Proponents of the Consistent Life Ethic oppose abortion, captial punishment, economic injustice, assisted suicide and euthanasia, and unjust (or some, even all) war. Normally, advocates of the "seamless garment" criterion are religiously conservative and so, one would I think rightly presume, would be proponents of (so-called) traditional marriage. As though there were any other sort.
Interestingly, however, the public rhetoric one hears from the criterion of the seamless garment says very little about marriage. Proponents of the CLE will even take to task their otherwise co-laborers against abortion who also happen to own up to advocating the death penalty. It seems to me, however, that if one wants a seamless garment argument between abortion and the death penalty (as well as, perhaps the other issues), one is merely going to perpetuate complete ineffectiveness in addressing these issues unless one also addresses some of the fundamental causes of abortion and the death penalty: sex outside the bonds of marriage, single mother/fatherless homes, and divorce. The statistics on the death penalty are in: persons sitting on death row come largely from homes that did not exhibit the traditional form of marriage and its necessary foundations of chastity, fidelity, and faith. And according to abortion advocates' own statistics, the vast preponderence (67%) of women obtaining abortion have never married.
Don't misunderstand: I'm not claiming that the seamless garment criterion does not include advocacy of marriage. It's just that one doesn't hear much about it. It's always the juxtaposition of abortion and the death penalty, and if one believes that all life is sacred one must necessarily be opposed to both. I think this argument has serious philosophical and biblical exegetical flaws. But that's beside the point. Rather, if one wants to advocate against the death penalty and against abortion, one will not be effective by enacting or striking down laws, or enacting a fair procedural mechanism. No, to fight against abortion, against the death penalty, against economic poverty, one must resolutely and unflaggingly fight for the marriage that God himself created.
For from the home flow the goods or the ills of society. If one wants to talk about seamless garments, start with the home. Repent of our--that is to say, Christians'--ungodly divorces, our use of chemical contraception and the whole mentality of being able to "afford" to start a family, our rampant and idolatrous consumerism, and our feeble and superficial faith that runs pell-mell after the world in the name of "relevance."
Until our faith is consonant with that once for all delivered to the saints, and until that faith permeates every area of our lives, but especially our homes, then talk of a seamless garment amounts to covering a rotting corpse with a hanky. Only a seamless robe of righteousness by faith in Christ, transfiguring our souls and bodies, will heal and transform our cities, counties, states and nation.
Posted by Clifton at October 23, 2005 01:29 PM | TrackBackA hearty, "Amen!"
Posted by: Bro. James at October 23, 2005 07:49 PM