Ben Watson on the Sanctity of Life and True Justice

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Collin Hansen
He calls abortion the spiritual battle of our lives. And he firmly believes that abortion will end when men make it so, Roe v Wade has been overturned but this former football star says the fight for life is only reached halftime. He is Benjamin Watson, author of the new book, The New Fight for Life row race, and a pro life commitment to justice published by Tyndale momentum. You may already be listening or watching and know quite a bit about abortion, but I’m gonna guess that you’ve never seen the subject explored quite from this angle. Watson argues this, quote, ignorance of or disregard for racial justice, especially by some white pro life, evangelicalism has been a hurdle to unifying and expanding the movement and quote, is not content to pass legal restrictions or even ban abortion he describes, quote, a higher more complete calling to address the factors that drive abortion decisions. And in this book, Watson comes prepared with an array of statistics that may surprise you. Surveys show that 76% of a board of mothers would prefer to parent the child under different circumstances. 40% of the women who abort their children attend church regularly. Watson describes a quote crucible of susceptibility that helps explain why 40% of women seeking abortion are black. compared to white women, black women, United States are four times more likely to have an abortion. Black women are also three times more likely than white women to die from pregnancy related causes, and explains that black women have been warned that if abortion is restricted or banned, more of them will die in childbirth. And this book, Watson is not afraid to step on toes or tell Christians that they need to step up in the fight for life. He has hope and the gospel and in the church. He writes this, as a church we need to become a safe haven, a refuge a place where the most vulnerable can turn, not just for spiritual help, but for emotional material, and financial support to Watson joins me joins me today on gospel bound to discuss the role of men in the pro life cause the relationship between history and agency and the responsibility of parents to talk to their kids about sex, among other subjects. Ben, thanks for joining me on gospel bound,

Ben Watson
man, it’s good to be with you. I’m excited about this conversation. Thank you.

Collin Hansen
It’s an it’s an important one. It’s an important book. And Ben, did you write this book in response to the end of Roe v Wade, or did that decision in 2020, to alter some of your previous plans to write this book?

Ben Watson
Collin, I had no plans to write this book. I think there are a lot of other topics that we could talk about that might be a little more a little easier to discuss, maybe not as as important as this one, because this is very important. But it’s one of those topics. And I think the convergence of life, as well as as race and America are two topics that bring a lot of emotion, and a lot of history and a lot of baggage. I believe that we have to speak about these things as believers because as you mentioned, we do have hope in the gospel. But we also understand the fact that people bear God’s image, and that we have to stand in the gap and that we have to speak about any type of person that’s being taken advantage of or vulnerability, all those sorts of things, we have a mandate to do so. And we see that in Scripture when it comes to justice and those sorts of things. But the book was was really a not necessarily a response to roe being overturned, but more of an encouragement to the pro life movement. The many different factions of the pro life movement, whether it’s the Catholics or evangelicals or people who don’t even have have a faith. I mean, there are there are atheists for life. I mean, they’re all these sorts of people but people that that that think that abortion is an attack against the human person that think that preborn children should be protected. My hope. And my goal in writing the book was to encourage them that this is halftime. I played a lot of football. And to use a football analogy. When you come in in the locker room, and the coach is evaluating what happened in the first half and going over the game plan and seeing what needs to change and encouraging you that you got to go back out there and keep on fighting because the game’s not over. It’s a response to that because after row was overturned, there, there seem to be a bit of a bit of apathy that set in for some thinking that this is over and as we know from a political standpoint, but also just from a Now communal, and systemic and the factors are still there, why we’re missing abortion, we, as Pro lifers have to keep going. And that’s why I wrote the book.

Collin Hansen
You know, Ben, the path from football star to pro life activist is not the most common. Help us, Elvis just to know how you got there,

