Two years after Roe v. Wade was overturned, the pro-life movement still has plenty of work to do to protect life.
Alliance Defending Freedom’s Senior Counsel Erin Hawley joined “CBN News” to discuss pro-life states’ response to the overturning of Roe, the importance of pregnancy centers and churches to the pro-life movement, and more.
Watch her interview below.
Recently, the Senate’s Committee on Armed Services advanced the National Defense Authorization Act for 2025. The proposal would “amend the Military Selective Service Act to require the registration of women for Selective Service.” If the bill became law, every daughter, upon turning 18, would be required to sign up for the military draft, just as men currently must do.
This effort illustrates the confusion behind the contemporary call for equity instead of equality. Equality is about dignity. Men and women are equal in standing, dignity, and value, despite the significant differences between them. This understanding of men and women is, in fact, grounded in Scripture. As described in the first chapter of Genesis, God made his image bearers male and female. Both are made after His likeness. Each are, before God, equal.
Equity, on the other hand, grounds dignity in sameness. It demands that men and women are seen as identical. Difference, in this view, implies inequality.
The picture of humanity described in Holy Scripture is one in which men and women share sameness as well as difference. They are, in this sense, complementary to one another. In order to fulfill their God-given purpose to fill and subdue the earth, men and women partner. Both are required. In fact, in sameness and difference, we are like the God whose image we bear. As revealed in Scripture, God is Trinity. The Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit share the sameness of the Godhead, with difference in persons. When we presume women to be the same as men, we undermine what our natures reveal about God.
Because confusion about male and female is, in fact, a confusion about reality, it requires adjustments. For example, a 2017 Marine Corps study found that three out four women failed to meet combat standards in boot camp. Of course, there have always been women able to excel in the physical service of the military, but this is far from the norm. So, standards were changed.
In 2021, Congress delayed the implementation of the Army’s new Combat Fitness Test over the fear that 54% of women had failed to pass the requirements. In 2022, a new Combat Fitness Test was implemented with different requirements for men and women, both of which were significantly less demanding than previous ones. Women must now run two miles in under 23 minutes; men in under 22 minutes. Both must complete 10 pushups, yes 10.
The men and women who give themselves to serve and defend our country should be honored, and there are growing areas of military service not dependent on physical strength and prowess. However, in those many areas that are dependent, giving an assault rifle and a pair of boots to men or women unable to meet the physical demands is not wise or kind.
Even more, a part of God’s design for men is as protector. In the Old Testament, whenever women led in wartime, the men of Israel had failed. God still used, for example in Judges 4, Deborah the judge and Jael, a woman with a deadly nail, and both received honor over Barak. But it’s clear that Barak had first failed to lead.
This historic shift of how male and female are currently understood is a symptom of the bad ideas of our gender politics. God’s design was wise and good, grounding our dignity and yet acknowledging the real differences that exist. When that design is ignored, there are consequences, for individuals and for nations.
Right now, I’m focused on protecting my daughters from this national absurdity.
This Breakpoint was co-authored by Michaela Estruth. If you’re a fan of Breakpoint, leave a review on your favorite podcast app. For more resources to live like a Christian in this cultural moment, go to breakpoint.org.
Copyright 2024 by the Colson Center for Christian Worldview. Reprinted from BreakPoint.org with permission.
On Thursday the group backing an abortion amendment in Arkansas sent Secretary of State John Thurston a letter alleging his office “unlawfully rejected” its petitions.
Arkansans for Limited Government submitted petition signatures to the Secretary of State last Friday to place an abortion amendment on the November ballot.
Arkansas law tasks the Secretary of State with counting and validating the petition signatures before certifying a measure for the ballot. Petitions that do not comply with state law must be disqualified.
On Wednesday the Arkansas Secretary of State’s office disqualified all of the petitions for the Arkansas Abortion Amendment for failing to properly identify paid canvassers who collected signatures for the abortion measure, as required by state law, and for failing to file a signed statement verifying that each paid canvasser was provided a copy of the most recent edition of the Secretary of State’s initiative and referenda handbook and given an explanation of Arkansas’ legal requirements for obtaining petition signatures.
Arkansas law says a person filing petition signatures with the Secretary of State must bundle the petitions by county and file an affidavit stating the number of petitions and signatures being filed.
If the signatures were gathered by paid canvassers, the law says the person filing the petitions with the Secretary of State must also identify the paid canvassers by name and file a signed statement verifying that each paid canvasser was provided a copy of the most recent edition of the Secretary of State’s initiative and referenda handbook and given an explanation of Arkansas’ legal requirements for obtaining petition signatures.
On Thursday Arkansans for Limited Government sent a letter to Secretary of State Thurston claiming the organization provided documents regarding its paid petition canvassers on June 27 — the week before it filed its abortion petitions — and alleging the Secretary of State does not have the authority to reject the petitions.
The letter does not address the fact that state law indicates the paid canvasser information must be submitted at the same time as the petitions.
Family Council has received documents obtained via the Freedom of Information Act that show Arkansans for Limited Government hired more than 70 paid canvassers after June 27. The letter does not specifically address whether these canvassers were provided information and training in compliance with state law.
While the abortion measure has been disqualified for failing to comply with state law, legal experts have pointed out the Arkansas Abortion Amendment would prevent the State of Arkansas from restricting abortion during the first five months of pregnancy — which is more extreme than Roe v. Wade — and would allow thousands of elective abortions on healthy women and unborn children every year.
The measure also contains various exceptions that would permit abortion on demand through all nine months of pregnancy in many cases.
The amendment does not contain any medical licensing or health and safety standards for abortion, and it does not require abortions to be performed by a physician or in a licensed medical facility.
It also nullifies all state laws that conflict with the amendment, jeopardizing basic abortion regulations — like parental-consent and informed-consent requirements that both sides of the aisle have supported in the past.
Articles appearing on this website are written with the aid of Family Council’s researchers and writers.
