Gerard van Honthorst. 1622
A Personal Backstory
When I was a child, I used to asked my mother, Why do women willingly go through the troubles of pregnancy, the agony of birth pangs, only to give birth to a child at the risk of their own lives? I asked because the only idea I had of childbirth came from the movies, where childbirth was almost always the cause of pain and death for women. As I was raised in a traditional culture, in which the purpose of marriage was to have children, and sexual intercourse was not allowed outside marriage, so to my mind, to eliminate the suffering of childbirth for women, it would be better to refrain from marriage. My mother never answered my question directly, and simply said that I didn’t know what I was talking about, and that I would understand when I grew up. Looking back on it, I suspect my childish solution to the problem of suffering is essentially not that different from what many people are proposing, that is, to eliminate suffering by eliminating the sufferer.
When my mother was pregnant with me, she was depressed, as the prospect of life for our family was very bleak. Both my parents grew up in relatively well-to-do families, and received education in private schools. By the time they were married, however, both families had fallen on hard times, and as my parents were the eldest child in their respective families, they took up the responsibility of helping their siblings, as well as raising my brother. My mother didn’t want to bring another child into the hardship they were enduring with no end in sight. She thought about terminating the pregnancy, but I kept kicking in her womb-my struggle for survival had started even before I was born, so she decided to carry me to full term. Little did she know the suffering that would ensue: the doctor soon told them that their baby had a congenital disorder with a life expectancy of one year. My mother cried and cried, but she and my father resolved to do everything in their power to make my short life on earth a happy one.
Christianity and Childbearing
The example of my parents taught me that child-raising is a self-sacrifice, especially on the part of the mother. The parent has to put aside their own needs to care for those of the child, to look no longer to their own interest, but to the interest of the child. All the good things in life, parents would not spend on theirselves, but save for and give to their children.
If I understand Christianity correctly, the self-sacrifice exemplified by child-raising is a type of self-sacrifice that leads to salvation. In John 16, Jesus said, “A woman giving birth to a child has pain because her time has come; but when her baby is born she forgets the anguish because of her joy that a child is born into the world.” Jesus likens himself to a woman, and His death on the cross to giving birth. For through His Sacrifice, a new Creation comes into being, and children of God are born in His image. His Death and Resurrection also fulfilled the prophecy pronounced on the woman, “I will surely multiply your pain in childbearing; in pain you shall bring forth children.”(Genesis 3:16) “Yet she will be saved through childbearing—if they continue in faith and love and holiness, with self-control.”(1 Timothy 2:15)
A Christian is joined with Christ in the Spirit, and receives in himself the deposit, or seed, of the Spirit. For this reason, a Christian is called a “Christ-bearer”. The life of a Christian can also be likened to childbearing: he has a choice between continuing with his old life, or sacrificing himself for the new life of the Spirit that is in him. In this sense, the choice between life and death in childbearing, is not limited to women only, but must be faced by each and every Christian.
If abortion is a crime, we’re all criminals. For we have all, at one time or another, abandoned, if not destroyed, the life of Christ in us to indulge in the life of the world. If anyone needs proof, think of the times when we know what is good, just and noble, and yet do the opposite. Consequently, we’re spiritually barren, having a form of godliness but denying its power. Let us not, then, justify ourselves like the Pharisees in the Gospel of Luke, but lament with the tax collector, “God, have mercy on me, a sinner!”
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