(The article below is actually an amalgamation of what originally were several conversations which began as a chance encounter at a rally and continued at various times following.  When my friend retold them to me the circumstances and the order were unclear, so here, for the purposes of storytelling, I have reassembled most of the relevant points, as best as I can remember them, into one longer conversation.)

Abortion Rights Advocate:  What’s that sign you’re holding there?

Bad Evangelist:  It says, “Abortion is NOT safe, NOT legal, and NOT rare.”

ARA:  Well, I suppose I can concede the “rare” part to a degree, but the rest of it just isn’t true …

BE:  You don’t really think it’s safe, do you?

ARA:  I guess you’re going to tell me it’s unsafe for the fetus.

BE:  The health risks for the mother tend to be glossed over, if they’re even brought up at all.  Not only that, but severe emotional scars can be left on the adults or on the other children in the family.

ARA:  That kind of stuff is incidental.

BE (incredulous):  Incidental?  Just one case is one too many!  Besides, have you ever met a child who survived an abortion?

ARA:  You know, I’ve heard that there are a few.

BE:  But did you ever meet one?  Because I have—and it was really hard to tell that she was any different from anyone else.

ARA:  Well, I think that medical science has progressed since then and doesn’t make that kind of mistake very often anymore …

BE (interrupting):  Are you calling her a mistake?

ARA (taken back):  No, no, not personally.

BE:  Well, she said that she has actually gotten use to people telling her that she’s a mistake, and it’s made her even more determined to make her life count for something and to prove them wrong.

ARA:  Hey, now, I didn’t mean for anyone to take that personally.

BE:  But you have to understand that you’re talking about real human beings any time you talk about abortion.

ARA (looking smug):  So, tell me something—do you eat eggs?

BE (looking confused):  No, they give me gas—why?

ARA:  Well, if you eat eggs then you can’t be truly pro-life.  Any kind of meat-eating would be contrary to pro-life ideals, including the life of the pre-hatched egg.

BE:  Wait a minute.  Who said I was “pro-life?”  (Using his fingers as quotation marks)  Did I say I was “pro-life?”  (Looking around at by-standers)  Did anyone hear me use the term “pro-life?”

ARA:  Well, what are you then, if you’re against abortion?

BE:  I’m “pro-human.”

ARA:  Oh, so that’s different, huh?

BE:  Yes, I’m carnivorous and not ashamed; but once baby humans are conceived they need to be given a chance to live their lives just like you and me.

ARA:  But at least you must make an exception for cases of rape and incest …

BE (shaking his head):  No, not for those either.

ARA:  But how could you put a mother through that?

BE:  It brings up a too-difficult question: since when do we as a society kill a child for the crimes of the father against the mother?

ARA:  What do you mean?

BE:  Well, rape is still a crime isn’t it?  And since the child didn’t commit any crime, why should he or she get the punishment?

ARA:  But the mother shouldn’t be punished either.

BE:  Exactly.  I mean punish the father—he’s the one that did it.

ARA:  So you’re talking about killing the father and keeping the fetus?  That’s capital punishment—would you go that far?

BE:  Only if you insist on killing somebody over such an instance.  It would be preferable to convict a rapist and punish him rather than to kill the innocent party.

ARA:  I still don’t see how you can square allowing capital punishment and prohibiting abortion.

BE:  You seem to be conveniently ignoring an important factor here; the difference between guilt and innocence.  You just can’t pass off guilt like modern psychology tries to do.  Justice would demand that no innocent life be taken; and if society mandates that a rapist deserves death for his crime, then so be it.

ARA:  So there’s no way you can see that a fetus may have to be sacrificed, not even for the life of the mother if the pregnancy put her in jeopardy.

BE:  That depends on how liberal your definition of “life of the mother” is.  There would have to be some serious physical condition involved.  This psychological harm stuff would still leave room for an alternative to abortion such as adoption.  The baby needs to be given every chance to have a life like you or me.

ARA:  But when it’s in the womb it hasn’t made it to real personhood yet.

BE:  Well, then, maybe none of us have.  You realize that you’re a fetus too, don’t you?

ARA (grinning):  Not since I was born …

BE:  So here you are, crusading so that other fetuses won’t get the same opportunities that you’ve gotten, just because you’re a forty-something, post-partum fetus.

ARA:  Hey, I’m no fetus …

BE (interrupting and mocking and old soda commercial):  Wouldn’t you like to be a fetus too, be a fetus, let’s be a fetus …

ARA (a little flustered):  All right, all right; I guess that means that you’re an old fetus too just like everybody else.

BE:  Well, I’m definitely no more or less a person now than I was in the womb.

ARA:  So that’s your story and you’re sticking to it.  So there’s no way you’d consider any alternatives to your theory?

BE (sprouting a devilish grin):  Here’s a theory you could go for—maybe you should wait until that fetus is about twelve or thirteen years old and we all see how it’s going to turn out, then decide whether or not to abort it.

ARA (pausing to make sure that was nothing more than a bad joke):  Very funny.  Anyway, your sign there says that abortion is not legal, and that certainly isn’t true.

