5 Reasons Why Christians Should Be Pro-Choice

Christians have a history of being pro-choice. Christians also have a history of supporting body autonomy and the freedom to make individual choices without government involvement. The United States was settled by people seeking control of their lives without government interference. With this history in mind, here are five reasons why Christians should be pro-choice.

five reasons Christians should be pro-choice — *Photo by Jasmine on Unsplash*

1) The Bible says life begins with the first breath.

“Then the Lord God formed a man from the dust of the ground and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life, and the man became a living being.” – Genesis 2:7

Before he breathed, Adam was mud. He wasn’t a ‘pre-born’ person; he was mud. Just as a fetus isn’t ‘pre-born.’ It’s a fetus, unable to survive without breathing. Abortion can’t end a life that isn’t alive. Perhaps one day technology will allow a fetus to be removed from a uterus to be grown in a machine. But that day isn’t today.

In the Hebrew, God gives Adam the Spirit of Life, ruaḥ, the breath of God. God gives all of us the Spirit of Life, with the Divine breath.

“Thus, says the Lord God to these bones: Behold, I will cause breath to enter you, and you shall live. And I shall lay sinews upon you, and will cause flesh to come upon you, and cover you with skin, and put breath in you, and you shall live; and you shall know that I am the Lord.” – Ezekiel 37:5-6

“The spirit of God has made me, and the breath of the Almighty gives me life.” – Job 33:4

Without breath, there is no life. This is why Jewish people, based on the exact same Jewish scripture Christians call the Old Testament, have always believed that life begins with breath.

Scripture tells us that God knew us before we were born and will know us after we are dead. But in between we are only alive when we are breathing.

2) Christians have historically believed life begins at ensoulment, not conception.

Across hundreds of years of common law there are just a few isolated cases of people charged with the murder of a fetus. This is because for most of western history the fetus wasn’t considered alive until the quickening— when a pregnant woman first feels the baby move. According to When Children Became People: The Birth of Childhood in Early Christianity, Christians believed that with the quickening, the mother-to-be was feeling the ensoulment as the baby’s soul entered the fetus.

Modern law and modern medicine call this viability, the moment when a fetus can survive outside the mother.

If life begins at conception, then governments should require death certificates for miscarriages.

But the U.S. government, and the Bible, don’t hold that life begins at conception; they both assert that life begins with the first breath. That’s why nearly all abortions are illegal after the baby is viable and able to breathe.

3) Government shouldn’t have control of an individual’s body.

If we allow the government to outlaw abortion today, we surrender the opportunity to oppose the government that requires abortions tomorrow.

In Florida, an unemployed, 16-year-old student was denied an abortion because a judge ruled she was not mature enough to choose to have an abortion. A child deemed too immature to have an abortion was forced to have a child she was mature enough to recognize she wasn’t able to care for. Why would reasonable Americans want to live with this much government control of our bodies?

Besides, religiously-based prohibition of personal behavior can’t be legislated in the United States successfully. The 18^th Amendment to the Constitution taught us that.

4) Republican operatives used abortion to divide Christians.

Southern Baptists were pro-choice in 1973, when Roe v. Wade was decided. But because Democratic President Jimmy Carter was a Southern Baptist and a Sunday school teacher, the GOP moved to split the Christian vote over abortion in 1980. (And to shore up the segregationist segment of Christian voters. If you didn’t know any of this, it’s because they succeeded.)

Since 1980 Christian voters have been manipulated by Republican politicians to deny scripture and freedom of choice and embrace Republicans who have systematically lowered taxes on the wealthy, on capital gains, and on corporations while vilifying the poor.

5) Pro-choice isn’t pro-abortion.

Christians should be pro-choice because we believe women should have the final say over control of their bodies. Not courts, judges, priests, or politicians. It’s a decision for a woman and a doctor to make in a clinic, not a decision for a governor signing legislation in a public ceremony.

If a small segment of activist Christians can dictate a woman’s legal right to reproductive health, why stop there?

Jehovah’s Witnesses reject blood transfusions. Why shouldn’t their faith-based decision extend to everyone else?

Certain Christians spurn vaccines. Should vaccines be outlawed, because some Christians don’t like them?

Mormons oppose caffeine and cigarettes. Cigarettes kill more than 480,000 Americans annually. There is no pro-life outrage dedicated to outlawing tobacco. Instead, American tax payers give tobacco farmers more than $60 million in annual subsidies to grow a product that kills people.

Jews believe that life begins with breath, so why should the religious beliefs of some Christians enshrine laws denying Jewish women healthcare their faith says they are entitled to?