Is God the Biggest Abortionist of All?

Brian Clowes
June 24, 2020
Reproduced with Permission
Human Life International

Why be pro-life if God allows babies to die in the womb all the time? If the pro-abortion movement is justified in characterizing God as an abortionist, certainly its opponents have a serious problem to consider.

"God Is an Abortionist": The Atheist View

Several major studies of pregnancy have revealed that one-fourth to one-third of all pregnancies end naturally after the mother is aware of her pregnancy, and many more occur before this time.

Many atheist celebrities have asserted that this high miscarriage rate is evidence that God either does not exist, or that He is cruel and capricious. For example, Sam Harris writes:

Of course, the Church's position on abortion takes no more notice of the details of biology than it does of the reality of human suffering. It has been estimated that 50 percent of all human conceptions end in spontaneous abortion, usually without a woman even realizing that she was pregnant. In fact, 20 percent of all recognized pregnancies end in miscarriage. There is an obvious truth here that cries out for acknowledgment: If God exists, He is the most prolific abortionist of all.1

And Sherry Matulis, during her 1991 "Humanist Heroine Award" speech, snarled:

And although a rose is a rose is a rose, you will never hear anti‑choice proponents raise their voices against spontaneous abortion. You will never see them picket or march on Washington or take any other action to try to stop or even lessen this spontaneous " holocaust ." And you will certainly never hear them decry their God with his big abortion mill in the sky for this wanton destruction of "innocent life" - this "mass murder" of up to 80 percent of all those fertilized eggs they refer to as "unborn children." Because to discuss it - to really examine its implications-is to put the lie to all their mystical twaddle.2

Other famous atheist writers, including Richard Dawkins (author of The God Delusion ) and Neil deGrasse Tyson, heir apparent to Carl Sagan, have made the same allegation.

It is apparent that these people, like many others, have fallen victim to an all-too-common malady: profound ignorance of the history and the teachings of the Catholic Church. As far as the "details of biology" are concerned, priests led the development of many sciences, including biology, for centuries, and the Church currently has access to the expertise of the world's most accomplished scientists in every field. This means that her teachings are always consistent with science. And the "reality of human suffering" has always been one of the Church's primary concerns, as even a cursory examination of her writings will show.3

The theme of "God as Abortionist" is repeated endlessly on pro-abortion and atheist websites and blogs and is considered to be one of the primary proofs that either God does not exist, or that He does not care about us.

As I have written before , there is ample reason to believe that children who die before birth, whether through miscarriage or abortion, benefit just as much from the mercy of God as the rest of us. This is congruent with the Church's ancient teaching that even those who are not yet born are full members of the human family. Even a person who lives to be a hundred years old soon realizes that the span of his or her life is but a blink of an eye compared to eternity, where we will have billions of years to contemplate each and every second we spent on earth. For aborted or miscarried babies, an eternity with God - without having to endure the inevitable suffering of their earthly lives beforehand - must seem to them His greatest act of mercy.

Nevertheless, the question of whether God is an abortionist does not consider the eternal happiness of the unborn child but the goodness of God Himself.

Does God Cause Evil?

Of course, Harris and others who ask if God is an abortionist are missing the central point, which is the question of intent .

God's permitting will is entirely separate from His ordaining will. As St. Augustine said, "Nothing is done, unless the Almighty wills it to be done, either by permitting it, or by actually doing it."

God's ordaining, or "active" will, desires only what is good and holy, and directs us towards a life that is also good and holy.4 Examples of God's ordaining will are the Ten Commandments, Our Lord's Great Commandment to love one another, and the precepts of the Catholic Church.5

Unfortunately, man's tendency to desire illicit things (concupiscience) and the temptations of the Devil frequently produce evil effects. God's permitting will allows this evil for His own purposes, as He attempts to draw good from everything. According to St. Thomas Aquinas , "God therefore neither wills evil to be done, nor wills it not to be done, but wills to permit evil to be done; and this is a good."

For those who wonder why God doesn't "step in" and put a halt to terrible evils, from 9/11 to war to political and economic corruption, the answer is simple: If He did so, Man would not be His supreme creation but His pet, protected from the consequences of his own actions. This misunderstanding leads to people asking questions like "why do bad things happen to good people?"

In other words, miscarriages are merely permitted by God, not desired by Him. By comparison, each act of abortion is usually desired by a number of people - the mother herself ( usually for social reasons ), the boyfriend or husband, perhaps the grandparents and friends, and certainly the abortionist.

God wills each baby into existence in the first place. Referring to Him as the "greatest abortionist" is as illogical as referring to the designers and builders of the original World Trade Center as terrorists. Interestingly, the same people who criticize God for being an abortionist are usually generous in their praise for Planned Parenthood, which operates the largest chain of abortion mills in the Western Hemisphere.

Some people allege that evil occurrences (such as miscarriages) are evidence that either God does not exist, or does not measure up to our ideal of a "loving God." They generally reason as follows: (1) Miscarriages are bad; (2) if a loving God exists, the percentage of miscarriages would be low; (3) but the percentage of miscarriages is actually high; (4) therefore a loving God does not exist.

August Berkshire is typical of those who cannot seem to understand the relationship between God and man and between good and evil. He says, "Most religious people believe their god is all-powerful and all-good. It naturally follows, then, that everything this god does must also be good." He then goes on to ask why evil - including miscarriage - exists in the world.6

But this "logic" could be used for any evil in the world. Earthquakes and tsunamis? "God does not love us." Fatal school bus crash? "God is cruel." Thirty-year-old mother of three dying of cancer? "God doesn't care about us."

The fact of the matter is that the greatest evil is sin, and God does not "micro-manage" our lives or sexuality. He does not cause or prevent abortions. He does not cause us to or prevent the transmission of sexually transmitted diseases. And he does not compel us or prevent us from murdering, raping or torturing each other. All of these evils spring from the mind of man alone.

Does God approve of sin? Of course not. He only permits it so that greater good may come out of it. Similarly, God is not an abortionist. He does not murder babies as real abortionists do; He only allows them to die. The moral difference between these two is not insignificant.

Conclusion

In the final analysis, the human brain is simply not equipped to understand all of God's will, any more than it can fully grasp the concepts of "eternity" or "infinity." If we could completely understand God's plans for us, He would not be God, or at least not a god worth worshipping. We can, however, know one thing: He has our best interests at heart, and we will completely understand His plans for us soon enough.


Endnotes

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