Mansfield Sermonizes on Abortion

Kenan Professor of Government Harvey C. Mansfield Jr. ’53 used biblical references to counter the arguments of abortion rights activists yesterday during a sermon at Morning Prayers in Appleton Chapel.

Despite the topics addressed, Mansfield wrote in an e-mail there was no political slant to the sermon.

“I just used politics to lead into the question whether a free people needs religion,” he said.

Mansfield began his talk by recounting the story of human creation from the book of Genesis, which he used as a basis for his sermon.

He said the passage showed the human power of reproduction and man’s dominion over the earth—rights that Mansfield said could have been withheld by God.

Mansfield quoted two opposing statements from John Locke to demonstrate two different views of the Genesis story. He said Locke’s idea of “Men being all the Workmanship of one omnipotent, and infinitely wise Maker,” contradicts Locke’s assertion that man is “absolute lord of his own person and possession.”

“These opposing statements of Locke’s frame a contrast between our two political parties today, the churchgoers in the Republican party believing that man is God’s property and the secularists who congregate among the Democrats believing that man belongs to himself,” Mansfield said.

Mansfield then turned his attention directly to the issue of abortion, addressing the belief of abortion-rights-activists that a women’s body belongs to the woman alone.

He said that because God awarded the power of reproduction to both sexes, not just to women, this assertion does not hold true.

“Man, while reproducing his kind and holding property himself, remains the property of God,” he said.

But students who are supporters of abortion rights disagree. “This is about individuals having a right to choose. This is not a woman’s issue but a person’s issue,” said Abigail L. Fee ’05, a member of Harvard Students for Choice.

Mansfield also said that while humankind has dominion over living things on earth, it must be responsible in its use of that ruling power.

“Man is understood to be his own property when ruling himself and others mindfully and respectfully,” he said. “Because we know that God is not a tyrant, ruling arbitrarily, we also know that human freedom does not require that humans have the powe of tyrants.”