JACKSON, Miss. (ABP) – The Mississippi Baptist Convention is backing a constitutional amendment facing voters Nov. 8 that would declare a fertilized human egg to be a person, effectively branding abortion as murder.
|
The state convention’s Christian Action Commission endorsed Initiative 26, also known as the Personhood Amendment, and encouraged Mississippi Baptist pastors and church members to support the measure expected to meet heavy opposition at the polls.
If approved by voters, the initiative would amend the Mississippi Constitution to define the terms “person” or “persons” to “include every human being from the moment of fertilization, cloning or the functional equivalent thereof.”
“Human life has a very special place in the creation of God,” CAC Executive Director Jimmy Porter said in a video produced for the Yes on 26 campaign, an organization with a stated mission of “ending abortion and cloning in Mississippi by voting ‘yes’ on Amendment 26 on Nov. 8. “In fact, the Bible says we are created in the image of God. We are the only ones. God felt that life was very special and values it. The Lord expects us to value life even as He does.”
According to the Mississippi Baptist Record, Jim Futral, executive director of the Mississippi Baptist Convention Board, sent an open letter urging Baptist pastors to consider the vote more than a political issue.
“It is a moral issue. It is an ethical issue. It is a spiritual issue,” Futral said. “This amendment is not just an anti-abortion position, but it is a pro-life position and will state that the people of Mississippi believe unquestionably that when an egg and sperm are united in a mother’s womb, the creation that takes place is a new, separate and unique individual that deserves the right to be protected, loved and have the opportunity to live out his or her existence.”
Opponents say that by most medical definitions pregnancy begins when a fertilized egg implants in the uterus. Moving it back to the moment of fertilization, they say, could cause legal complications for practices like in-vitro fertilization and the use of “morning-after” birth control pills.
Critics say the Mississippi proposal makes no allowance for abortion in cases of rape, incest or the mother’s health and could bring women who have miscarriages under suspicion they might have done something to cause them.
Supporters of the amendment dismiss those concerns as “scare tactics” and say opponents really aren’t concerned about women but with not wanting abortion providers to lose money.
“This initiative is about defining in our constitution what already is being taught in basic biology — when the sperm fertilizes the egg, life begins,” Porter said in an Oct. 24 blog. “Life begins at the moment of fertilization and is to be protected by law.”
The “personhood” movement is the latest attempt to reshape America’s abortion debate. Instead of adding laws restricting access to abortion, as many states have done, it sidesteps legal issues by granting the fetus constitutional rights. Some anti-abortion activists reject it, saying it could backfire in a Supreme Court defeat and wind up strengthening abortion rights under the court’s 1973 Roe v. Wade ruling that makes most abortions a private matter between women and their doctors.
With more than 2,000 churches and nearly half a million resident members, Southern Baptists are Mississippi’s largest religious denomination.
“Mississippi Baptists can go to the polls, vote ‘Yes,’ and almost singlehandedly make the right decision,” Futral said in his letter to pastors. “One thing is for sure — if we do nothing, we will miss a choice opportunity for making a decision that will reverberate across our land.”
According to the New York Times, similar personhood drives are brewing in Florida, Michigan, Montana, Ohio, Wisconsin and other states.
-30-
Bob Allen is managing editor of Associated Baptist Press.