Losing Ireland | FREE MOVIE | Documentary

Janet, do you believe we're capable of a civilised debate on this issue?

Well, as a person who's spoken of having travelled for an abortion myself, an awful lot of the rhetoric online can be very hurtful and we can get a knock among the abuse. So I would ask anybody engaged on this topic to be civil.

Do you believe abortion is murder?

Yeah, but I'm not going to say yes. I'm not going to blame the women who do it.

But we do need to change some of the language. We do need to destigmatise this. It's one of the reasons the Abortion Rights Campaign is called the Abortion Rights Campaign. For too long, we didn't even use the word abortion in this country.

How do you stop babies being murdered?

That's right.

So what you do is, you don't condemn them and tell them they're murderers.

From our point of view, we're the campaign to broaden the existing abortion rights in this country. So it's really important that we use the word.

Are told by a medical-certed doctor that this baby is not going to survive outside the room. Why should you be tortured and carry a child that's not going to survive? It's inhuman.

Why is it that the pro-choice movement doesn't like to engage positions intellectually and with reason?

This is what the left does. They intimidate the aborted people. That's the purpose of the left. Make sure that you can't articulate your viewpoint in any way.

Why Silence and Cowardice Leave the Church Unprepared

I was asked to go to Ireland earlier this year to speak across Northern and Southern Ireland in some churches. And when I was in Ireland meeting with these wonderful Christians, all Presbyterians, it was just one of the most amazing experiences of my life, getting to fellowship with them and to teach.

I got to hear from my Irish brothers and sisters about this looming thing of abortion sort of on the horizon. And I remember I asked everyone that I talked, everyone I got a chance to talk to in terms of leadership from North to South, I asked, well, what are you doing to fight it?

What are you doing to fight against that? What are you doing to be bold and to speak the truth? And I remember that the consistent answer that I got from North to South was ultimately nothing. We're talking in our churches about it, but we're not doing anything in terms of going out and meeting them where they're at and coming into conflict.

And I just want to suggest to you brothers and sisters here in Ireland, if we do not start faithfully proclaiming the gospel in the midst of a hostile culture, we only have greater days of darkness ahead of us.

We can't keep saying, well, God is sovereign. Truly he is. Yes, he is. He is sovereign. But embracing cowardice, laziness, and making the excuse that God is sovereign is not a Christian virtue. And so I asked them if they would be willing to allow us to help.

I said, you know, we will dedicate all of our resources at Apologia Church that we possibly can to help you in this fight. We'll produce content. I'll send our team out here. We'll do whatever it takes to create the media and message that needs to be heard in Ireland.

And so I said, call me and we will help in whatever way we can. And I didn't hear anything. But what Marcus and I did hear is we heard about in Ireland, all that's happening right now with abortion and the pro-choice movement, trying to repeal the Eighth Amendment.

So my Irish brothers and sisters didn't actually call me back for help. But we saw that there was a massive march, a pro-choice march in Dublin, and we decided this is the important story to tell the church in the United States and in Ireland.

And so we decided to go out and to offer support to the church in Ireland and to also provide a story to the church in the United States. This is where we're lacking. This is what we're losing. And so we went to Ireland anyways.

And our hope was to be able to speak the truth while we were there and to tell the right story that both the church in the United States could understand and the church in Ireland. That is that we are called by God to be faithful in our culture, to speak the truth, to speak it in love, to be bold and to love our neighbors who love ourselves.

Ireland's Christian Heritage and the Drift Toward Secularism

Looking back through the history of our country, it's such a long way away from where we once were. Like we would, in our denomination, we would trace our roots all the way back through to the Scottish Reformation and John Knox.

So at one point we were in a nation that was covenanted unto God to be a nation that enacted only the laws of God's word and enacted laws that upheld God's word. That's where we've come from. And just gradually over time, we've slidden so far away from that.

And I'm sure even as you've seen on your visits to Ireland or Northern Ireland, the landscape is just dotted with church buildings all over the place. You can't walk more than half a mile before you see a church building of some kind.

So the landscape quite literally is a monument to the Christian heritage that we have. And so it's very sad to see where we are now. I mean, I was born in 1987, so I'm part of the millennial generation.

We're the least likely group of people to go to church, to believe in the absolute truth of the Bible. And we're just so far the other way now. And I mean, really, issues like abortion and sexuality, transgenderism, all these things are now part of the conversation in our country.

