Many others will debate the politics and the next steps, but I am wondering: where are the religious voices from the left on this issue? Where are those bloggers, and speakers, and social justice organizations who have spoken up on so many injustices?

The Planned Parenthood video has received (and deserved) wide coverage. It should been seen by all who can handle watching it. Actually, if you care about justice, I think you should take the time to watch the whole video. The entire unedited version is available, despite many only referencing a “heavily edited” version.

Many have commented and that’s encouraging. Yet, some have been conspicuously absent, when they’ve spoken up on so many other issues.

Where Are They?

In my last post, I was very clear the video does not say quite what the “Center for Medical Progress” wants it to say. However, along the same lines, the video doesn’t say what Planned Parenthood wants it to say either.

There are plenty of people pointing out the discrepancies in both statements, but the people who are strangely silent are the leaders of the Democratic Party and some progressive Christians who are often aligned with them.

That’s not my opinion alone—Christopher Hale said as much in the Washington Post:

To date, no high-ranking Democrat in the United States has commented on the video. That’s unfortunate, because progressives should be leading the fight against this grotesque act of selectively removing and preserving aborted fetuses’ organs for scientific use…

Deeply rooted in the foundation of our nation is the belief that every human being has dignity and the right to live in that dignity. As progressives, we further believe that the government plays a crucial role in protecting that dignity, especially among those who face adverse societal conditions: the poor, the unemployed, the uninsured, immigrants, the LGBT community — and yes — pregnant women and their unborn children.

And he is right. The silence has been deafening.

Some Recent History

Perhaps this can be explained, at least in part, by the Democratic National Convention meeting in 2012 at which abortion had become such a central element of the platform and convention.

At that time, I wrote:

In 1992, President Clinton talked about making abortion “safe, legal, and rare.” Now the DNC cheers its mention—dozens of times—and never mentions the “rare.” Perhaps the cheering points show us that the “rare” part was just a talking point from another era.

It’s also worth noting that Cokie Roberts of NPR, hardly a bastion of conservatism, expressed the same shock that I did:

“I think this Democratic Convention was really over-the-top in terms of abortion. Every single speaker talked about abortion,” Roberts said Sunday on ABC’s “This Week.”

I tweeted this at the time:

It deeply disturbs me to see a stadium full of people cheer whenever abortion is affirmed. #DNC2012

Where Are Mainline Protestants and Progressive Evangelicals?

Many others will debate the politics and the next steps, but I am wondering: where are the religious voices from the left on this issue?

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