Can Jews Support Roe v. Wade?

As a Christian, I too struggle with all of this. I personally believe that any of the moral laws God gave to the Jews would be His ideal for all people and that to limit it to the Jewish population may have been for two reasons (1) allowing for human weakness in Jews (as in all of us) that they might not be able to bring themselves to value others as much as they value their own people and (2) to prevent Jews from forcing their laws on others and rather allowing God to deal with each people in the way that will best bring them to righteousness.

So, as a Christian who strongly opposes abortion, I have to decide if I have the right to force my conviction on all Americans, especially when that would cause me to support a candidate that in every other area has the wiser platform. I also have to consider what precedent it going to be set by allowing the kind of invasion of privacy required to enforce it. Finally, I have to consider how overturning Roe. V. Wade would play out in the real world. Would it actually reduce the number of abortions? (or only cause 30 more years of arguments, and increase the number of ILLEGAL abortions, which are still abortions, after all.) Or would economic policies that grow American wealth and insure a fairer distribution of it and reduce poverty help reduce the number of abortions over all? Would highlighting the fact that the politicians that have a 100% proLife voting record fail to mention that they attach riders to those bills that decrease the availability and education concerning to the public? Would this eventually lead to policy outlawing the use of birth control, even to married couples?

I have come to the conclusion that I, as a Christian, need to look at the big picture as Jesus seemed to do. When he came, he confronted what was extreme in the culture of Israel at the time... the part of the society that pushed extreme interpretations of the law and that favored the powerful over the weak, the rich over the poor. He did not come to destroy the law, but to fulfill it, and he was only pointing out the trends that were in violation of God's heart and values by how they interpreted and applied the law. We too, today, as those who stand for family values and God's values have to walk a fine line between hypocrisy and true righteousness. We have to do this in matters of our faith and also our national constitution.

I applaud your courage in posting this statement. I have posted blogs of similar intent within my conservative Christian community and "I have the scars to prove it." ;-D

May our Father have mercy on us all and fulfill His purposes in spite of our feeble and stunted efforts to "help" Him achieve them.

Robyn from Tennessee

One more point - support for any feasible restricted abortion policy necessarily restricts the right of Jews to follow the dictates of their own religion, i.e. where Judaism would sanction an abortion and such a US policy would forbid it. Isn't this a valid reason to not support restricted abortion?

I don't know the Jewish law with regards to this subject matter but as a woman of the Jewish faith I find it hard to believe that religion would define how I should handle my body? First of all I feel it's necessary to have the right for abortion in cases of rape. I also don't feel that it is anyone's right to judge anothers choice or morale convictions as it relates to their body! There's an old saying that goes along the lines, "will you go 6 feet under for me????" So, knowing that this is a sensitive subject the true answer should be between the person and their G d.