And for me, it's really just the outworking of Romans 1 and 2, you know, that we've exchanged the truth for a lie and we're reaping the consequences of that. So it's a lot of sadness for me on a personal level to know where we've come from to get to where we are today.

Maybe there's a feeling within the Christian community that actually the battle with abortion has been won to some extent, or we're in a reasonably comfortable position so we don't need to fight right now.

But the danger there exists, I think, that maybe in being complacent about it, we don't realise that actually what people feel are less significant issues right now are creeping in through the back door slowly, and maybe the church is a little bit asleep on it.

The Pro-Choice March, the Eighth Amendment, and the Public Fight in Ireland

Pro-life and pro-choice activists in Ireland are bracing for a tough fight. The nation will vote next year on whether to ease some of the strictest abortion laws in the world. The Prime Minister has promised a referendum by June.

Abortion is illegal in Ireland, except if the mother's life is clearly endangered. Campaigners will be closely watching what changes are put to voters.

Centuries ago, women accused of witchcraft.

Faced amongst other ordeals. Trial by war.

Tied to a chair or run under a boat. If she survives the drowning and floats, she's a witch.

If she dies, she's a woman.

We are not witches, but if the church and state insist,.

Then let us be the descendants of all the witches they could not drown.

The laws of the church have no place on your flesh.

A veterinarian will abort a calf if a cow falls out.

How is it that livestock is worth more to this land than us?

Why the Pro-Life Movement's Language Weakens the Gospel Witness

So one of the things that we have had to face as a church and as a ministry in our current culture in terms of the abortion debate is we've had to face the challenge of the rhetoric, the challenge of the argumentation, the challenge of the polemics.

We've had to address the fact that the pro-life movement generally will not speak about abortion in biblical terminology. It will not be honest, ultimately honest, about what the sin and crime of abortion is.

And it will not be ultimately honest in a helpful way that points people to Jesus in terms of what the women are actually doing, what they're guilty of, and their need for Christ.

The pro-life movement has a lot of women who are active in it who have had abortions. And they very much argue that the mother who got the abortion is also a victim. So the pro-life movement, for the almost 50 years that it's been in existence, have never called for punishing the woman who gets the abortion.

We want to, of course, get the abortionists to stop doing the activity. And we want abortion to stop. But we have not, you know, said that women need to be penalized for doing it.

Doctors should not have the control of a human being's body. They're only there to basically give, they have a duty of care towards the patient. Like, which patient, it doesn't matter which patient. In the case of like a mother and a baby woman.

What I'm trying to say is, right, if you're basically incapacitated within your own body, but your soul and your mind are correct, I think you should be able to make a conscious decision to sign over your life if you choose so.

Because you believe in bodily autonomy.

Exactly.

So what about, what do you say to the person that says, I believe in bodily autonomy too and that's why I'm against abortion. Because there's another body that's no longer autonomous, it's being killed.

Okay, right.

The Failure of Neutrality in the Fight Against Abortion

What we've seen is the major pro-life organizations have decided to take a course that says, let's be very neutral in our approach. Let's not be explicitly Christian. Let's not call abortion murder and let's not fight for the immediate end of abortion, the criminalization of abortion as murder.

It's been more in terms of neutrality, taking a backdoor approach. As a matter of fact, in an interview we had not too long ago with the vice president of National Right to Life, one of the largest pro-life organizations in the world, he specifically said that.

You would see Jesus and his authority as full and total reigning over the church, but you do see civil government as a distinct organization and sphere of authority that is not necessarily to be obedient to Jesus in terms of this law, murder, those sorts of things that you would see as a distinction.

As a difference, some people who operate in the arena of public policy are motivated by that same commitment to the way that you and I accept, but some do not. And yet among some of those who do not, some of them still are willing to protect the lives of unborn children for what might be referred to as humanitarian reasons.

They recognize that abortion is not a victimless crime, that an innocent human being is killed every time an abortion is committed, and they would legislate for religious reasons.

So, okay, that helps a lot, actually, tremendously. So, when we pursue ending abortion in our nation and addressing this pro-life issue, we want to pursue it in a different kind of language. You're suggesting that it would be more helpful and conducive to getting rid of this evil.

