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Your Conversation Navigator

This guide will help you navigate conversation with pointers of what to say and how to say it. But it is up to you to work it into a natural dialogue.

Conversations require at least two people. That means you have two different stories, possibly two different worldviews, and plenty of opportunities for confusion. But meaningful dialogue is still possible. Our team creates it every day, and so can you.

Click through the navigator below. Then hit “continue” to start the conversation.

Know the Case

To be effective, dialogue must be well-informed. Prepare by committing to memory these three lines clarifying why abortion is wrong:

  1. It is wrong to intentionally kill innocent human beings.
  2. Elective abortion intentionally kills innocent human beings.
  3. Therefore, elective abortion is wrong.

Sometimes pro-life people get sidetracked from why abortion is wrong, instead focusing on related issues, such as how abortion affects mothers. Jay Watts provides a helpful reminder: There is a difference between why abortion is wrong and what’s wrong with abortion. There are many things that are wrong with elective abortion—such as how it affects family members—but there is one objective reason abortion is wrong: It intentionally kills innocent humans.

Bring Photos

Good navigation requires good tools. To call others to action, start with pictures of the victims you want to help. 

Say, “You and I might have a lot to say about abortion, but this isn’t our story. It’s really about the actual people killed by abortion. They can’t speak, but they can tell their stories visually. I’d like to show them to you.”

download pictures from our gallery. Order handouts from our store.

Ask, “Have you seen pictures of Jewish Holocaust victims or people brutalized by American human slavery? If so, why not also look at pictures of innocent people being killed today?”

Read more about the importance of abortion victim photos in our online questions.

Find Common Ground

To find out where to take the conversation, suggest two action points you’d like to pursue. How they respond will determine how to focus the conversation.

Say, “As a leader of our church, I know you are very busy. I don’t want to give you more to do. What I’d like is your blessing to do two things. First, I’d like to add preborn babies scheduled to be killed by abortion and their parents to the list of prayer requests for our corporate prayer time. And second, I’d like to start a pro-life outreach group and invite members of the church to join. What do you think?”

ask, “Who should I talk to about adding preborn babies and their parents to the prayer list?”

Then check out our Conversation Navigator for starting an outreach group (insert link) to start finding people at the church who will join you.

then you’ll need to focus your dialogue on why outreach fits within the Christian mission.

then your church leader may be “personally pro-life” only—which is functionally the same thing as being pro-choice.

Point to Truth

Now that you know where to focus your dialogue, chart a course pointing toward truth.

Say, “The Bible is full of commands to help orphans, and I think preborn babies being aborted count as orphans. Their parents have rejected them. Would you agree?”

say, “Today it is unthinkable to own someone because of their skin color. We can do the same thing with abortion. If we make it unthinkable, then people won’t consider killing their babies. Also, if we offer help to mothers and fathers planning to kill their children, we can eliminate their perceived need for abortion.”

then jump down to “If your church leader may be functionally pro-choice” below.

then they are treating preborn babies in a way they wouldn’t treat born children. If it were toddlers being killed daily, they likely would not only be personally opposed but would take action so that no one killed their toddlers.

The best strategy is to walk them through the pro-life case. Click each line below to see support for the claim.

Say, “I’m sure you and I already agree on this point. That’s why, for example, we both oppose killing toddlers.”

Ask: “Is the embryo growing?” They will likely say, “Yes.” (If not, show them pictures of the embryo’s growth.) 

Then say, “Dead things don’t grow. So, since the embryo is growing, she must be alive.”

Next, ask: “Are her parents human? If so, wouldn’t it make sense that whom they create would belong to the same species?”

For more on this, check out our Questions about Abortion.

Say, “Remember the pictures we looked at earlier of abortion victims? Would you agree those babies were killed?”

Continue, “Do you know what happens in an abortion? With pill abortions, the baby is starved and suffocated before being flushed down the toilet. In surgical abortions, she is decapitated, dismembered, disemboweled, and discarded. Would you agree this is purposeful killing?”

