The Consistent Life Consensus in Ancient Christianity
by Rob Arner, CL Board member
Adjunct Professor of Religion at Reformed Episcopal Seminary and Chestnut Hill College, Philadelphia, PA
Rob Arner with kids Grace, Josh, and Luke
When measured against the standard of the ancient Christian church, contemporary American and European Christianity is in a moral mess. When it comes to what have been called the “life issues,” Christians are no less sharply divided than members of secular society. Some Christians, called “conservative” by conventional narratives, believe abortion is a grave moral evil. Yet often these same Christians will fall in line to support the latest war proposed by the nation’s chief executive. Other Christians tend not to view abortion as such an intrinsic evil, but rather a tragic “choice” for mothers in difficult circumstances. These Christians, sometimes called “liberal,” are more concerned with systemic and social evils, such as poverty, and are critical of the ready recourse to war. These two groups far too often find themselves talking past one another at best, and actively working against one another at worst, so significant progress isn’t made toward addressing either group’s moral concerns.
But imagine if this were not so. Imagine the impact if there were instead a united witness, an ecumenical consensus surrounding the thorny question of whether and in what circumstances a disciple of Jesus might take a human life.
Such a consensus actually existed in the ancient Christian church, stretching from the time of the apostles until the Christianization of the Roman Empire with the conversion of the emperor Constantine.
In my investigation into the ethics of the ancient Christian church, I read every surviving orthodox Christian sermon, treatise, letter, and apology from that period (about 90-314 C.E.) and discovered a startling consensus on this issue. As diverse as the ancient Christian church may have been on wealth and poverty, sexuality, church governance, theology, and a host of other issues, when it comes to the subject of killing other human persons, the ancient Christian writers were startlingly in accord with one another. Without exception, the church strongly condemned the taking of human life in any form whatsoever.
Neither homicide, nor feticide, nor infanticide, nor suicide, nor capital punishment, nor killing in war were considered acceptable. Put more precisely, no surviving orthodox Christian writing dating from before Constantine ever approves of Christian participation in human bloodshed.
In the Roman Empire, life was cheap. Not only was the “peace” of the empire secured and maintained through brutal conquest, but everyday life for Roman citizens, even during times of “peace,” was filled with violence. Killing was sport in the gladiatorial conquests and chariot races.
The value of individual human persons was deemed subordinate to the good of Rome. This was true at both the upper levels of society — witness how many Roman emperors met with violent deaths at the hands of their rivals (or loved ones!) — as well as at the bottom strata, as the life of a slave was all but worthless to his or her master, and unwanted children of the poor were either aborted or abandoned in the countryside to die of exposure. The glory of Rome was built on the broken backs of enslaved peoples and the blood of those deemed expendable. It’s into this milieu the ancient church brought its message that was decidedly on the side of life— in every case.
Both abortions of unborn children and the killings of unwanted or disabled born children were widely practiced in ancient Rome. The early Christians stood forcefully against these practices. For instance, the ancient discipleship manual commonly known as the Didache, which dates from around the turn of the second century CE, and therefore may actually have been written at the same time as some of the New Testament, contains an explicit prohibition of infanticide and abortion: “A further commandment of the Teaching: Do not murder; do not commit adultery; do not practice pederasty; do not fornicate; do not steal; do not deal in magic; do not practice sorcery; do not kill a fetus by abortion, or commit infanticide” (Didache 2.1–2).
Another explicit statement:
But with us, murder is forbidden once for all. We are not permitted to destroy even the fetus in the womb, as long as blood is still being drawn to form a human being. To prevent the birth of a child is a quicker way to murder. It makes no difference whether one destroys a soul already born or interferes with its coming to birth. It is a human being and one who is to be [an adult], for the whole fruit is already present in the seed. (Tertullian, Apology, 9)
Just as with “private” issues of abortion and infanticide, the early church offered an adamant “no” on the most “public” kinds of killing. The early Christian discussions on killing in war, and on military service more broadly, are so numerous and multifaceted that I can only scratch the surface.
The church’s broad condemnation of killing made the military profession deeply problematic. In the Apostolic Tradition, how the church prepared new initiates for baptism:
(9.) A soldier in command must be told not to kill people; if he is ordered so to do, he shall not carry it out. Nor shall he take the oath. If he will not agree, he should be rejected [from the baptism preparation].
(10.) Anyone who has the power of the sword, or who is a civil magistrate wearing the purple, should desist, or he should be rejected.
(11.) If a catechumen or a believer wishes to become a soldier they should be rejected, for they have despised God. (Apostolic Tradition, 16.9–11)
For many soldiers, quitting the army before their terms expired would entail an almost certain death sentence. Therefore, those who were already soldiers at the time of their conversion could stay in their posts as long as they did not swear the military oath or kill anyone.
Military imagery of discipline and order was converted to positive imagery of peace, as in this example:
But when the shrilling trumpet blows, it assembles the soldiers and proclaims war; and shall not Christ, think you, having breathed to the ends of the earth a song of peace, assemble the soldiers of peace that are his? Yes, and He did assemble, O man, by blood and by word His bloodless army, and to them He entrusted the kingdom of heaven. (Exhortation to the Greeks, 11)
Numerous ancient Christian writers go on record as opposing all killing period. Their words express a strict ethic that was pervasive across the church of that era, not just isolated to one city or region. Origen, for example, said of Jesus:
He taught that it was never right for his disciples to go so far against a man, even if he should be very wicked; for he did not consider it compatible with his inspired legislation to allow the taking of human life in any form at all. (Against Celsus, 3.7)
Lactantius wrote:
So, neither will it be permitted a just man, whose service is justice herself, to enter military service, nor can he accuse anyone of a capital crime, because there is no difference whether you kill a man with a sword or a word, since the killing itself is prohibited. Therefore, in this command of God, no exception whatsoever must be made. It is always wrong to kill a man whom God has intended to be a sacrosanct creature. (Lactantius, Divine Institutes 6.20)
The church before Constantine consistently rejected killing—whether in the womb, in the arena, on the battlefield, or anywhere else.
Might this ethical and moral clarity be relevant today, in our time of polarizing culture wars? Might it have the power to bridge the gap between “conservatives” and the life-issues dear to their hearts, and “liberal/progressives” and the peace and justice issues dear to theirs?
