PCA Encourages Life-Positive World View
The Progressive Christian Alliance has published the following statement challenging all to adopt a “life-positive” worldview toward the issues of poverty, wars, hunger, injustice, and reproductive health:
For many decades much of the Christian conversation in the political arena has centered on the issues of abortion and homosexuality. This has limited the ability of the church to engage in social action, political-spiritual discourse, and a deeper exploration of its own spirituality and identity. The PCA affirms, along with the Biblical witness, that life is Sacred and it is of value as the place in which the Divine becomes manifest, as seen in the idea of the Incarnation.
Incarnation, to say that God becomes manifest and an Immanuel – God With Us – in the human condition and the message of Christ to see him in the lives of the poor, hungry etc names human life as beloved to God. Christians are called to be active in their affirmation of the goodness of life, of witnessing the Incarnation of God in the human condition and of seeing Christ in the ‘least of these’.
The Problem:
A). By focusing solely on Abortion as a limited number of criteria for Christian political engagement Christians have supported candidates, policies and practices that have pillaged the earth and created war and injustice. It is a LIMITED definition of life, and thus overlooks the other ways in which Life is not treated with reverence and as a seat of the holiness of God.
B) By holding onto a limited understanding of the sacredness of life Christians have relinquished their prophetic voice to speak to the dangers and sin of war, gaiacide, poverty, hunger, and societal injustice. In this way we are prevented from making Christ fully manifest in the world.
Solution:
A). Christian political engagement should be based on an Incarnation approach. Recognizing that God experiences humanity as good and entered into humanity to share in our story we understand that the sacredness of Life is in the multiplicity of ways it flourishes. Likewise the biblical witness affirms that God is both Transcendent of the human condition – outside and separate, the father from whom creation emerges, and is Immanent – the God who fills all creation, whose body is creation itself and who is made manifest in the unfolding of life across time. This is a God from whom life and creation are the form in which God is made manifest to us.
B). In order to do this we must explore a movement from Pro-Life to Life-Positive. A life positive ethic understands the sacredness of life to be evident in our commitment to the end of war, injustice, poverty, human rights abuses, and an understanding of life that supports the value of the unborn while recognizing a woman’s right to control her own reproduction, the social/health/economic considerations that women with unexpected pregnancies may expect, as well as the concerns around birth defect, rape and incest.
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The Progressive Christian Alliance is a post-denominational organization of Progressive Christians seeking to reclaim the authentic gospel of Christ and serve those around them.
The Living Hour & Lord’s Prayer is an affiliate ministry of the PCA.
