Darrow Miller and Friends

The Inestimable Value of a Baby

  1. The Inestimable Value of a Baby
  2. What Women, and Men, Stand to Lose in Today’s Incivility

DC McAllister advocates for the babyMcAllister cares about the baby

Denise McAllister, a maternal feminist[1] writer and cultural and political commentator, tweeted the above during the heated passions of the confirmation hearings of Judge Brett Kavanaugh before the U.S. Senate Judiciary Committee. McAllister wrote about what she called the root of the fire and heat over the Supreme Court nominee. As a strong, free-thinking woman, she did not mince words.

McAllister is based in Charlotte, NC. She is furiously pro-life. But it was not always so. In 1999, as a recently divorced single mom, living in poverty, with two children and an “unwanted” pregnancy, she headed to a Planned Parenthood affiliated clinic to terminate the pregnancy of her unborn baby girl. But something happened while sitting in the car outside the facility.

I thought aborting the baby would be best for myself, for my children, for the baby. But my baby would be dead. That’s what I knew as I sat in my car that day in the parking lot of Planned Parenthood, and I couldn’t escape it. While I rationalized that killing my baby would be best for everyone, her included, I knew it was really about me, my disappointments, my feelings, my life that would suddenly be so hard.

Could I sacrifice this child on the altar of my selfishness? This beautiful child growing inside of me? A child I was responsible for? A baby I had brought into this world by my own choice to have sex?

The choice that changed two lives forever

The car was like a furnace, and I looked at the door to Planned Parenthood through the haze of heat on the hood. The smell of stale fries brought back memories of my children laughing, of days when everything was good. Maybe not perfect. But good. It could be that way again. Just step out of the car, keep the appointment, lie down on the table, close my eyes, spread my legs, and let them cut out my mistake.

I didn’t kill my daughter. I’m ashamed that I wanted to—even for a moment. In the end, though, I couldn’t do it. Her blood would not be spilled to make my life easier, no matter how right my motivations might have been when it came to my family.

Choosing life changed my world forever. It was never the same, and it has been difficult as I’ve struggled to navigate the waters of a broken life. Women who abort their children do it because they say they want a better life. But it’s not a better life they want—it’s an easier one. It’s a life without outward struggle, without the consequences of choices already made. It is easier. But it’s not better. It’s never better. Death is never better.[2]

The tweet came at the high point (or should I say the low point) of the national angst and explosion of incivility. The press, politicians and general public were all speaking of the great divide in the country as manifest by the Judiciary Committee hearing where 51-year-old Dr. Christine Blasey Ford alleged that Judge Kavanaugh had sexual assaulted her some 35 years earlier when they were both in high school.

National hysteria to save abortion, dump the baby

The national uproar was a large-scale version of McAllister’s turmoil as she contemplated aborting her unborn baby. She had “the right to choose,” but the choice involved another human’s right to live. Which is the higher principle? The right of the baby to live, or the right of the mother to choose to kill her baby?

The decision focuses on two human beings, the mother and her unborn baby. But the life-and-death decision is made in the context and conflict of two radically different metanarratives. It is a religious conflict between those who worship the Creator, He who conceived the wonder and beauty of human sexuality, and those who worship sex itself. The issue is that simple.

McAllister’s tweet simply added more fuel to the raging fire.

leftists feared Kavanaugh might force you to keep your babyThose who sided with Dr. Ford were led by “Believe All Women” activists and other “pro-choice” advocates. They saw in Kavanaugh a white male, who if confirmed to be a Supreme Court Justice, might be the vote to overturn the controversial Roe v Wade decision that allowed abortions in every state. They would stop the Kavanaugh nomination at all cost, a no-holds-barred fight to the end, a battle of sacred belief systems. On one hand, worshipping the god of sex. On the other, the audacious God who conceived and created the wonder and blessing of human life and the intimate sexual means by which a unique human life is conceived from two people.

McAllister’s tweet intended no harm, but simply to shed light on the cause of the debate dividing the country.

Let’s unpack the tweet.

“At the root of #abortion hysteria is women’s unhinged desire for irresponsible sex.”

She describes as hysteria what she saw in the proabortion activists who were frantic at the prospect that the Supreme Court’s decision might be overturned.

Freedom requires responsibility

When she speaks of irresponsible sex, she’s acknowledging that some unplanned pregnancies are from unwanted sex, including rape. But she is arguing that most pregnancies are from wanted sex. She’s saying that to indulge in sex without forethought for the child who may be conceived, and later to abort that child, is reprehensible. McAllister speaks of what she knows personally:

That’s especially true in my own case because I’ve been in the exact position as many women who want abortions. I know how I got to that point. The choices I made. I know the fear of an unplanned pregnancy. I also know the irresponsible choices I made to get myself into that situation. I own it.

The sexual license of the modern and postmodern worlds breeds lawlessness in men and women, acting irresponsibly and refusing the consequences.

I want women to own their responsibilities for their freedoms …. One of those responsibilities is when you choose to have sex, even with birth control, you have the responsibility to be prepared for the possibility of pregnancy.

You can’t just end another human life because you didn’t want to be responsible – all because you put a higher value on having sex than on human life.

To be human is to be free. To be free is to be responsible. When a person denies responsibility for their actions, they reduce themselves to dumb animals. They are guided by their passions, not their humanity.

Sex is their god. Abortion is their sacrament.

Worshipping at the altar of the god of SEX leads women and men to the sacrament of abortion. The god of sex frees human beings from personal responsibility and establishes a culture of death.

The focus of modern and postmodern culture is on sex. Sex has become a god. Sex of any kind is good. (For more on this subject, see our blog WORSHIPPING THE GOD OF SEX and Mary Eberstadt’s, The Left Has a Religion — the Supreme Court Just Proved It.)

  • Darrow Miller

… to be continued

[1] We have written earlier about the three waves of feminism in the West.  The first, maternal feminists, were women who fought for mother’s rights, and for the sacredness of a baby’s life. In other words, they fought against abortion.

[2] For the complete story gut wrenching story go here.

print this page Print this page

Tagged in:, , ,
About 
Darrow is co-founder of the Disciple Nations Alliance and a featured author and teacher. For over 30 years, Darrow has been a popular conference speaker on topics that include Christianity and culture, apologetics, worldview, poverty, and the dignity of women. From 1981 to 2007 Darrow served with Food for the Hungry International (now FH association), and from 1994 as Vice President. Before joining FH, Darrow spent three years on staff at L’Abri Fellowship in Switzerland where he was discipled by Francis Schaeffer. He also served as a student pastor at Northern Arizona University and two years as a pastor of Sherman Street Fellowship in urban Denver, CO. In addition to earning his Master’s degree in Adult Education from Arizona State University, Darrow pursued graduate studies in philosophy, theology, Christian apologetics, biblical studies, and missions in the United States, Israel, and Switzerland. Darrow has authored numerous studies, articles, Bible studies and books, including Discipling Nations: The Power of Truth to Transform Culture (YWAM Publishing, 1998), Nurturing the Nations: Reclaiming the Dignity of Women for Building Healthy Cultures (InterVarsity Press, 2008), LifeWork: A Biblical Theology for What You Do Every Day (YWAM, 2009), Rethinking Social Justice: Restoring Biblical Compassion (YWAM, 2015), and more. These resources along with links to free e-books, podcasts, online training programs and more can be found at Disciple Nations Alliance (https://disciplenations.org).

1 Comment

  1. Catalina Moscoso

    November 6, 2018 - 3:36 am

    Thanks for this article my dear Mentor. I love how you write. Always I am learning from you. May our God keep you with health and safe, I love you so much.

Shares