Pro-life? Pro-choice? Try being pro-grace instead.

How could God have designed the creation of human life? Any way he wanted, yet he chose pregnancy. And through that design, God has made it impossible for us to try to help one person while bypassing the other. The woman and the child are intertwined, so that anything we do to one impacts the other. This truth stares us in the face anytime someone is pregnant. Our country’s political abortion debate centers around a demand to choose which person we will value or protect over the other—the woman or the child. I know many Christians who feel unsettled by this binary, who believe something about it is off, and yet most conversations I’ve heard in the church about abortion still revolve around the question “Are you pro-life or pro-choice?”

What if we’re asking the wrong question?

Throughout his life, Jesus resisted binary questions that asked him to choose one value at the expense of another. The gospel accounts show this happening almost exclusively with the religious leaders of his society. In many cases, Jesus chose not to provide a direct answer and instead responded with new questions. These questions often prompted the religious leaders and all others listening to look inward and examine the motivations of their own hearts rather than judge others. In the Sermon on the Mount, Jesus asks the crowd, “Why do you look at the speck of sawdust in your brother’s eye and pay no attention to the plank in your own eye? How can you say to your brother, ‘Let me take the speck out of your eye,’ when all the time there is a plank in your own eye?” (Mt 7:3‑4).

This is one of the most important questions we can ask ourselves today—no matter what our political and ethical convictions around abortion may be.

In response to the question “Are you pro-life or pro-choice?” I propose alternate questions for Christians to ask:

Is legislation the primary way Jesus brings about change in the world?

Does either political platform (pro-life or pro-choice) offer a full expression of God’s redemptive nature?

Does the way we think and talk about abortion accurately represent Jesus?

Jesus taught—and even, more importantly, he showed us through the life he lived—that it is who we are as people that matters most, allowing God’s redemptive work to flow through his people and impact culture. As Dallas Willard summarized in Renovation of the Heart in Daily Practice, “The revolution of Jesus is one of character, which proceeds by changing people from the inside through an ongoing personal relationship to God in Christ and to one another. . . . From these [transformed] persons, social structures will naturally be transformed so that ‘justice roll[s] down like waters, and righteousness like an ever-flowing stream’ (Amos 5:24 NRSV).”

Jesus’ emphasis on the priority of our transformed character stands in stark contrast to the US church’s collective response to abortion over the past fifty years. In my view, this response has primarily emphasized influencing others—by shaping their moral views, voting behavior, or the legal options available to them. We have been instructed more on how others should believe or behave and less on how we can be transformed by engaging in conversation, listening to people’s stories, or learning about the emotional and practical realities that lead to abortion. An approach that prioritizes external outcomes over internal transformation often relies on partisan rhetoric, judgment, or blame to achieve its ends, and it has caused harm in the process. We see evidence of this harm by observing how women relate to the church when considering abortion.

A study from Lifeway Research shows that only 7 percent of all women who have abortions speak with someone at a church before making that decision (Lisa Cannon Green, “Women Distrust Church on Abortion,” Lifeway Research, November 23, 2015). It also shows that, while four in ten women are attending church once a month or more at the time of their abortion, the percentage of them who approach a church for help is only marginally higher at 16 percent. Viewing these numbers side by side, we see that even women within church communities do not approach the church for support when faced with the decision to carry or terminate a pregnancy. That same study also found that while seven in ten women who have had an abortion identify as Christian, 76 percent of all women say local churches had neither a positive nor negative impact on their decision (Aaron Earls, “7 in 10 Women Who Have Had an Abortion Identify as a Christian,” Lifeway Research, December 3, 2021).

For all our emphasis on outcomes, the church has had very little impact on those who have direct, firsthand experience—known as lived experience—of unintended pregnancy or abortion. Worse, we are perceived as unsafe by many women. According to the same Lifeway study of women who have had abortions:

Women are twice as likely to say they expect a judgmental church response rather than a caring one when facing an unintended pregnancy.
Women are twice as likely to say they expect a condemning reaction rather than a loving one.
Sixty-five percent of women say church members judge single women who are pregnant.

