According to a recent poll, 51% of Americans identify themselves as pro-life [1], with 59% of Protestant Christians and 52% of Catholics contributing to the numbers [2]. Many of the pro-life arguments are rooted in religious rhetoric, like the notion of life beginning at conception, or of life having some intrinsic sanctity or sacredness. Passionately they make the claim that abortion is murder, and scripture may be thrown around about the wickedness involved in depriving the innocent of their lives, but does the bible really condemn abortion, and is it a good moral basis for deciding such issues?

This article will not deal much with the arguments for abortion or the science relating to fetal development. Instead it will examine the consistency of the viewpoint adopted mostly by conservative Christians about the supposed pro-life teachings of Christianity and the bible. With that said, let's see what can be found.

I. The Pro-Life Verses

The verses above are often quoted as examples of the Christian god's opposition to abortion. Note the ambiguity of the Jeremiah passage. God knows us before he creates us... but in what sense exactly? Does God know the 'person' that a miscarriage would have become? If he does, then it hardly seems that simply knowing us before we are created is sufficient reason for God to value our progression towards birth.

The passage in Exodus is problematic and indefensible as a prohibition against abortion for a couple of reasons. First of all, the scenario describes an accidental deprivation of one's offspring. Abortion is the choice of the mother, whereas Exodus 21 speaks of a couple who had no opportunity for choice and probably wanted to have the child. Through the result of two men's careless wrestling, property is involuntarily lost. I say 'property' because the miscarriage (which is never given an age of development) is not treated as life in the passage, since compensation is monetary and only "life for life" if injury is inflicted upon the mother. Also note the chauvinism of how the husband is paid for the lost property, with no consultation to the wife.

Many anti-choice Christians use verses like Genesis 1:26-27 and Exodus 21:12 to argue that because God creates us all in his own image (and we all know how much of a narcissist God is), and because he instituted death as the punishment for taking life, the intentional destruction of an undeveloped embryo or fetus is therefore murder. Yet such arguments never do explain why a fetus should be considered human life, and they certainly don't take into account the lesson of Exodus 21:22-23 regarding the monetary compensation for a miscarriage. Pro-life Christians have to be pretty imaginative in quoting scripture, because there are actually no verses at all in the bible that speak of abortion. There are, however, many that seem curiously anti-life.

II. The Anti-Life Verses

This passage in 2 Samuel tells of how God punished David for his adultery with Bathsheba by killing the son he bore with her, several days after it came out of the womb. God's feud was supposedly with David, so why kill his son, who was undoubtedly an innocent life?

If Christian pro-lifers really believe that abortion is murdering children, then it looks as though God is not against it after all. In fact, he's done some of his own infanticide. Now it might be argued that God wants to be the only one killing babies and he forbids us to do as he does, but I think that any god who slaughters children is probably not worth following. And God actually did order his people to kill children for him, many times (Numbers 31:17, Deuteronomy 2:34, 1 Samuel 15:3, Ezekiel 9:3-6).

Life is never given any kind of special sanctity in the bible, not adult life, young life, infant life, male life, female life, human life, animal life, plant life, or anything of the sort. God previously drowned most of the earth's population in a global flood, decimated Sodom and Gomorrah, and killed the firstborn child of every Egyptian to free his people from slavery after he had continually hardened pharaoh's heart. Clearly God considers human life expendable and he does not discriminate in who he murders.

III. The Anti-Life Universe

You may believe that God has created all we see in the universe, but if you do accept this, you should be aware of just how harsh a mistress nature is to life of any kind. Several mass extinctions took place on our planet, before humans even arrived upon the scene. Viruses continue to evolve and pose perhaps the biggest natural threat to humankind. As the evolutionary biologist and geneticist Francisco Ayala has pointed out, "God is the greatest abortionist of them all" [3], considering that "at least 20 percent of pregnancies are known to end in spontaneous abortion".

The bible does say that God is "not wanting anyone to perish" (2 Peter 3:9), but he has supposedly designed some destructive imperfections into nature and our bodies, and even his own book tells of how he personally ordered the slaughter of many adults, women, and children. There is no sanctity of life to the Christian god, and the bible never teaches that life begins at conception. Instead it says that life begins when a person draws their first breath.

IV. The Pro-lifer's Dilemma

One of my favorite questions to ask a Christian pro-lifer is whether or not they believe abortion interferes with God's plan for the fetus. If they think it does interfere, then God is not omnipotent, as some actions or decisions can interrupt or violate his decrees. If they think that it doesn't interfere, then it could only be argued that God's plan for the fetus was for it to be aborted. Now before any of you jump to claim 'free will' as the answer, let me illustrate a few problems with such a suggestion.

Jeremiah 29 and Psalm 33 tell us two important things: 1) that God plans for the future of every living thing, and 2) that God can intervene to stop or amend human plans, but his own plans can never be stopped or amended. Assuming that God and free will coexist, let's say that God plans to give a fifty year lifespan to a fetus. Could our free will really take precedence and interrupt or negate God's plan before the fetus hits 50 years of age? The scriptures quoted above give a resounding "no". So if we humans cannot interfere with the plans of God by aborting a fetus, what is left to conclude other than abortion being part of God's plan?

There are many reasons one may oppose abortion, but the bible and Christianity are not pro-life, nor are they anti-abortion. Religious conservatives have simply taken many bible verses out of context to support their traditionalist, pseudo-family agenda. Once again religion fails to deliver an acceptable ethical argument for a major social and political issue of our day. The bible is not a guidebook to life, it is an outdated set of superstitious and theological tales. Any attempt to use it beyond such a scope always has, and always will, fall quite short of making a solid, coherent case. Whatever your views on abortion may be, the bible is not a helpful or wise source to turn to for your decision.

1. Anonymous. (2009) Majority of Americans now �pro-life,� poll says. Associated Press. Retrieved Sept. 7th, 2009.
2. Ertelt, S. (2009) Gallup Poll: Majority of Americans Pro-Life on Abortion.... LifeNews.com. Retrieved Sept. 7th, 2009.
3. Dean, C. (2008) Roving Defender of Evolution, and of Room for God. NYTimes.com. Retrieved Sept. 8th, 2009.