LET THIS SINK IN: Even some euthanasia advocates are saying, 'Stop! how did we get here, killing people who don't want to die?'

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TRUMP ADMINISTRATION PUTS MONEY INTO ABSTINENCE EDUCATION

TOM LAMPRECHT: Harry, there are a number of stories I want to take you to today, which come out of CNS News, Life News, World Magazine and The Daily Wire. They deal with the pro-life movement and they deal with euthanasia.

Let me give you one headline out of Life News: “Planned Parenthood already hates the Trump administration but they will hate it even more when they discover the administration will be diverting sex education funds to abstinence programs.”

DR. REEDER: Actually, they’ve already started doing this, both the Health Department leadership and the Education Department leadership under Trump. I don’t know what role he is playing in it other than he has positioned some very effective leaders in these areas.

And one of the things that is happening is the elevation and the teaching of abstinence until marriage with ethical dimensions as well as medical benefits. Of course, Planned Parenthood, any time there is abstinence, their business just goes down. They are not in the business of reducing abortions — they’re in the business of doing abortions and the normalization of abortion.

And so, they will clearly strike back at this and, I am waiting on the Republicans that have been elected on a platform that said, “We will defund Planned Parenthood,” I’m waiting on them to do it and I’m grateful that it’s already happening on the state level.

MORE THAN HALF OF CHILDREN IN SOME STATES BORN OUT OF WEDLOCK

TOM LAMPRECHT: Harry, perhaps one of the reasons the Trump administration wants to promote abstinence programs is reflected in an article in CNS News: “Babies born to unmarried women, in Mississippi, that percentage is 53.2%, Louisiana 52%, New Mexico 51.1%, nationwide 39.8% of babies born are to unmarried mothers.”

DR. REEDER: Tom, the statistic that you just surfaced is just simply an unsurprising result of the sexual revolution. The sexual revolution, which is why abortion is so important to the current sexual revolution in the culture, because when you have sex, you will have children and you get the result of a child that’s not wanted, then you’ve got to have abortion to get rid of the inconvenient and the unwanted and that’s why abortion has become the sacrament of the secularist movement and the sexual revolution.

You have the “live together culture” — which we used to call “shacking up” — that now is embraced as a normal way of life and courtship. The result is, of course, what? That’d be children outside of marriage so now a child comes into the world and the child is not illegitimate, but the arrangement of the parents is illegitimate and it’s wrong and it will have an effect in the life of the child.

And guess what happens? Now we have an entire generation growing up in abject depression. Why is that? One of the contributing reasons is broken homes and the attempt to normalize children in homes where either the parents of the children are not married and without a covenantal commitment for life or where there is the absence of a parent or that we put them in “same-sex” homes in which there is the absence of either a father or a mother by definition.

CANADIANS TURN TO EUTHANASIA FOR CHILDREN

TOM LAMPRECHT: Harry, let me switch gears a little bit here and go from the abortion issue and the pro-life issue to the euthanasia issue, which obviously are related. “Health care professionals in Canada are increasingly being approached by parents of never-competent infants and children — including those too young to make reasonable decisions — to discuss whether or not these children, what they call “mature minors,” should be put to death via euthanasia if they’re imperfect.

DR. REEDER: And, Tom, it’s right for you to connect those two because just stop and think about what is being said. Now, this is a law that was introduced with all the assurances that, “All we’re talking about is doctors assisting people who obviously are dying, who don’t want to go through the throes of death and they want a doctor to simply put them to death as painlessly as possible, ‘death with dignity.’”

And so, it was put in place with all the assurances that’s all that’s desired. No, now we find out that they wanted people who have mental derangements that those who are their guardians can speak for them and their need to be put to death and now we’re moving into the area of adolescents. The first step is to the “mature minors,” if they want to be put to death.

Well, to begin with, to want to be put to death as a minor is not mature — that is an oxymoronic statement to begin with — but what we really have now is the fact that you’re going to have people who are making decisions of what minors are saying in depression about their life to take their life and they can overrule parents with this law — parents who would intervene to say, “No, you can’t do that.”