I submit that the way of Jesus Christ as lived by the early Christian church is decidedly a “third-way” that defies these two conventional categories and has tremendous potential for healing a broken world by uniting ideological opponents in common cause with one another— to work alongside, rather than against one another. At this hour of history, it may be the most effective and necessary means by which we can become ambassadors of reconciliation and protect the vulnerable persons in our world today.
Editor’s note: For a book-length version and extensive documentation of this thesis, see
Consistently Pro-Life: The Ethics of Bloodshed in Ancient Christianity.
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For more blog posts on the history of the consistent life ethic, see:
First Stirrings in Connecting the Life Issues
Ancient Roots of the Consistent Life Ethic: Greece
The Adventures of Prolifers for Survival: Scorned by Mobilization for Survival
Reminiscing on the Founding Meeting of the Consistent Life Network
Adventures of Organizing as a Consistent Lifer
by Lisa Stiller (written September 10, 2015)
In the past month and a half, one of the many things I’ve been busy with is helping to organize rallies on issues as divergent as “Defunding Planned Parenthood” and “Support Diplomacy for Iran.” I’ve been sending press releases for organizations such as Students for Life of America/SFLA (the Woman Betrayed rally organizers in Portland, OR) and MoveOn.org (the Iran diplomacy rallies).
Left: Constance Cooper & daughter Fia Ewing with Lisa
Right: Lisa with Peg Wills
Do I feel kind of schizophrenic?
Well, yes. Today I just finished sending out a revised press release for the MoveOn rally, which has now morphed into one that will thank our Oregon Senators for voting for diplomacy. And tomorrow I’m working with another member of Democrats for Life of America (DFLA) to put together a press release about a quiet protest we’ll hold outside of an event where a top Oregon Planned Parenthood official will be speaking. I’m waiting for someone in the media who gets these press releases to ask me how I support both causes.
A few of my friends get it. Most don’t.
They say, “How can you claim to be a liberal and advocate defunding Planned Parenthood?” I say, “How can I not?”
As a “liberal”, or someone on the “Left” (I’m really growing to hate these labels), I believe in providing the funding and support for whatever it takes to help people and families out of poverty. I support those things that work to promote the dignity of all life, peace, and an end to violence.
Abortion defeats all these. It does nothing to address the root causes. Why do so many women feel they need to turn to abortion, why do so many women end up with unintended pregnancies? We’re supporting the quick fix, rather than tackling the larger problem.
Same with Iran. It’s much simpler to explain about promoting policies that lead to war and the use of aggression. The Iran deal was in no way a quick fix, and implementation will be complex.
So I will continue to stand up for life, in every form, with a Consistent Life Ethic. Hopefully my friends will someday “get it.”
Photos:
Top Left: Bill Samuel and Lisa at Wild Goose Festival
Top Right: Lisa, Richard Stith and John Whitehead at March for Life table
Middle Left: Lisa at West Coast Walk for Life
Middle Center: Lisa and Tony Masalonis at Call to Action conference
Middle Right: Lisa and John Whitehead at Cardinal O’Connor conference
Bottom Left: Lisa opposing war with Syria (sign reads: Syria – Let’s seek a nonviolent peaceful solution)
Bottom Right: Lisa protesting in the Trayvon Martin case
Nukes and the Pro-Life Christian: A Conservative Takes a Second Look at the Morality of Nuclear Weapons
By Karen Swallow Prior
from Sojourners, August 2015
I WAS SITTING IN the wrong end of a police wagon the first time I questioned nuclear weapons. Technically, it was a school bus, but it served the same purpose: hauling scores of protesters to the county holding center where we would await booking for our trespasses.
We had been protesting abortion. I was thinking about nuclear weapons because a couple of those in the bus were peace activists who had long rap sheets from years of anti-war protests. I, on the other hand, was a Republican-voting, independent Baptist church-attending, conservative-leaning, law-abiding (well, until now) kind of Christian. I was awed—and grateful—that these peaceniks would join the likes of me in common cause against another kind of violence.
My new friends adhered to the “seamless garment” philosophy, also called the consistent life ethic, one committed to the protection of all human life, whether from war, poverty, racism, capital punishment, euthanasia, or abortion. One of them gave me a button that read “Peace begins in the womb,” and I pinned it to the bottom of the black leather motorcycle jacket I used to wear in those days.
A few years and many more abortion protests later, I was starting a local chapter of Feminists for Life, attending an Episcopal church, heading up a small private school in the inner city, teaching at a Jesuit college, and reading the poetry of Father Daniel Berrigan, the famous Vietnam-era anti-war activist who was now being arrested for protesting abortion.
– See more at: https://sojo.net/magazine/august-2015/nukes-and-pro-life-christian#sthash.URc7MaLr.dpuf
Karen Swallow Prior, a professor of English at Liberty University in Lynchburg, Va., is the author most recently of Fierce Convictions: The Extraordinary Life of Hannah More: Poet, Reformer, Abolitionist and a research fellow with the Ethics and Religious Liberty Commission of the Southern Baptist Convention. She is also a Consistent Life endorser.
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Another blog post on a conservative look at issues of violence:
Why Conservatives Should Oppose the Death Penalty
For more blog posts on personal journeys, see:
Supporting the Dignity of Every Life (Bill Samuel)
Coming to Peace and Living a Consistent Life After Military Service
Off the Fence and Taking My Stand on Abortion (Mary Liepold)
Sharon Long: My Personal Pro-life Journey
On Being a Consistent Chimera (Rob Arner)
The Myth of Sexual Autonomy
Julianne Wiley
by Julianne Wiley
Note: Julianne Wiley (aka Juli Loesch) was the founder of Prolifers for Survival, the predecessor group of Consistent Life (CL). This is an updated version of an article published in the Spring 1987 version of Sisterlife, then newsletter of CL member group Feminists for Life.
Occasionally on the web we find abortion defenders compelled to admit that the Left and the media are more likely to be won over by the “seamless garment” approach, which includes opposition to abortion in the context of opposition to other kinds of sanctioned killing. Or that prolife feminists have grasped some “essential feminist truths” which make their arguments against abortion more compelling.
With the game beginning to go against them, some will fold the rest of their hand and slap their highest card on the table: sexual autonomy.
No matter what else happens, and no matter what “utopian” changes may come, there will always be the vagaries of sexual passion and the failures of contraception. Thus, come what may, abortion will always be “necessary” if we are to be free to live “sexually autonomous” lives.
