Voting members declined by a 748-154 vote to
tamper with the ELCA social statement on abortion adopted eight years
ago at the 1991 Churchwide Assembly.
That
statement supports legal, publicly funded abortion if the fetus has
"lethal abnormalities incompatible with life" and opposes abortion
after viability of the fetus "except when the mother's life is
threatened or when lethal abnormalities indicate the prospective
newborn will die very soon." The defeated amendment proposed removing
that language.
The proposal was among various social issues
brought to the assembly as "memorials" from synod assemblies. Voting on
them, the assembly:
• Supported international debt reduction and
the ELCA's participation in the Jubilee 2000: USA Campaign, which seeks
to forgive the debt of poor nations (929-29).
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