Pro-Abortion Religious Leader Bemoans Lack of Clergy Backing Roe v. Wade

Life News ^ | 1/16/08 | Steven Ertelt

[wagglebee]

Washington, DC (LifeNews.com) -- With the thirty-fifth anniversary of the infamous Roe v. Wade Supreme Court case coming next week, the head of a pro-abortion group for religious groups and leaders is bemoaning the fact that not enough clergy are promoting abortion.

However, the organization will be hard-pressed to find converts from among the Catholic and Protestant denominations that strongly oppose abortion.

Reverend Carlton Veazey, the head of the Religious Coalition for Reproductive Choice, says he's worried that, on this anniversary of Roe, "our country is on the brink of abandoning its commitment that abortion will be" available.

Veazey, a pastor of a Baptist church in Washington, D.C., is worried that the Supreme Court's upholding the national ban on partial-birth abortions and state personhood initiatives and abortion bans are "sounding the death knell for the landmark constitutional decision."

"At this point of crisis, compassionate clergy leadership is needed to awaken the silent majority of Americans who are pro-choice," he says in a statement LifeNews.com obtained.

"They know there is no one right or wrong decision about abortion," Veazey adds, saying "They deserve to know that the majority of their religious communities support abortion being legal and available to all women."

However, polls of religious Americans paint a very different picture.

However, an April 2005 Gallup survey found a strong majority of Catholics believe the Catholic Church should retain its view against abortion.

Approximately 59 percent of those polled favor the church's pro-life stance while just 37 percent of respondents opposed it. Catholics who attend church on a weekly basis were more likely to back the church's pro-life position, by a 69 to 29 percent margin.

An August 2007 Pre Research poll also found 64 percent of Americans who want abortions banned or restricted.

Just 31 percent of the public agrees with Veazey that abortion to be generally available and not have more restrictions placed on it.

Evangelicals, black evangelicals and Catholics were more likely to be pro-life than members of mainline Protestant churches and non-Christians, the survey found.

Finally, an October 2007 CBS News survey found 79 percent take one of the three pro-life stances with 35 percent taking the life of the mother position and the same percentage taking the rape, incest and life of the mother position. Nine percent opposed all abortions.

Among self-described evangelical voters, just 17 percent supported abortion.

Despite the polling data, Veazey promised that "hundreds of clergy and religious leaders in the Religious Coalition for Reproductive Choice" will continue "speaking out to protect" the so-called right to abortion.

[wagglebee]

"They know there is no one right or wrong decision about abortion," Veazey adds, saying "They deserve to know that the majority of their religious communities support abortion being legal and available to all women."

What a demented monster!

[wagglebee]

Pro-Life Ping

[wagglebee]

Moral Absolutes Ping!

Freepmail wagglebee to subscribe or unsubscribe from the moral absolutes ping list.

FreeRepublic moral absolutes keyword search
[ Add keyword moral absolutes to flag FR articles to this ping list ]

[MHGinTN]

Reverend Carlton Veazey, the head of the Religious SATANIC Coalition for Reproductive Choice ... there now, more accurate.

[RKBA Democrat]

Some good news from the pro-infanticide crowd. Remind me to shed some crocodile tears for their inability to find quislings.

I found the statistics to be heartening. Looks like the power of compounding is working it’s magic. It’ll take another 10-20 years, but infanticide for convenience’s sake will eventually go away in the U.S. Not because of anything that happens in the political sphere of course, but because women will stop allowing their unborn children to be eliminated.

[PatrickF4]

They know there is no one right or wrong decision about abortion.

Then, there is no right or wrong decision about anything! How can they claim to be religious or moral leaders when they say such things? What kind of moral authority can they claim? These types of religious leaders are only concerned with "social justice", and their own narrow interpretation of that.

[Past Your Eyes]

"Veazey, a pastor of a Baptist church..."

I guess anybody can come along and call themselves a "Baptist" church. I wonder what kind of a "Baptist" this turkey is.

[ALPAPilot]

Formal cooperation in an abortion constitutes a grave offense. The Church attaches the canonical penalty of excommunication to this crime against human life.

Catechism of the Catholic Church

This would suggest that 100% of Catholics oppose abortion. I guess those who have excommunicated themselves still keep showing up and pretending they are Catholics.

[wagglebee]

General Christianity Ping

[The Ghost of FReepers Past]

Oh yes how shocking that ministers are not in favor of irresponsible sexual behavior or killing unborn children when that behavior leads to pregnancy. How uncompassionate of them to not condone sin and selfishness and irresponsiblity. /s

[padre35]

He is a Baptist Minister in Washington DC, if anyone should be concerned with the well being of his flock, it should be Veazy(like Weezy)...

Instead, he is championing the death of infant life?

My goodness, what is the clergy coming too?

[Tanniker Smith]

I wonder if Veazey's grandfather bemoaned the closing of the last concentration camp, or if Veazey's great-great-great grandfather bemoaned the Civil War ending slavery.