Ellen Willis in the Village Voice hurled the following challenge: “I have yet to hear any right-to-lifers take full responsibility for that fact or deal seriously with its political implications.”
On the contrary. I think that it’s the advocates of sexual autonomy who have failed to recognize its political implications.
The opposite of sexual autonomy, or independence, is sexual bondedness, or interdependence. What the autonomous wish to enjoy is precisely unbondedness; and one of the bonds to be rejected is a bond to offspring who were conceived without deliberate choice.
To the defenders of such autonomy I would like to post these questions: Is there such a thing as parental obligation? If so, when and how, and for whom, does this obligation arise?
In the past, people assumed that simply by engaging in heterosexual relations with each other they acquired parental obligations if and when pregnancy resulted. But now, this is to be seen as a denial of sexual autonomy. Obligations now arise, not from the decision to have sex, but from the strictly separate decision to bear the child.
But please note: The decision to have sex is a decision made by both partners. The decision to bear the child is made by only one of them: namely, the woman.
Thus, the woman’s responsibility corresponds to her choice, made at some point during the pregnancy. If she doesn’t want to assume any obligation, she can choose abortion and any question of parental responsibility is foreclosed.
But for the man, parental obligation supposedly arises from the woman’s choices: her choice to bear the baby, and her choice to name him as the father and even to bring legal action to compel his support, if it comes to that.
The problem here is obvious. You can expect increasingly to hear the sexually autonomous male’s just complaint: “How is it that she gets a choice, but I don’t? She chose to be a mother. I didn’t choose to be a father. I just chose to have sex!”
There will always be men who, at any given moment, want sex but don’t want a child; some of these men will get women pregnant. But sexual intercourse now implies for each of them – exactly nothing, no responsibility.
It’s only the woman’s subsequent and separate option that determines everything. That being the case, why should any man feel he’s acquired an obligation if the woman decides to give birth? Because he deposited sperm in the woman’s vagina? Don’t be medieval.
Am I predicting that the elevation of sexual autonomy to the status of a “right,” coupled with the availability of abortion, will cut men loose entirely? That paternal responsibility will sink to zero? That men are not only going to take off, but feel justified about it?
Hell, no. I’m not predicting that. I’m reporting it. I’ve done my share of women’s shelter work. I saw it all the time. A couple has a child. Three years down the line he decides he isn’t cut out to be a father. “But you can’t just walk out. This is your child too!”
“Sure, sure. But it was your choice.”
Well, the gentleman is right, given that the availability of abortion has made procreation a unilateral female decision.
Most male commitment to the long-term responsibility of child rearing is not obtained through court order. It is obtained voluntarily through a man’s sense, bolstered by society, that it’s right and fair. Why? Because the choice that obliges both him and the woman is the choice they made together, in the act that made the child.
The vast majority of women and children in this world rely upon webs of interrelation predicated upon a sexually connected man: a man whose sexuality makes him the husband of this woman, the father of this child. It’s sex that binds him, obliges him to another gender and another generation.
If the act of generation loses this weight, this significance—and the abortion culture simply blows it away—then you end up with fathering that never makes a father, mating that never makes a mate, short-circuited sex that dreams of nothing more than being plugged into its own sockets.
Autonomy—in this sense—is as pro-woman as poverty and as pro-sex as an amputation. And abortion—the dismembered offspring—is not only its program, but its most perfect and fitting image.
Does the Consistent Life Ethic Water Down Life Issues?
Some say the consistent life ethic (CLE) waters down a particular life issue. The harsher critics state, or at least imply, that this is deliberate. This kind of criticism is not new, but this year I’ve been seeing it more than I usually do.
While some may be insincere about their support of the CLE, we believe a genuine commitment to the CLE strengthens work on each issue. Our Purpose Statement states “We serve the anti-violence community by connecting issues, building bridges, and strengthening the case against each kind of socially-approved killing by consistently opposing them all.” And this synergy among issues works.
People who aren’t convinced on one of the issues often tell us that they respect our position because we are consistent. They are more willing to listen to why the unborn should be protected because we also oppose the death penalty and war, or listen to our arguments against war because we also favor protection of the unborn. They may be much less willing to listen to those not committed to other life issues.
Some people mistakenly believe that we oppose focus on a single issue. In fact, we believe there is a need for some individuals and groups to focus on a particular issue. Some of our member groups focus on one issue, or perhaps on two. They join Consistent Life because they see their work in the broader CLE context. We don’t want to water down the work of any of these groups. We are an inclusive network that encourages and promotes the anti-violence activities of all our group and individual members, working together, each in their own way, to make a difference.
Bill Samuel has served as President of Consistent Life since 2005.
First Stirrings on Connecting the Life Issues
by Carol Crossed, Consistent Life Board member
Carol Crossed
In the 1970s and 1980s and in the midst of raising six children, I was immersed in several activist movements of the day. What began in world hunger and lobbying activity for Bread for the World became more sophisticated with the Nestle Boycott. Understanding the corporate role in world hunger catapulted me beyond soup kitchens and reading how much sugar was in breakfast cereals. Working through the United Nations, I better understood corporate behavior and how to monitor it. But everywhere I turned it was the capitalists (that would be me and the US) who not only marketed infant formula that caused infant deaths, but sold armaments that caused infant deaths. My passion slowly morphed into anti-militarism. And how could one hope to feed the world if 52% of the US discretionary budget went to feed the arms race?
While I tried desperately to fix this equation through rallies and protests and sit-ins, a woman whom I had never met was often quoted in opposition to whatever particular cause I was fighting for, or against. In newspaper articles or letters to the editor, she called me a Marxist or a socialist or a lesbian or a Wiccan. While I didn’t have problems with some of these labels, she clearly thought of them (and therefore of me) in a derogatory way. I decided to find her name and call her, and invite her to have coffee. I took tons of literature and was sure I had a convert on my hands. She couldn’t help but be impressed with how intelligent, peace-loving, and rational I was, right?
After 20 minutes into my spiel, using complex words like cross-fertilization of agri-business and uranium isotopes, Janet interrupted me. “Why don’t you ever say anything about the unborn child in abortion?” It stopped me. Dead in my tracks. I stuttered and said something about certainly not believing abortion was a good thing. “And besides, there are already enough people working on that issue.” She asked, ‘Why don’t you go with me to this right-to-life talk next week?”
