Opec @ MindSay 
I am a born again Christian, I’m pro-life, and I support Rudy Giuliani for President of the United States. The former New York City mayor is my preferred Republican candidate, and the refusal of so many in the evangelical community to even consider him based solely on his pro-choice views saddens me. They’ll probably even kick me out of the group after reading this.
Like it or not, in 1973, seven unelected justices on the U.S. Supreme Court stripped the right of millions of Americans to regulate abortion through their elected legislators at the state level. It is now the law of the land, and short of an amendment to the Constitution, there is little the President or Congress can do about it. Sure, the President can appoint new justices to the Supreme Court, but these are lifetime appointments, and someone has to die or resign first...and it seems that just can’t happen fast enough for the religious right.
The mayor’s promises not to make abortion a litmus test for new justices and to appoint “conservative strict constructionist” judges aren’t what most evangelicals want to hear. Never mind that our soldiers are dying in Iraq, that there are still Islamic nutcases who want to blow us off the map, that we’re being held hostage by OPEC and raped every time we fill our cars up with gas, or that we’re being invaded by illegals from south of the border; their only concern, unfortunately, is that a presidential candidate commits to appointing justices who will overturn Roe v. Wade.
With that in mind, let’s look at some facts. Before 1973, when the Court cleared the way for abortion as a form of contraception, the procedure was already legal in all fifty states. Thirty states permitted abortion only to save the life of the mother. Sixteen states, including North Carolina, allowed abortions to save the life of the mother and in cases involving rape or incest. Four states allowed for some form of abortion on demand. Restricted in most states, yes, but legal all the same. Where was the pro-life outcry back then?
If, someday, the Supreme Court should overturn Roe v. Wade—and I don’t believe it will—it won’t be the end of the world and the return to back-alley abortions that pro-choice radicals like Ted Kennedy would have us believe; neither will it be the final nail in abortion’s coffin that most pro-lifers believe it will be...as I once did. Abortion will still be legal, and overturning Roe will simply mean that we the people have our right back to set the policy in our respective states.
While I am pro-life, I am also a realist, and I believe that abortion is a necessary evil in some circumstances. I was once pro-life to the point of making Jesse Helms look liberal, and then someone asked me a simple question: If your wife was raped and became pregnant with that man’s child, do you think she should have to carry that child to term? I cannot honestly say that I think she should, and I don’t believe that many evangelicals could honestly say that either.
Since then, my position has been that of our state’s pre-Roe. I believe abortion is acceptable in cases of rape or incest, and if necessary to save the life of the mother. If it came down to losing my wife or our unborn child, I’d obviously want the doctors to do everything in their power to save my wife. A fellow Christian once asked me did I not believe God could intervene and save them both. Of course I believe He could, and I’d pray that He would...but maybe that person has more faith than I do. I wouldn’t be willing to take the chance. We could always try to have more children, but I could never replace my wife. That may sound harsh to some, but I do not feel that my position on abortion conflicts with my Christian faith in any way. I have a clear conscience.
I most certainly respect that my opinion isn’t going to be everyone else’s, nor do I expect it to be, but I have little respect for single issue voters, be they pro-life or pro-gun (which I am also). According to nearly every national poll, Rudy Giuliani is the only Republican with a snowball’s chance of defeating Hillary Clinton in the general election. It is just the height of ignorance for evangelicals to write Rudy Giuliani off for being pro-choice in favor of electing a pro-choice militant like Hillary Clinton, who many of these same folks view as Satan incarnate. It just doesn’t make any sense.
© 2007 by J.D. Lewis