LGBTQ Pastor DEBATES Michael Knowles： Is The Bible Pro-Choice？
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Summary
In light of President Trump defunding Planned Parenthood, the pro-life movement is on the move. Pastor Brandon Robertson of Sunnyside Reform Church in New York City joins me to discuss the question: Is abortion biblical?
Transcript
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Jesus would not consider a fetus to be a fully formed human being.
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There is no scientific consensus of when life begins because it's not a scientific question.
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It is a moral, philosophical, spiritual question.
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Brandon, hold on. There is a scientific consensus on when life begins.
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The whole point of an abortion is to end a life.
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So you believe when a sperm enters into an egg, that is a human being?
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I am joined, and I'm very happy to be joined, by Pastor Brandon Robertson,
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pastor of Sunnyside Reform Church in New York City,
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to discuss the question that we were going to talk about off the top.
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Because President Trump is defunding Planned Parenthood, the pro-lifers are on the move.
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Pastor Robertson, Brandon, thank you so much for coming on the show again.
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It's so good to be here, and I'm grateful in God's sovereignty
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that it's me and you having a good conversation.
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Republicans have tried to do this a number of times.
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President Trump, despite his sometimes ambiguous statements on abortion,
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has been the most pro-life president we've ever had.
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He appointed the justices who overruled Roe v. Wade.
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He's the first sitting president to show up to the March for Life.
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So, I think his pro-life bona fides are pretty good.
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Many Christians, most Christians, it seems to me, are celebrating that.
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You are not, because you think that a Christian can support abortion.
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but I do want to say also that it is just concerning the way Trump is going about
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This broad use of executive power, I think, should be concerning to anybody who cares about
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democracy, because, especially for your side, what happens when liberals get in and use the
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same executive powers to go after Planned Parenthood?
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No, Brandon, on that point, were you concerned when Mr. Obama said,
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forget about the legislature, I've got a pen and a phone.
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Look, I didn't like that at the time, but your point on the hypothetical future use of power by
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liberals, sure, that's bad, but I don't need to worry about the hypothetical,
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because they're already doing it. So, from my perspective, at least, I think, look,
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would I like this stuff codified in law? Yes, but I'll take it. However Trump can do it,
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I'm in. I'm all for executive defunding of Planned Parenthood.
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But the way he's doing it is so interesting. He's defunding nine Planned Parenthoods from a
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55-year-old program because they support DEI and supposedly stand for immigration. It's a very
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backwards way to try to defund some Planned Parenthoods and not all of them, and it's just bizarre
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from where I sit from a political standpoint. Well, sometimes I think, you know, President
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Trump is wise as a serpent, innocent as a dove. He certainly aspires to that, and I think he
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achieves it quite frequently. And so, anyway, if you could defund Planned Parenthood because the
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Planned Parenthood lunch kitchen failed the health inspection because they had one mouse in there,
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I'm all for it. You know, obviously, the real reason to defund it is because they're killing
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babies. But if it, beyond that, however you got to do it, if it's because there's a crack in their
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roof and, you know, it's not safe to inhabit, fine by me. What is the argument? I mean, what is the
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basic argument? You know, I'm a macro-snapping papist, as I've mentioned once or twice, even in
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this very segment. And the Catholic Church has been consistent for 2,000 years that abortion is not to
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be permitted, going back to the didache, going back to the earliest catechism that we have.
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Well, to that point, I actually, I mean, my position, I would say, actually leans on a lot
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of some of the early Catholic saints and theologians. You know this argument. There has
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been a large degree of diversity in Christian theology about when exactly life begins. You
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have Augustine and Thomas Aquinas having this belief that sometime after conception, and there's
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varying degrees of dates and times when that happens, that they believe life actually begins.
