Rev. Bill Deenick. Trowel & Sword. May 1973
Preamble: Bill Deenick was intelligent, wise and softly spoken, among other things. Not what you would call a radical. To read his suggestion that Christians should man picket lines and barricades would seem somewhat out of character for this man of God. That is, until you realise that he was also passionate about his beliefs. I remember many years ago reading a feature article in a Melbourne newspaper highlighting his role in the Dutch underground, rescuing Jews from the Nazis during WW2. Above all, Bill was a man of action. Knowing that, it comes as no surprise that he urged Christians into action in another holocaust – the killing of the unborn in the place where they should have been safest. In their mothers’ wombs. A battle which today, sadly, barring a miracle, has been largely lost.
To The Barricades
The Christian community in Australia may well have to go to the picket line and the barricade if they desire to have any say at all in the determination of a number of urgent moral and legal issues at stake at the moment. It will no longer be good enough to leave it to the archbishop and the cardinal to give expression to the Christian opinion. Politicians today do not seem to believe that the church has a following or that Christian people have a conviction unless we are willing to fight for it publicly in not overly peaceful demonstrations.
The first instance on which this may be necessary is abortion law reform. Things have happened as they were expected to: a few private members of the House of Representatives have moved a bill under which abortion would be available on demand in the district for which the Federal Government is responsible i.e. the A.C.T. The prime minister (ie. Whitlam) has already indicated that he favours the bill; and since the main political parties have no policy on the matter they have decided that their members in parliament are free to vote as they see fit.
The matter itself is very clear. If the bill becomes law it will be legally permissible for an expectant mother to have her pregnancy terminated if she so desires. This, we are told, is her right. If there are reasons why she thinks that the new human life conceived in her should never become a living child it is up to her and to no one else to make that decision.
I do not propose to re-open the discussion on every aspect of the abortion debate. Legally the matter is complicated by the fact that in a State like Victoria the law as it is has practically become a dead letter since in a recent case no jury could be found prepared to convict a doctor who had practiced abortions for some considerable time. From that angle it could be argued that the proposed bill if it were to become law would only sanction the situation as it already exists, and for this reason many politicians will find it politically safer to leave things as they are. If the present law cannot be upheld because it is in practice “un-policeable” what more do abortionists want? In that respect the supporters of law reform are at least more honest. But for the Christian community the pressing question remains whether under the pressures available to the media for public communication (where Christian thought has very little influence) life and legislation in Australia should be allowed to be further de-christianised.
It may be helpful to have a closer look at some of the more popular arguments advanced in favour of law reform, since many people are confused by the seemingly humanitarian concern of the reformists. One argument used constantly is that the pregnant woman herself alone has the right to determine what is to happen to the life that she carries. Her womb is her own and the life that she carries is hers. She can do with it what she believes to be best. It is her future and her happiness that is at stake, and no one else but she has the right to determine what she has to do for her own wellbeing. The church certainly has nothing to do with it, and even the man who fathered the life that she carries has little voice in the matter, if any,
This argument has its roots in the individualistic philosophy of existentialism. In that philosophy only one question is really meaningful, i.e. what does in my opinion favour my personal happiness as I see it. I have no obligation but to myself alone and I have no ambition but to remain absolutely free to be happy in my own way. It is clear that in that context I cannot accept any commitment to the happiness of others. For a man like Jean Paul Sartre the neighbour represents hell. He robs me of my liberty. He threatens my individual happiness. He will always try to make me do things that benefit him but burden me. In her novel “She Came To Stay” Simone de Beauvoir rationalises the murder of the girl who unwelcome yet came to stay. In that climate of thinking the pregnant woman, who experiences the life growing in her as a threat to her individual liberty and happiness, has no option but to dispose of it. That is her prerogative.
In the light of the teaching of Christ this philosophy represents the old lie with which man turned away from his original destiny in the service of God. The liberty which he then sought he never found; nor will he find it today. If our (supposed) self-interest is to be the one and only standard by which we desire to live we are left in the bondage of a most arbitrary, and often cruel master and society is heading for anarchy.
In the N.T. the fellow man does not represent hell but heaven; he does not threaten my liberty but he calls me to a meaningful encounter in the service of God. In fact in him we meet God. What you do to him, says Jesus, you do to me. There is no return to personal happiness but through the recognition of our commitment to the happiness of others and in a broken world like ours this always means sacrifice. In the case of a pregnant woman this means that she cannot deny personal responsibility for the life which grows in her to be child and a person. She cannot deny a growing I/you relationship between herself and what is to be her child. It is not a living person yet; it is still in a way part of herself but it is in the process of becoming an individual human person. She has no right to interfere with that process simply because the final authority over her body is not hers. Paul already maintains in Cor. 7 that the wife does not rule over her own body but the husband does; likewise the husband does not rule over his own body but the wife does. And in Paul’s thinking they know together that the final authority over their bodies, as temples of the Holy Spirit, is not theirs but God’s. If anyone destroys God’s temple God will destroy him.
