A Sexually Diverse World Religious Position Statements on Abortion: Pro-life versus Pro-choice he following statements come from a variety Tof major religious organizations. They reflect the nature of the arguments and the rhetoric of the abortion debate. Consider these statements in relation to the Gallup poll (Table 19.1) that shows a wide diversity of opinion among the American public. Pro-life Statements [The] Church has always rejected abortion as a grave moral evil. It has always seen that the child's help- lessness, both before and after birth, far from dimin- ishing his or her right to life, increases our moral obligation to respect and to protect that right.... The Church also realizes that a society which tolerates the direct destruction of innocent life, as in the current practice of abortion, is in danger of losing its respect for life in all other contexts. (National Conference of Catholic Bishops, 1985) All human beings ought to value every person for his or her uniqueness as a creature of God, called to be a brother or sister of Christ by reason of the incarnation and universal redemption. For us, the sacredness of human life is based on these prem- ises. And it is on the same premises that there is based our celebration of human life-all human life. This explains our efforts to defend human life against every influence or action that threatens or weakens it, as well as our endeavors to make every Table 19.1 Gallup Poll Findings on Americans' Attitudes toward Abortion Percentage 1975 1992 2008 Abortion should be: Legal under any circumstances Legal under only certain circumstances Illegal under all 21% 31% 28% 54 53 54 circumstances 22 14 17 3 1 No opinion Source: http://www.galluppoll.com 12 life more human in all its aspects. (Pope John Paul II, 1979) Orthodox Christians have always viewed the willful abortion of unborn children as a heinous act of evil. The Church's canonical tradition identifies any action intended to destroy a fetus as the crime of murder. (Orthodox Church in America, 1992) Abortion is not a moral option, except as a tragi- cally unavoidable by-product of medical procedures question whether homosexuality is truly abnormal and unnatural and therefore against the will of God. There are three positions, broadly speaking, on the issue: rejection, love the sinner but hate the sin, and full acceptance. Rejectionism According to the rejectionist position, it has generally been presumed that the Judeo-Christian tradition absolutely opposes any sexual acts between persons of the same gender and regards those committing such acts as dreadful sinners, utterly condemned by God. Although there are few references in the Bible, all the explicit ones are negative, the most famous being the passage about the destruction of Sodom.8 Rejectionists tend to rely on a literal reading of the Bible. They note that the Hebrew Bible calls male-male sex "an abomination" (Leviticus 18:22), and although Jesus made no comment on the sub- ject, they read Paul's statement in Romans (1:26-27) as an unambiguous condemnation of homosexual acts. They allow, however, that Paul did not seem to have found homosexuality any more dreadful than Other relevant biblical passages include Leviticus 18:22 and 20:13; Genesis 19; Romans 1:26; and I Corinthians 6:9. necessary to prevent the death of another human being, viz., the mother. (Lutheran Church-Missouri Synod, 1979) [W]e do affirm our opposition to legalized abortion and our support of appropriate federal and state leg- islation and/or constitutional amendment which will prohibit abortion except to prevent the imminent death of the mother. (Southern Baptist Convention, 1989) Pro-choice Statements The United Church of Christ has affirmed and re- affirmed since 1971 that access to safe and legal abor- tion is consistent with a woman's right to follow the dictates of her own faith and beliefs in determining when and if she should have children, and has sup- ported comprehensive sexuality education as one measure to prevent unwanted or unplanned preg- nancies. (United Church of Christ, 2004) Abortion is an extremely difficult choice faced by a woman. In all circumstances, it should be her deci- sion whether or not to terminate a pregnancy, backed up by those whom she trusts (physician, therapist, partner, etc.). This decision should not be taken lightly (abortion should never be used for birth control pur- poses) and can have life-long ramifications. However, any decision should be left up to the woman within whose body the fetus is growing. (Union for Reform Judaism, 2004) Our belief in the sanctity of unborn human life makes us reluctant to approve abortion. But we are equally bound to respect the sacredness of the life and well-being of the mother, for whom devastating damage may result from an unacceptable pregnancy. In continuity with past Christian teaching, we rec- ognize tragic conflicts of life with life that may jus- tify abortion, and in such cases we support the legal option of abortion under proper medical procedures. We cannot affirm abortion as an acceptable means of birth control, and we unconditionally reject it as a means of gender selection. (United Methodist Church, 2000) We believe that legislation concerning abortions will not address the root of the problem. We therefore express our deep conviction that any proposed leg- islation on the part of national or state governments regarding abortions must take special care to see that individual conscience is respected and that the responsibility of individuals to reach informed deci- sions in this matter is acknowledged and honored. (Episcopal Church, 1994) Judaism does not believe that personhood and human rights begin with conception. The premise that personhood begins with conception is founded on a religious position which is not identical with Jewish tradition. Therefore, under special circum- stances, Judaism chooses and requires abortion as an act which affirms and protects the life, well being and health of the mother. To deny a Jewish woman and her family the ability to obtain a safe, legal abortion when so mandated by Jewish tradition, is to deprive Jews of their fundamental right of religious freedom. (United Synagogue of Conservative Judaism, 1989) other sexual sins. The rejectionists also note that-in English translation-sodomy is included in lists of sins that include adultery and fornication (1 Corin- thians 6:9 and 1 Timothy 1:10). Insisting that the sin of Sodom (Genesis 19) was homosexuality, they also tend to see homosexuality wherever the Bible men- tions Sodom. A thread of condemnation of homosexuality does run through Christian history. Homosexuality was not uncommon in the Mediterranean world of the early Church, and the Church condemned it as part of the immoral world in which it found itself. The Church saw it as a crime against nature that might bring down the wrath of God upon the whole community (Kosnick, 1977). In the Middle Ages, Thomas Aquinas stated that "unnatural vice... flouts nature by trans- gressing its basic principle of sexuality and is in this matter the gravest of sin" (1968 ed., II-II, q. 154, a. 12). Many religious people continue to hold the rejec- tionist position condemning homosexual acts and rejecting homosexual persons unless they repent and become heterosexual. An example of this stance is a 1987 resolution of the Southern Baptist Convention, which stated that "homosexuality is a perversion of divine standards and a violation of nature and of nat- ural affections.... [While] God loves the homosexual