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And I do think, to be very honest, that that is a question that's beyond all of our pay grade,
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including the Magisterium of the Catholic Church's pay grade, to actually know the precise moment of
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when life begins. But it does seem to me, from where I sit, understanding the science and with
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my theological perspective, that life does not begin at conception. Conception is a potential life,
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and that there are a number of reasons that a woman might need to have an abortion, and I don't think
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that should be outlawed or illegal. And I think most Christians in the modern era have agreed with
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that. In fact, you'll know, Christianity Today, back in the 1960s, published a whole entire article
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that was pro-choice and advocating for abortion. So, it's a relatively recent move that we've seen
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conservative Christianity really hamper down and say that abortion is this mortal sin that we must all
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avoid. Well, it's certainly true on the Protestant side. And so, you know, worth pointing out here,
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for the, you know, we have our own liberals in the Catholic Church, too, and we call them Jesuits.
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But, you know, even they, even the liberals in the Catholic Church tend to be ardently pro-life.
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I mean, some of the most, I think of one Jesuit in particular, Father James Martin, who's-
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Exactly. I'm not surprised to hear that. But even he is ardently pro-life.
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Christianity Today is a Protestant magazine. And, you know, I like that the evangelicals kind
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of came over on the pro-life side. To your point on Thomas Aquinas, for instance, because this is
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a great observation that St. Thomas Aquinas, it's a little unclear, especially if you're not totally
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immersed in his thought, does Thomas Aquinas endorse abortion? Because he says that at a certain point,
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you have the ensoulment of the baby, you know, maybe around quickening or something.
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The reason for that, however, is based on a faulty understanding of how gestation works.
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And it's no knock on St. Thomas Aquinas. He didn't have sonograms at the time.
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But the belief, coming from Aristotle's understanding of biology, was that the only active principle in
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conception was the sperm, and that the sperm acted on the blood of the woman. So there was no
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conception, really, of an egg, that the sperm was acting on the blood, and it was in a vegetative
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soul for some period of time until quickening, say, until you could feel the baby. And now,
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not because of any theological developments, but because we have sonograms and things like
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that, and because we have modern genetics, and because we have microscopes and things,
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we can actually see that that's not when life begins. That the new human person,
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with the full independent genome and the principles of life, you know, growth and metabolism and all
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the rest of it, they all begin at conception. Conception meaning the very beginning. So,
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your argument beyond, you know, when life begins, which you say it's beyond our pay grade
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theologically. I don't think it's really beyond the pay grade at the very least of
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scientists and biologists. You know, whatever you wish us, you could say, well,
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the baby doesn't have a soul or isn't entitled to dignity because he isn't quite a person or
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something, whatever, you know, which I think is silly. But at the very least, it's a human being.
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It's an independent human being. He has the processes of life. So, let's get to brass tacks.
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Why does a woman supposedly need an abortion? And why and when would Christians tolerate that?
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Yeah, I mean, I think most people are familiar with these arguments that a woman who, for instance,
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is facing severe health challenges, perhaps might die if a pregnancy moves forward. I think there
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should be an opportunity for her to consult with her doctors and figure out whether or not it's
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safe and good for her to carry out that pregnancy. The other common times that most people, I think,
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agree that abortion should be considered is in cases of incest, abuse, rape. And again, I think
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no one is flat out pro-abortion. I think most people are wanting some moderate abilities for
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people to make choices on this very, I think, gray ethical issue about when precisely life begins
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that women have the opportunity, if confronted with one of these terrible situations, to choose to not
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move forward with a pregnancy without being thrown into prison, which is what many of these conservative
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states are actually advocating for. Why would you say no one is pro-abortion? Seems to me the women
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who go out and shout your abortion, for instance, are pro-abortion. But I'm more interested in your
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take. Forget about those ladies for a second. Why is it the case that you would even be impelled to
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say, look, look, look, no one's pro-abortion? Why not? Why wouldn't someone be pro-abortion?