I thought to myself that she is the last person I wanted to be seen with, but in the spirit of my exceptional conflict-resolution, peacemaking, tolerant, loving self, I choked out, “Well, ah, OK. But will you go with me to hear Fr. Dan Berrigan who is coming in September to speak about war?”
So we began going to events together. I learned from Dr. Mildred Jefferson of National Right to Life that there were over a million unborn lives aborted every year, not a million since Roe v. Wade, which is what I previously thought. Janet learned about the nuclear arms race and Mutually Assured Destruction. (Janet: “Oh my dear God! That will kill the mothers of the unborn babies too!”) I had a sign that had the Leviticus quote: Welcome the stranger and carried it around in my car. It worked well for Sanctuary rallies and at abortion clinics. And when NYS had hearings on reinstituting the death penalty, I asked Janet to go in my stead because I was doing community service for an abortion sit-in.
We formed a group in Rochester, NY, called Common Ground of Upstate New York. We brought together people by bringing together issues that sought to protect life either on the left or right of the political spectrum.
Juli Loesch (now Julianne Wiley) in 1980s video
What I was experiencing in western New York was identical to what other peace and life activists were coming to grips with. One person was Juli Loesch Wiley, the founder of the precursor of Consistent Life Network: Pro-lifers for Survival.
Pro-lifers for Survival was founded in 1980, a cultural time ripe with escalating violence to the human person. The nuclear weapons build-up and the escalation of abortion made death endemic to our social fabric and less and less likely that nonviolence would be culturally accepted. If violence begets violence, it was no accident that Roe v Wade was decided toward the end of the Viet Nam War.
While some forms of killing were condemned by certain pockets of activists, it was common that some form of killing was accepted, even promoted, by the same group of aforementioned activists.
In 1976 or 1977 Juli Loesch (now Julianne Wiley) was involved in the anti-nuclear-weapons and anti-nuclear-power movements through the Pax Center in Erie PA. She thought when you think about nukes with any depth, you’re obliged to think about the next generation. Juli had done some reading and writing about radioisotopes and genotoxins as a danger to human embryos. This compelled her to think about nukes and intergenerational justice. It also compelled her to question the moral obtuseness of nuclear strategists like Herman Kahn who were willing to sacrifice vulnerable humans by the millions without even perceiving that “they are us,” that they are part of our human family and our human future.
Juli’s group had put out a No Nukes leaflet that looked a lot like a leaflet she picked up on the street from some anti-abortion women, even using the same quote from Deuteronomy, “Choose life that you and your descendants might live.” Since Juli was a feminist who believed, “Women united can never be defeated,” she thought, “Those women are potential anti-nuke allies. Why aren’t we united? I’ve got to find some way to talk to them.”
Somewhere over the next two years, Juli was able to meet prolife people, found them abundantly open to dialogue, and came to respect their sincere commitment to the next generation. She became convinced that pro-life and anti-nuke folks belonged together. “Same values. Same passions. Same sense of solidarity with the tenacity of life and the need to nonviolently accommodate all of us. It seemed like a natural to me.”
Pro-lifers for Survival was born, and later became the Seamless Garment Network, now re-named Consistent Life.
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For more blog posts on the history of the consistent life ethic, see:
The Consistent Life Consensus in Ancient Christianity
Ancient Roots of the Consistent Life Ethic: Greece
The Adventures of Prolifers for Survival: Scorned by Mobilization for Survival
Reminiscing on the Founding Meeting of the Consistent Life Network
Rejecting Mass Murder: Looking Back on Hiroshima and Nagasaki
By John Whitehead, Secretary of Consistent Life
Hiroshima after the bombing
The United States devastated the Japanese cities of Hiroshima and Nagasaki on, respectively, August 6th and 9th, 1945, in what were—to date—the only occasions in history that atomic bombs were used in wartime. The atomic bombings killed tens of thousands of people instantly, with many more dying of injuries in the following hours, days, and weeks—by the end of 1945, an estimated 210,000 people had perished as a result of the bombings. Because the use of atomic bombs against these two cities contributed to the surrender of Japan and the end of the Second World War, many have argued that the bombings saved lives that would otherwise have been lost in continued warfare and thus that bombing Hiroshima and Nagasaki was justified. For adherents to a consistent ethic of life, however, these uses of atomic bombs were not justified—they amounted simply to mass murder.
Those who advocate a consistent ethic of life vary in their precise attitudes toward war. Some are pacifists who regard all killing in war as inherently wrong. For these pacifists, destroying a city with an atomic bomb must be rejected in the same way that any killing must be.
Other consistent ethic of life advocates are not absolutist in their opposition to war but adhere to Just War Theory or other ethical philosophies that allow that killing in war could be justified, at least under certain circumstances. For these non-pacifists, the reasons for rejecting the use of atomic bombs against cities are less straight-forward than they are for pacifists. Even viewed from such non-absolutist consistent ethic of life perspectives, however, the destruction of Hiroshima and Nagasaki is difficult to justify, for two reasons.
First, violent means to achieve an end cannot be justified if nonviolent means can achieve the same end. Just War Theory acknowledges this basic principle by requiring that war must be a last resort in order to be justified. In 1945, the end pursued by the United States and other Allied powers—the surrender of their wartime enemy, Japan—could have been achieved by diplomatic means without resorting to the threatened or actual use of atomic bombs against the Japanese.
A major obstacle in bringing the war with Japan to an end through negotiation was the Allied insistence, expressed in the Cairo Declaration of 1943 and Potsdam Declaration of 1945, that Japan surrender unconditionally. Such insistence left the Japanese uncertain about what the fate would be of the Emperor Hirohito, the Japanese head of state who held divine status in the eyes of many Japanese. The Allied Potsdam Declaration, which promised that “stern justice shall be meted out to all war criminals” even left open the possibility that Hirohito might be executed or imprisoned by the victorious Allied powers.
Such a possibility was unacceptable to the Japanese government. Indeed, so unacceptable were threats to the emperor and his position that even after atomic bombs had devastated Hiroshima and Nagasaki and the Japanese government was willing to come to surrender terms, wholly unconditional surrender was out of the question. To the very end, Japan’s rulers insisted that Hirohito remain sovereign, and the war only came to an end when it did because the United States was willing to relent and allow Hirohito to stay, at least provisionally. Had the Allies relented on this point sooner, the war might have been brought to a successful conclusion without atomic bombs ever being used.
