Sanctifying Life in the Early Church

Evidence from both Christian and pagan sources reveals that the pre-Constantinian Christian churches practiced a broad and holistic sanctity-of-life ethic. A review of the documents can only deepen our confidence that a sanctity-of-life ethic is neither a modern nor merely a political innovation but instead goes back to the very origins of our tradition. . . . Christians are instructed repeatedly by numerous key leaders that all killing is forbidden to followers of Christ, and these instructions had their effect. Christian nonparticipation in the Roman military and resistance to the evils of war was one result. . . . Loyalty to Jesus requires abstaining not only from war but also from abortion, abandonment of infants (“exposure”), and direct infanticide. These were quite common practices in the Greco-Roman world, and had especially devastating effects on women and female children. Under Roman law, the father was granted the power to kill, abandon, or sell his child or to order any female in his household to abort, which involved primitive methods that often ended women’s lives or ruined their health. But for Christians, the child’s life too, was sacred, even in the womb and in infancy, as was the life of the woman carrying the child. For both Jews and Christians, abortion and infanticide were absolutely banned. CBHD