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Well, precisely the reason I said. I think this is a gray issue. I don't think we can know when
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precisely life begins. I think I'm pretty confident, based on my understanding of the science, that in
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the earliest stages of conception, what we are dealing with is not a human being with all the
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faculties and rights of a human being. Well, hold on. Faculties and rights are, certainly rights is
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not the purview of a natural scientist, but even faculties, sure, I totally grant a baby at four days
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gestation does not have the faculties that I do right now. I know some people who seem like they have
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those faculties, but we are supposed to have more advanced faculties. But now we're getting into the
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realm of ethics, philosophy, and theology. Yeah. Or is it your belief that human beings get their
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rights or else their dignity from the exercise of their faculties of reason? Surely you wouldn't say
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that. No, but I do think a human being needs to be born to have the fullness of rights. Why?
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Even in liberal states, we've had protection of babies in the womb. Like if a pregnant mother's
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murdered, it'd be a double homicide until recently in New York. And totally. And I would agree that,
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again, the line is murky at when exactly we move from potential life to life. I do think towards the
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end of a pregnancy, we're dealing with a fully functioning human being, quite obviously. Science
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is clear. The sonograms show a fully functioning human being. But up until that process, that is not the
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same thing as a fully functioning human being. A fetus does not have all of the abilities that
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we have as a human. It's a potential. A two-year-old child doesn't have all the faculties
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and abilities that I have. You know, I guess I'm just, I'm, no, I promise you, I have a two and a
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half year old kid, you know, and he's very capable and he's precocious and everything. But there are
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many things that I can do that he can't do. I can, I can like screw in a light bulb. I can drive a car.
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I can do math. But that's talking about learning. That's talking about learning. But the brain
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capacity is there and it will continue to grow into a full human brain. It will continue to grow,
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exactly. And I guess that's my point for babies in the womb. I think you're on kind of weak ground
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here because I guess the question you have to answer is, on what grounds do human beings possess
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rights or dignity at all? And your answer seems to be something like, well, you know, when they can,
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when they look more like us or when they can move around a little bit more, who knows when they can
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like cry out to mama or something like that. But that's not my argument. My argument is human beings
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derive their dignity because we're rational creatures, because we are the sort of creature
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that reasons. And a little baby in the womb doesn't reason. And a two-year-old toddler doesn't
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reason. And a person who's severely mentally retarded or in a coma or actually just asleep doesn't reason
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either. But it doesn't mean that you can kill any of those people. They are human beings.
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They have the material, you know, the matter of human beings. And I think they have clearly the
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substantial form of human beings as they are developing, even by your admission, into a fully
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grown adult. Again, well, first, did I hear you say that the dignity of humans comes when they can use
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those faculties? No, no, no, no. Quite the opposite. Okay. Got it, got it, got it. Human dignity comes because
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we are rational creatures, which is to say we are the kind of creature that in principle can reason.
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Now, if someone has a traumatic brain injury, he might, or if he's born severely retarded or
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something like that, or as I pointed out, even if he's just kind of a sleeper in a coma, he no longer
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can reason. That doesn't mean that we can kill him. He doesn't lose his dignity. He doesn't lose
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his rights. He's just, he's still, he's still the kind of creature that can reason.
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Yeah. I think the big difference here, and I agree on so many of these issues, I think the
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difference between kind of the progressive theological community and the conservative
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slash Orthodox Christian community is your side calls things black and white that I don't think
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we can know in humility. As human beings with limited capacities, there are things we can't know
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to be absolutely true black and white. And I do think when does life begin is a question that we
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have been debating in Christianity since the beginning. I reject the notion that you began
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the segment with, that this has been somehow the consensus for 2,000 years. There has been a
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diversity of opinion for 2,000 years. And so, of course- A diversity of opinion among people.