Ben Watson
how it got here? I always wonder about that, to be honest with you, people ask that question a lot. And that was not a situation when I woke up one morning and said, This is a fight I want to get in. But I will say this, I was raised by my two, God fearing God loving Bible believing parents, my mother and father, they’re still with us. They are leaders in their community. My father is a pastor in South Carolina. But they always taught us and demonstrated to us the importance of humans and and of children and of people that are in different areas of their life, whether they be the preborn women, men, people who are poor or wealthy didn’t matter. They taught us the value of human dignity. And so from a very early age, I remember having a just a worldview that was based on caring about people, and I didn’t get along with everybody. I spoke poorly of a lot of people. And I still do sometimes. But but there’s just this understanding in our household that life, life mattered. And it was in human life was different than the animal counterparts. And so I think for us, we had our first child in 2009. Grace, she’s 14 years old now. And I remember going and doing the 3d 4d ultrasound, and we’re sitting there, and looking at a 3d 4d ultrasound. And my wife says to me, when we leave, she said, You know, one day, I would love, I would love to provide this service for pregnant women. Now we’ve since had six children, I’m a pro at reading and ultrasound. Now I know everything, I don’t need the doctor, and they’re gonna think about it now. But fast forward about eight years from that point, and we were able to start purchasing ultrasound units and donating them to pregnancy resource centers in areas where I played so Baltimore, Maryland, and New Orleans, Louisiana, and hometown in South Carolina, and at some of the different places where we had lived, we saw that as an opportunity to, to step in and to provide that service. Because we do know that when men and women see the ultrasound image, it changes how they view life in the womb. When you’re in the NFL, and you do those sorts of things, sometimes I guess it makes headlines. So that kind of got us started. And I did a few articles, I had an opportunity to speak at the March for Life. And currently I work with an organization called human coalition. And we provide direct services to pregnant women, we also have a legislation arm human coalition action. So this has been a journey that has really just picked up I would say over the last eight years, but it’s always been something along with a bunch of other issues that I like to call issues of justice or human flourishing that we’ve been involved with as a family.

Collin Hansen
There’s gonna be some people, Ben, who they see two men talking here about abortion, and they’re just automatically going to dismiss us as a result. So let’s talk about what you see as the role of men in the fight for life.

Ben Watson
23 and 2323 and 23. What do I mean by that? Well, there’s 46 chromosomes and every person 23 and 23. And so men have a role biologically, no matter what the the motto, or the mantra, or the prevailing winds of culture will say, until men, we have a role. So that’s number one. And whenever I have an opportunity to talk to men about this issue, I firmly believe that abortion ends when men say it will end. And so many women who have done that those first 48 hours when they’re making a decision, and so many women would say you mentioned that that 76% said and we’ll talk about that later, but many of them would say if I had a relationship with the father or not even a relationship with the father said that I will just be there not not not that I can provide everything. Not that I’m not scared. But But no, we’re gonna do this together, it changes her outlook. And so what Satan always tries to do is to disrupt order and disrupt relationships between man and woman. We see it in the garden, we see it in the very beginning. This is not a new ploy. This is what he does. In so many different aspects of our life. It is about disrupting or disrupting respect between man and woman. I’m in disrupting the complementarianism between men and women. And so abortion is a primary example of that. And so I always tell men, you know, look, we have a voice, we have a role we’re needed, we’re necessary. The key is, are we willing to perhaps stand up against a culture that is telling us that, that we aren’t necessary. And also, I think that part of it is, is us admitting collectively as men. That many times we haven’t been who we need to be. Now, sometimes a man is not present because of extenuating circumstances, he may be experiencing his own injustice that removes him, he may have something else that’s not his fault. He wants to be there. I’ve, I’ve had teammates who have told me man, I wanted to be there. And then my girlfriend went and got an abortion. And I didn’t know so there are many men who are out here hurting. But I think collectively, we have to admit that, you know, what we, we haven’t served in love too many times been responsible in the ways that we should, how do we change into right, and, and, and make that right, instead of continuing to go along the path that we’re going,

Collin Hansen
of course, one of the major themes of this book, The interplay, we’ve been talking about already between abortion, race, and justice. And I have a feeling that many people who would consider themselves pro life pro life activists, even perhaps students of the movement, especially if they’re white, just might not be aware of some of the history that you cover. And I think one of the most fascinating and certainly tragic components of the book, is the history behind what you describe about black women as the, quote, deep seated desire for bodily autonomy and control over their own future. Why don’t you give us just a brief overview as it’s quite a significant section of the book, but give us just a brief overview for somebody who just doesn’t really know what that means. When you say that? Yeah,

