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States are trying to criminalize the free speech of those seeking to protect unborn life

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PRO-LIFE MOVEMENT IN THE COURTS, TESTING CONSTITUTIONALITY

TOM LAMPRECHT: Harry, last week, we talked about the California case that had their oral arguments before the Supreme Court. It’s a situation where pro-life centers in California were being forced to say certain things in promoting state-supported abortion facilities, telling women that they had that as an option. Obviously, that is something that goes contrary to what the pro-life centers wanted to promote. Harry, today, I’d like to take this a step further and talk about the bias that’s going on in certain cases in courts and in the media that perhaps are trying to influence what’s going on at the Supreme Court level.  

DR. REEDER: You and I have noticed that there is an upsurge in judicial and governmental silencing, shaming and marginalizing of the pro-life movement. You have to realize that the secular elite, which affect so much of the government and so much of the media, has a vested interest in promoting abortion and the murder of unborn children in the womb.

What we’re talking about is the 99% of abortions that are there because the child is less than perfect, is not wanted, is a consequence of the sexual revolution, “I don’t want another mouth to feed,” or, “I don’t want to be bothered” — therefore, we now have a culture that says the woman has a right to kill the child.

In reality, what we’re doing is actually creating a culture to tell women not simply, “You can kill the child” — as horrific as that is — “You actually ought to kill the child.” And, Tom, this is what we’re talking about today, now the secular elite, through governmental pressure and media persuasion, is attempting to silence those who would say, “Hold it. Time out. This is a life. You cannot constitutionally take the life of a person. There is a right to life, not a right to murder a life in the Constitution.”

The Constitution knows no such legal right to kill children, whether they’re in the womb or in the arms of the mother and now that those who are being either motivated because of a Christian world and life view that every life is sacred, made in the image of God and deserves to be protected by society, and those who are motivated simply on a Constitutional basis, they are now attempting to be silenced by the secular media, the secular elite, and now by a secularist fascist government.

COURT CASES CAN BECOME UNFAIR PLAYING FIELDS FOR PRO-LIFERS

TOM LAMPRECHT: Harry, in fact, let me take you to a situation up in Michigan where Michigan District Judge Marc Barron sentenced activists last week to 12 months’ probation, eight days of community service in court fines and restitution to an abortion center where they were doing a protest. He also ordered them to stay 500 feet away.

That kind of sentencing isn’t a really big surprise, but what is interesting is a spokesperson for the activist made this statement: “During the trial, the judge prohibited the defendants from mentioning abortion or their pro-life views, something he said is standard practice for trials involving pro-lifers at abortion centers. Why? As long as the unborn are not recognized as persons, pro-lifers who defend them are basically hung out to dry.”

DR. REEDER: There’s two things: one is these exorbitant punitive steps to criminalize those who are exercising free speech to protect the life of the unborn and the other is these extraordinary measures to curtail free speech in order to eviscerate the argument of the pro-life activist in the court. In other words, “We’re not going to let you mount your defense that you are protecting life because we’re not going to allow you to say that the unborn child is a person.”

Therefore, when you rule out someone’s defense, then they can’t have a defense and, therefore, the jury can be persuaded in the direction of the predisposed commitment of the judiciary, which means governmental power to thwart the purposes of justice and the constitutional arguments of those who are appealing into the right to life in the Constitution and the fact that the child is a person and, therefore, has a life and, therefore, has a right to life.

THIS EMPHASIS IN THE MEDIA SEEKS TO CURTAIL FREEDOM

And, again, Tom, you, I think rightly, connected this upsurge of media focus, governmental intrusion, and judicial prejudicial action. You are seeing this curtailing the freedom of those who are motivated by religious purposes and those who want to defend themselves and, therefore, curtailing their freedom of speech because those ideas will win the day in the public square and in the court when there’s a jury present and, therefore, the court is attempting to keep the status quo of a culture of death as a legal and accepted practice and even try to assign morality to the killing of children instead of allowing those who would argue for the morality of a right to life.

Tom, I believe you’re seeing this because the reality is I think the argument for the right to life is beginning to win the day throughout the culture, particularly, toward the millennial generation and the generation coming up under the millennial generation.

GUN VIOLENCE WALK-OUTS NOW BECOMING ABORTION WALK-OUTS?

TOM LAMPRECHT: Many people are familiar with the fact there was the walkout over the shooting that took place down in Florida. What’s happening right now, students are beginning to launch a campaign to start a pro-life walkout using the hashtag #life on social media. We don’t know yet whether the school administrators will allow this to happen or not. We do know that a principal at Rockland High School out in Sacramento California was planning to sit down and have a conversation with the student that’s heading this up.

DR. REEDER: By the way, there’s another one in Minneapolis I’m aware of. Out of the concern of gun violence, also just simply pointed out that there is violence against life including abortion and was addressing the sanctity of life across the board in terms of a student response. On the same day that students were walking out over the issue of gun violence, they just broadened it to the sanctity of life.

So, Tom, there are a number of situations that are happening. When the secular elite see that, what they want to do because they want to preserve this right to kill children… Let’s remember that abortion is the sacrament of the sexual revolution.

And I think there’s something else that needs to be understood. Because this sanctity of life issue is in the final analysis a moral and therefore religious issue that all life is sacred because life is created in the image of God and because of that motivation, the reality is I want to send a message to the secular elite to the judicial demagogues and fascist governmental attempts to intimidate the sanctity of life movement: it’s not going to work.

INTIMIDATION BECOMES INSPIRATION

For those of you who think you can kill the consequence of a Christian world and life view such as the sanctity of life by intimidation, attempting to silence and shame Christians, you actually provide a motivation for Christians. If you go to the nations who have attempted to not just kill Christian ideals, but kill Christians, look at the explosion of Christianity in China and go look at the explosion of Christianity in India right now.

I can promise you that you are actually engaged in a tactic that, throughout 2,000 years, has been used in the hands of a sovereign God to actually accomplish the opposite of what you think it will accomplish. Therefore, when you bring the power of the press and the power of the state to shame and silence Christianity and a Christian world and life view, what you’re actually going to do is motivate Christians to faithfulness.

Because, when it finally becomes clear: are we to obey God or men, there is no doubt what we will do. We will both live and speak to men the truth of God. We’ll do it in love, but we won’t stop doing it out of fear. Therefore, your intimidation actually becomes an inspiration.

COMING UP TUESDAY: FREEDOM OF SPEECH AND RELIGION INTERTWINED

TOM LAMPRECHT: Harry, on Tuesday’s edition of Today in Perspective, I would look at the connection between the freedom of speech and the freedom of religion. We saw it in the California Supreme Court case and we’re seeing it around the world as well.

DR. REEDER: And, tomorrow, I think we’re going to see the ingenuity and the wisdom of the Christian world and life view on our founding fathers in the development of our Constitutional documents.

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, who transcribed some of the top podcasts in the country and her work has been featured in a New York Times Bestseller.

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