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I made the, I suppose, more modest claim, though I don't know if it's really all that modest in the
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end, that the Catholic Church, at the very least, has been consistent. And you raised
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the good point of, well, what about Thomas Aquinas? You know, he's the greatest doctor
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of the church. And he says that, you know, babies aren't really like babies until a little while
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after. But then I pointed out, well, Thomas Aquinas simply thought that conception occurred
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later than we would now say, even a secular person would now say, conception occurs. So all I'm saying
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is the Catholics have been consistent, at least since the didache. And certain other flavors of
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Christianity have not been. But all flavors of Christianity read the Bible and see John the
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Baptist dancing in the womb at the visitation. How? You wouldn't encourage Elizabeth to kill John
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the Baptist? Elizabeth's health wasn't on the line, as far as I know. And that was not a conception that
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came out of abuse or anything like that. But- But if it had been, would you encourage the murder of
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the prophet who is to make straight the ways of the Lord? Well, I don't think it's a murder to have
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an abortion on a potential life. Would you encourage the ending, the termination of the pregnancy to end
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the even possibility of the life of the prophet? Probably not for John the Baptist, because in
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God's will and God's plan, that was what needed to take place. But the point I wanted to make was
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that on your side, things do seem more black and white. You all take these very hard positions,
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which I actually do think, and I mean this with a lot of respect, is an exercise in hubris because
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it's humans declaring certainty on things that we cannot have certainty on. Whereas on my side,
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I'm willing to say, I think abortion is a very tricky ethical issue. And I don't think we should
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be drawing firm black and white lines on this. If a little orphan shows up to your door and is very
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hungry and asks for food, do you think that the person whose door he shows up to should feed that
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little orphan? Generally, yeah. Every time or are there exceptions, assuming he has enough food?
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In the hypothetical, I mean, there are so many things that could be happening there, but yes,
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we'll say yes. Yes, every time. So you're drawing a clear black and white distinction in all of your
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hubris, in all of your pride and sanctimony. You're telling me that I need to feed that little hungry
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orphan every time he shows up to my door. Where do you get off with this moral sanctimony?
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That's not what I said. I said there are certain issues that clearly are above the pay grade of
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human beings. And this is one of them. There is no scientific consensus of when life begins,
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because it's not a scientific question. It is a moral, philosophical, spiritual question.
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Hold on. There is no scientific consensus of when we should be able to have abortions.
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There is a scientific consensus on when life begins. The whole point of an abortion is to end
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a life. If there were no life that were growing that had the markers of life, the seven markers of
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life that are agreed upon by scientists, that was biologically human, that was an independent human,
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not just like a fingernail or a hair follicle from the mother that isn't a parasite. That fact is
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established. It's the reason we have abortion in the first place. They might say, well,
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this kind of abortion is bioethically defensible, but you can't say it's not a life.
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I can say. I think it's a potential life. I would make that distinction. I think many,
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many people make that distinction that you've heard this argument. It's not perfect, but a seed is not
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a tree. And if you stop the seed from germinating and growing, that's not the same as killing a tree.
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A potential life is not the same as a life and a potential life.
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Like an egg. I would grant you an egg or a sperm that they're not a human being,
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but when they come together, they grow, not like a seed that you have on your everything bagel.
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They come together as a distinct creature, which is fully human and genetically totally different from
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the egg or the sperm in itself and totally different from the mother. Beginning Palm Sunday,
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So you believe when a sperm enters into an egg, that is a human being?
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That's why, for instance, when Planned Parenthood performs an abortion, kills a baby, Planned Parenthood
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was caught on camera admitting this. Planned Parenthood will take the baby and take the body parts of the
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baby and sell them to researchers who are doing work and performing research and experiments to
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develop drugs and other procedures for human beings. If the baby weren't a human being, if the
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baby's life had not been ended, they wouldn't be able to do that. Planned Parenthood wouldn't be able
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I don't think I, first of all, I don't know that situation enough, but that does sound horrifying.
