Current Hypocritical Landmarks (I) — “Evangelists” and the Right to Life

Current Hypocritical Landmarks (I) — “Evangelists” and the Right to Life

More Complete Title: Current Hypocritical Landmarks (1) — Self-described “Evangelicals”, the Right to Life, and a Total ban on Abortion. Focus: 3 Hard Questions for self-described “Evangelical” Christians who support legislation which would make all abortions criminal offenses punishable by imprisonment or fines.

Short Prefatory Remarks: The issue of the definition of the “right to life” and our collective responsibilities for protecting those fragile unborn, born, and living entities which may, are, or have become a young human child is a very complex issue. Human beings here in the USA and elsewhere have and will continue to differ in their responses to such issues for both rational and irrational reasons — and in their motivations. The issue of the definition of the “right to life” and our individual responsibilities for protecting such fragile creature is also a very complex issue. However, the issue of any human’s individual responsibilities includes such diverse motivations and individual experiences that I normally hesitate to make anything more than somewhat vague remarks on specific issues. However, whenever our responses involve either public words-and-deeds and/or blatantly partisan, often self-contradictions political activities — then such responsibilities often require rather sharply focused remarks about religious hypocrisy — most especially with those who proclaim their own righteousness and are investigated with ascendant political power. I begin, however, with a brief explanation of why I find myself concentrating on these issues as a living human being who has himself also read many of those Scriptures — some of them many times — so seemingly important to those who describe themselves as “religious” or “Christians” and — most especially — as “Evangelists.” There are, of course, an extraordinary number of diverse people who might describe themselves with such words. However, I am here concerned primarily with those prominent persons who believe and assert that they and their cohorts are “more righteous” than those who differ or oppose them by disposition, belief, or deeds. For myself I find myself in a situation not unlike Martin Luther who in 1521 asserted 'Hier stehe Ich, Ich kann nicht anders. (Here I stand, I can do no other).’ As one who grew up in a predominantly Protestant environment I am also acutely aware that whatever the merits of Luther’s challenge to the entrenched corruption in the Roman Catholic Church of his day and its hierarchy, it is true that other things he later said in the Peasant Wars and, towards the end of his life, about the Jews rivaled in wickedness the ills he had challenged as a young and intrepid monk.

An Assumption: The Author believes that the shortest way to hell (God’s awful grace) is to commit one’s self to fundamental Religious Hypocrisy.
A Confession: The Author must also must stipulate (1) that there are many roads to hell, (2) that he himself has traveled on too many of these roads, and (3) that he cannot assert that his own efforts should be believed by any specific human being. However, he must also assert (4) that he himself will not and can not remain silent!  What others will do is in their hands and hearts — with the author believing that the resolution of all such matters remains in God’s Rule over History and the Heavens.

An Aside: In this Short Series, the Author is addressing himself as an imperfect Christians to a prominent contemporary group of self-professed “evangelicals” who have sometimes outdone themselves in professing their own righteousness while engaged in acts that are notably shorn of charity. The author himself grew up in the Southern Bible Belt and at a very early age was exposed to a number of important (Christian) Biblical teaching. Furthermore, both in his childhood and his adulthood he has been exposed to other Christians whose acts, thoughts, and beliefs were more obviously related to the charity and love that should characterize self-professed Christians than many activities of the author himself. In other blogs which attempt to make a more explicit regard for a decent respect for the opinions of all mankind — the author will refer more explicitly to those who do not share such Christian beliefs or, indeed, any explicitly religious beliefs. The author (quaintly perhaps to some) believes that heretics and atheists are here to remind all of us that Christians and other “religious” persons are all-too-frequently prone to hypocrisy and other human weakness.

Concerns such as the author’s are not new. We provide a couple of them with each of our “Landmarks”.
I. Woe is me! I am lost, for I a man of unclean lips and I live among a people of unclean people — and my eyes have seen the Lord! [Isaiah, Chapter VII, paraphrase of the New English Bible]
II. In the Kingdom of the Blind, the one-eyed man is King. [An ancient and, apparently, pre-Christian saying]

The Hard Questions
Question#1.
(1a) Do you believe your attempts to criminalize all abortions will earn you a first row seat at St. Peter’s Table in Heaven?

(1b) [ 1a Alternative] Do you believe that fervent opposition to all abortions makes you a better person than those persons who participate in any abortion.

Note #1a — Jesus of Nazareth is quoted as saying “Why call me good, only the Father is good.”
Note #1b — This witness (lchj) believes that “Hell” or “Gehenna” is a spiritual or purgative fire  — which is not to be confused with revengeful fantasies of “everlasting torture” concocted by human being who hide their unloving side behind an uncharitable “faith”.
Note #1c — There are, of course, a multitude of reasons why various people are generally opposed to abortions. However, it is quite apparent that among the loudest of those who oppose abortion are a prominent horde of politically active persons who call themselves “pro-life” and are simultaneously missing in action when it comes to our responsibilities for life after birth of the poor and downtrodden.

Question#2.
(2) Do you believe that a woman who has a headless (“acephalic”) fetus within her body has a duty to carry that natal being to term?