Ben Watson
I think in if I was going to write this book, I my truest desire was to speak the truth about the issue of abortion, but specifically to hone in on the fact that black women are three to four times more likely than their white counterparts to get abortions, and to give voice to why. Because so often in pro life circles, what I’ve what I’ve noticed, and mostly in this hasn’t happened as much in many black pro life circles. But I’m in both a lot of different colored circles. And many times what I hear is a statistic is black women are three to four times more likely. So why do black people vote Democrat? Or why do I mean, it always goes somewhere from there, but but no one ever talks about why is that the case? Can we guess? Can we talk about it? Can we discuss? Why is it the case that this subset of women is more likely? Do black men and women just like avoiding their children more than anybody, any other ethnicity? I mean, if that’s what you believe, then say that at least that’s an answer. But if that’s not the case, I think we need to dig a little bit deeper as to why. And so when it comes to, to black women, my goal was really to highlight some of the reasons that they have told me why this issue is important. And you can’t you can’t disconnect or decoupled the president from the past. And so what I mean by that is specifically when it comes to to black women, and having autonomy, black people in general, but specifically black women, have been at the bottom of the social caste system in this country for hundreds of years. If you don’t believe me, you can do your own research. Or you can read the book just when it talks about the father of gynecology and the fact that he was doing experimentation on black enslaved women. The fact that black women were brought to this country for breeding purposes during chattel slavery and part of the influx of black women coming was to reproduce so that they will be more of a slave for us. Fast forward up through the 1900s. And even up until now, when we listen to mystically at at poverty, maternal mortality, and so many other social outcomes. Black women many times are at the bottom when it comes to wages, and how much they are paid for the same job with the same education as male their male counterparts, but specifically their white male counterparts. It is astounding that black women earn about 58 cents on the dollar. And so there are so many issues and for many black women At least many that I talked to even in writing this book, who are pro life who are against abortion. It’s not that they want the right to kill their children is that they want the right to have something of their own and to not be forced, or prohibited from doing things. Because culturally in this country, that has happened far too often. And I think that when we think about it in that light, it gives us a little bit more compassion. Perhaps, in in when we hear some of these, you know, quotes from women, specifically, even black woman with talks about your about my body, my choice, or whatever it may be, because we understand where they’re coming from, and why they’re saying that many times people respond out of their hurt, not necessarily out of their conviction, many times people respond in defense, because they have to draw the line so far away, because they’ve been offended in so many ways, personally and also collectively.

Collin Hansen
Well, just your answer, there have been shows how in the book you, you do something that I don’t see very often you’re you’re exposing the dynamic interplay between history and agency. And then when you hear people say, emphasize history, and then history is destiny, you really can’t help it because of what you described there. All you can do is empathize. But you can’t change anything. And some people emphasize agency, but they will cut off the history so that they act as if there’s no context for why people would make certain decisions. I’m wondering how you tried to navigate this at a time when it seems like all different sides just want to portray themselves as victims? How do we move forward in this, and that’s what I’m saying. You talked about some of the, the legitimate concerns of victims right there. But in the way this culture operates, kind of every side is vying to put itself in that position of victimhood, right. How do you move toward godly agency to solving this? You know, this horrible injustice of abortion?

Ben Watson
Yeah, it’s kind of it’s kind of crazy. You mentioned victims, I mean, the folks who are, you know, individual responsibility, something happens to one of their champions that they see is unjust, all sudden, they’re a victim. Exactly. You know, and and it’s the way I address it is, in the way I believe Scripture shows us is that there are some people who are victims like victimhood is not, we have an entire legal system that is based on someone being a victim, and how do we protect them. There is nothing inherently wrong. It’s not a victim’s fault, but we’ve taken victim and turned it into some sort of pathology. Specifically, I’ll be be frank, I feel especially as a black man, many times people say they’ll use the term, you know, a pathology of victimhood or, or they have a spirit of victimhood, and I’m thinking, what will what many people have been victimized. And so the issue is not a spirit of victimhood it is seeing where you’ve been victimized and the victimizer seeing where they victimized you. And then correcting that. And that’s what we see in Scripture. That’s what we see in, in James when it talks about, you know, not paying people fair wages, talking about exactly this justice, that’s what we see from from Zacchaeus, when he was victimizing people, when he repaid them four times. I mean, there are numerous examples in the Bible of victims, and you always see God’s heart, lean towards not that he’s against the wealthy or those in power. There’s nothing wrong with having wealth as problem with using it, as you know, to abuse. But you see his heart for those who are victimized, and those who are oppressed, and those who are in the bottom of society. And so the way I talk about it is simply being frank, that’s why it’s important that we have a good understanding of history. And by what I mean by history. I mean, when we started this, this interview back, I don’t necessarily mean 100 years ago, as I mean, from today, back, it’s important that we have an understanding of history because then we don’t have to use these these, you know, euphemisms for what we mean we can actually come to the table and say these things have happened and there’s some things that we’re not going to discover till later and some things are happening right now that we won’t know till later, but as much as we can we want to be a people of restoration and reconciliation, and, and protection and redress. For those who have been legitimately victimized

