How To Be Pro-Life

[marigold]

I'm not sure how I even explain what I am asking. The backstory is that I come from a very... well, 'this culture' family. The women in particular are very vocal about feminism, we can do it, solidarity, bodily autonomy including access to contraceptives and abortions, etc. We all absorbed it growing up, and I don't wish to totally discount its influence because I think it's given me many good things, like a sense of self-worth (it's really scary realising how few people actually have that); confidence in standing up for others; the ability to think critically, especially about sources of information; a general sense of love and freedom about the world.

All those things can serve you really well in Christianity! And they all conspired together to make me first of all a believer, then quietly pro-life. To begin with it was just a 'sense' of things; then it developed slowly into realising the incompatibility of murder being wrong and abortion being right... then that the little baby obviously should have bodily autonomy and bodily autonomy = right to stay alive no matter what anyone else says. I wasn't sure I could support it with anyone else's evidence, but everything started slowly going in the one direction.

Within the past couple of years, two popular culture things were actually real game-changers in how I thought about the whole issue. The first was the episode of House where he spends basically the entire episode in a ward room with a young woman who is thinking about having an abortion. She asks him if he thinks abortion is murder and he says YES obviously it is, it just depends on what you think is worth it. (Paraphrasing.) This was really helpful to me because it said clearly what I thought everyone around me in the culture had been saying euphemistically; that of course it does end a life, but the mother's decisions about her body are more important. Now maybe I'm going to blow a Phatmasser mind or two but I don't honestly think that any pro-choicer thinks that abortion is a wonderful thing and oh, everyone should experience it - they just think that it is necessary and ought to be available because women being able to choose what happens to their bodies is more important. 

(That's also why I think discussions that try to bring in 'scientific evidence' are ultimately pointless: because that's not what the real sticking point is.)

The second was a quote from Peter Kreeft: "Abortion is the anti-Christ's demonic parody of the Eucharist. That's why it uses the same holy words, 'This is my body', with the blasphemous opposite meaning." That just blew my mind and I haven't been able to stop thinking about it since I heard it (the talk is here).

All this stuff coming out about Planned Parenthood selling body parts has come at the same time as these years of considerations have matured into being quite settled on the issue, and I'm feeling twinges of conscience that it shouldn't just be private any more.

But here's the thing. I have no idea how to be pro-life. Specifically I have no idea how to be pro-life as a twenty-something from a pro-choice SJW family in 21st-century western society. What does it look like? How do you talk to people? What do you do?

Bring me all the good advice, Phatmassers

PS some of you may be interested to read the Orthodox Wiki article on abortion. It's possibly the least encyclopedic thing I've ever read, but the second half of the Overview section, in particular, reads like a love letter.

[Didacus]

Be strong, be fatihful and may the Father Himself keep you in His hands.   

[He is Risen!]

I hadn't heard that Peter Kreeft quote before, but wow!  For me, being pro life has really meant not being silent when people around me (family and friends mostly) bring the issue up and to know my facts to be able to confidently share the truth.  When I was younger I would be quiet to keep the peace and not make waves, but to speak the truth in love can plant seeds for the other person to have a change of heart where silence is often taken for agreement.  I think a lot of people support PP because they have been fed their lies for their whole lives and to think differently is very strange or extremest, so know your facts!  Also, it has meant doing things that actively support the pro-life cause like donating items or money to organizations that support mothers.  There are all kinds of hands on things you can do.  Of course, this is in a foundation of prayer and fasting (very important).  I know that to say something that disagrees with family can be unnerving, but say a prayer for courage and grace because you are shining the light in a place that is very very dark.  Be not afraid!

[marigold]

Yeah, I guess a lot of it comes down to knowing your stuff and not backing down immediately... I'm usually pretty confident but I hate confrontation

[julianneoflongbeach]

There is no need to get confrontational. If you are with people who turn the discussion towards abortion, your choices are more than to either get hysterical or stay silent. Just remember to keep your cool and state facts. "I just want to let you know I've changed my mind on this issue, if you want to know my reasons they are x, y, and z." And if you don't want to get into a debate just let them know that talking about it as a positive makes you uncomfortable and the subject needs to be changed.