Note #2a — A relevant passage here, I believe, is Jesus’s question — "Is man made to the sabbath or the sabbath made for man?" Of course, St. Paul said that we should be “fools” for Christ. However, Paul did not say that we should be damned fools for Christ. Paul meant that truth — including key Christian truths partially seen thru the eyes of faith — may very well seem to be foolish to those who do not or have not yet been able to recognize them. Women are no under no obligation to undergo the pain and danger of childbirth to bring forth the partial semblance of a human being which does not have a brain. A dog or a monkey is higher in the order of creation than a headless human torso.

Question#3.
(3). Do you believe that a woman who has a dead or dying fetus within her body has no right to an abortion??

Note #3a — A few years ago the Catholic hierarchy in the Irish Republic succeeded in delaying an abortion until the fetus died and the woman herself was killed by the dead corpse within her body. I personally believe that the hierarchy’s behavior was (1) an act of murder [a public deed] and (2) an apparent ‘mortal’ sin [Actual “Judgment” always in the “Hands” of a Merciful God.]

Genuine Problematics 
Continuing Commentary, Discussion, and (mild) Confessional Statements
[“Further comments including some with my own hair down.”]

When I was quite young (perhaps 10 years old?) my father told me that  — if it were ever come to it taht if he were in the position that he might have to choose between saving the life of our mother and one of his children [me or one of my siblings] that in such an event he would opt to save my mother’s life. It was an odd conversation that did not last very long and seemed unprompted and somewhat awkward. I have simply gathered that he felt that I should know this important perspective of his. Fortunately, he was never presented with that choice. I did not, however, at any time feel that I myself was obliged to follow his example.

At my advanced age, it is now relatively easy for me to believe that my own son’s survival is more important than that of myself or my spouse. However, I also know that such questions do sometimes present themselves in more difficult circumstances. In the mid-1960s there was a war-induced famine in Nigeria’s suppression of the Ibo attempt to create an independent “Biafra” nation. The general Ibo general practice then was to preserve the mother’s life because she might be able someday to raise new children — and because the earlier brood would almost never be able to survive on their own.

On the other hand, I can respect the fact that many women [presumably the great majority] — once pregnant — are predisposed to carry the pregnancy to term. I also respect the fact that many (often poor and/or young) who are unable to foresee a viable future for a prospective newcomer may/will [often with painful reluctance] put their newborn child up for adoption. Still there are also a number of physical, psychological, and diverse personal circumstances which lead other prospective mothers to choose an abortion [again, often with painful reluctance].

Because other living person’s are involved, I will make a brief remark about my own experiences. In an earlier time I was quite disturbed and made some very regrettable mistakes with someone whom I knew and loved and who sought an abortion against my advice. [At thirteen she had been left with 2 twins after a traveling Arab seduced her and went on his way…].

In such difficult matters of the heart, it seems clear that unless we are personally connected to people who very well may be making a mistake, that the words of Jesus to the people who would stone the woman accused of adultery “Let him who is without sin cast the first stone!” [John 8:11]. In a few cases, we may be close enough to a person to provide some advice as Jesus did when he instructed the woman to go and sin no more [John 7.53-8.11].

On a related matter, it is also quite clear that love operates in realms that require some people to break taboos that many of us would almost never consider [e.g., while my own sexual joys and temptations have been directed towards members of the other sex, in my mid-thirties my male roommate fell in love with another man — and I and other friends of his observed that he became a better person!]

As the Good Book says, Not all those who say “Lord! Lord!” will enter the Kingdom of Heaven. True religion does not provide us with a prescription for spiritual ‘safety’. Rather, it requires us to embark on a dangerous journey with A God who is adventurous beyond our wildest dreams.

There are some people who describe themselves as “evangelical” Christians who say they want a “Seat at the Table” with the power elites and, especially, with our current president (DJT). However, while it is true that Jesus certainly upset the normal working of the commerce inside the temple [“You have made God’s House as ‘Den of Thieves’”] — when Jesus was hauled before Pilate he was mostly silent. Jesus was politically relevant, but as the story of the Temptation in the Wilderness (Matthew Ch 4: 1-11) makes clear — Jesus was not prepared to make a deal with the devil as the politically-ambitious hypocrites of his day (Caiaphas) and of our day (Reed, Falwell, F. Graham…) were and are more than willing to do. We all have an individual voice and we may join with other so that we are more readily heard — but to seek an outsized voice is not a spiritual directive. When we sing “We’re going to sit at the Welcome Table” we are not seeking a Table with those who have committed themselves to seeking dominion over their fellow human beings. When Jesus rejected the entreaties of “Satan” [Matthew 4: 8-10] he set a general standard for which every natural leader must work out the details for himself or herself. There is, however, no valid Christian exception that allows a Faustian bargain for the conservative Christian or for a liberal Christian because they have a righteous concern.

More generally, of course, there in no moral exception for those of other religions, secular and/or atheistic beliefs. The Faustian bargains of Isis and Stalinism and various ills of the non-Christian or non-Judaeo-Christian world are every bit as reprehensible as those of the Christian world. The primary Christian responsibility is to remove the Beams from our own eyes [ Cf., Matthew Ch 7:1-5] — we can then share our message with integrity with others as well.


Dr. Lon Clay Hill, Jr. (retired)
Miramar, Broward Co., FL, USA, Planet Earth, The Universe