Collin Hansen
it’s almost like in this book Ben and I think this is consistent with your your public profile. years ago, my, my wife kept kind of elbowing me saying, You got to check out this Facebook post from Ben Watson. It’s amazing in there. But it’s almost like, I just don’t see many people like this. It’s almost like you, you wander off and into the no man’s land, different people, they’re in their trenches, they’re taking their shots. And there you are sort of like walking down in no man’s land. And you’re, you’re pointing out the problems all over the place, while the bullets are, bullets are flying. And so people have already gotten a taste here of the book of the just the way that you try to approach the issue from many different perspectives. There’s lots of these tough, straightforward words in the book. But I do think that maybe the most pointed words, in the entire book concern black pastors. Obviously, we’re talking about not talking about all black pastors here, you’ve talked about your father as an example in the area. But here’s one of the Here’s a quote from the book, he say, some of our most well known shepherds are leading their flock off a cliff for a bag of silver, and a fleeting moment of popularity. Instead of calling out the value of life amid every attack on human dignity, including policing, incarceration, poverty, elder care, voting rights, and abortion, some leaders have drawn a line of distinction when it comes to the rights of preborn children. Now, as I read that, quote, I’m just thinking, Ben, about how we’ve seen this problem all too often in history. And I teach often on this subject related to white pastors, who never confronted slavery, or segregation. So the question is not so much about black pastors or white pastors in the civil rights movement. But what is the solution overall to this tendency, we have to turn a blind eye to the sins of our allies, or friends.

Ben Watson
I think that so often, well, there’s a couple things, I think so often, when it comes to turning a blind eye to the sins of our allies, we many times attach our worth or identity to our political or social heroes. And so what I mean by that is, you know, we’ll do politics, for example, if I’m voting for a specific politician, I will absolve him of all guilt on things that I know are wrong, because my identity is attached with that person. And that happens for pastors, it happens for lay people, it happens in different sectors. And I think that that is is bordering on idolatry at times. And it is something we have to be very, very aware of and interest in introspective on because there’s a plumb line that we see in Scripture. And the plumb line doesn’t move to the right or the left, depending on who’s popular, who’s not popular. And we’re all held to a certain standard that God has laid out. And so as believers, it’s important that we’re able to differentiate, I support this person here, but I just don’t support him here. When it comes to the pastor’s that I’ve talked about I’ve been, especially after Roe was overturned. If you remember, if the audience can remember, there were several, not just passionate, but a lot of people who came out saying what the next step is, they’re going to take away this right, they’re going to take away that right and, and all those sorts of things which which we know as we talked about in the conversation, some of that is a protective mechanism because of historical grievances. Right? I understand that. Exactly. But but but before a pastor, specifically, black pastors of large black congregations it’s a sit in pulpits and and not call out snuffing out life, specifically, when it is impacting our community more specifically, when our tradition has been one of taking people in and people like like, like Fannie Lou Hamer, who stood up for civil rights and for children and in people who the list goes on and on. Our tradition is one of being socially aware, but also having deep theological foundations. And you see that going all the way back to, to chattel slavery. And so for them to sit there, and and do that is not helpful for us. But also, I believe that the black church is strategically placed to be the conscience of America on this issue as much as it’s been the conscience of America on so many other issues. Colin, when you look at the civil rights movement, and you look at the march from Selma to Montgomery and they left Brown, ame chapel and you think about all those who are in those movements, some whose names we don’t know, but they were involved with churches, and they met in churches and they were ministers and they were women who served in the churches. And these people have great faith who, who came to America and said, No, this is not right, we’re gonna fight for this. Because there’s a spiritual mandate behind it. That’s why I believe that the black church, not necessarily the denominations, but also just black believers have an opportunity here, because abortion impacts us so disproportionately, and so my call to them, and there are plenty of passes that are doing this this thing, right? I mean, of all denominations, great friends, people you’ve interviewed, I can name a whole list of great great men I look up to, but then there are some who we must challenge because there are so many that are watching and following them. And this is not in their stance is not bringing about life. And it’s not going to it’s not going to bring about the the flourishing in our communities that we so desperately need.