Say, “Now, some people say because embryos are different from toddlers, they don’t really count as one of us, don’t have human rights, or are not persons.” Continue, “But there are only four differences between toddlers and embryos, and none of them justify killing: Size, Level of development, Environment, Degree of dependency” (remember the acronym SLED).

They say, “The embryo is so little. It can’t be a person like us.”

You say, “A toddler is smaller than both of us, but she’s still a person. So, size must be irrelevant to our personhood.”

They say, “The embryo isn’t self-aware, can’t communicate, have rational thought, etc.”

Ask, “Why does that matter? How do you know being self-aware/communicating/having rational thought/etc. gives humans value?”

Say, “A toddler is less self-aware than we are/can’t communicate like we can/etc. She’s less developed than we are. But she’s still a person. So, level of development must be irrelevant to our personhood.”

They say, “Being inside someone else means the embryo can’t be a unique person like us.”

You say, “Where you are doesn’t change who you are. When you leave your home to go to work or school, changing environments doesn’t change your value as a person or affect your human rights. The same is true for the preborn baby.”

They say, “Because the embryo needs someone else, it can’t be a person.”

You say, “Children depend on their parents. That doesn’t make them non-persons or strip them of human rights. So, dependency must be irrelevant to personhood.”

Summarize: “We know it’s wrong to purposefully kill innocent humans. And we know that’s what abortion does. So abortion is wrong in the same way killing toddlers is wrong.”

Continue, “So we’re back to what we should do about it. In the parable of the Good Samaritan, Christ directs us to help our neighbors in need. These babies dying are our neighbors. Will you support me in helping them?”

For more on this, check out our Questions about Abortion.

Follow Their Ideas

Sometimes you will have to take a detour. Even if they see merit in your ideas, they might have adopted ideas from their cultural setting which need to be explored before they can agree not only that abortion is always wrong but that it demands response from the church.

So, follow their thinking for a bit to show where it would lead. As they present arguments or slogans they’ve heard, discuss the logical conclusions of their ideas. Here are some examples:

Ask, “What kind of a world would it create if no one judged actions as right and wrong? The result would be anarchy. Is that the kind of society you really think we should be building?”

Continue, “The law legislates right and wrong behavior. Do you think Christians should not be involved in the process of legislating what is right and wrong? What kind of a world would that create, if we only allowed non-Christians to write the law?”

Say, “Let’s explore that idea. Imagine we knew a mother living in poverty who couldn’t handle caring for her newborn anymore. What if we knew she were planning to kill her newborn? If we kept quiet, allowing her to kill the child, would that be loving toward the mother?”

Continue, “Is it really loving someone to allow them to plan and execute a crime? What kind of world would it create if we made that our principle for all immoral behavior, not just abortion?”

Say, “You’re right. You can have a pro-life worldview while living inconsistently with it. But do you think it’s a good thing to live inconsistently with our moral principles?”

Continue, “Imagine we went back to the days of human slavery in America. Let’s say we knew two people who both opposed slavery. One was an underground railroad conductor, actively bringing slaves to freedom. The other opposed slavery in his mind but took no action to oppose it. Are these morally equivalent? If not, which one should we try to follow?”

Watch Out for Pitfalls

There are some common obstacles on the path of meaningful conversations. Watch out for these.

This is an attack on people rather than their ideas (an ad hominem logical fallacy). Even if it were true, it would be irrelevant to the question of whether we should engage in pro-life efforts.

Say, “What if I introduced you to pro-life activists who are not mean? Would that change your mind?”

tell them about Created Equal. Show them our videos.

respond, “Then it seems the issue isn’t really whether pro-life activists are mean. There’s another reason you don’t want to do pro-life outreach. Can you explain?”

Say, “I agree that we don’t want to equate any issue with the Gospel.”

Then say, “But consider what Jesus said in the Great Commission: ‘Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all that I have commanded you.’”

Continue, “Among the commandments Christ gave was to care for neighbors in need. We’re supposed to teach others to observe this commandment. How can we do that if we ignore our preborn neighbors in desperate need?”

Add, “There are many biblical passages commanding us to help those in need. We follow these today by helping preborn babies. That’s not a distraction from the Gospel. It’s living out the truths of the Bible.”

CONTINUE