I mean 3/5th of a person isn't a person and neither is someone less than human, right Veazey?

[Das Outsider]

"They know there is no one right or wrong decision about abortion," Veazey adds, saying "They deserve to know that the majority of their religious communities support abortion being legal and available to all women."

No one right or wrong decision on abortion? I don't have wonder why some Americans just despise so-called religious leaders. It is one thing to be a clergyman in favor of the right to abortion, but Veazey shirks all pretense of politeness and just says "abortion."

The biblical case for abortion rights is almost as strong as the Jewish case for self-internment.

[Das Outsider]

My goodness, what is the clergy coming too [sic?

The clergy in Aldous Huxley's Ape and Essence.

[Das Outsider]

I guess anybody can come along and call themselves a "Baptist" church. I wonder what kind of a "Baptist" this turkey is.

Perhaps a "Zen Baptist." I've heard that label quite a bit lately, as though there's really no conflict between the fundamental philosophical presuppositions of traditional Anabaptists and/or English Baptists and Zen Buddhism.

Maybe a "Roe Baptist." It's a tough hoe to Roe, but I'm sure some Marxist vector might popularize the term some time in the near future. Have you ever heard the phrase "gay Baptist preacher?" Wait a few years.

[Past Your Eyes]

Nope, haven’t heard that one yet. As a Baptist, I hope I never do but I certainly will not be surprised when I do.

[Das Outsider]

Nope, haven’t heard that one yet. As a Baptist, I hope I never do but I certainly will not be surprised when I do.

I wouldn't be surprised at all. My saying such is a sad reflection on the state of Christianity in general. How did we let this happen? Answer: We tried to be "nice," instead of cleaving to the Word of God and standing steadfast by it.

[TWohlford]

As a former (recovering) member of the clergy, this doesn’t surprise me at all.

You see, to be a pastor, you must be elected by the congregation, and those votes are taken by paper ballot as well as paper money (check). Quite frankly, you p*ss off the wrong person, and you’re packing up the parsonage.

So, the “successful” pastors are the ones that keep the peace. The last thing that 99% of their congregations want is their pastor to take a stand that puts them on the front page of the newspaper, where they are somehow made to feel “unsophisticated” or “intolerant”.

In time, those “successful” clergy are the ones who are promoted to positions of supervisory power — bishops, moderators, etc.

I once saw a pastor whose parishioner had been accused of ritual molestation of dozens of kids (Grass Lake, MI). His pastor shunned the guy, not even offering the comfort that one might give to a convicted man on death row. The pastor was horrified to be with the guy, and standing up for his innocence (was found innocent later) was out of the question.

MLKing bemoaned the fact that the clergy of his day might’ve talked a good game, but were all missing when it came time to take action. Many didn’t even talk a good game, instead writing King while in jail asking him to avoid confrontation instead of doing his marches.

Things haven’t changed much today.

[Gondring]

I found the statistics to be heartening.

Too bad Lifenews.com can't even cite their own stories correctly!

They say...

An August 2007 Pre Research poll also found 64 percent of Americans who want abortions banned or restricted.

And they link to their own story... of a Pew Research poll that was conducted in August 2006. And most telling of all is that they totally made up the 64 percent number--it isn't in there.

For example:

Abortion continues to split the country nearly down the middle. But there is consensus in one key area: two out of three Americans (66%) support finding "a middle ground" when it comes to abortion. Only three-in-ten (29%), by contrast, believe "there's no room for compromise when it comes to abortion laws." This desire to find common ground extends broadly across the political and ideological spectrum.

and

Public opinion about the legality of abortion is largely unchanged from previous polling. While about one-in-three (31%) prefer for abortion to be generally available to those who want it and one-in-ten (11%) take the opposite position that abortion should not be permitted at all, most Americans fall in between, preferring what might be described as a "legal but rare" stance. One-in-five (20%) say that abortion should be available but under stricter limits than it is now, while about one-in-three (35%) say that abortion should be illegal except in cases of rape, incest or to save the woman's life.

As for the CBS News poll claim...

...79 percent take one of the three pro-life stances...

Okay, first of all, what they are citing in the poll itself was a number for WHITE EVANGELICALS (yet LifeNews implies that it's either everyone polled, or else [from their previous paragraph] it's "Evangelicals, black evangelicals and Catholics.") I don't know many black evangelicals who consider themselves white evangelicals. Perhaps some Catholics do.

And secondly, they say: "one of the three pro-life stances," so they are saying that "abortion is okay in the case of rape" is a "pro-life" stance. Interesting. Only 9 percent of White Evangelicals (4 percent in general) said abortion should be banned entirely, though 35 percent of White Evangelicals said it would be okay only to save a woman's life.

Bottom line: a lot of sloppy game-playing with the numbers, and lumping "some restriction" in as "pro-life"

[Salvation]

Abortion kills people!