Who would have thought that holding a self-contradictory and incoherent position might wind up confusing people or leading them not to trust you?
I’m with First Things’ blogger Pavlischek on this one: rather than listen to Wallis talk about what People of Faith think about abortion, I’d like to hear what Wallis himself thinks. Should abortion be legal? Why or why not? If abortion is to be legal, what constitutes legitimate grounds for the government to discourage the practice? And if the anti-abortion provisions included so far in the health-care reform bills are not satisfactory—as Wallis and the Catholic bishops seem to agree—is he willing to bring down the final bill? Again, why or why not?
I don’t think it’s too much to ask of public religious voices that they own their words. Surely we today can suffer a little embarrassment or loss of political status.
Oh, and while we’re at it, I have yet to hear anything from Dan Gilgoff or Rachel Laser. Sure seems like there’s lots of people worried about what other people are thinking, but not so many actually willing to come out and say what they think, or why.
Pencils down, please. Time to hear your answers.
Tags: abortion, dan gilgoff, first things, health care, healthcare, jim wallis, pro-choice, pro-life, reproductive rights
America responded to the problem of teenage pregnancy and cross border illegal abortions by making abortion legal. Christianity responsed by becoming political, and the Republican party responded to the Christians by offering promises for votes. They succeeded in winning elections, so they had to keep putting the promises off in the future so that they could continue winning more. Once in office they had to consolidate power, and a war on terror was the most effecient way to do that. They were able to kill two birds with one stone by convincing us if we let the rich become richer they would trickle on us. We were eventually able to see what that meant, but our mistake was too big to ever admit, so we are stuck.
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