Nagasaki bomb mushroom cloud
Even if such diplomatic means of ending the war had not been available, however, the atomic bombings would still not have been justified, for a second and ultimately far more important reason.
A fundamental principle of Just War Theory—and one that even those who do not wholly endorse Just War Theory can appreciate—is that military forces should discriminate between enemy military personnel and enemy civilians when using violence. Enemy citizens who by their status as members of the armed forces are authorized and prepared to use lethal violence in wartime may be reciprocally regarded as legitimate targets of such violence; enemy citizens who are not in the armed forces and are not authorized to play such a violent role are not legitimate targets.
Granted (to echo a point made by Just War theorist Michael Walzer), the line that divides military personnel and civilians can be difficult to draw. Some enemy citizens may belong to military reserves or militias that act as auxiliaries to regular military forces; other citizens work in industries that produce weapons and thereby contribute, at least indirectly, to violence. Nevertheless (again echoing Walzer), some enemy citizens will always fall into categories that place them clearly outside the military realm: children (both inside and outside the womb), the elderly, and the sick and disabled. Further, I would argue that other classes of people who might serve in military capacities but perform clearly nonviolent functions—doctors and nurses, clergy—also fall into the protected category of civilians.
To target these clearly inoffensive, non-military people is unjust. Such people were targeted in the devastations of Hiroshima and Nagasaki and did perish as a result. Using a weapon of such overwhelming destructive power as an atomic bomb against an entire city inevitably involves targeting people who should be protected from violence, even in wartime.
In addition to the pacifist and Just War reasons given above, consistent ethic of life advocates have one more important reason for rejecting the Hiroshima and Nagasaki bombings—and any similar slaughter of civilians. The essential argument made by defenders of the bombings—killing huge numbers of people, including children, ultimately achieved the worthwhile goal of ending the Second World War—can be invoked to justify other forms of violence, including abortion. Don’t worthwhile goals (so the argument would go) such as gender equality, curbing overpopulation, reducing poverty and crime, or preventing child abuse justify the deaths of countless unborn children?
Consistent ethic of life advocates know better than to accept such toxic rationales, whether in the realm of abortion or warfare.
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For another of our blog posts about nuclear weapons, see:
An Open Letter to Fellow Human Rights Activists
From Richard Stith J.D.(Yale), Ph.D.(Yale), Professor of Law Emeritus & Consistent Life Board Member
Richard Stith at annual March for Life
I think any endorsement of abortion rights to be a mistake, for two reasons: Endorsing abortion rights causes further harm to already oppressed women, particularly in the developing world. And endorsing abortion rights hurts our important work for human rights in general.
(1) If a woman is dominated by others, the freedoms she is given will be exercised against her by those who dominate her.
We all know that many women are simply unable to effectively negotiate the terms and conditions of their sexual interactions and reproductive choices due to pervasive discrimination, coercion and violence against them. Unfortunately, legalization of abortion provides those coercers with another weapon that they can use against the women they dominate.
In other words, abortion rights may truly be liberating for powerful women whose careers cannot easily accommodate children, for women who are truly free to choose without outside pressures and for whom the opportunity costs of children are very great. Polls indeed show that such women overwhelmingly support a right to abortion. By contrast, poorer women, even in the USA, are the group most hostile to abortion. Why would they want abortion available if it’s only going to result in a boyfriend, a parent, a husband, or an employer coercing them (even by violence) to forego one of the few satisfactions they have in their oppressed lives, the love of a child? Or just think how the availability of abortion can facilitate raw sexual exploitation: A college student told me once: “I’m really pro-choice, but you can bet I tell my boyfriend I’m 100% pro-life.” She knew that the option of abortion could easily make him less careful. But not all young women are so clever. (Consult the great feminist thinker Catherine MacKinnon for more on the effect of making abortion a “privacy” right. She points out that it is precisely in women’s private lives that male dominance is most extreme.)
The developing world is much, much worse for most women. Except for a tiny elite segment of women (which unfortunately may be the only non-male presence at international conferences set up to propose new laws) abortion hurts women because it empowers husbands, sweatshop owners, and pimps to use them with impunity. The rule is very simple: Those who make real life choices for women are the real rights holders, regardless of who may have the formal legal right to make decisions.
Even seemingly obvious rights to abortion, such as abortion after rape or incest, may backfire against women where they are weak. After all, in most societies rape and incest are viewed very negatively, if they are discovered. Male predators ordinarily want their victims to have abortions so they won’t be exposed and punished, and so that they can continue their sexual exploitation. Only in a modern nation, with a good police force, can predators regularly be caught and punished, so that the abortion decision can more truly be that of the woman. This is a tough call I admit, but the uncertainty of the real-life impact of laws permitting abortion should give one second thoughts about making even abortion after rape into an international right, applicable in all circumstances in all countries.
In summary, to proclaim rights to abortion around the world is to adopt a first-world, or an upper-elite, view of the beneficiaries of such rights. A down-to-earth look at poor and oppressed women’s actual lives will lead one to conclude that women would first need to be empowered before they could truly benefit from any rights to abortion.
2) No organization can proclaim complete support for Human Rights if it endorses abortion.
As a teacher of comparative law, I can tell you the right to life of the fetus is explicitly protected by a number of international treaties and national constitutions. Fundamental rights to abortion are recognized far less extensively.
I’m not saying that only a few nations permit abortion. Many do. But very few treat it as a basic human right. Abortion is permitted simply because the legislature of the nation has decided to pass such a law, but that law could be repealed tomorrow without violating any treaty or constitution. Nowhere in Europe (with the possible exception of abortion for severe health reasons in Italy) is there a clear constitutional right to abortion, to my knowledge. But various countries’ constitutions or constitutional court decisions contain a right to life. Germany is one. The unborn child has a constitutional right to life throughout pregnancy there, recognized twice by the Constitutional Court in lengthy decisions in 1975 and in 1993. [Do not rely on the over-simplified report that Germany does not punish abortion in the first 12 weeks, as long as the pregnant woman has undergone solidly “pro-life” counseling and has waited three more days to think it over. That is true, but the Court’s reasoning is that the counseling will save more unborn lives than threats of punishment. Strange as it may seem to us, abortion goes unpunished in Germany in furtherance of a fetal right to life, not of a maternal right to abortion.] And why does Germany care about unborn life? The answer given by the Court is that to permit abortion is to head once again down the path to devaluation of individual human life followed by the Nazis. When we proclaim a right to abortion, according to German human rights doctrine, we are attacking life, the most basic human right of all, and following again that dreaded path.
