We have been told, over and over again, that abortion is all about “a woman’s right to choose.” The pro-life comeback has been — correct as far as it goes — that this leaves the child’s right to life (and therefore the child’s right to choose) out of the equation. This is a valid argument, and a powerful one. But the child’s choices are all potential and future, and at the time when abortion is being contemplated, the child is in drastic need for someone who knows God to make choices on his behalf. This should be, under God’s design, a decision for life made by a nurturing mother and a protective father. When we get where we ought to be, it will not even be a decision.
What are fathers for? The biblical answer goes far beyond the answer provided by Darwin. Fathers are more than inseminating carbon units. God has established and ordered the world in a certain way. God commanded Adam, and all fathers after him, to provide and to protect (Gen. 2:15). That is what fathers are for. Provide for and protect whom? The answer is their wives and children. Unprotected children are fatherless children. Unwanted children are fatherless children. Aborted children are therefore the final word in fatherlessness.
Someone might interject and say that surely aborted children are motherless as well. This is true, and tragic. Motherlessness, the fierce suppression of the mothering instinct, is the immediate cause of an abortion. But that motherlessness is, in its own turn, a function of fatherlessness. This all happens because fathers have believed the lie that it is possible for them to opt out of the creation mandate. That mandate is assigned to every man who is ever given the tremendous privilege of making love to a woman. First the pleasure, then the provision and protection. The privilege of planting seed in a garden brings the necessary responsibility of tending that garden.
But fathers have been excluded, by law, by peer pressure, and by their own selfishness. It has been done by law in that the pattern established by Roe v. Wade has made everyone think that a decision to abort is to be made by a woman “and her doctor.” Fathers are removed from the decision by law. It is irrelevant to our ruling class whether or not the father in question has bound himself with a solemn oath to provide for his children, and to protect them. There is nothing a man can do under our current legal system to take full legal responsibility. The family has been aborted.
Peer pressure is applied by means of the sneer. Countless songs, sitcoms, romantic comedies, teen sex comedies, and more, have provided the general populace with catechetical material for the truly effective sneer. Any man who thinks that a wonderful time in bed must be necessarily linked to a lifetime of responsibility is written off as a hopeless dweeb. Faced with a choice between not being mocked and having a backbone, far too many men choose the option of not being mocked. But fathers who wilt in the face of such sneers and mockery are just sperm-delivery fathers. They have all the backbone of a wet napkin. They deserve the mockery, certainly, but from the other direction.
Of course, there is the problem of old-fashioned selfishness. Convincing men to take the sexual pleasure, and to not feel responsible for any resultant child, has therefore not been a difficult argument. It has been a downhill argument. The moral authority of Western civilization spent a number of centuries persuading and convincing males that they should take up responsibility for their progeny. That was the uphill part of the argument, and it was made possible by the growing influence of the gospel. Unfortunately, we have decided to all head back downhill again, and us with no brakes now.
So whatever else we do, let’s frame the question of abortion correctly. Abortion is the most drastic form of fatherlessness possible. Let’s not talk anymore about “a woman’s body.” A woman’s body is just what the man deserts.