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And I will, but I will say that I do think we can say that up until the point, at some point in the
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period of gestation, that this person becomes a person. That at the beginning of a pregnancy, when
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a sperm and an egg come together, that is not the same thing as a fully functioning human being with
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all the faculties of a human being. Okay. So we agree on this. We're kind of talking in circles.
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It's true. You know, the baby at six months old or five years old or whatever, it's not exactly the
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same thing as you, a grown person, but it would seem to me still a human being. And I don't see
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much argument against that. One, a more audacious claim that is made, not by you, but by one of your
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fellow progressives, is that our Lord not only would sanction abortion, but that he would work
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at Planned Parenthood. Just take a listen to this clip that was going around.
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If Jesus were here today, he would be a clinic escort, distracting women from the hatred of the
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protesters, or an abortion doula, holding women's hands and offering support and love as they end
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their pregnancies. And I expect he would have a stern word for self-righteous legislators who use
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abortion as a political issue rather than showing compassion for the people seeking abortions.
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Okay. I don't know what denomination that priestess finds herself a cleric in, but do you agree with
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that statement? Not only would our Lord tolerate abortion, he would volunteer at Planned Parenthood to
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help them be performed. It might be unsurprising to you, even though I'm a very rational progressive,
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that I actually do agree with her. Wow. I didn't know. I actually didn't know if you would agree
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with her or not. Yeah. The reason is, I would say two things. One, 96%, I believe, of the services that
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Planned Parenthood provides are not abortion. It's cancer screenings, it's STI tests, and things like
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that. Mammograms, yeah. I don't know. They haven't performed a lot of those. Well, they don't perform
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mammograms, though they used to say that they did. But come on. Does Planned Parenthood exist to hand out a
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condom to someone, and each time they hand out a condom, it counts as a service? Or does Planned
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Parenthood exist to perform abortions? I have gone to Planned Parenthood many times in my own life for
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testings and general health treatments, and I've never had an abortion. So my own anecdotal...
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If I came forward then and I said, okay, 97% of what Planned Parenthood does is give tests to Pastor
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Brandon. And no one really finds that controversial. So you know what we're going to do? We're just
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going to eliminate the 3%. It's barely anything Planned Parenthood does anyway. These abortions
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that don't even really matter to Planned Parenthood. Let's just eliminate that. Some other organization
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can do that. Planned Parenthood is just going to do tests for Brandon and all the other wonderful
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services they supposedly provide. Good. We agree. We have political consensus, right? Would they go
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for that? Would you go for that? I wouldn't go for that because, again, I don't think abortion is a
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sin. I don't think abortion is... But you don't even think it's a minor part of what Planned Parenthood does,
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this is really my point here. You realize that's the heart of what Planned Parenthood does.
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I don't think the numbers actually air that out. But I do think that abortion is what Planned
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Parenthood is known for, primarily because of the right targeting Planned Parenthood as this leading
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organization representing abortion. But to the point, I think Jesus is going to be with people in
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the height of struggles, in the height of the hardest decisions that we make. I think Jesus is with
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people in the height of those struggles. And I believe Jesus is with all of the women.
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Would he facilitate abortion? He's with us. He's always with us. Would he facilitate abortion,
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which is her claim? Yeah, I think he would walk a woman into a Planned Parenthood and sit with her
00:22:53.320
as they're making a decision to go forward with an abortion. I don't think Jesus is a doctor,
00:22:57.720
so I don't think he's going to actually carry it out. He certainly is a doctor. Doctor means teacher.
00:23:03.140
He is the teacher because he's the divine logic of the universe. But our Lord speaks a lot
00:23:09.340
about the little ones. Let the little ones come to me. Whoever scandalizes one of these little ones,
00:23:15.340
it would be better for him to be thrown with a millstone into the water. You don't think he would
00:23:21.140
take a little bit of issue with abortion, with murdering a baby? I don't think those little
00:23:28.380
ones are fetuses. No, I think he's talking about fully- You don't think the fetuses are little?
