Apropos the wisdom of
Gov. Huckabee's rhetoric in supporting the Human Life and Federal Marriage proposed amendments to the Constitution, here's
Robbie George explaining the approach he took in his new book (with Christopher Tollefson): Embryo: A Defense of Human Life. From an interview in Laywitness:
LW :You propose that religion is neither necessary nor sufficient for making the argument against the destruction of human embryos. What role does religion have to play in the pro-life argument? Why is it important that people of faith learn the scientific and philosophical arguments?
His first point is self-evident, I think. Communication and persuasion require common ground:
RG: I think Christians have to understand that very many of our fellow citizens are not Christians, or are not devout Christians, or do not hold an understanding of Christianity that affirms right out of the blocks the moral status of the human embryo. So they deserve to hear the argument for that proposition, and I think it’s incumbent upon Christians to do that—to make that argument in the public square and to appeal to common sources such as reason itself, science, and our basic philosophical stances articulated in the Declaration of Independence. It simply won’t be persuasive to citizens who don’t accept the authority of the Bible or the authority of the Church that the Bible or the Church says “this is so.” So one reason I think Christians need to learn to make these arguments is that this is the currency of public debate in our culture. And I think it’s good that that’s the case. I think it’s good that we can lay aside our distinctive and different religious beliefs in an area like this and argue on the basis of the philosophy and science—on the basis of reasons that are accessible to all, what are sometimes called “public reasons.”
But isn't this interesting? We're all so accustomed in a pluralist environment to "tolerating" differences of faith, it turns out
even for believers the arguments from reason are stronger motivators than those of faith:
And number two, I think Christians need to learn this argument so they will be motivated to act for the sake of justice. Even if we don’t appeal to religion to determine whether an embryo is a human being—that’s a scientific question—once we’ve determined that an embryo is a human being, and determined, in view of our commitment to the equal dignity of all human beings (all members of the human family), that the human embryo deserves our respect and protection, I think faith should motivate people to go out there and act for the sake of defending the defenseless, act for the sake of protecting the vulnerable. Just as it was faith that motivated so many people to exercise leadership roles and to support the civil rights movement and to overcome racial injustice, I think similarly faith should motivate all of us—Christians, Jews, people of other faiths—to act in defense of the vulnerable human embryo who right now is subject to being manipulated and destroyed in biomedical research.
This is precisely why,
as I've pointed out before, it is the pro-choice side that continually tries to make the abortion question a matter of religious faith. Instinctively it realizes that if believers can be made to think their opposition to abortion is something that can be known only through Revelation --such as the Trinity or the hypostatic union-- they'll be unmotivated to "impose their view" on others. Faith, after all, is a gift. The defense of the unborn is a question of justice precisely because we can demonstrate rationally and scientifically that the embryo is a person. That's something everyone can know, not something that must be received as a revelation. People of faith defend the unborn because
it is just; and because they are people of faith, they're especially motivated to promote justice for all.
