Babies as punishment

Disclaimer: this isn't intended as a political post (though if you can't guess how a CSPPer might feel about Obama...). If you want to talk about the political implications, go here where I came across this quote and talk to Gene Veith & co. about it.

So if I'm not trying to get all political, why quote Obama? Because these words, uttered by Obama at a town hall meeting in March, are so representative of the pervasive view of babies as punishment rather than babies as blessing, a mindset that has even stealthily invaded the church (but more on that in a future post).

So here's what he said:

"When it comes specifically to HIV/AIDS, the most important prevention is education, which should include — which should include abstinence education and teaching children, you know, that sex is not something casual. But it should also include — it should also include other, you know, information about contraception because, look, I’ve got two daughters, 9 years old and 6 years old. I am going to teach them first of all about values and morals.

“But if they make a mistake,” Obama continued, “I don’t want them punished with a baby.”

Wow. This reminded me of the movie Juno in which Juno does make such a "mistake" (sin? such an outdated concept!) and her stepmother expresses her relief to Juno's father about the teen's decision to place the baby for adoption rather than to abort: "Someone's going to get a sweet blessing from Jesus out of this garbage dump of a situation." Amidst the rubble of our broken world, the circumstances surrounding a baby's conception and birth may be heartbreakingly sin-saturated. But God's Truth is clear: that baby, though a sinner himself, is a blessing.