00:23:32.020
Children. I think they're little. You're good on that. I think that Jesus would not consider
00:23:39.000
a fetus to be a fully-formed human being. And again, I think many Christians, including Augustine,
00:23:45.700
who says the law does not provide that what is not yet a man should be treated as a man,
00:23:50.560
would agree with me. But the baby's a man. He's a man in the sense, in the beginning,
00:23:55.240
God created man. Both male and female created he them. He's not a man like he doesn't shave,
00:23:59.080
but he's a man in the sense that he's a human. He's a human being.
00:24:02.300
To use Augustine's language, I will say it's not yet a man. It's a potential man.
00:24:09.160
He's a man. Oh, man. Oh, man. Oh, man. Oh, man. To say that he's a potential man,
00:24:15.780
it's murky language. Would you call a five-year-old a potential man, or would you say a
00:24:21.580
five-year-old is a man? Well, I don't like to do it. Let's use the word human.
00:24:26.040
Yes. Well, now you want to use the word human, but hold on. We're trying to understand what
00:24:29.700
St. Augustine is saying. Would you call a five-year-old boy a man, or would you call him
00:24:33.700
a potential man? I think the way that Augustine was using the word man, he would call a five-year-old
00:24:37.980
boy a man. But he wouldn't, would he call a one-year-old boy a man? Yes. Would he call a baby
00:24:45.140
two days before his due date a man in his mother's womb? Not two days before. No. Okay. All right.
00:24:51.660
So where do you find that in Augustine? Where do you find that distinction? It seems to me you're
00:24:55.800
conveniently flipping the meaning of the word man. On the one hand, to refer to a human being,
00:25:01.880
and then on the other hand, to refer to a fully grown type of human being.
00:25:05.780
Are you seriously suggesting that in Augustine's quote, the law does not provide what is not yet
00:25:11.560
a man should be treated as a man, which is talking about the process of a fetus in a womb.
00:25:18.800
And that's what he's talking about. And no, no, I think, I, yeah, I think one can understand
00:25:24.980
at a broad level that we shouldn't treat a five-year-old as a fully grown man for the
00:25:30.140
purposes of say, moral culpability. So that would be one way in which we shouldn't treat as a man,
00:25:34.620
that which is not yet a man. We should not treat it going all the way back. We should not treat a
00:25:40.580
sperm and an egg as a man. They are not men. They're not human beings even. But you believe
00:25:47.380
something magical happens, the moment a sperm meets a vegan, it becomes human.
00:25:50.060
No, I think something natural happens. I don't think something magical happens. I think something
00:25:53.940
Well, I do think it's magical. I think conception is magical in a great way.
00:25:57.900
It's wondrous and impressive. Yeah. But if you think it's so magical in the sense that it's
00:26:01.940
wondrous and awe-inspiring and impressive, why would you? Why? Why is it? I thought it was just a
00:26:07.020
little meaningless clump of cells that we can just get rid of whenever we wanted. Why is the
00:26:12.840
You got to stop listening to the far, far, far left. I think most of us are far more reasonable
00:26:17.480
than that. We never just say it's all just a clump of cells. I think the process itself
00:26:21.280
is a remarkable process. Brandon, respectfully, the far left is much more reasonable on this
00:26:26.320
issue than the position you've staked out. Because the far left is wrong. I mean, they'll
00:26:30.240
just pretend that the baby's not a baby and they'll change the law. Sure. But they'll go so far as to
00:26:35.840
change the law in New York to permit abortion up until the moment of birth. And you're saying,
00:26:40.580
no, no, no, I wouldn't do that. But your view is totally incoherent to say conception is this
00:26:46.060
magical moment, this magical, wondrous, awe-inspiring thing occurs.
00:26:51.260
It's a beautiful, yeah. Why is it beautiful? What's so beautiful about it?
00:26:54.140
Because it's the potential for life to be formed.