Collin Hansen
And using the Bible to justify their anti life vs. Which is all sorts of confusion, which is not exclusive to the to the black church. We’ve seen that in Western Michigan, as well in the Reformed Church most recently. That That seems like a special kind of, of heinous evil.

Ben Watson
It is and it’s, it’s offensive. It’s offensive to me personally as a believer, but it should offend all believers when the Word of God is misconstrued. What it is when it is used in a way that is not complete that is not honest. That is not faithful to the text but used to manipulate eventually is really used in order to maintain power. Or or money.

Collin Hansen
Yeah, yeah, favor with allies and exactly what comes with that. Then what what’s it? What’s it feel like to walk through a no man’s land? Is it is that easy for you?

Ben Watson
It feels it feels lonely. And it um, you know, sometimes it’s funny people say, Well, you know, I was in your I was looking at some comments on something that you said, and, and all the pro life people, you know, were clapping on one thing, then on the other thing, they all hated us, like, how come like this is so predictable? I know exactly what you know, I know exactly what’s going to happen. Yeah, I’ll tell you this. There are several people who are, are open and willing to have. I don’t want to use this word, but I use it because I don’t have a better one and a more nuanced approach to some of these things. But it doesn’t sell. And the frustrating part, yes, we live in a culture where you have to be wholesale, one way or the other. With your ears closed and eyes closed, blindly walking ahead, running ahead, in order to make headlines in order to garner support in order to raise money in order to run for office even. I mean, that’s just where we are right now. And it’s unfortunate, because there are a large swath of people who don’t feel that way. They just don’t have the loudest voices. I have a friend who, who, who you know, as well. And he always says that the activists always have the loudest voices, many times, but they don’t represent everybody in between. And they don’t represent the truth of whatever movement they speak of. And so it’s it’s a lonely place, but there are others out there. And there are people like yourself, who I truly appreciate and what you do. podcasting and speaking and writing, because it’s encouraging to see someone who’s who’s open to seeing the, you know, seeing our issues, our current issues through a biblical perspective, not that we have it all right, or have it all wrong. But being willing to grapple with those things and not not falling to the, you know, to the to the far left and the far right of Progressive Conservative, but trying to walk that line.

Collin Hansen
I think the way to put it, Ben is that solutions don’t sell your right. Solutions and solutions don’t sell it’s not. I don’t think what you and I are advocating for is moderation, per se. My friend Chris watkyn might call it diagonalization. It’s simply a recognition that we need a multifaceted solution, that there’s not going to be a solution to the horrible injustice of abortion without some sort of leadership and collaboration across churches across ethnicities, a holistic approach that that deals with the underlying problems of Justice and the fears as well as mobilizing different communities and different ethnicities and bringing understanding but also promoting agency among historically victimized communities. It’s going to take everything to able to get there and so I wonder if and for people watching this or listening to this. Do you care You’re about solutions. Do you actually care about the problem? Or do you care about your tribe winning on an election night? That’s fine. If your tribe winning on election night is going to contribute to change and solutions, and we have seen some changes that helped to get us toward a solution. But there’s so much further to go on this question. For decades, the focus was on overturning roe. Okay, we did it. Well, there’s a long way to go. If we’re at halftime, I think that’s probably optimistic in some ways.

Ben Watson
Yeah, I think that for for a lot of people, were, what we saw. And what we can see is, is are those who, for them, this was a political venture. And this was this was not a journey. This was a cause that had a specific endpoint angle. And that was overturning roe. And now that there is not that, you know, go to raise money to, to fight for to argue about there. They’re moving on to the next thing. That’s the next sexy thing. And so,

Collin Hansen
I don’t know. Yeah, go ahead.

