Ideology vs. humanity

Dear editor:

Bob Bowman’s letter, “Killing the innocent,” is filled with figures and data. Whether his figures are true or not true, abortion is a human and legal issue and complicated.

In 1968, a conference sponsored by the Christian Medical Society and Christianity Today — the leading magazine about evangelicalism — refused to characterize abortion as sinful, citing individual health, family welfare and social responsibility as reasons for ending a pregnancy.

In 1973, W.A. Criswell, president of the Southern Baptist Convention from 1968-1970, had this to say: “I have always felt that it was only after a child was born and had a life separate from its mother that it became an individual person, and it has always, therefore, seemed to me that what is best for the mother and for the future should be allowed.”

For centuries, women have swallowed poisons, syringed with lye and turpentine and have used coat hangers and probes, risking serious injuries and even death, to end pregnancies. In civilized, enlightened nations, abortions are safe, sanitary and readily available. While abortion is one of the safest procedures done, certain religious and political leaders fight for restrictions, putting safe abortion out of reach for women in 87 percent of counties in the United States. Abortion has always been available for the wealthy and should be accessible regardless of an individual’s financial situation.

In America, we have a constitutional guarantee granting us the right to privacy. That is what Roe vs. Wade is all about. Ever since the ruling became law, evangelical religious leaders and conservative politicians determined to take away a women’s right to privacy by criminalizing abortion.

Does Bob Bowman really care about the lives and health of women? From his letter, I sense he does not realize the right to choose is very personal, it’s about our spouse, our daughters and granddaughters, aunts and nieces, and not about embryos, political ideology, religious beliefs and personal assumptions about what God thinks. It’s all about real people and their families.

Many Christians are so deeply pro-life they are self-righteousness, judging and condemning, completely lacking compassion, refusing support for women facing the difficult choice. I hope for a day when evangelical Christian attitudes change from being self-righteous about abortion and mature with a pro-grace attitude for women facing unplanned pregnancy.

Something is not right, something is dreadfully wrong when a person’s ideology becomes more important than humanity. Something is not good when an ideology becomes more important than compassion and love. That is when we have lost our way. George Lindholm Hot Springs