Is Mercury Pollution's Effect on Newborns a Pro-Life Issue?
The Evangelical Environmental Network recently spent $150,000 on TV and radio ads and billboards promoting new U.S. Environmental Protection Agency mercury pollution regulations as a pro-life issue because of mercury's effect on neonatal health. Leaders connected to the Cornwall Alliance called the campaign's portrayal "disingenuous and dangerous." Family Research Council President Tony Perkins, Richard Land of the Southern Baptist Convention, Focus on the Family employees and others signed a joint statement rejecting the issue as a pro-life one. "The life in pro-life denotes not quality of life but life itself. The term denotes opposition to a procedure that intentionally results in dead babies," the statement said. Observers spoke with Christianity Today about whether the issue should be seen as a pro-life concern.
"When it affects one in six children, reduces IQs, and increases heart disease, it's a pro-life issue. Being pro-life means protecting life at every stage. We have to be consistent in our theology. Jesus calls us to care for the unborn. Abortion is critical; so is this."
Mitch Hescox, president, Evangelical Environmental Network
"The sanctity of human life is at issue in many areas. Some people make abortion the overriding issue. We need biblical balance. If being concerned about all the things God cares about 'waters down' a pro-life stand, that's God's fault and God's problem."
Ron Sider, president, Evangelicals for Social Action
"Being pro-life means more than just opposition to killing the unborn. It also means opposition to euthanasia and assisted suicide, support for the handicapped, and affirmation of the elderly and infirm. And yes, it may also mean protecting babies from hazards."
Dennis Sullivan, director, Cedarville University Center for Bioethics
"Being consistently pro-life requires more than opposition to abortion. However, politicians who favor abortion-on-demand cannot claim the pro-life mantle regardless of how many other pro-life policies they support."
Galen Carey, vice president, National Association of Evangelicals
"The 'life' in 'pro-life' denotes not quality of life but life itself in historical usage. Mercury emissions do not kill. Calling this a 'pro-life' issue obscures the term's meaning, though pro-life people will want to reduce risks without increasing other risks more."
E. Calvin Beisner, spokesman, Cornwall Alliance for the Stewardship of Creation
"Once you start to expand the term 'pro-life' very far beyond abortion and euthanasia, it dilutes the issue beyond the point of real meaning. Using the label 'pro-life' on other political issues comes across as a way to potentially divide and diffuse pro-life votes."
Mark Tooley, president, The Institute for Religion and Democracy
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La complejidad hispana: Todo cambió en el 2012
The Latest in Movie News, May 20, 2013
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Ray Glinski
Data I've seen indicates that this legislation would decrease global mercury by 2.5% - does the epidemiology really show actual measurable health improvement from such a miniscule environmental impact? And what about the "quality of life" for the families thrown out-of-work because the cost to upgrade the scrubbers is prohibitive? Once again we see the EPA is myopic, and Christians shouldn't waste their time trusting insight from government agencies that continue to fail. Are these Christians taking up a collection for those future unemployed?
CHARLES REDFERN
The problem with the Cornwall Alliance response to the EEN is that it plays directly into the hands of the pro-choice movement, which has claimed that pro-lifers are merely anti-abortion. For more on this, see here: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/charles-redfern/the-farright-fringe-embar_b_1 278936.html
Nick Laushkin
Christians need to better frame their responses to issues of the day. God is concerned with all areas of our lives, and especially for those that cannot speak or stand up for themselves. It's not a matter of learning something new. but remembering who made us and why. For me, the real question is what is God calling us to do, with our lives and in our communities. To ask or demand that a fellow Christian stay silent on issues that have Biblical importance, issues that affect this generation and future generations is not supported in my reading of the Bible. Creation Care is a matter of Life- not because we say it, but because we are commanded to do this. It's a matter of remembering who we are, who made us, and then to go out and act and speak accordingly.