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The other day on Dr. Keyes’ radio show, he spoke with a lady from Florida named Christie. She was pro-choice. Not only was she wrong in her opinion about child killing, but she rashly attempted to debate Alan Keyes, who is a world-class debater on any subject. She was demolished. Her parting words were feeble and desperate: "They aren’t human beings until they are born."

My brother Michael called Dr. Keyes immediately to tell him that his argument with Christie had failed. The word "failed" might have been a little strong, but not necessarily inaccurate. If Dr. Keyes’ objective was to persuade Christie of the truth about child killing, he did fail. Of course, she may ponder the exchange and eventually change her mind. Not very many people will turn on a dime (I don’t think I do), but given compelling reasons, a lot of people will slowly start cranking the wheel to one side...

...which is what Dr. Keyes himself may do as he thinks about what Michael tried to explain: People who have themselves committed abortion killings – and there are a lot of them in this country -- can have their intellectual defenses totally crushed by sound reasoning, and still not change their minds. They’ll cling to any and every shred of argument they can, even ad hominem "arguments" and red herrings. For these people, a change of mind is a great deal more than an intellectual decision. A change of mind makes them vulnerable to unspeakable tortures of the heart. Most of them are suffering anyway, but a change of mind about abortion means they have to come to terms with something that previously they could at least try to ignore. Personal blood guilt will have to be faced head-on, and that’s just too much for almost everybody. It’s one thing to listen to the wolf howling outside the walls; it’s quite another to open the door and let him in.

It’s good and proper that we give clear reasons for why it is wrong for parents to kill their children, and why the law should not allow parents to kill their children, but we shouldn’t be too optimistic about the power of intellectual arguments alone to change the hearts and minds of people who have already killed a child. For each one of them, "the abortion issue" is not abstract. It’s not really about 35 million abortions since Roe v. Wade, or about 4,000 children killed by abortion every day in the United States. It’s about one abortion. One child. It’s about something that’s been done and can’t be undone.

Human reason is a wonderful tool, but it’s like a taxi cab driver who won’t carry you into the projects at night, even if it’s just a mile further on. If you want to go there, you get out under a street light and you walk. For people who have killed a child by abortion, they know that if they accept the truth, they will have to go home, after dark, to a very rough neighborhood. The taxi doesn’t go there. Human reason and the eloquence of Alan Keyes won’t move these people that last mile.

You can objectively win an intellectual debate without changing your opponent’s position. Douglas and Lincoln debated over and over and over again. Most voters could tell who won, but Douglas himself was oblivious. Alan Keyes can crush poor Christie’s arguments and still she pathetically clings to empty dogma. If the objective is to win whatever can be won by intellectual argument, Dr. Keyes is reaching his objective. He is winning arguments. But if the objective is to end the murder of children by abortion techniques, the limits of human reason will have to be acknowledged. There are 50 or 60 or 70 million Americans, maybe more, who have participated in killing a child by abortion – fathers and mothers through direct action, and many, many others by giving wicked counsel. The political importance of these people as a barrier to securing justice for the weak must someday be recognized by Dr. Keyes and other pro-life leaders.

What can be done about the last mile?

When the truth about child killing (what is usually called "abortion" because of the sanitized medical nuance) is stated clearly, there should be a concurrent presentation of the Gospel, of the truth that there is forgiveness from God through repentance and faith in Jesus Christ. When the truth about abortion is presented with the message of the cross, the Holy Spirit may open the eyes and hearts of many millions of people, and there will be a change in this country which will shake the whole world. But without the message of the cross, without the hope of forgiveness, I’m not convinced that we would benefit from convincing (intellectually) 60 million people that they’ve killed their own children. Where would that leave them? I suspect there would be a hardening effect -- and we may even be seeing this already, as writers like Naomi Wolf candidly admit what the techniques of abortion are really all about, even while groping for a new moral framework to put it in. The moral framework she’s looking for is available: In the ancient near east it surfaced as the worship of Molech.

Abortion may be a political issue, but it is also a terrifying personal issue for tens of millions of people. It’s an opportunity for the Gospel and a challenge for the Christian churches.

I know that many pro-lifers will balk at this. (Dr. Keyes either balked or didn’t understand what Michael was saying.) We’re not used to seeing an obligation for evangelism bound up with our obligation to speak out for the defenseless. Evangelism doesn’t come naturally to any of us, and we’d just as soon wrestle with this as if it were a legal problem that can be solved by electing better legislators and better executives, by getting better judges, and so forth. But I believe we’re ignoring an elephant sitting right in the middle of the room: a vast population of people who have killed at least one child by abortion, whose problem is much more serious than a wrong opinion about a political issue. They have blood on their hands, and if we neglect to tell them where they can find water that will wash off that blood, we should not be surprised that their reluctance to even listen to arguments about abortion will continue to be an insurmountable political obstacle -- and a riddle to those who rely too much on the power of reason, forgetting that guilt can be a cruel and unreasonable master.

If you didn’t see this above, see it now: Abortion... is a terrifying personal issue for tens of millions of people. It’s an opportunity for the Gospel and a challenge for the Christian churches.

It’s a challenge for the Christian churches because it’s an opportunity for the Gospel.

PB

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