When Jesus addressed the Jews, he exposed two defining traits of Satan, the adversary: “He is a liar and the father of lies.” “He has been a murderer from the beginning.” It was through lies that he deceived Eve. It was through murder that, throughout human history, he sought to obstruct and interrupt the unfolding of God’s plan of salvation and restoration. Satan stirred Cain’s anger and fueled his fratricidal act.

His goal? To eliminate Abel, the man whom God favored and whose descendants would carry out the redemptive plan.

It was Satan who inspired Pharaoh to issue the horrific decree to decimate the enslaved Israelites, whose growing population worried him. “When you help the Hebrew women during childbirth, if it is a boy, kill him,” he commanded the midwives. This was a radical method to reduce the chosen people, heirs of the promise, and eliminate, before his birth, the one who would liberate them from Egyptian bondage: Moses. It was also Satan who incited Herod the Great’s jealousy and rage when he learned from the wise men about the birth of the “King of the Jews,” prompting the massacre of the innocents.

The tyrant’s decree to kill all children under two years old in Bethlehem targeted the Son of God, Jesus, who was born in a manger and destined to bring universal salvation. Closer to our time, the Nazi Holocaust aimed to exterminate the Jewish diaspora. Through the “final solution,” the enemy sought to erase the despised Israelites from the map.

These are different situations, yet they follow a common strategy: thwart the divine plan. The method is unchanging: death.

A massacre of the innocent, whose cries are unheard by the world, is spreading across the globe and increasing in intensity: abortion. This is not a new phenomenon. In ancient times, it was believed that the “ensoulment of the embryo,” depending on whether it was male or female, occurred forty or eighty days after conception (a principle later accepted by Thomas Aquinas). Among the ancient Greeks, abortion was generally permitted within these limits. In Rome, it was equated with poisoning and punished accordingly. In the 13th century, the English punished it by death. In Brabant, around the same time, both the aborter and the aborted were burned alive…

The Catholic Church has consistently condemned abortion. At the Council of Ancyra (314), it was decided to punish abortion with ten years of penance. Today, offenders risk excommunication, though this is rarely enforced. Since 1960, many countries have legally adopted a liberal approach to abortion, driven by two main reasons: a desire to minimize the health risks through strict medical control and the aim to direct a profitable market toward hospitals.

In France, the laws of January 17, 1975, and December 31, 1979, under certain conditions, permit abortion, euphemistically referred to as “Voluntary Termination of Pregnancy” (IVG). Medical authorization for abortion, up to the tenth week, is granted to a pregnant woman deemed to be in a “situation of distress” (a term open to wide interpretation). Similarly, abortion is allowed if the pregnancy poses a serious risk to the mother’s health or if there is a high probability that the unborn child will suffer from a severe and incurable condition. The consulting doctor may refuse the request from the initial consultation. If the procedure is approved, the woman is informed in advance of the medical risks, as well as the rights, assistance, and “benefits” offered (including reimbursement by Social Security). For minors, parental consent is required.

Currently, in France, for approximately 800,000 births per year, about 183,000 legal IVGs are recorded, representing roughly 23% of births. The actual number is likely higher, as it is unclear how many illegal abortions take place in France or abroad. If we apply this percentage to the total number of annual births worldwide (about 150 million), we arrive at an estimate of around 34 million abortions per year globally.

This estimate may seem excessive, given that the two most populous countries—India and China—prefer sterilization and contraception to limit their booming populations. However, it’s worth noting that countries like Poland and the USSR, for example, record more abortions than births.

Regardless, no precise global statistics can be seriously considered, but our estimate gives a sense of the scale of the phenomenon. In less than two years, the number of embryos destroyed in their mothers’ wombs represents a population equivalent to that of France, across all nations! Almost always, this horrific outcome reflects the rejection of the fruit of love. After all, a voluntary union (except in the rare case of rape) initiated the reproductive process. Alas, the superficial, fleeting sensuality promoted by the spirit of the world is selfish and murderous, much like the devil who inspires it.

Many unwanted children are born, carrying the consequences for a long time, and sometimes for life. Many unwanted children, however, are innocent victims of this blind carnage.

A video film, “The Silent Scream,” shows, via ultrasound, the various phases of an abortion. The image quality is not the best, fortunately—otherwise, it would be unbearable to watch. In it, the embryo is seen trying to move away as much as it can from the deadly instrument seeking it out. When it is struck, the pain is so intense that the helpless little being opens its mouth wide in a terrible, inaudible scream (hence the title of the film). Then follows the methodical and relentless dismemberment, and finally, the suctioning.