Every church leader I’ve talked with over the years has told me their church wants to be welcoming and supportive for people with this lived experience, and many believe their church would be supportive if someone approached them. What is standing in the way is not our intentions but deeply rooted mental models we often aren’t even aware of. Those perceptions come from our culture as well as the church, and they leak out in our attitudes and words even when we don’t realize it. If we’re going to be as approachable and compassionate as Jesus was, we have to get to the root of any place these models don’t resemble the way Christ valued people.

The terms pro-life and pro-choice don’t equip Christians to communicate the inherent worth of both women and children. This is a source of frustration for many people I know who hold complex and multifaceted views on abortion. These labels are political descriptors rather than spiritual ones; they are rooted in specific partisan American politics, and with these terms comes the implicit demand to prioritize one person over the other. The main issue with relying on these partisan terms is that both views fail to convey a comprehensive Christian ethic that recognizes the imago Dei (image of God) in all people.

The term pro-life emphasizes the value of the child without acknowledging the equal value of the woman, the life-altering impact of pregnancy and parenting, and the societal factors that leave many women and children without essential support. The term pro-choice highlights the value of the woman without acknowledging or adequately wrestling with the mystery of God’s creation of life through pregnancy, whether at conception or some later stage. These theological shortcomings make both terms incomplete in reflecting a truly Christian perspective.

The pro-life/pro-choice binary also makes it very difficult to communicate nuanced policy views, such as when or under what conditions abortion should be legal. I know many Christians who support limited legal access to abortion—for example, in cases of rape, incest, life-threatening pregnancy, or during the first trimester or other early stages. This kind of qualified view is their way of communicating that they are considering the needs of the woman more than policies that seek to abolish, criminalize, or prosecute abortion. It also communicates that they are considering the value of the child more than policies that seek to legalize abortion, for any reason, up to forty weeks. But which term can they use to articulate their perspective on legislation?

I have heard Christians who hold complex views say something to the effect of, “I’m personally pro-life but politically pro-choice.” While this statement attempts to bridge values from both political parties, relying on partisan labels can make it hard for believers to truly understand each other and find common ground.

In my experience, thoughtful Christians from different political sides have much more in common with each other than with those who lean toward extreme positions on their own side. Over two decades of conversations around abortion, I’ve encountered very few Christians who appear completely indifferent to the needs of either the woman or the child. Most believers wrestle deeply with these concerns, but the emotional weight and political polarization often keep us from listening well and hearing each other.

For these reasons, I have found it most productive to limit the use of pro-life and pro-choice in favor of language that helps Christians express a more comprehensive, holistic perspective informed by Scripture and the life of Jesus.

I use the term prograce because it elevates the hope of Christ above any attempt to change others through force or argument.

The term prograce is grounded in two primary theological pillars applied to the abortion conversation:

Equal value, equal dignity—honoring the inherent worth in every human. If we lead with a political position of pro-life, we will be perceived as valuing the child more, and if we lead with pro-choice, we will be perceived as valuing the woman more—this leads to stereotyping and shuts down conversation with other Christians. If we make our political affiliation secondary to our theological belief in the dignity of all human life, we can honor both the woman and child involved in a pregnancy, which is the fullest expression of God’s heart.
Transformed by grace—relying on the power of grace alone. If we become defensive, thinking the problem is the response of other people, we will continue in the same patterns, seeing the same outcomes. If we immerse ourselves in grace, we can look inward to recognize ways we may have unintentionally contributed to division, judgment, and shame in this conversation, instead of creating a culture of compassion in our families, churches, and communities.

Prograce is the posture and language I have found through my journey to best express what I believe: We won’t see transformation in society until we, as the church, are transformed by grace.

Image: Unsplash/dadalan real