I’m not a fan of recorded speeches, lectures or debates because it takes too long to get information from them. I prefer transcripts but when they’re not available, I’ll begrudgingly listen to audio. This video is a debate between Mike Adams and Dr. Willie Parker on the morality of abortion. You can skip it if you don’t like listening to audio. I don’t blame you. But if you’re interested in watching one of abortion’s premier moral defenders prove that abortion has no moral defense, I recommend skipping ahead to around the 31 minute mark.
Or skip it…I still don’t blame you. I posted the video as reference because you’re not going to believe me when I tell you what Dr. Willie Parker actually said during this debate. Parker identifies as a Christian and has written a book about abortion as “the Christian thing to do“. I haven’t read the book. I don’t plan to read the book. I’ve heard enough of Parker’s rhetoric to get it. His moral argument for choice is based on the idea that unborn fetuses are “human” but they’re not “people”.
See? Told you that you wouldn’t believe me!
Parker is NOT a random, empty-headed celebrity advocating for abortion. The dude is a doctor. He was medical director for Planned Parenthood in Alabama. And he’s a Christian! If anyone can make the moral case for abortion, it’s Willie Parker. Amen?
The problem is – there is no moral case for abortion. If there was, Parker would have made it. Instead, Parker makes a vague distinction between humans and people. It’s okay to kill humans. It’s wrong to kill people. Toward the end of the video, someone asks the Good Doctor how he determines when a human is a person. His answer is, “It is not an instantaneous event…”
If you’re a Christian, you can’t be pro-choice. Watch the video before you tell me I’m wrong. Listen to Willie Parker. He’s making the best argument possible for abortion – and that argument is outrageous. At best, he is muddled. At worst, he is evil.
If you’re really pressed for time, skip ahead to 1:24:50 and listen to Parker try and explain when humans become people. Then, if you’re a Christian, ask yourself if any of that is supported by the Bible.
…oh, Mike Adam’s closing statement is fabulous.
6 Responses
Parker’s entire case rests upon his desire to distinguish between humanhood and personhood, then to cloud the nature of the transition into personhood. It is simply an exercise in sophism. It springs from the Roe v. Wade decision which itself said the right to abort will fall apart if the personhood of the fetus can be established. The pro-abortion camp has an obvious vested interest in denying the personhood of the unborn, or in some cases the personhood of the very recently born.
I used to know someone whom I would consider to be a sincere Christian who held the view that the fetus is not a person until the time of “the quickening”, when the soul moves into the body. In that view, when the fetus begins to move, to kick and punch, it is taken as evidence of the quickening, and is the point beyond which abortion is no longer acceptable. I’m not quite sure what to make of this view, but it does seem a lot more plausible than Parker’s clumsy attempt to tap-dance around it and appeal to pluralism.
I’ll need to think about the “quickening” thing. It’s intriguing. Thanks for the comment.
Ron- You bring up an interesting idea. However, I think that the fetus has the potential to grow into a human being. Therefore, I consider it a human, and by killing it you are committing murder.
Abortion has no moral defense. Pretty much says it all.
I don’t think most people who are claim to be Christian really are.
Parker is not a Christian. Plain and simple.