00:26:56.940
When a man and a woman go on a date and order a bottle of wine, the potential for life to be
00:27:00.740
formed occurs, okay? And that's magical too, but I think less so than what you're talking about
00:27:05.500
Yeah. Okay. I'll give you that one. Although I've never gone on a date with a woman and ordered
00:27:10.680
a bottle of wine, so I don't know. But I will say, I think my position and I think the majority
00:27:18.000
of progressives' positions today on this issue is that this is a murky topic about when precisely
00:27:24.360
life begins. But we are pretty sure that up throughout the process of conception and gestation,
00:27:31.880
what we're not, we are not dealing with a human being that deserves all the rights that a fully
00:27:37.140
born human being has. I think the theological and philosophical tradition offers a lot of room
00:27:43.120
for this perspective. There is murkiness about when precisely someone becomes an ensouled human being,
00:27:49.260
a fully formed human being with the image and likeness of God in them. And because there is
00:27:54.480
ambiguity about this, the bigger question that we're actually debating about here is whether this
00:28:02.440
Okay. Last question. Last question. Because you say, look, you don't have this clear cut view of
00:28:06.360
the far left. You have this murky view. You know, it's all just kind of murky. We don't know. We just
00:28:12.780
Okay. So if that's murky, then do you, when there's murkiness over the question of,
00:28:18.560
is it murder to perform a certain action? As you say, do you think it's better to err on the side of
00:28:25.500
caution or on the side of liberality? That is, if we don't really know at what point it becomes
00:28:31.440
murder to perform an abortion, should we err on the side of doing abortions or not doing abortions?
00:28:39.080
I agree with you that we should err on the side of caution, which is why those who advocate for
00:28:42.960
abortion and the scientists that work on pregnancies have done so.
00:28:46.620
But you pointed out the scientists have, no, it's above their pay grade. This question.
00:28:49.400
Well, I said the church, it's above their pay grade. But I think the point here is that we do
00:28:55.260
have some general consensus that what is happening with an egg and a sperm coming together in a womb
00:29:00.260
is not a human being. It's a potential for life. And so, yes, I think there are some serious ethical
00:29:06.860
questions when we get into late-term abortions, although I don't think those should be criminalized.
00:29:11.920
You don't even think the late-term abortions should be criminalized?
00:29:14.440
What happened to your reasonable view? Your view now appears to be no different than the far left.
00:29:19.860
It's just they speak with moral certainty and you say it's all ambiguous.
00:29:23.360
Well, no. I think that if your wife is the one laying in a hospital with a potential for death,
00:29:28.460
that is a really hard moral choice to have to make. And I don't think making that choice should
00:29:34.540
No, well, you mentioned St. Thomas Aquinas earlier, and this St. Thomas Aquinas is a good guide on most
00:29:39.080
things. But here, for instance, if one's wife had a medical problem and the treatment of the
00:29:46.960
medical problem would result in the death of a baby, as does sometimes happen. Ectopic pregnancy
00:29:51.820
is a good example of this. Then through the principle of double effect, one could give the
00:29:56.160
wife the medical treatment, even if the unintended but even, say, inevitable secondary effect is the
00:30:03.000
So you lose the goalposts. So it's not called abortion, but it's still, you're moving forward
00:30:07.100
with a medical treatment that might likely end the life of a baby.
00:30:09.940
Yeah, a woman has cancer, has chemotherapy, but you're, this is not particularly complex moral
00:30:14.880
thinking. The principle of double effect is like relatively basic stuff here. You are still not,
00:30:19.700
the treatment is not the abortion. The abortion can, or the death of the baby can be a consequence
00:30:24.400
of the treatment. Nobody disagrees with that. No pro-lifer really disagrees with that. A pro-lifer
00:30:29.000
might make a different decision in his or her own life, but no one disagrees with that moral
00:30:33.680
Well, I will say that is what I'm talking about when I'm talking about late-term abortions.