And you’re right to tie this back to abortion because now we have mandated abortions as well as elective abortions of the inconvenient and the unwanted. Well, now we have children who were born wanted but now have become unwanted and now, if they become unwanted, there’s an avenue to get rid of them as well.

WHEN PERSONAL CHOICE BECOMES BEING PUT TO DEATH

TOM LAMPRECHT: In fact, it’s gotten so bad over in Belgium that you have euthanasia advocates rebelling against the movement because of individuals who don’t want to die but are being put to death.

DR. REEDER: Even some euthanasia advocates see where the needle has been moved and say, “Oh my goodness, how did it get there?” By common grace, they’ve got some common sense in this regard. It’s a long way away, Tom, from when you and I were children and there was the Hemlock Society that argued for people’s privacy to put themselves to death and now we have destroyed the medical profession, which has now become a profession that has violated its very first ethic, which is to do no harm and now the profession can be hired out as assassins in the womb and assassins at the end of life. That is a demoralizing effect upon the entire profession that used to be held in esteem for the lengths that it would go to in order to save life, promote life, and preserve life.

GERBER BABY OF THE YEAR HAS DOWNS SYNDROME

TOM LAMPRECHT: Harry, we’ve talked about before how, in certain European countries, you do not see any children with Downs Syndrome — they literally have all be aborted. Let’s end with some good news today. The Gerber Baby Food Company has decided to select this year’s Gerber Baby that will appear on their jars of baby food: a baby with Downs Syndrome.

DR. REEDER: Not long ago, there was the trumpeting news that Downs Syndrome children are decreasing in society in number. Isn’t that wonderful? No, it’s not. The reason they are decreasing as a factor of society is because we are killing them. In some countries, over 90 percent of the children who are diagnosed with Downs Syndrome through pregnancy testing, are now put to death. That’s why we don’t see them in society is because we are killing them before they can get into this society because these precious children are declared as unwanted and inconvenient because of their imperfections.

SPECIAL NEEDS KIDS HAVE A SPECIAL ABILITY TO UNDERSTAND GOSPEL

I would love for people to experience these precious children. They started with me with a little Downs Syndrome child in my first church. I had one Downs Syndrome child, Peter, who would greet me every day coming from the sessional prayer time on the way to the pulpit and make me stop while he banged down on the piano. I don’t know what he played and he didn’t know what he was playing, but he was convinced it was “Jesus Loves Me, This I Know.” And he would sing it and then he’d say, “Okay, Preacher, you can go now.”

From then on, I just said, “I’ve got to be involved in special needs ministry,” and I’m grateful that we’re able to do that. And I love the fact there’s always the Gerber Baby of the Year. Not only is the child beautiful, not only is the child attractive and not only is the child clearly a Downs Syndrome child but the child is placed there as one who is worthy of affirmation because the child is made in the image of God. And, yes, sin’s curse has marred the child’s physical capabilities, but you would be surprised how easy it is for a Downs Syndrome child to understand the Gospel and respond to the fact that Jesus loves them.

I am so grateful that Gerber, against a lot of opposition, had the courage to do that. I was diagnosed with an ulcer when I was in the third grade — my parents may have thought I was the ulcer but, no, I was diagnosed with an ulcer — and I remember my doctor put me on a diet and the diet included Gerber Baby Custard. And I have loved Gerber Baby Custard ever since so I’m going to go out and buy some Baby Custard to tell them I appreciate what they’ve done as a statement for the sanctity of life and the dignity of boys and girls made in the image of God even when inconvenient, even when imperfect.

Dr. Harry L. Reeder III is the Senior Pastor of Briarwood Presbyterian Church in Birmingham.

This podcast was transcribed by Jessica Havin, editorial assistant for Yellowhammer News. Jessica has transcribed some of the top podcasts in the country and her work has been featured in a New York Times Bestseller.