The regional human rights treaty for the Americas, the American Convention on Human Rights (Pact of San José, 1969) explicitly proclaims “Every person has the right to have his life respected. This right shall be protected by law and, in general, from the moment of conception.” [Art. 4(1)]. It also emphasizes that “’person’ means every human being.” [Art. 1(2)] Thus we see that the unborn child is recognized as a person with a right to life from the moment of conception. When it comes to legal protection of that right, it is true, the signatory states have a little flexibility (presumably to deal with any clash with the mother’s equal right to life) because of the words “in general.” But this is not phrased as a limit on the right itself, but only as a permitted (but not required) minor exception to the legal enforcement of that right. Do we really want to proclaim a right to violate the core of a major human rights treaty? Does it want to have to say from now on: “We’re for many recognized human rights, but we’re opposed to others”? [A recent American human rights court decision twisted the above words to escape their impact, but please remember that court decisions are not binding precedents in Latin America. The words of the Treaty remain the law, despite the contrary court decision.]
It is true that the Protocol to the African Charter endorses a very limited right to abortion—the first such treaty right in the world. This is quite ironic, however, since black Africa may be the most anti-abortion part of the globe. A Pew poll, for example, found that 64% of Nigerians and a whopping 81% of Kenyans said women should be stopped from having abortions (USA: only 32%, according to Pew). How much does that Protocol represent the African peoples as opposed to representing NGOs and other elites? Do we want to be part of what may well be a shoving of elite Westernized interests down the throats of Africans?
Lastly, and most simply: The Human Rights movement has long had one clear message: Human Dignity. We have proclaimed that rights are not just for the strong, or just for citizens, or just for non-criminals, or just for adults. We have always said that just being human is all one needs to have human dignity and human rights. But no one seriously doubts that the unborn offspring of two humans is also human. So if we endorse a right to abortion, we are saying that merely being human and alive is no longer enough for dignity and rights. We will either have to make a deep change in our self-understanding and abandon our foundation in the dignity of simply being human, or else constantly face the charge of hypocrisy from many opponents and erstwhile supporters—the sort of charge leveled at Thomas Jefferson for proclaiming that all persons “are created equal” while he held onto his slaves.
For the two reasons I have explained above, I believe it to be highly unwise for our Human Rights movement to endorse rights to abortion. Such rights may benefit powerful elites, but they harm many of our most vulnerable sisters in the developing world. And they clash head-on with the internationally recognized human right to life of the fetus, and even with our own foundation in universal human rights.
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For more of our blog posts from Richard Stith, see:
When “Choice” Itself Hurts the Quality of Life
Equal Concern for Each Human Being, Not for Each Human Issue
A Way Beyond the Abortion Wars?
Beyond the Abortion Wars: A Way Forward for a New Generation, Charles C. Camosy, William B. Eerdmans Publishing Company, 2015.
Ever since Roe v Wade, abortion has been a major political issue in the United States, and we don’t seem to be making much progress in coming to some solution that would quiet down the “abortion wars.” Charles Camosy, Professor of Theological and Social Ethics at Fordham University and a Board member of CL member group Democrats for Life of America, has been deeply concerned about this for a long time. He was one of the key organizers of the 2010 Conference, Open Hearts, Open Minds and Fair Minded Words: A Conference on Life & Choice in the Abortion Debate, held at Princeton University. This brought together people from across the spectrum of views on abortion in an atmosphere encouraging respectful and fruitful dialogue on the issue.
Camosy seeks in this book to move the dialogue forward by outlining where we are in the abortion controversy in the U.S., describing key approaches to a better understanding, and presenting a proposal for moving forward. He presents an outline of The Mother and Prenatal Child Protection Act (MPCPA), which he proposes as federal legislation. In the course of the book, he also engages in considerable discussion of Catholic theology as it relates to the issues discussed in the book.
Camosy is to be thanked for his considerable effort to find a way to move the country forward on this difficult issue. His book, which includes extensive footnotes and a bibliography, shows evidence of the enormous effort he has made to gather information and perspectives helpful in moving forward. There is much in the book which will be helpful to people interested in making progress on this issue.
In looking at the present state of the abortion debate, he indicates that confusion and polarization have created the illusion of a hopeless stalemate. However, he maintains a majority of Americans actually agree in many respects about abortion morality and law. He supports this with the results of numerous polls which show that most Americans are not on either end of the spectrum of views on abortion and the law. And he notes that it’s only been a few decades since abortion was identified with party and ideology in the way it often is today. He writes of a “Costanza strategy” in which ideological and party positions on abortion seem to be in contrast to their general political approach. Republicans seem to take a “big government” approach in focusing on legal regulation, while Democrats seem to take an individualistic approach rather than protecting the vulnerable.
Sidney Callahan
Relying heavily on the work of feminist scholar (and CL endorser) Sidney Callahan, Camosy extensively looks at the effects of abortion on women. In looking at the main principles of “pro-choice” feminists, she (Callahan) realized they were not feminist at all but simply borrowed from men. Camosy also notes that current American policies on abortion are largely a product of men. Men such as Dr. Bernard Nathanson and Hugh Hefner were key figures in the early days of a strong push for “abortion rights.” Roe v Wade was decided by an all-male Supreme Court, and Justice Blackmun’s majority decision particularly focused on the concerns of male physicians. Because women’s choices are made in the context of social structures created by powerful and privileged men, making abortion an option also results in pressures on women to have abortions rather than leading to greater freedom for women. A study found that only 28% of American women having abortions said they were sure about the decision, and 64% said they were pressured by others to have the abortion.
Camosy notes some important reasons for hope that the country can move forward. There are significant demographic factors in play here. The rising proportion of Latinos in the population is important because this population is more inclined to favor protecting the lives of prenatal children regardless of their party identification. Another factor is the generational shift in which younger age groups are more skeptical of abortion than older age groups. He also notes that, despite the “war on women” rhetoric of “pro-choice” groups, poll after poll has shown that a larger proportion of women than men support restrictions on abortion.
What Is Abortion?
