Dr. John Biskind attempted to abort a fetus that was 37 weeks along-nearly full term. The baby was delivered alive, but with skull fractures and lacerations.

A New Component-Untouched by Federal or State Laws

Pro-life and pro-choice arguments have gone beyond the political arena into that of private health care. Numerous mergers and affiliations between Catholic and non-Catholic hospitals have taken place in the United States in recent years, resulting in the Catholic health care system being responsible for 16 percent of all hospital admissions annually (RCRC Publications, © 1996 the Coalition, "Merge With Care").

Private health care facilities are untouched by federal or state laws on public policy about abortion. Free to set their own policies regarding reproductive health care, the Catholic facilities uphold Catholic principles for their hospitals and beyond. "Directives for Catholic healthcare personnel are frequently imposed even beyond hospital walls, at clinics, auxiliary facilities, and even private practice offices" (ibid.).

What lies ahead? "In the next two or three years, thousands of hospitals-run by communities as well as various religious organizations-will affiliate with Catholic facilities and consolidate services in an effort to provide more cost-effective health care." So this new component in the abortion debate will only grow.

This trend has alarmed pro-choice lobbyists and community activist groups such as "The Coalition" quoted above in an attempt to counteract it.

Chinese Émigré's Testimony Fuels Flames

Thirty-seven-year-old Xiaoduan Gao fled China in fear of undergoing forced sterilization for secretly adopting an abandoned young boy-an act that violates China's one-child rule. Her interview on ABC World News Tonight with Brian Ross added passion to the ongoing debate.

Mrs. Goa, herself the former director of a so-called planned birth center in China, shocked ABC's viewers by confirming interviewer Ross' statement that she, "has now come forward to say...that women who defy the country's one child per family policy routinely face sterilizations and forced abortions-including women as much as nine months pregnant" (© 1998 ABC NEWS and Starwave Corporation).

Horrifying as it is to contemplate, Mrs. Gao said, "The child can still be alive when he comes out of his mother's womb and as soon as the child cries, the doctor will give it another injection and the child will die" (ibid.).

Mrs. Gao's gripping testimony brings pathos to perhaps otherwise dry statistics released this summer from Atlanta's Center for Disease Control. Legal-induced abortions in the United States for 1995 totaled 1,210,883 (© 1998 American Medical Association).

Work with those numbers and add some humanity to them! They represent 1,210,883 mothers and 1,210,883 fathers. Some will immediately argue that many fathers are neither in the picture nor part of the decision making to abort. That's worth further comment later in this article. But arguably, at least one other concerned person-mother, father or friend of the pregnant woman-is affected by the decision to abort those 1,210,883 pregnancies. That's a minimum of 2,421,766 lives that are touched in a powerful way by physiological and spiritual forces.

Inevitably brought into the debate are the unnamed and unseen, those 1,210,883 that are never born. This is a controversy not easily put to rest.

Everyone Has "Rights" But Who Has Responsibility?

Women's rights enter the controversy. Is abortion a choice that only the pregnant woman can and should make? A modern dictionary defines abort as "to bring forth a fetus from the uterus before the fetus is viable; miscarry" (Webster's New Universal Unabridged Dictionary, © 1996 by Random House Value Publishing, Inc.). So the disputants of one side point out that a uterus is the unique property and concern of the pregnant woman and therefore the decision to abort is solely hers to make.

Without argument, there are truly tragic and extreme cases, but abortion is not the only alternative. A bumper sticker on the issue reads "If it's not a choice, it's called a child." How tragic that there are many couples-unable to have children-anxious to adopt at the same time as others are aborting their children. Free counseling programs exist in most communities to provide encouragement and information to the pregnant woman who wants to take responsibility for her child, not take its life.

Debaters argue with equal passion for the rights of the unborn. Do "fetuses" have rights that are being overlooked? (Why is it, do you suppose, that the progenitor of the unborn is called "the father" and the one whose body carries the unborn is called "the mother" but there seems to be so much debate over whether the unborn is actually a child? Hmm.)

Then there's the argument over father's rights? Do they have any say in the decision to abort? What about societal or community rights? Should the community at large determine whether or not abortions can be performed? And the arguing goes on and on.

Reframe the Discussion

It is a mistake to debate the issue of abortion in isolation. The broader question is, "How did our society become saddled with this controversy?" A sweeping prophecy in 2 Timothy 3:1-7 speaks to those wider concerns. They include rejection of moral values, rejection of the traditional family, a lack of good judgment, an addiction to pleasure seeking, selfishness and a failure to take personal responsibility.

The abortion issue has much to do with one taking responsibility for his/her actions. Argument about abortion is often buttressed with and bogs down in examples of extreme or rare scenarios. Let's take the debate back to before pregnancy occurs. Many decisions are made-some deliberately, some under pressure, and some by making no calculated choice to do anything other than let nature take its course. The decision to spend time with one of the opposite sex, often including the decision to drink alcoholic beverages and to use other drugs, the decision to touch and to allow touching in intimate ways, the decision to be "sexually active" are among them.

Consider further the decision to be "sexually active." Unmarried people make a decision to act contrary to the laws of God by deciding to engage in sex outside of marriage. And then seek to free themselves from the unwanted consequences-the men by shuffling away, the women by bringing "forth the fetus from the uterus before the fetus is viable."

When human desires are given free reign, there are undesirable consequences. Jesus put it this way: "What comes out of a man, that defiles a man. For from within...proceed evil thoughts, adulteries, fornications.... All these evil things come from within and defile a man" (Mark 7:20-23). Human nature, left unchecked, will spawn the precise societal crises that exist at the heart of the abortion issue.

Note how many of "the works of the flesh"—human nature—are often part of the circumstances that lead to an unwanted pregnancy. "Now the works of the flesh are evident...adultery, fornication, uncleanness, lewdness...drunkenness... and the like" (Galatians 5:19--21).

Existing Laws Already Cover the Abortion Issues

Where are the answers to the screaming questions surrounding abortion? Is violence in the name of morality the answer? In their passion against abortion some religious people have participated in terrorizing abortion clinics and medical personnel involved in performing abortions. To murder for the sake of stopping murder is inexcusable. "For whoever shall keep the whole law, and yet stumble in one point, he is guilty of all. For He who said, 'Do not commit adultery,' also said, 'Do not murder.' Now if you do not commit adultery, but you do murder, you have become a transgressor of the law" (James 2:10-11).

Is lobbying for more or better-defined legislation the answer? Two clear laws that govern the abortion issue are already on "the Books"—you shall not murder and you shall not commit adultery! An incalculable positive change would sweep through society if people stopped choosing violence to force and enforce their opinions, if they started living sexually responsible lives. There must be a fundamental commitment to morality, to the Ten Commandments.

Moral living is, "summed up in this saying...'You shall love your neighbor as yourself.' Love does no harm to a neighbor; therefore love is the fulfillment of the law" (Romans 13:9-10).

Perhaps if all concerned-the "sexually active" men and women, the pregnant women considering abortion and the society at large-answered one simple question, the answers to the tougher ones would fall in place. The simple one is "Who is my neighbor?" WNP