To Sartre and others all this may seem to be hell; for the Christian it is the kingdom of heaven in which people are in love mutually concerned for each other’s body. From the moment of conception there is (in the process of growing) another body meant to become by the grace of God a temple of the Holy Spirit; and in the relationship between husband and wife it means that a third life has come into the picture which comes with lawful demands. Admittedly outside marriage things become immediately more difficult, but not principally different. The unmarried mother has no final authority over her own body either, nor can she escape responsibility over against God for the child growing in her. She must protect it and make it welcome. A true understanding of what personal happiness means will lead her to the conclusion that individual personal wellbeing is served best by the acceptance of divinely ordained responsibility and by obedience to the law of Christ.
In that law we are called to care with sacrificial love and concern for human life (our own and everybody else’s). There are no shortcuts to personal happiness as suggested by those who favour abortion on demand. A return to true happiness is found only when all concerned are prepared to bring the sacrifices needed.
This has not always been properly understood in Christian circles, nor has it always been practiced. Not always have Christian families been able to deal with the problem of a sixteen year of old pregnant daughter in a manner that restored personal and family happiness. Yet, by the grace of God there have been such Christian homes, and Christ’s church continues to have a great task here. First of all we must see that within the church all children are welcome, those born to the single mother as well. But also outside the Christian community the church has a tremendous field of work for the restoration of happiness in the way of sacrificial and loving concern. It is not in its legislation against abortion but in its condemnatory attitude and in its lack of a loving concern for the restoration of life that the Christian world has fallen short in many disastrous and hypocritical ways. Therefore the law reform that we need is not that abortion be made legal. That is a no exit road. If it leads to anything it is to the depreciation of human life and the deepening loneliness and unhappiness. The law reform needed must be found in the direction of an enlightened legislation towards the care for and the protection of the pregnant woman (within or outside marriage) and of every child born. This will cost the community infinitely more than abortion law reform, which to be sure is the cheap and easy way out. To follow Christ in community life is more expensive; but it is worth it. Justice to the born and the unborn exalts a nation.
One more point. In order to make things attractive to naive souls the hard realities of existentialist (im)morality have been sugarcoated with humanitarian phrases. It is argued that the real motive behind abortion law reform is concern for the future of the pregnant teenager and of the child born out of wedlock. The poor girl who cannot pay for a proper but expensive abortion by a qualified surgeon (expensive because it is illegal) has to turn to the backyard abortionist for help.
If abortion is legalised we eliminate the back yarder.
This sounds very humanitarian and people who are easily persuaded by what looks like a defence of the socially less privileged may fall for this kind of argument. The procedure is simple enough. The first thing to do is to point to an obvious social evil from which the socially weak suffer most; and the next thing is to suggest that your solution is the only and the quickest way to right that wrong. It is true, is it not, that the child born out of wedlock has less of a chance in life than other children? It is true, is it not, that fewer children should be born out of wedlock? It is true, is it not, that the poor pregnant girl must be kept out of the hands of the back yarder? Yes, all that is true. But it is not true that abortion law reform is the answer. It is not true that the pregnant teenager is really helped when her child is not given a chance to live. Her loneliness and unhappiness will only deepen. The aborting doctor does not merely cut a living thing out of her womb. He cuts love away out of her heart. In a very drastic manner he confirms her in a way of life in which in crucial moments love and responsibility are sacrificed to what seems to be personal interest. And as far as the back yarder is concerned, abortion law reform will merely give him status and a safer financial return.
Are protestant Christians today prepared to go to the picket line and the barricade in defence of the law of Christ and for the protection of human life? In Melbourne the prime minister met with a stormy protest and in London the picket lines were waiting for him. I sincerely hope that this is only the beginning of a vigorous nationwide opposition not only to the proposed bill but to the whole of the philosophy behind it.
As far as I am concerned: if cardinal Knox goes to the barricades I will be happy to join him. But do we need to wait for him?
What the Christian Church has to offer is both ethically and intellectually infinitely superior to the short cut solutions of the law reform enthusiasts.
Why then should this not be trumpeted from the rooftops?
BILL DEENICK
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