But the simplest and most effective thing you can do about it is pray, in which ever way feels best. And, of course, vote for people who at least won't make the matter worse.

Edited July 15, 2015 by julianneoflongbeach

[MarysLittleFlower]

From my limited experience I'd say... Debates just make people get more defensive. I'd pray a lot and say things in a non confrontational way... Sometimes someone is wrong and we feel anxious and try to change their mind. I've found it better to ask - what could help the person where they are to go to the next level? Not all points or topics about abortion need to be mentioned at once for example. But if someone asks what I think or if there's an opportunity to say the truth I don't believe in being silent unless there's a serious reason to postpone speaking.  

[Gabriela]

Why should you say something? I think silence and prayer are sufficient. We don't all have to be "active culture-changers". When people around me are discussing abortion, I keep my mouth shut. If they ask me what I think, I tell them. Typically the people I'm around hear me out respectfully, though they don't agree. But if they start getting argumentative or hostile, I say, "I was just standing here with my mouth shut [praying for your conversion < I don't tell them that part ], then you asked me what I thought, so I told you. Now you're attacking me for obliging you." That usually shuts them up. If it doesn't, I excuse myself politely and walk away.

I agree with you: Debates are pointless. The best thing you can do in the presence of pro-abortion hostiles is maintain your calm Christian composure. That will show them there's more than one—angry—way to talk about the issue. Which is really where society needs to start with this topic.

If you can't maintain calm Christian composure, walk away and pray silently for them.

[marigold]

I feel like I've been telling myself I'm doing that for years and it's turned me into a coward. There's non-confrontational, and then there's fear of confrontation that makes you vigorously avoid all opportunities when that topic's going to come up. I should care less what people think but I don't know how

[marigold]

I also want to know how being pro-life affects other things people do, if it does...?

[beatitude]

Why should you say something? I think silence and prayer are sufficient. We don't all have to be "active culture-changers".

I have something interesting to add to this. I have a good friend and former flatmate who used to be a very liberal Anglican when it came to ethics. We became friends at university and we had several philosophical debates about abortion. I could never change his mind. Then, three years later, after we'd been living in the same house for twelve months, he abruptly said that he'd changed his mind on abortion and "a big part of that was you". I was startled, as we hadn't discussed it for ages. I asked what he meant. He said, "It's not anything you've said, it's more how you live your life."

At the time I was working in a residential school for people with Down's Syndrome and related profound learning disabilities. I would often chat about my work to my housemates. My friend said that just hearing me talk about the things I had done with my students (cake-baking, helping one to write his name for the first time in his life, etc.) had been influential in changing his point of view. He had never supported abortion on grounds of disability alone, so it wasn't that I had convinced him for disability-specific reasons - he had already recognised the argument for selective abortion on disability grounds as weak. He said, "You obviously care about people who are vulnerable, and looking at you, it's easy to see that it's right to do it." This had transformed his view of the unborn. This conversation really shook me, because it showed me just how much influence our words and actions can have when we don't even know it. It also showed me that Catholic ethics are interlaced - being pro-life isn't divorced from simple kindness, from basic respect for others - and we need those things for philosophical arguments to be taken seriously. For me, being pro-life means cultivating an awareness that each soul was created by God, bears the image of God, is "the least of these, my brothers", and that there is no other person like them in existence and never will be again. If you believe that, really believe it, then the belief should show itself in all areas of your life.

In answer to Marigold's second question, being pro-life has affected my choice of work. I feel a special call to be with people who have severe learning disabilities, people who are most likely to be pitied and written off (even by other Christians). I sometimes hear Christians saying of the people I work with, "God has put them on this earth to teach us lessons", thinking that they are making a pro-life statement, but it isn't actually pro-life - they are basically implying that the only reason a person with a severe learning disability could have for existing is to 'teach' us something. But they are their own persons with full human lives; they are not just educational aids for the rest of us. I want my life to bear witness to this. I work in humanitarian response, and my hope is one day to create a community for people with intellectual disabilities and their families who have experienced war and trauma, no matter what their religious, political, or ethnic backgrounds, because I have started to see that peace and reconciliation must begin with regard for the most vulnerable. For me this is an expression of pro-life philosophy too - care for the unborn dovetails with being anti-war and support for the dignity of disabled people who are so marginalised that academic journals publish articles questioning their right to be here and breathing. It's all part of the same picture.

