The Hollow Empathy of the “Pro-Choice” Christian

A close-up of a wooden cross glowing at its center, with the faint silhouette of an unborn child seamlessly blended into the light, symbolizing the sanctity of life.
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It is a peculiar affliction of modern discourse that the more self-evident a moral truth becomes, the more elaborate and disingenuous the attempts to subvert it must be. Nowhere is this phenomenon more apparent than in the case of abortion. Once a matter of whispered euphemisms and reluctant concessions, the issue has undergone a grotesque evolution. It is no longer merely defended as a tragic necessity, but increasingly heralded as a positive good, a sacred rite of female autonomy, beyond reproach by the unenlightened and unworthy.

This absurdity is magnified when one considers the presence of self-described Christians among the ranks of abortion’s apologists. One struggles to conceive of a more perverse contradiction. Christianity, after all, is a faith predicated on the inherent worth of human life. It centers on the belief that each individual is endowed with divine significance, that the weak and voiceless should be defended, that suffering and sacrifice are to be met with grace and resolve—not obliterated for the sake of convenience. Yet, here we are, witnessing the contortionist performances of believers who attempt to reconcile Christ’s message with a practice that quite literally dismembers the most innocent among us.

Let us dispatch with any euphemisms at once. Abortion is not “women’s healthcare.” It is not a neutral act of personal choice, nor an administrative procedure of little consequence. It is the deliberate termination of a human life. This is not a matter of religious opinion or ideological assertion—it is a fact of biology. It was a fact before Roe v. Wade, and it remains a fact in 2025, no matter how furiously some may wish to obscure it. Trust science? Yes, let’s! Every abortion, by definition, ends a life that was alive. That is what it does. That is its function. If it did not, there would be no need for the procedure at all.

Now, it is one thing for an atheist to defend abortion, clinging to the hollow rhetoric of bodily autonomy and personal sovereignty as if human rights were not contingent upon the possession of a body to begin with. It is quite another for a Christian to do so. A Christian who defends abortion must either discard the very foundation of their faith—its reverence for the sanctity of life—or else construct an elaborate theology in which Christ Himself, champion of the vulnerable, would shrug indifferently at the mechanized destruction of millions of unborn children, or worse, champion it.

Some attempt to split the difference, advocating a kind of moral agnosticism on the issue. “Personally,” they murmur, “I oppose abortion, but I would not impose my beliefs on others.” This, of course, is rank intellectual cowardice. A position that concedes the humanity of the victim yet refuses to oppose their destruction is not neutrality—it is complicity.

And let us not pretend that this “pro-choice” Christianity is born of some higher, nobler empathy. Quite the opposite. The argument, if you can call it that, rests upon a selective application of compassion. It expresses sympathy for the mother while denying even the faintest recognition of the child’s suffering. Indeed, the entire enterprise hinges on ensuring that the child remains unseen, unconsidered, and unnamed. Empathy, you see, is reserved only for those who can articulate their distress. The unborn, voiceless and hidden, receive none.

What is this if not a failure of true moral clarity? A real, robust empathy—an empathy uncorrupted by fashionable ideology—would not content itself with mourning the plight of women while utterly discarding the existence of their offspring. A real empathy would recognize the plight of both. And yet, the defenders of abortion seem unable to extend their sympathy an inch beyond the parameters of ideological convenience.

The broader absurdity, of course, is that the very people who profess to care most about the marginalized are often the same who advocate for their eradication in utero. The child who is inconvenient, the child who is disabled, the child who is unwanted—these are precisely the human beings whom society is most eager to dispose of. And yet, we are told that this is done in the name of compassion, as if the measure of a civilization’s morality is its efficiency in eliminating those who might burden it.

And who, I ask, profits most from this great moral masquerade? Certainly not the women who are so often coerced into abortion by unsupportive families, negligent fathers, or a society that has convinced them that their lives will be ruined by the existence of their own children. Certainly not the unborn, whose silent screams are conveniently dismissed as the product of primitive nerve reactions. No, the real victors in this arrangement are the abortionists and their industrial complex, their well-oiled propaganda machine humming along as they reap the financial rewards of death. One wonders, as these champions of “reproductive justice” deposit their considerable salaries and profits, whether they feel even a flicker of unease at the price of their prosperity.

The question, then, is not whether a Christian can support abortion. A Christian can, of course, believe many things—they can believe the sky is green, if they so wish. The question is whether one can do so without a profound rupture in their moral and theological framework. And here, the answer is painfully clear: no. They cannot. One cannot serve two masters, and one cannot pretend that the Gospel can be squared with the deliberate destruction of the innocent.

If Christianity means anything at all, it means standing in defense of the vulnerable, even when it is inconvenient. It means speaking truth even when it is unwelcome. And it means recognizing that there are some evils so blatant, so inescapably grotesque, that no amount of rhetorical acrobatics can justify them.

Abortion is such an evil. And those who would baptize it in the language of faith are not only mistaken, they are morally derelict.

For women facing unplanned pregnancies who need support and guidance, Option Line offers free, confidential help: https://optionline.org/

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