I just read the following observation in an Axios newsletter:
“Abortion rights have yet to lose since the end of Roe when the decision has been up to voters instead of legislators or courts.”
This is a sobering reality that pro-lifers need to come to terms with. It’s why many Republican politicians are now treating the pro-life cause as a political liability. See Donald Trump’s statement yesterday, and Kari Lake’s statement today. And of course, we know where the Democrats stand. They are even worse by supporting abortion rights through all nine months of a woman’s pregnancy.
The politicians are simply reflecting public opinion at this point. The majority of the American public wants access to legal abortion. They don’t want to talk about the humanity of the unborn or our responsibility to protect innocent human life. Why is that?
The bottom line is that people value their sexual freedom and want to be free from the consequences of their own fertility. If birth control measures fail, they want the option to kill the baby. And they don’t want to think about the humanity of the person they are killing, and they certainly don’t want public conversations that make them think about such things.
They want sexual freedom, and they don’t want their freedom encumbered by the babies that might result from that freedom. So they will insist that abortion must be legal. They will fight tooth and nail for that freedom. They will punish politicians who might restrict that freedom.
As long as people make an idol of sexual freedom, they will also make an idol of legal abortion. Until the idols come down, the pro-life cause will be a political liability.
But here’s the thing. Just because a democratic majority supports a thing doesn’t make that thing right. Chattel slavery was once the unquestioned law of the land with large majorities from all political parties supporting it. Those who opposed slavery were the ones in the right, even though they were a minority.
Pro-lifers need to be ready for life in the minority. Because that is where we are right now. We need to be ready to bear witness to the truth come what may. We need to hold fast to our principles even if the majority hates us for it. And we need to do it because every life really is sacred—even if the idols of sexual freedom say otherwise.