BE:  Oh, really?  So why do you think abortion is legal?

ARA:  Because the U. S. Supreme Court passed a decision in the 1973 case Roe v. Wade that made it legal.

BE (wagging his finger):  No, no.  That didn’t make it legal at all.

ARA (rolling his eyes):  You’ve got to be kidding.

BE:  Really—don’t you know anything about the Constitution?

ARA:  Sure, I know as much as anybody.

BE:  Well, they’ve just got us all fooled, then, don’t they?  The truth is that the Supreme Court doesn’t have the power to legalize anything.

ARA:  Oh, sure they do.

BE:  Not according to the real Constitution, they don’t.

ARA:  Oh?  What amendment are you talking about?

BE:  It’s not in an amendment.  It’s in the front part, in the original articles, where no one ever seems to look anymore.  The very first statement after the Preamble, in Article I and Section 1 says: “All legislative power herein granted shall be vested in a Congress of the United States, which shall consist of a Senate and a House of Representatives.”

ARA:  What are you, some kind of political science expert?

BE:  No, I’m just somebody who knows how to read the English language.  When it says that all legislative power is in the Congress, that leaves NO legislative power in the other branches of the government, including the Supreme Court.

ARA:  But the Supreme Court can rule on any law that comes up.

BE:  They can apply the law, but that’s not the same as making something into law.  Only the Congress can legalize something; if it’s the Court doing that, it’s not valid.

ARA:  How can you say that for sure?  They have power to interpret the law.

BE:  That’s a gross over-interpretation of their powers; it isn’t in any way legitimate.  It’s all spelled out right there in the Constitution, if anyone would bother to look at it for what it actually says.

ARA:  But the government does stuff like that all the time—it’s their job that they were elected for.

BE:  But you ought to know that the Court members weren’t elected, but appointed.  And their job is to stay within their limits and not over-reach their power like in that Roe v. Wade thing.  By the way, did you know that the woman who was “Roe” in that case has changed her mind about it all and has gone around the country protesting against abortion and speaking at anti-abortion rallies?

ARA:  Well, I can’t help that.  I guess she can have the right to protest just like she had the right to get her abortion in the first place, doesn’t she?

BE:  The main right that she exercised was the right to repent of her sins and then to have the privilege of accepting Jesus into her life.

ARA (nodding):  Ohhhh, so that’s what this is really all about for you, huh.

BE:  Of course it is.  You know, though, you don’t have to be religious to be against abortion; but in my case it was a recognition of the importance of all life in the sight of God.  The last thing I would ever want to be guilty of would be when I stand before God I’d have to explain why I didn’t speak up on behalf of the most innocent ones of all the people on earth.

ARA:  That may be fine for you, but I don’t even want to waste time with this God stuff.  I mean, why should I pay any attention to this God of yours who probably isn’t even real?

BE:  But just suppose for a minute that I turn out to be right.  You’re risking a lot by not believing, and there just could be a literal hell to pay.

ARA:  But then if you’re wrong and I’m right, what then?

BE:  Well, even if there’s no God, no heaven, no hell, etc., when I die I’m dead and that’s that.  I haven’t really gained anything then, nor have I lost anything.  But if I believe and I’m right, I have a tremendous gain.  So if you believe, it’s heaven or nothing, and if you don’t believe, it’s hell or nothing.  Now who’s the risky one?

ARA:  You know, I just think I’m still better off without all this believing in hellfire and stuff.

BE (laughing under his breath):  Then you don’t even have fire insurance, do you?

ARA (getting a little impatient):  No, I don’t need anything like that.  What makes you think that there’s any proof that this God exists?

BE:  Well, it starts with the fact that you can’t prove that He doesn’t exist.

ARA:  What?

BE:  There is nothing in either science or in nature to show that they’re necessarily acting independently of a God who is either manipulating it or else at least observing it from somewhere in the background.  There is nothing that gives any definite indication of His non-existence, therefore you have to allow for the possibility that He is there.

ARA:  But that doesn’t mean that He necessarily is there, either.

BE:  But then it doesn’t make sense to be an atheist, because atheism is too narrow to allow for the possibility of the existence of a God that they can’t disprove.  The only other option, then, would be agnosticism; and I’ve already shown you the great risk that you’re taking by not being prepared to find out whether that God really is there after all.  Wasn’t it Carl Sagan who said that “Absence of evidence is not evidence of absence?”

ARA:  But why bother to plan for such a thing that probably won’t happen?

BE:  Why do people write wills long before their sixty-fifth birthday?  Why do careful drivers buy car insurance for more coverage than the legal minimum?  Why do employers have workmen’s comp arrangements?

ARA:  OK, OK, but some things are more likely than others.

BE (shaking his head):  Boy, talking to you is like trying to play Monopoly with blank dice—we just can’t seem to get past “Go.”

ARA:  Well, talking to you isn’t much better.  You seem to think that Roe versus Wade are the only two options you have if your canoe goes adrift.  And your canoe really has gone drifting up the creek, hasn’t it.