[Gabriela]

"It's not anything you've said, it's more how you live your life."

Exactly. Marigold, remember: "Preach always. If necessary, use words."

I don't think it's cowardice to remain silent when no one asks your opinion. In fact, I think people who feel they have to speak up whenever something immoral is being discussed often run the risk of being perceived as loud, annoying moralizers, and so actually have the opposite effect from the one they think they have: that is, they drive people away from the Faith rather than draw them in. You know nobody wants to hear your view—the Catholic view—so why force it on them? That can only make them more resistant.

I think that people who feel the need to broadcast Catholic views of morality far and wide, at every opportunity, make the mistake of thinking that it is us who convert people. We don't convert anyone. God converts people.

To me, evangelization-by-"lifestyle" is actually the most effective way to evangelize. People never feel that you're "shoving your religion/morals down their throat". You never give them reason to formulate arguments against you. You just mind your own business and they look on, observing how a happy Christian lives. Eventually, the hole in their own soul starts to eat at them. And they keep looking at you. And it eats. And they look closer. And it eats...

And then they start thinking...

Of course, if someone asks my view, or asks what Catholicism teaches on x, y, or z, I tell them. That's where it would be cowardly to back down: If someone asked and I ferreted my way out of it because I'm too afraid of how they'll react. But I don't, even when it's "dangerous" for me (like in my job, or for you, like in your family). In this way, if they start doing the atheist rant against my answer, I am totally justified in reminding them that I didn't bring this up, they did. They realize then that there's no way they can fairly or rationally accuse me of being the loud, annoying, moralizing Catholic, so they back off, usually with an apology. And all is well.

And it eats... 

 

 

Edited July 16, 2015 by Gabriela

[MarysLittleFlower]

I feel like sometimes I drove people further from the faith by saying stuff - which makes me feel terrible and guilty... and other times I say nothing and feel like I'm causing scandal... There are many good points here and in the last two posts posts but how do we feel like we're not scandalizing people by saying nothing? I don't always say anything... I also read we are not obligated to say anything if it would make the person worse but other timed we may have an obligation too. 

[Gabriela]

I don't think giving scandal can apply in the case of remaining silent while people discuss a broad social issue like abortion. I think it would apply in a case where, for example, a recognizably Catholic person sits quietly and looks on while another person is injured in body or dignity. But for big debates like this, I think you need to be strategic and very smart about how you evangelize on the issue. Personally, I think a person is more likely to give scandal by actually saying something in such a conversation than by simply remaining silent.

Edited July 16, 2015 by Gabriela

[MarysLittleFlower]

How so? (Regarding the last point). Or does it depend on how you say it? For example one might share a personal story instead of just "preaching"... Something that wouldn't make it defensive at first. Like if people are talking about aborting people with downs syndrome, one might say "I work with downs syndrome kids at a school and they are a joy to know". Or other personal experience stories that are hard to argue with? 

[marigold]

For me, when I'm talking with non-believers who are either clueless about the faith, or hostile, or both, I've had more success getting a point across when I explain from a purely personal point of view. Even if that means leaving out the fact that my view comes from the faith, for the time being.

For example, last night I was talking with my dad, who is a hippie and an artist and into all kinds of 'green' stuff, and he asked me about which monastic communities I was thinking about visiting. I mentioned a couple, and then went into more detail about one of them, which happens to have a focus on ecological farming. I told him what they did and why, and emphasised the bits I knew he would be interested in. And he was! That's an easy situation because I know him inside out, and I know that it's taken him a lot to get over his prejudice against Christian communities, so I show him the bits that he can understand - organic farming, care for the earth, interest in preservation of ancient land, etc. That's a foothold, and he's now got a positive impression of something that those weird Orthodox nuns do, which can start to counterbalance all the terrible true and untrue things he thinks about Christianity.

I think my point is that I don't know how to do that with pro-life issues.