Camosy posits that there are “direct abortions” and “indirect abortions.” In doing so, I think he is blurring important distinctions. To most people, abortion is an act taken with the deliberate intention to end a fetal life. If you Google “abortion definition” you are presented immediately with the answer of “the deliberate termination of a human pregnancy.” This is what Camosy calls “direct abortions” (with an important qualifier described in the next paragraph). Medical procedures taken for other reasons which might result in an undesired side effect of the death of a prenatal child are not considered by most people (for good reason) to be abortions, and Camosy confuses things by labeling them “indirect abortions.” One reason this is important is that even the most strongly pro-life people who want all abortions to be illegal will generally oppose making such medical procedures illegal. Overall, he is seeking to blur the lines between “pro-life” and “pro-choice” which has value in trying to come to common ground on ways forward, but I don’t think broadening the term abortion to include cases where there is no intent to terminate a human life is an appropriate way to do that. Prenatal children die for a variety of reasons, but it seems to me that intent is critical to defining abortion.
But Camosy goes even further. He includes in “indirect abortions” cases where there is a deliberate decision to end the life of a prenatal child, but the means used is RU-486 (mifepristone) rather than surgical abortion. His argument for considering chemical abortions “indirect” is based on an analysis of the exact means by which the drug results in a death which he holds puts it in the category of “refusal to aid,” a distinction based upon common categories used by professional ethicists. However, to most people it is not the means used which is critical, but the intent to end the life of the prenatal child.
A Way Forward?
Camosy proposes federal legislation with provisions he divides into four categories:
- Equal Protection of the Law for the Prenatal Child. Direct surgical abortions would be prohibited except to save the life of the mother.
- Equal Protection of the Law for Women during Pregnancy. A pregnant woman would have the “right to defend herself with deadly force against a clear and present mortal threat.” Direct abortion would be permitted if the pregnancy poses a “clear and present” threat to the mother’s life, and “indirect abortion” would not be effective.
- Support of Mothers and Their Children during and after Pregnancy. He proposes to protect the civil rights and social equality of women through a number of measures, including: equal pay for equal work; increased protection for women and mothers when it comes to hiring and firing; universal access to postpartum maternal health care; dramatically increased paid pregnancy leave with complete job protection; two years of universally available prekindergarten and increased availability of affordable child care; attempts to reform the both the huge cost of adoption and the stigma of adoption; and improvements in collecting child support along with prosecution of those pressuring women into having an abortion.
- Refusal to Aid for a Proportionately Serious Reason. “Indirect abortion” would be banned except to save the mother’s life and in these three cases: 1) in the first eight weeks of pregnancy using RU-486; 2) after eight weeks of pregnancy where nonconsensual sex is demonstrated by a preponderance of evidence; and 3) clear and unambiguous terminal diagnosis and the likelihood that the prenatal child will die in utero (to allow mother and other family to baptize, cuddle, or otherwise bond with the child).
Key here is Camosy’s framing of an important aspect of the seemingly intractable nature of the abortion debate being that on the one side of the issue the focus is on the prenatal child and on the other side the pregnant woman, often without giving much consideration to the other party. This results in people on opposite sides of the issue talking past one another. Camosy seeks to bridge this gap by incorporating the basic civil rights of both mother and child in the proposal. Whatever one might think of some of the specific elements of the proposal, it seems to me that Camosy is right on target on the need to incorporate protections for both the mother and the child.
There are certainly barriers to such a proposal, some of them intrinsic to the political and cultural environment in the country and some which may be related to how Camosy framed his proposal. I see some of these as:
How the media/corporate/political-industrial complex, as Camosy describes it, has framed the abortion debate. I believe Camosy is correct that the people are not nearly as polarized on the issue as this complex would have us believe, but the reframing of the issue in ways that foster real solutions is going to face difficult going.- Those on either end of the spectrum of views on abortion will need to compromise to some extent if we are to reach some societal agreement which will substantially abate the abortion wars. This is difficult, and those with a more nuanced perspective are less likely to try to lead movements related to the issue than those with the strongest views on each side.
- Camosy rests significant parts of his proposal on making or blurring distinctions in ways which will not seem to make sense to most Americans. The idea that medical procedures not intended for the purpose of ending the life of a prenatal child can nevertheless be considered abortions, and the idea that whether an abortion is surgical or chemical is a key distinction seem like non-starters to me.
- The differences which exist in America on the role of government in general and the relative roles of different levels of government create difficulties in accomplishing all this through Federal legislation aside from the question of the basic merit of the ideas included. So we will have some objections on the basis that a provision should not be a matter of government mandate at all, and some on the basis that the provision should be decided on the state or local level not the Federal level.
- On the more specific level, it seemed to me a glaring omission that Camosy does not mention paid maternity leave, despite the importance of this to the mother (and family as a whole) and the fact that the U.S. is one of only two countries in the world which do not mandate paid maternity leave. This seems a more critical matter than the increased paid pregnancy leave he does include.
However, I think Camosy has provided a great service in seeking to outline such a comprehensive way forward. Few people would agree 100% with anyone’s attempt to outline such a comprehensive proposal, but this does not negate the value of doing so. I hope that his effort will stimulate thinking on what is needed, and it should help in moving forward in developing some legislation which can obtain sufficient support to be enacted. So I heartily commend Camosy for drafting and publishing the proposal.
It’s Not Just a Catholic Issue
There is a problem in the structure of the book which can cause confusion. Camosy is quite explicit that the theology of a particular faith group should not be the basis of legislative action. Yet he has been accused of seeking to impose Catholic theological positions on the nation. While the charge is false and he has presented arguments for what he proposes which are not dependent on any particular theological point of view, the interweaving of detailed expositions of Catholic theology in parts of the book can confuse people. He does present material and a proposal which is valid for Americans regardless of their faith perspective or lack of it, but the interjection of Catholic academic theological arguments in the book can nevertheless mislead some readers.
Camosy seemed to me to be always looking over his shoulder at the Catholic hierarchy to try to ensure that his status as a Catholic theologian is not threatened by what he writes. In a couple of footnotes, he even says that his viewpoint should be disregarded should the Church ever define its doctrine in a way which is inconsistent with it. To someone like me who is not a Catholic, that’s a real turn-off and can even lead to wondering how sure he is of the views he expresses.
I wish he would have largely refrained from arguing Catholic theology in the front of the book, and instead had a Part 2 or an Appendix which detailed how his arguments and proposal were consistent with Catholic theological understandings. Such a separation would made it easier for those who do not adhere to Catholicism to evaluate his arguments and proposal more on their merits. However, that was not his choice and we who are not Catholic need to seek to avoid being put off by the Catholic theological reflections interweaved in the book.