00:30:38.760
So you think we should criminalize elective late-term abortions?
00:30:42.500
I think on these questions, I think that's a very strong, morally ambiguous question that
00:30:48.980
So you wouldn't even, day before birth, New York's law, the New York Andy Cuomo law,
00:30:56.440
Yes. Thank you for being more precise in exactly what that means. Yes. I think that generally that
00:31:00.940
would be illegal unless it's a situation that I consider abortion, which is making a choice for the
00:31:08.760
Again, we're going to keep going down the timeline, and I do think that there is a scientific
00:31:13.140
general consensus, and I'm not familiar exactly at this moment.
00:31:19.420
I think all of this is a strong, morally ambiguous-
00:31:27.200
Yes, Michael, I think these things are wrong. Those things are wrong.
00:31:29.900
Four days? Okay. So, all right. The difference between Pastor Brandon's view and the radical
00:31:34.900
far left's view is the radical far left wants abortion up until the moment of birth to be legal,
00:31:38.940
and you, Brandon, say, four days before. That's the cutoff.
00:31:45.500
I will say, the legal question is the scary part here that I actually think is really consequential.
00:31:51.940
I don't think that you actually have very many situations where women are walking into a clinic
00:31:56.380
at nine months of pregnancy saying, I just want to end.
00:32:00.060
And there will be no problem. It's like with Planned Parenthood. Planned Parenthood does so few
00:32:03.200
abortions. It's so unimportant to their business. Great. Spin it off. We agree.
00:32:06.840
No, I think what this is is a great political talking point. And I think everyone in the
00:32:11.640
pro-life movement knows this, that you're choosing a very extreme case that almost never happens and
00:32:17.580
saying, well, come down on this so that you can keep gaining ground.
00:32:22.320
The pro-abortion crowd can so easily dismiss that talking point by agreeing with us. Oh,
00:32:26.660
this never happens. It's totally ridiculous. Forget about it. Great. We agree. That can be illegal.
00:32:31.160
But they won't do it. And I think the reason they won't do it is because they support it.
00:32:33.640
I don't think, I think that's a very interesting jump to a conclusion. I think that the point is
00:32:41.360
that we don't want to see people criminalized for making choices about their life, their bodies,
00:32:57.160
That's a choice about a person's body. Much more a mere choice about a person's own body because it
00:33:02.220
doesn't involve another person or what you would call a potential person. So should heroin be
00:33:05.880
illegal or are laws against heroin use and fentanyl use totally immoral?
00:33:11.380
I mean, to be honest, on drug questions, I want to do a lot more research into that because I do
00:33:16.460
think the over-criminalization of drugs has been a negative, a net negative for our country. So
00:33:23.940
Yes. I don't think heroin is a good thing to do. Do I think that somebody who does heroin
00:33:28.760
should be thrown in prison? No. Or arrested or stopped in any way from doing it?
00:33:36.240
Not necessarily. Should there be laws against, I don't know, maiming yourself or killing yourself
00:33:44.160
Again, I mean, I think suicide is not a good thing, but I do think it's-
00:33:53.960
No, but like, how do you actually enact that? Somebody attempts suicide and you throw them
00:33:57.760
in jail? I think, no, they need mental health treatment.
00:34:01.020
Okay. If we're talking about treatment and if that's how laws about drugs work, I would
00:34:05.860
Often that is how laws about drugs work. So then you support that. So you support some
00:34:09.340
laws that prevent people from doing what they wish with their own bodies, but not others.
00:34:13.760
No, not prevent them. That helps them get treatment. Yes.
00:34:17.020
Okay. All right, Brandon, I have kept you too long. We've run over, but I'm glad. I'm glad we
00:34:21.360
had this time together, Brandon. I look forward to the next time you're on the show. In the
00:34:27.980
Follow me at brandonrobertson.com. And Michael, thank you. I appreciate your spirit of conversations
00:34:37.160
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