Author and pastor David Platt was, at one time, the youngest leader of any megachurch in the country. He also headed up the Southern Baptist Convention’s International Mission Board.
But during the anti-abortion March for Life last week, he apologized to the crowd for not preaching against abortion more forcefully when he was younger.
“There was a point as a pastor when I just kind of stayed away from abortion [because I’d think] that’s a political issue,” Platt, the lead pastor of McLean Bible Church in Vienna, Virginia, and author of Radical, told [the Christian Post]. “But I got really convicted. Far before it is any kind of political issue, it is a biblical issue that God speaks really clear about the value of life.”
It’s easy to cherry-pick Bible verses about the value of life (Psalm 139 in particular), but historically, these were not used to support an anti-abortion approach, nor are they a concise explanation of when personhood begins. Indeed, conservative Christians didn’t become anti-abortion until it became politically useful for them to do so in the late 1970s. Late 1970s. That’s years after Roe v. Wade. Before that, it was considered a “Catholic” issue (which might as well be Pagan, according to evangelical Protestants). Many prominent Southern Baptists at the time advocated for choice.
Those days are long gone.
“We have all turned aside from your ways to our ways — in our lives and as a country. How we have settled for racial injustice, ignored the immigrant, marginalized the poor and neglected the needy. How we have confused sexuality, abused authority, objectified beauty and how we have taken the lives of children,” he said in his prayer.
He further prayed for an end to laws that “make it legal to murder a child.”
Believe it or not, murdering children is still a crime. So is murdering babies. Butchering the English language and the meaning of words — alas — is perfectly legal.
Meanwhile, conservative Christians continue to oppose the very things that could lead to a reduction in abortion rates. By and large, they won’t support an increased minimum wage (so parents can better provide for their kids), affordable healthcare, subsidized childcare, or paid maternity leave. Those things (or lack thereof) contribute more to a “culture of death” than “confused sexuality” or any of the other things Platt mentioned. Why is there no repentance for voting politicians into office who punish poor people?
Platt, to his credit, mentions the need to reform the foster care system, and he himself is an adoptive parent. However, some women who don’t want to place their children up for adoption lack the resources to care for a child, let alone themselves. They may be trapped in a cycle of poverty or lack health insurance to cover the prenatal costs. Platt says something to the effect of “We will be there for you to help you care for this child,” but is curiously mum about what, specifically, that entails. Will he and his congregants cover the medical bills? Childcare? Babysitting? Anything?
Without details, it’s just empty rhetoric. The people who oppose women’s rights most forcefully have no desire to actually solve the problem they’re complaining about.
(Screenshot via YouTube)