Continuing on the theme of the importance of life, and some of the comments from Anthony Martin, I have come up with the following discussion about the idea of somehow “choosing” war casualties over abortion casualties. The idea being purported by Anthony Martin seems to be that more deaths occur via abortion than war, and because of this it is a greater evil. However:
In order for the argument of numbers to be valid syllogistically one must agree to the following arguments:
Syllogism A:
Premise #1: Murder is always morally wrong
Premise #2: Abortion is always murder
Conclusion: Abortion is always morally wrong
Syllogism B:
Premise #1: Murder is always morally wrong
Premise #2: Casualties of war are always caused by murder
Conclusion: Casualties of war are always morally wrong
Syllogism C:
Premise #1: Murder is always morally wrong
Premise #2: Less murder is less morally wrong than more murder
Conclusion: Casualties of war are less morally wrong than abortion
Of course Premise #2 of Syllogism C is false because it assumes that Premise #2 of Syllogism B is true (among other things), which it is not. Therefore, if we redefine Syllogism B as follows:
Syllogism B1
Premise #1: Murder is always morally wrong
Premise #2: Casualties of war are sometimes caused by murder
Conclusion: Some casualties of war are morally wrong
We will eventually come to the conclusion that murder committed in the name of war is morally wrong, while murder committed in the name of abortion is also morally wrong. However we will not discover that killing in the name of war is always morally wrong, or that killing in the name of abortion is ever morally right. Because of this inequality they cannot be used for strict numerical comparisons. One action is always wrong, and one action is not always wrong.
The question should not be if we would choose abortion over war or vise-versa, but rather “Is abortion equal to casualties of war from a moral perspective?” If the answer is no, then we are free to object to abortion on all fronts and to accept casualties of war in certain cases. Obviously I believe this to be the case.
I submit that the problem that the liberals are facing when they try to understand how Christians can be pro-life and pro-war at the same time is in a misunderstanding of the theology that is driving those decisions. In effect, Psalms 139, and the sixth commandment (in many cases) cannot be applied equally to a baby in the womb and a soldier in the trenches.