As American Christians celebrate the death of Roe V. Wade and prayerfully petition God for the end of abortion in their respective states, evangelical leftists have begun subversive messaging to bring the Democratic Party platform into the church under the guise of the trojan horse of “making abortion “unnecessary” or “making abortion unthinkable.” Many social media messages about the Supreme Court decision from leftist evangelicals followed a typical pattern that began with a mention of the ruling and ended with a statement about making abortion unnecessary or ending the conditions that they believe cause women to want to murder their pre-born children.
Former TGC contributor Thabiti Anyabwile (AKA Ron Burns) believes that the overturning of Roe V. Wade will be a “pyrrhic victory” (a worthless or fruitless victory) if work is not done to “make abortion unthinkable” and “create conditions for women that help them escape the dreadful situation altogether.” By this, Burns means that the church must advocate for leftist policies such as increased welfare, gun control, and anything else deemed necessary to deter women from murdering their children, as if throwing money and failed socialist solutions at a heart problem will instantly make murder go away.
Egalitarian Beth Allison Barr echoed Burn’s sentiment, beginning her Twitter thread by claiming the pro-life credentials of having done pro-life work. Allison Barr didn’t offer any praise for the ruling, as she is a leftist, but instead used the opportunity to rail against the systemic oppression of women. Barr wants to stuff her “pro-life” trojan horse with egalitarianism, birth control, “believing women,” and leftist “systemic solutions.”
Karen Swallow Prior, a self-proclaimed “whole life” pro-lifer (a position more deceptive than a whole-life insurance sales pitch), wants a deluxe trojan horse that will include everything from climate care, gun control, animal rights, egalitarianism, and socialism. She isn’t shy about her desire to loot money from those who have earned it and dump it on pregnant women. Of course, everyone knows that Bible verse about redistributing wealth and giving it to pregnant women to change their hearts and win them over to the Gospel. Or was that a Democratic Party field manual on how to win votes?
Sheologian Summer Jaeger pointed out the subversiveness of the messaging. Instead of pointing women to the Gospel of Jesus, leftist evangelicals and incrementalists have substituted pragmatism for the message of the Gospel. In place of presenting the Law of God as a mirror to show women that murder is a sin and the Gospel to show them that salvation and forgiveness for that sin come through Christ alone, they want to win women over with cold hard cash. Whether that cash is obtained through redistribution within the church or government programs, money will never solve the heart problem of a wicked and depraved generation.
While they were typically more purposely vague about their understanding of what “make abortion unthinkable” means, institutionalist evangelicals were also out in force. Jen Wilkin pushed the idea that “underlying factors make abortion appear the only alternative for so many women.” After reading all of the comments about the extenuating circumstances of women in the United States that cause them to murder their children, an outside observer would certainly question the argument’s legitimacy on the basis of economics. If women in the United States, a country that ranks as one of the wealthiest countries in the world, choose to murder their children at a higher rate than most third-world countries, how would more cash and programs solve the problem?
It’s subtle, but then this theological sort of sleight of hand always is.
