The Lejeune Testimony, Part 6: Not Politics. Testimony.

Dear pastor, and dear Christian in the pew: hear me as a watchman.

In April 1991, a geneticist took the oath in a municipal courtroom in Morristown, New Jersey, and testified about a child he would never meet. For five parts, this series has laid the Lejeune testimony before you, page by page. The evidence is in. This is the closing argument, and the jury is you.

God gave His prophet a hard charge: “But if the watchman sees the sword coming and does not blow the trumpet, so that the people are not warned, and the sword comes and takes any one of them, that person is taken away in his iniquity, but his blood I will require at the watchman’s hand” (Ezekiel 33:6). The watchman does not decide whether danger comes. He decides only whether to sound the trumpet.

This is my trumpet. It is not politics. It is testimony.

The Record

Here is what Dr. Jérôme Lejeune told the court under oath. No witness was called to contradict him.

The State called no geneticist to answer him. On appeal, Judge Stanton wrote that the prosecutor “presented no witnesses at all on the issue of when human life begins.” The State did not say the science was wrong. Its prosecutor argued that even if the testimony established a human life, the abortion was legal (pp. 20–22). The science, in other words, did not matter (Part 5). And the trial judge, as UPI reported, called the child “a living human being that was legally executed” (Part 1).

Judge Stanton declined to rule on when life begins. He called the record too limited and one-sided to support a finding. But the record was one-sided because the State chose not to answer it. That is the record, and in that courtroom no one answered it.

What the Ballot Asks

On November 3, Virginians will vote on Question 1. Read the text for yourself. Before the third trimester, the only state interest the amendment counts as compelling is this one:

In the third trimester, the Commonwealth may regulate. But it may never prohibit an abortion that, “in the professional judgment of a physician,” is medically indicated to protect the life or the physical or mental health of the mother, or when the child is not viable. For every third-trimester case short of saving her life, where Virginia law now requires three physicians to certify, one physician’s judgment would be enough. The text sets no limit by week for those cases.

Two individuals are present. The text counts one.

Not Politics. Testimony.

Pastor, I know the reasons for silence, because I have heard them from good men. “The pulpit is for the gospel, not the ballot.” “I will divide my church.” “There are women in my pews who have had abortions, and I will not wound them.”

Let me be fair. Those reasons are not cowardice. The last one is love. Some in your pews have walked through an abortion. Some will vote yes because they are thinking of a woman facing a terrible diagnosis. They deserve gentleness, never contempt.

But look at what you are being asked to preach. Not a candidate. Not a party. A question of fact that a scientist answered under oath, and a question of worth that only God’s Word can answer. Is the child in the womb a human being? Is he made in the image of God? That is not politics. That is Psalm 139. That is Genesis 1:27. That is “You shall not murder” (Exodus 20:13). If the pulpit will not speak where Scripture speaks plainly, it has handed the question to someone else. (The VCA Editorial Board has made the case that “politics” is a word the church should never have surrendered.)

And the woman in the third row? Silence does not spare her. It leaves her without the word she most needs to hear. The same gospel that names the sin carries its only cure: “But with you there is forgiveness, that you may be feared” (Psalm 130:4). Preach the child and the cross together, and she will hear both.

Now You Know

The proverb saw the excuse coming long before there was a ballot: we did not know. God’s answer is that He weighs the heart. He knows what we knew.

After the Lejeune testimony, no one who has read it can say he did not know. The proverb does not ask whether we can stop every wrong. It asks whether we held back what we could, with what we were given. You have been given a vote, and some of you have been given a pulpit.

What the Pew Can Do

• Read the record. Start with Part 1, or read the original transcript for yourself.
• Put it in your pastor’s hands. Send him this series. Ask whether he has seen the Virginia Pastors Letter, which more than 300 Virginia pastors had signed as of early October. Ask him, kindly, to speak.
• Vote. Early in-person voting is open now and runs through Saturday, October 31. Many localities add library sites and Sunday hours in the final two weeks, so check yours. The deadline to register for a regular ballot is Friday, October 23. After that, eligible voters may still register in person and cast a provisional ballot through Election Day. Requests for a mailed ballot must reach the registrar by 5 p.m. on October 23. Election Day is Tuesday, November 3.
• Pray. For the women facing these decisions, for the doctors, for your pastor, and for Virginia.

The child cannot speak for himself. The voter can. Vote No on Question 1.

The Verdict Belongs to You

Dr. Lejeune died in 1994. The testimony outlived him, and now it has reached you. If we stay silent with it, the silence is ours to answer for.

And yet the Lord who set the watchman on the wall has “no pleasure in the death of anyone” (Ezekiel 18:32). “Turn back, turn back” is His cry (Ezekiel 33:11). No closing argument of mine can open a single heart. Only the Spirit who raised Christ from the dead can do that. But the God who knitted every child together in secret still sees Virginia, and He still holds out mercy to every pastor, every pew, and every voter who will turn to Him.

Sources

• Transcript, State of New Jersey v. Alexander Loce, et al., Morristown Municipal Court, April 13, 1991. Complete transcript (PDF); testimony of Dr. Jérôme Lejeune, pp. 36–83.
• State v. Loce, 267 N.J. Super. 102 (Law Div. 1991), full opinion (Stanton, A.J.S.C.).
• Frances Ann Burns, “Calling abortion ‘legal execution’ may open new Roe challenge,” UPI, April 30, 1991.
• Virginia Department of Elections, Proposed Constitutional Amendment, Question 1, full text.
• Code of Virginia, § 18.2-74, “When abortion lawful after second trimester of pregnancy.”
• Virginia Department of Elections, Early Voting Office Locations.

Unless otherwise noted, Scripture quotations are from the English Standard Version (ESV).