Gloria Steinem passed away this summer and was hailed as an icon of the women’s feminist movement. She was praised for her many endeavours over the course of her life, with one of her defining legacies framed as her fight for “women’s reproductive rights”. The use of this phrase is particularly revealing, because the word reproductive naturally directs our minds toward conception, babies, and children. Campaigning for “reproductive rights” implies a desire to support motherhood, ensure access to medical care, or assist in family building. The argument is framed as a fundamental right, as though something essential was being withheld or restored. But it is vital to scrutinise the language being used, because these terms conceal the reality of what is actually taking place. The true objective of her campaigning was to secure for women the legal right to end the lives of their unborn children at will.

The abortion and fertility industries have adopted this exact linguistic strategy, selling these procedures to society under the sanitised labels of “healthcare” and “family planning”. In the U.K., both are readily accessible through the National Health Service. It is a clever ploy: restricting or removing either sounds like essential medical care is being denied. The reality, however, is starkly different.

First, an abortion is the intentional termination of an unborn baby in the womb. Depending on the developmental stage of the child, various methods are used to end that life. Second, IVF completely bypasses sexual intercourse, using laboratory technology to force conception. No restoration or healing of the body takes place – it is not medicine in any true sense. Furthermore, the IVF industry is inextricably linked to abortion. Millions of human embryos are discarded if they are unwanted, lost during the thawing process, or left frozen indefinitely. Neither procedure heals bodily dysfunction or is even intended to do so; in fact, both are directly bound to the destruction of unborn life.

Yet, to persuade millions of women and men to participate in these procedures, or to defend them as so-called rights, modern movements have worked tirelessly to frame them as indispensable to a free society. As a teacher, I have found it astonishing to observe colleagues in my own sector, those who care for, educate, and nurture the youngest among us, unhesitatingly affirm that women must have this “choice”. “We must be able to choose, right?” is the question routinely asked. It is stated with complete assurance, as though this principle were the very bedrock of modern civilization, and to oppose it is to be anti-choice, old-fashioned, and rigid. This easy regurgitation is the direct product of decades of repetition, as slogans like “my body, my choice” and “healthcare” have saturated our culture from every angle.

As Scripture reminds us, there is nothing new under the sun. Satan has always sought the destruction of human beings as image-bearers of God, but he takes particular delight in targeting the most innocent and vulnerable. Pharaoh’s attempt to preserve control over Egypt began with a command to slaughter the Hebrew boys. Herod’s desperate attempt to secure his throne resulted in the massacre of the infants under two years old in Bethlehem and its vicinity. This is a demonically inspired agenda. History is littered with the worship of idols through the deliberate sacrifice of children. We read of this throughout Scripture, as the nations surrounding Israel sacrificed their babies to Molech and Chemosh. We view ourselves today as advanced, enlightened, and modern, yet fundamentally nothing has changed: today, the worship is of self, and the altar of sacrifice is “choice”.