Abortion is a complicated and divisive issue in America, in part because it strains the capacity of our culture and political system to discover a way to protect the life of the unborn in a society shaped by the value of individual rights and freedom.    We Americans cherish the cultural value of being free to make our own decisions without interference from government.

Yet the freedom we exercise in the case of abortion is more than the liberty to live where we choose or to hold certain religious or political opinions we have adopted, since the exercise of this freedom results in the extermination of another human being.  

The law of the land is not always a sufficient solution to personal moral and ethical responsibility.  The United Methodist Social Principles affirm,  "Governmental laws and regulations do not provide all the guidance required by the informed Christian conscience."    Whatever the law might be, we human beings, and Christian human beings I might add, still have to exercise our own moral responsibilities as persons and develop together a culture that promotes and nurtures moral values and choices.