Any woman contemplating abortion who saw these horrific images would likely abandon her plan. But of course, all of this happens in the secret of the abdomen, shielded from view.

At the end of a public screening of “The Silent Scream,” I witnessed two people rise spontaneously from their seats in tears and come forward. To everyone’s surprise, they each confessed, one after the other, to sins unknown to us, asking for God’s forgiveness and the support of our prayers. The first, a middle-aged woman, had undergone two abortions. The first was illegal and done by “artisanal” means, and the second by the “modern” method we had just learned about through the film. The sight of these images shocked her so profoundly that she was instantly overcome with an irresistible conviction of sin.

The second person to come forward was a younger man. A few years earlier, he had pressured his wife, who wasn’t present, to undergo an abortion. The film had similarly shaken him, filling his heart with deep remorse. Such an awakening of conscience would be preferable before the irrevocable is committed. That’s why it’s essential to encourage people, especially young ones, to watch “The Silent Scream.” It’s an effective way to expose one of the devil’s works and counteract it.

Regarding abortion, what, ultimately, will guide the Christian attitude, in the fullest sense of the word? Certainly not human motivations, no matter how timely or commendable they may seem. Circumstances invariably shift, constantly altering our notions of good and evil. This is unstable ground, prone to uncontrolled slippage.

The only solid foundation, because it is unchanging, is that which reveals God’s mind on this subject (as on all others): Scripture. It affirms that “His divine power has given us everything we need for life.” That is where we must look. The question immediately arises: From when can the embryo be considered a living being? In antiquity, as mentioned, the time frame was set, depending on the gender, at forty or eighty days.

Today, the law, by authorizing abortion before the tenth week (70 days), implicitly recognizes that up until that point, the embryo cannot truly be considered a living being. Thus, the ancient and modern views converge. But here’s what King David wrote on the subject around a thousand years before Christ:

“My frame was not hidden from You
When I was made in secret,
Woven together in the depths of the earth.
Your eyes saw my unformed body;
All the days ordained for me
Were written in Your book
Before one of them came to be.” (Psalm 139:15-16)

This is the truth. The adversary seeks to hide it behind clever speculations and pragmatic arguments. Yet the biblical revelation could not be clearer. From the moment of conception, as soon as the initial cell division occurs, God sees the human being that the tiny, formless mass will gradually become, nestled at that time in the mother’s fallopian tube.

God knows in detail the entire destiny of the man or woman who is potentially present in that fertilized egg, which, after eight days, reaches the embryonic stage. The genetic heritage of this embryo, complete from the start, already contains the entire destiny of every individual. A destiny that only the Creator can, if He wills, alter or shape. From the very first instant, we are, therefore, in the presence of a living creature—so alive, in fact, because humans are made in the image of God, that beyond earthly existence, an eternal perspective awaits them.

The apostle Paul, guided by the Holy Spirit, lifts the veil on this eternal reality: “For those God foreknew (this is the case here), He also predestined to be conformed to the image of His Son, that He might be the firstborn among many brothers and sisters. And those He predestined, He also called; those He called, He also justified; and those He justified, He also glorified.”

The call to life of a human being implies, as we see, the accomplishment of a trajectory that passes, as for Jesus, through incarnation, death, resurrection, finally eternal existence in a spiritual body, in celestial glory. This affirmation is madness for the “wise” of this world. But marvelous hope for us, Christians, who firmly appropriate it, by faith!

When we know this, we realize the exceptional gravity of abortion, both for those who decide to submit to it and for those who practice it. The blind genocide abruptly interrupts so many nascent existences destined for life! And here they are prematurely eliminated, in a cruel way, by the will of those who owed them protection, before they have even seen the light of day. The height of iniquity.

In the last century, abortionists were given the name “angel makers”. There is probably something accurate in this pretentiously sadistic expression. The eternal destiny of a creature cannot be called into question by the murderous intervention of men. The design decided by the Almighty remains the same, whether it is an embryo torn to pieces in the …

This text is an excerpt from the book “They Will Become One Flesh: Bible and Sexual Chaos” written by Henri Gras.

We invite you to read the following article “THE INSTITUTION OF THE COUPLE“.

LIKE GODS. LIKE GODS. LIKE GODS. LIKE GODS. LIKE GODS. LIKE GODS. LIKE GODS. LIKE GODS. LIKE GODS.