How Does a Christian Choose?

Sometimes I argue just to argue. I admit that. But this is not one of those times. This is an issue that is very important, and it is one where I am unwilling to give the ground to the pro-abortionist that Calminian’s argument affords.

The U.S. government is responsible for the lives of people who fall within her jurisdiction. This includes both citizens and non-citizens. The U.S. Constitution recognizes rights to both citizens and non-citizens. But the right to life is not a constitutionally given right, it is a God given right (and so recognized in the Constitution). Citizenship is derived from laws within a secular government. If we base the right to live on citizenship we have surrendered the fight to the pro-abortionists. Life is a God given right because life is given by God, not by man.

Abortionists do not take up the fight on grounds of non-citizenship. Clinton once, correctly, said that the unborn are not citizens. But her fight to kill babies was based on their personhood, their humanity. The DNC platform does not seek to deprive the unborn of some right as a citizen but of the right to life endowed by their Creator. When we diminish this we tear at the very fabric of the U.S. Constitution (which takes life as a basic human right, and as a justification for our independence as a nation), we diminish God’s work in value as dependent on citizenship, we reduce what it is to be human to one’s citizenship (Calminian equates “human” with “citizen” in those arguments), and we play into the hands of pro-abortionist arguments because we deny the right to life as a basic human right.

Abortion is not wrong because, as citizens, the unborn have rights under our government and our government has a responsibility to its citizens. Abortion is wrong because it deprives a person of a basic human right. Once we give this ground we are standing squarely arm and arm with the pro-abortionist.

 

You've hit the nail on the head. The debate itself (when we move the human right of life to the category of citizenship in order to debate abortion) is another way of justifying Roe vs Wade. Our justices never had the authority to deny life to the unborn because the right to life was not dependent upon one's citizenship. Laws protecting abortion exceed (or should exceed) the authority of our government because we recognize (or should recognize) life not as a government given right under citizenship but a God given right. Laws that deny basic human rights are unjust laws.

 

No, the denial of citizenship is not always used for evil. I am not sure how you came to this conclusion. Our government denies citizenship to people daily, and this is not an act of evil. What is used for evil is the redefining of human rights to be that of citizenship (what you are doing). Once you diminish human rights to be derived from citizenship, and then the government responsibility to be owed strictly to its citizens….well, you give away to the pro-abortion agenda.

But that is not and has never been their argument. When pro-abortionists argue, they argue against the unborn being “persons”, not citizens. You are missing the point and moving the argument from where it should be (a God given human right to life) to these unborn being a legally recognized subject of a secular government. And you forfeit the argument because there are only two types of citizens (either native by birth or naturalized) and by definition the unborn are neither

Categorically, yes - but not arbitrarily. By definition they are not qualified for citizenship. I don’t think that you even know the difference between human rights and citizenship (at least I hope you don’t, since you are still arguing the issue).

All humans have certain rights. They posses these rights because they are human. These rights cannot be taken away at any time. There are factors that distinguish citizenship from human rights. The key citizenship rights are the rights to participate in government, the right to dissent, and the right to self-regulation and correction.

It is not a matter of somehow “qualifying” the unborn to be citizens…it’s a matter that they simply are not (by definition) US citizens. They cannot be citizens unless you diminish those human rights to make them so. It is not an issue of being arbitrary. It is an issue of definition. The unborn can be no more citizens than they can be Republican. It’s a matter of definition.

Because I am a Christian. I believe that all men are endowed by God with certain rights. These are human rights. I believe that it is wrong to diminish human rights by somehow trying to squeeze them into rights derived from citizenship. It diminishes the lives of the unborn, it diminishes the lives of those already born, and it diminishes the holiness of God. I do not separate my “political” views from my religious views. For me, abortion is just as much (if not more) a Christian issue as it is a political one.

That is why I insist on dealing honestly with this issue, and that is why I refuse to move abortion out of the human rights arena. And that is why we disagree. You are making up your own definitions and diminishing the lives of those millions who have been aborted by making it an issue of citizenship and an affront to society rather than an issue of human rights and an affront to Almighty and Holy Creator God.