Conclusion
I heartily recommend that people read this book. There is much valuable and well documented information in it. Despite some quibbles I have with its content and structure, I think it is groundbreaking in seeking to set out a possible direction to move beyond the abortion wars. It can serve to stimulate a much-needed dialogue.
Bill Samuel has served as President of Consistent Life since 2005.
Figuring Out Euthanasia: What Does It Really Mean?
By Rachel MacNair, Vice President of Consistent Life, and Director, Institute for Integrated Social Analysis
A lot of people when asked their position on “euthanasia” will assume you’re talking about animals being “put to sleep.” Proponents will call it “death with dignity.” The phrase “assisted suicide” is more common when it’s presented as a political issue, but that only covers one kind of euthanasia.
Source: The Child Who Never Grew (1950), Ch. 2
Picture credit: Wikimedia Commons; Quote from izquotes.com
So, for definitions:
- Involuntary euthanasia means the targeted person doesn’t want to die but is being killed anyway; it only specifies that the motivation for the killing is beneficial (or at least it’s being presented as such).
- Non-voluntary euthanasia means the targeted person isn’t in a position to say yes or no. That person is either not considered mentally competent or is unconscious in a long-term way. It’s presumed that being killed would be good for this person without needing to consult her or him.
- Voluntary euthanasia is where a person (with safeguards, presumably unpressured) desires to be killed. This is where current debate mainly is, with some countries and U.S. states legalizing it.
Another classification that applies to all three types above is:
- Active euthanasia means deliberately killing someone by means of an act – shooting, smothering, giving a lethal injection, etc.
- Passive euthanasia means intentionally bringing about someone’s death by omitting something necessary to keep her alive.
Passive euthanasia is the trickiest, because it’s the most ambiguous. So here are some parameters:
If a person could survive just fine if, say, his or her diabetes or pneumonia were treated, but would die if it isn’t, and the reason for withholding treatment is the person has disabilities or for any other reason her or his death is desired, then that’s passive euthanasia. It’s killing, and pretense otherwise is playing with words.
But if a person is not treated due to medical neglect, with apathy about whether that person lives or dies, and the motivation is racism or misogyny or disdain for those with disabilities, or quite commonly that the person lives in poverty, then that’s an outrage, but it’s not passive euthanasia. Being callous about causing death is not the same as deliberately intending to cause death – though of course they’re connected.
If a conscious person who’s terminally ill is quite firm that she doesn’t wish to eat, in full knowledge this makes death inevitable, force-feeding is not required. People do have a right to turn down medical care or any other impositions on their bodies. If she’s refusing to eat because it makes her feel sick, or even simply because she’s not hungry, then this isn’t passive euthanasia. But if her refusal to eat is intended to bring about her own death, then she is committing suicide by passive euthanasia. But she still has a legal right not to eat, if she is competent.
A DNR Order – Do Not Resuscitate – can be a reasonable decision if a person makes it for herself and is days away from dying. It can become passive euthanasia if decided by other people for a person who could live several more years if resuscitated, and especially if that person didn’t want the DNR.
If a person decides that she’d rather have laughter therapy instead of the chemotherapy her doctor recommends, her doctor may take the attitude that this is suicidal. But it isn’t suicide by passive euthanasia if she has no intent to die. People have the right to select what treatment they will and won’t have, doctors’ opinions notwithstanding, and the best we can do is educate and do further research; in some cases, after all, the laughter therapy may actually work better.
If a person does something incredibly dangerous in order to help other people, as for instance happens all the time with firefighters, this is admirable and doesn’t constitute any form of euthanasia or actual suicide — as long as surviving the event is desired, even if it isn’t a likely outcome.
If a person jumps out of a high-rise window to escape a burning fire, that’s not suicide the way jumping out of a window normally would be. The purpose is to avoid death by fire. If some quirk were to occur and the person survived the fall, the response would be one of delight and good fortune, not disappointment at not having died.
And, finally, deciding that the medical care is not working and is more of a burden than a help, and therefore stopping it, is not necessarily passive euthanasia. It’s done in hospices all the time. People who decide to go home once the doctors say there’s nothing more the doctors can do because those people prefer to die at home rather than in a sterile hospital are making a reasonable choice. Death is not what they want; they are handling the inevitable.
This is what makes this issue more difficult than others – executions and abortions, after all, are much more clearly defined. Involuntary euthanasia is clearly wrong, non-voluntary is liable to be an exercise in bigotry, and “voluntary” can so often be pressured as to make its voluntariness questionable. But truly voluntary does mean the death isn’t inflicted by others, which is quite qualitatively different. Active euthanasia is, by definition, clearly killing, and so opposing it is clear cut. But whether “pulling the plug” in any given instance constitutes passive euthanasia or is instead a reasonable medical decision is much murkier and way more complicated. In this case, intent matters crucially.
Cartoon used with permission of Dave Lupton, aka Crippen
So here are the connections to the other issues:
- The targets of any kind of euthanasia have been shown over and over again to be disproportionately ethnic minorities, women, the poor, and especially people with disabilities.
- The reasoning of “choice” and “bodily autonomy” is so closely connected to the rhetoric on abortion that the connection comes up frequently among both proponents and opponents.
- The death penalty can be understood as active euthanasia for the (presumably) guilty. There have indeed been convicts who request euthanasia in Europe as an alternative to spending life in jail, which would be a back-door way of re-introducing the death penalty there. In the USA, it is not uncommon for capital offenders to abandon further appeals and “volunteer” to be executed, in effect requesting active euthanasia rather than more life in prison.
- The connection of euthanasia to the Nazis and World War II is so blatant as to help account for why people are nervous about legalizing it – and it’s crucial that we never forget. We must learn from experience.
- Common dynamics for all socially-approved violence apply, especially euphemisms to cover the brutal reality, and the slippery slope whereby small beginnings lead to greater and greater violence until people have gotten acclimated and no longer regard as shocking what used to be seen as shocking at the beginning of the process. Once killing people for “good reasons” comes to be accepted, the boundaries of what constitute good reasons become debatable. CLN urges that we not take that first step.
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For others of our blog posts on euthanasia, see:
How Euthanasia and Poverty Threaten the Disabled
What’s Cruel for the Incarcerated is Cruel for the Terminally Ill
Reflections on the Charlie Gard Case
Historical Black Voices: Racism Kills
The Creativity of the Fore-closed Option