The Sanctity of Life

 This was first published in the Church of the Holy Trinity Sunday bulletin, Feast of the Epiphany, 2019.

Before I formed you in the womb I knew you, and before you were born I consecrated you…  Jeremiah 1:5

As Biblically-informed Christians, we believe all human life is sacred and must be protected from the moment of conception until natural death.  Jerimiah 1:5 tells us that in the womb God knew us and consecrated us as His own.   Psalm 139 says that God Himself  knit us together in our mother's womb and that we are "fearfully and wonderfully made."   

Until this past century, the sanctity of yet-unborn human life was the clear teaching of the Church.  In the second-century document called the Didache, it is written that "you shall not murder a child by abortion."  (Did. 2:2.)  In this age of individualism and self-determination, we have as a society discarded this sort of Biblical understanding.  

Modern advocates of abortion have insisted that ending a life in the womb is a personal, individual, and morally neutral choice of the mother.  With the courage of our convictions as Christians, we must, however, proclaim the inherent evil in this.  From a Christian understanding, abortion is contrary to the will of God and the sacredness that God has assigned to human life.    

We know that Satan’s objective is to destroy all things sacred.  We may someday look back on the current Abortion-on-demand Movement as one of Satan’s greatest successes.   Abortion can destroy the life of a child and the soul of a mother, all at the same time.  In our "Woke" culture we have claimed the right to judge and condemn previous generations for their sins and tainted worldviews, while we stand outside the context and norms of their time.  I wonder if future generations will look on our practice of ending millions of unborn lives as genocide, and do the same to us. 

Even though abortion-on-demand is the prevailing societal norm and is considered politically correct, we Christians cannot be silent.   Being the Church in this increasingly pagan culture is a challenge, but we must pray for the grace and strength to be faithful witnesses to the fact that God alone is sovereign over life.

Father Rob