We wouldn't want to use necessarily biblical terminology in that arena because it wouldn't work in a secular context. We don't want to address it in that way. You think that would be actually hurtful to the cause if we use biblical language and stand, you know, as Christians with biblical terminology, you think it'd be easier to do away with this in a different way?

I think that's a fair statement.

Why the Church Must Call Abortion Murder and Preach Repentance

And what that has ultimately done is it has killed our witness as the church. It has destroyed our ability to give the gospel of grace to women because we're telling them that they're not actually guilty of murdering their child.

And so, there's really nothing to point them to Jesus about. If it's just a mistake, if it's just something that's uncomfortable, if it's just something that's against our traditions, then there's no need for repentance.

There's no need for Jesus. And so, we've seen across this long, horrible time period, this mark on our history in America, we've seen the church in America has been largely biblically silent, and we have seen the damaging effects of the national pro-life movement upon the witness of the church and ultimately the effective end of abortion in our nation.

And one of the interesting things is that America has such a strong Christian heritage and biblical foundation to it. Abortion was illegal in the United States of America on biblical terms, image of God, it's murder when you take the life of your child with premeditation.

We had a successful pro-life movement in the United States before when abortifacients were popular, the church rose up and fought against it explicitly with the gospel. We've won this fight before. And what's interesting to me is to see that as the church remains biblically silent in the area of abortion, we are not effective.

We are not effective in terms of ministering to women and their souls. We're not effective in terms of the legislative battle. And in other words, if we go to our legislature and we say, this is just something that makes us uncomfortable, what goes against our traditional values, it's not murder, we just, we think it should end.

Then legislatures have nothing to legislate on. If it's not a moral issue, if it's not the taking of a human life, if it's not murder, then the legislature has nothing to legislate against. It's just ultimately your preference versus another preference.

And what we've seen though is that the pro-choice movement in the United States doesn't fight like the church does. It doesn't fight like the pro-life movement does. They use very, very strong language.

They fight with all of their might. They are bold. They take no prisoners. And we've taken an approach that is very, very soft, that is not explicitly Christian, that doesn't use the right terminology consistently.

And the people who are in charge of the pro-life movement nationally are all committed to really a course of ending abortion that is not effective. What kind of thoughts do you have when you think about what is ahead of you and what you guys ought to be doing as a church to fight?

What do you think?

A Call for Urgency, Courage, and Practical Church Engagement

Well, the first thing I think, I think I feel guilty. That's the first feeling I have. Because I think I haven't, I've not really been, it's not been at the forefront of my mind, it's not been at the forefront of my prayers, and it's not been at the forefront of my action.

And the more I think about it, yeah, we absolutely need to be completely involved in an active way in bringing the gospel into this situation. We have to do that with a sense of urgency. Because if we don't do that now, and we just say, oh sure, we'll do that in a year, or we'll do it, or we'll do it when we're really on the cusp, then it's not going to be effective.

And I feel like I want, I want a way to engage just as an average person. I'm not, I'm not, you know, I'm not in leadership, obviously. So I, but I still, I'm just an average person in a church and I want a way, I want to be given ways from my elders and from my ministers, say, in ways I can engage or, you know, more than just prayer.

I think prayer is obviously vital, but we have to do more than that.

Do you guys talk about it in terms of abortion being murder?

Yeah, I think in Christian circles, certainly we would. I mean, I'd be fairly sure that, I'd be pretty confident that I've already used those words from the pulpit, even in my short time as a pastor. I've certainly heard other pastors use that language.

I think that the issue then is how vocally or how widespread do you use that language outside the church? So it's one thing for me to say it from the pulpit to the pews on a Lord's Day morning, but we maybe would lack more confidence to say that, you know, the Christians in the pew would lack confidence to say that in the course of ordinary life, you know.

I mean, what is, what is the nature of Ireland's relationship with the abortion question? How much is that defined by Ireland's relationship with religion?

I think that as the marriage equality referendum showed, Ireland's relationship to religion has profoundly changed. Young people in particular more and more often are striving for a more secular and progressive society.

And many, and actually the issue of choice in this march today isn't just about abortion. It's about winning back our state services from the control of the church. Our hospital systems are still almost entirely run by the church.

Our education system is almost entirely run by the church. I am absolutely certain that we can win this and it won't be won by any benevolence from the political establishment granting it to us. It will be won by young people, by women, by LGBTQ activists going to the streets, demanding change and winning people over along with us at the same time.

