As so often is the case (at least for me), I was on the web searching for one thing and ran across something else that piqued my interest.
It was a keynote speech delivered by Tim Keller at the 2018 National Parliamentary Prayer Breakfast in Westminster Hall, London. The Rev. Keller is, of course, a near legendary figure in evangelical circles and the author of multiple books.
In his remarks he quoted from Martin Luther King, Jr.’s sermon, “The American Dream.” Keller was making the case that it is the Christian
Here’s the quote from Dr. King:
You see, the founding fathers were really influenced by the Bible. The whole concept of the imago dei, as it is expressed in Latin, the ‘image of God,’ is the idea that all men have something within them that God injected. Not that they have substantial unity with God, but that every man has a capacity to have fellowship with God. And this gives him a uniqueness, it gives him worth, it gives him dignity. And we must never forget this as a nation: there are no gradations in the image of God. Every man from a treble white to a bass black is significant on God’s keyboard, precisely because every man is made in the image of God. One day we will learn that. We will know one day that God made us to live together as brothers and to respect the dignity and worth of every man.
There are many threads that have been woven together to make up the fabric of what we call the sanctity of human life. But the principle thread, I would argue, is that we believe with every fiber in our bodies that each and every human being is unique.
Each of us matters. None of us is disposable. None is more valuable than any other.
By unique we mean one of a kind. Every single one of us is irreplaceable.
To be sure secularists can make the same argument on a different basis. And we are glad that there are many secular pro-lifers.
But as Dr. King eloquently explained, when we affirm that each of us is made in the image of God, it gives us a transcendent worth and dignity that is not dependent on whether someone decides to give us that.
It is ours by inheritance.
There are “no gradations in the image of God.” What a statement! Put another way, human value is not valued on a sliding scale. When it is, there lies madness.
The great apologist G. K. Chesterton once wrote, “All men matter. You matter. I matter. It’s the hardest thing in theology to believe.”
And to the anti-life, some lives matter, some lives don’t crowd, it is impossible to believe.
Chelsea Garcia is a political writer with a special interest in international relations and social issues. Events surrounding the war in Ukraine and the war in Israel are a major focus for political journalists. But as a former local reporter, she is also interested in national politics.
Chelsea Garcia studied media, communication and political science in Texas, USA, and learned the journalistic trade during an internship at a daily newspaper. In addition to her political writing, she is pursuing a master's degree in multimedia and writing at Texas.
