Lessons from Church History # 1

Quotes About Abortion

Quotes about abortion from throughout Christian History.

Letter to Diognetus, A.D. 80 - 160

[Christians] marry, as do all. They beget children, but they do not destroy their offspring. (ch. 5)

Letter of Barnabas, A.D. 80 - 130

You shall not slay a child by procuring an abortion, nor shall you destroy it after it is born. (ch. 19)

[In the way of darkness] are people ... who are murderers of children and destroyers of the workmanship of God. (ch. 21)

Justin Martyr, c. A.D. 155

We have been taught that to expose newborn children [i.e., to leave them out to die or be found] is what wicked men do. We have been taught this so that we will not do harm to anyone and so that we will not sin against God. First because we see that almost all so exposed are raised as prostitutes[both boys and girls, according to Ante-Nicene Fathers note].
     Second, [we fear] that same may not be picked up, but die, and we will be murderers. (First Apology 27, 29)

Athenagoras, A.D. 177

When we say that those women who use drugs to bring on abortion commit murder and will have to give an account to God for the abortion, on what principle should we commit murder? For the same person would not regard the very fetus in the womb as a created being, and therefore an object of God’s care, and then, when it has passed into life, kill it. Nor would the same person avoid exposing an infant, because those who expose them are chargeable with child-murder, then, on the other hand, when it has been reared, destroy it.(A Plea for the Christians 35)

Tertullian, c. A.D. 210

For us, since we have forbidden murder once and for all, we may not even destroy the fetus in the womb, even though at that point the human being still dervies its blood from other parts of the body for sustenance.
     To hinder a birth is merely a speedier killing of a man. Nor does it matter whether you take a way a life that is born or destroy one that is preparing to be born. It is a human if it is going to be a human. You already have the fruit in its seed. (Apology 9)