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OURWORD
Abortion: there are no easy answers,
but compassion must still be part of the solution
F ew decisions by the Supreme Court of Canada have awakened
as much debate as the recent decision which struck down the
existing abortion law, leaving the country with no law at all with
respect to abortion. Five judges out of seven decided that the law
was bad because it created unequal access to abortion. The reaction
of provincial premiers has resulted in even more striking inequities
regarding the right of women to seek abortions.
It is now clear that the federal government will have to move
quickly to pass a law which will be applied equally throughout the
country. We are all called upon to think about the issue and
participate in the debate. There appears to be consensus that there
will always have to be room for some abortions in some situations;
this is where consensus ends.
With the exception of the Roman Catholic Church, which has
always held that nothing must harm the fetus from the moment of
conception, most of us now agree that if a mother's life is in danger,
if conception results from a rape or incest, then abortion is permissable
. Few Protestant churches question the use of birth control
pills, which in effect act as abortive agents flushing the two-week
old embryo from the body. It is clear from these examples that,
given a choice between a life of a mother and that of a fetus when
the choice has to be made, the life of the mother is considered more
important. No one speaks of "murder" when an abortion is administered
under these circumstances, even though this might occur
fairly late in a pregnancy, beyond the critical first trimester.
When is the fetus considered a viable human being with equal
rights to life as a member of society? Opinions range from that of
the Catholic Church (at conception) along the continuum to the
traditional time of "quickening," to the point at which the fetus can
survive outside the womb. The view of British Common Law is that
a human being is someone who has emerged alive from the
mother'S body. If a mother should kill her infant within 24 hours of
giving birth, this act is not considered to be "murder" in the eyes of
the law. Since the Church has no tradition of conducting services for
a fetus or for a stillborn infant, it would appear that this life has not
been considered to have the same value as that of an infant that is
born alive.
The point to be made is that in this area we do make value
judgments with regard to the relative value of life, and the stage at
which fetal life is viable. As Christians, we are called upon to value
and respect the life that God gives to us. As the editor of one
Mennonite paper pointed out, "we are called upon to present a
consistent position to the government with regard to the sanctity of
life." We must also present an honest witness.
The abortion debate is about the balancing of two sets of rights;
the right of women to have control over their own bodies, and the
protection of fetal life. The law and the church have not traditionally
shown any great degree of compassion toward women. Women
who bore children "out of wedlock" or who broke down under the
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strain of bearing or nurturing too many children have not always
been treated with kindness or humanity, let alone Christian charity.
We must acknowledge that it is women, not men, who still carry
most of the responsibility and burden of caring for children. Do we
as a society, which is presently not always giving sufficient support
to these women, have a right to force them to have children they do
not want? In thinking about this we must acknowledge that within
our own faith community women do seek abortions, have done so in
the past and will no doubt continue to do so in the future. In our
witness to government, we must be honest and acknowledge this.
We cannot expect the laws of society necessarily to reflect all of our
own values and certainly we cannot advocate the adoption of rules
which we do not observe consistently ourselves. In a recent.meeting
in Steinbach, Jake Epp suggested to his audience that
"churches must be seen to be addressing the realities of our world
rather then passing judgment on the world as we think it should
be."
If, then, we are to participate in the debate, let us do so with
charity. The charges of "murder" that are being made by the Pro­
Life groups have no justification in the history of the law and the
traditions of the church. Women who seek abortions and those who
perform them are not "murderers." Such terms are slanderous.
By all means let us follow the example of the Mennonite Central
Committee in its submission to the Prime Minister, which called for
respect for life but also the establishment of strong support services
and counselling for women with unexpected pregnancies. It is not
enough to insist on bringing every pregnancy to term; the ugly
statistics on child abuse tell us that some parents need as much
nurturing from society as children need from parents.
In the best of all possible worlds, there should be a loving home
for all the children that are born. One of the mysteries of life is the
fact that God's gifts do not fall on all people equally. There are
couples who long for children and are not even able to adopt; there
are many who conceive children they do not wish to have. We can
not solve the agony of those who wish to adopt children by forcing
those who have conceived to carry their babies to term.
In considering our witness regarding abortion we must
acknowledge that even if abortions were made illegal, they would
not be stopped. They would once more be driven underground. Not
all women have the emotional resources to deal with every pregnancy.
It is not just young, unmarried women that seek abortions,
but women in all walks of life, married and unmarried, young and
not-so-young. If abortions become illegal, we would once more
have a situation where the poor and desperate would be at the
mercy of unscrupulous people who could well endanger their
health. Politicians will be hearing from many lobby groups about
this issue. Will they be hearing, from the Mennonite community, a
voice that has some compassion for women and some understanding
of the complexity of this issue? - Ruth Vogt