Where's the church?

Well, I don't think that, as far as I can see, we're not really, we're not really engaging in an active way and certainly not in media to a great extent. I think we could do a lot more. And I think that maybe when you chat to people about it, people are maybe afraid of, that if we do actively get involved, that the church, say if we go to a protest where we're completely outnumbered and the media will then turn on us and make us look bad.

So they maybe think, oh well, we'll come out of it even worse. But actually, it doesn't matter if we come out of it worse. You know, it doesn't matter if I look bad. It's what, if God's brought glory and His word is proclaimed, even one life is saved out of that, praise God.

Ireland, America, and the Need to Speak the Truth About Abortion

Now, take America's problem. I'd say the church in America, take our problem now and look across the way to another Christian nation, another historically Christian nation, Ireland. It's without question a nation that has been transformed by the gospel.

You can't walk around Ireland and not see the remnants of a Christian civilization all around you. I mean, in many instances, it's more explicit and obvious than the United States of America is today.

You can't miss the foundation of Christianity for Ireland and Irish culture. Now you take Ireland, an historic Christian nation, and see what they're fighting against now. They are where we were in the 70s.

They're in a place now where they have the Eighth Amendment, and it's amazing. The Eighth Amendment essentially equalizes the life of the unborn child with the life of the mother. And so in Ireland right now, it's illegal to procure an abortion, to have an abortion.

And there's even a 14-year jail sentence, prison sentence in some instances for the act of abortion. And right now, the pro-choice movement in America is influencing the pro-choice movement in Ireland.

I mean, we walked around Ireland, and it was amazing to see the consistency between the pro-choice movement there and the pro-choice movement here. It's almost like they purchased the signs from the pro-choice movement United States of America branch.

It was the same signs. It was the same rhetoric. It was the same argumentation. And what's amazing is that we went in Ireland to a pro-life rally. There was maybe 100 people there. They were very, very passive, very, very calm.

They didn't even want to hear the word murder in this context. It was incredible to see how the pro-life movement in Ireland is being so heavily impacted by the pro-life movement here, I want to say the failed pro-life movement here, that they're adopting their methodology.

They're adopting their stance on neutrality. They're adopting their stance on not explicitly Christian. They're adopting their stance on don't use the word murder.

Don't let your Eighth Amendment go, because women will be railroaded into making a terrible mistake that they will live with, and society will then try and tell them that it's in their interest.

A Final Plea to Make Abortion About the Gospel

I'm a pastor of a church in Arizona. We have an organization that is saving thousands of children in abortion mills in my country. Over 3 ,000 children are killed every day in my nation. We have abortion facilities in my area, and we send teams out.

My church has saved over 100 babies locally in the last couple of years. We have 250 churches across the nation that are saving babies. I just want to implore you and plead with you as an American who faces this death on our streets every single day.

The pro-life movement in my nation is an abysmal failure. It has failed. Listen, please, I plead with you. You're about to face this. We have 60 million babies dead in my nation. 60 million are dead.

The pro-life movement was a failure at the beginning. The pro-life movement was a failure, is a failure now. I want to plead with you, plead with you to make this issue about what you just heard, the lives of these babies, the lives of these women, and not the pro-life rhetoric that says, that says, appeal to the emotions.

It'll hurt the women. We tell the women, this will hurt you, ma 'am. You're going to grieve over this. And they say, it doesn't matter. I have the right to kill my child. I want to plead with you to make this about the gospel, to make it about the biblical worldview.

That's what gave you your value and dignity in Ireland. It's the only thing that's going to maintain it. If you step off of the word of God, as the pro-life movement has in my nation, you are going to face abortion every day in your streets.

It must be about Jesus. It must be about repentance and faith. It must be about the gospel. Brothers and sisters, you have to speak to the heart of your nation, the heart of your nation, and they need Christ.

You have to call it what it is. Abortion is murder. Abortion is murder. And you must speak to it in that way, or you're going to face what we are. Brothers and sisters, please listen to my plea. Stand on the word of God in Ireland.

Make it about the heart. Make it about the gospel. Call your nation to repentance, and you will defeat this beast. You will. Please abandon the pro-life movement's rhetoric and make it about Christ.

Thank you guys for listening.