Ben Watson
No, I was just gonna say and, and there’s nothing wrong with with that because roe needed to be overturned. I didn’t ever want to downplay that. I mean, that needed

Collin Hansen
that needed was a necessary step in the journey.

Ben Watson
But there’s but there’s more to be had, because the day after roe is overturned. The relationships, the housing, the health care, the different insecurities, the employment, the the lies that are present prevalent in culture, all those things, we’re still there waiting at the doors of women, that the chemical abortions that are 50%, now will be approaching 70 or 80%, in the next couple of years is still there, all those factors, were still present, even though Roe was overturned. And that’s what we need to realize.

Collin Hansen
Yeah, I don’t know, Ben, if if people understand the basic politics of abortion, which is that when roe seemed secure, that in many ways, benefited the pro life cause politically because there was a segment of people who saw that as an unjust decision. But they never had to worry, practically speaking about the consequences of it being overturned the sort of chaos that would ensue the all the debates that would be new, and vice versa. Now that you see roe overturned, now the pendulum has swung politically to the opposite side and the pro choice movement, even after that victory for the pro life movement is more ascendant now in elections, because in some ways, it’s like a lot of pro life activists and voters were not prepared for the debate, it was so fixated on a Supreme Court decision, they weren’t prepared to take it to the streets to talk to people, including a lot of politicians who had their talking points about Roe. But he clearly did not have a lot of understanding or conviction about abortion itself, or under any understanding about the factors and might not understand the resolve if a fabulously wealthy pro choice movement that is not going to go quietly in this country. Anyway, I got a couple more questions here. With Ben, we’re getting going now, just as we come toward

Ben Watson
the end. But there’s billions of dollars in this. And so I tell you something else that that that many people weren’t prepared for. We weren’t prepared for the target. That’s, that’s on our back now. Yeah. And I want to I want to legitimize that and say that that is that is a very real feeling, a real experience that many people are, are enduring, that are pro lifers that have been different areas of corporate America, who are are being silenced, and who are being threatened. And that target is growing not just for individuals, but for organizations that have any sort of affiliation with the life, the life issue and the life movement. They’re dealing with some hardships as well.

Collin Hansen
Sometimes just literal targets. I mean, for the people that are on the front lines of this, it’s a it’s a real risk, a real real risk to body in life, to be standing for life right now. You know, again, Ben, you cover so many different things, people will know that from your public, public ministry and your and your work and as a football commentator, and all kinds of different things, a man of many talents and gifts. Um, one of the things you cover in this book is he talked about how to talk to our kids about sex. And you rightly point out and I say this all the time when I’m talking about Cata cases, you don’t talk to your kids about sex. It’s not that they’re not going to learn it’s just somebody else, namely the internet that’s going to teach them. So I guess part of what I’m asking is, are we supposed to kind of what do we do? We write out a script. And we try to bring this up casually. And, and I guess the main question is just be real practical here. What age do you begin? For boy or for a girl?

Ben Watson
Yeah. You know, I wish I could sit here and say that, you know, I was leading this charge and it was my, you’re the expert men come up often that it was my idea to talk to the kids about sex early. No, that was that came from my wife, she she urged me to talk to my boys and to talk to my girls, even as a dad to talk to my girls about about, you know, not just a sex, what it is from a biological standpoint, but from an emotional standpoint, from a spiritual standpoint. And so that has served us greatly in our household because we have open conversations, our kids are 14 down to four identical twin boys that are four and they’re clueless, I call them typhoon and tornado. My two identical twin boys, they, they’re out of control. But they’re not in on the conversation, but they might be around the dinner table. And here are some things I’ll tell you what. If you’re a parent, and you’re listening, you don’t know how to talk to your kids about sex and you want an easy on ramp. Start reading the book of Genesis with them. Oh, yeah. Oh, oh, that’s something that I remember my father doing for us as kids and something that I’ve tried to do with my kids, and we’ll go a chapter, every few nights, you know, we’re not every night like we like to be. But even getting through Genesis one through 20, we had a conversation the other day around the table, we were in Genesis 17, the covenant of circumcision. Oh, there was a very robust conversation, especially and then the next one was like Sodom and Gomorrah. And so my point is, as, as believers, especially, you’re 100%, right? Our children are going to learn about sex, it’s either going to be the internet is going to be their own sexual desires, is going to be a friend on the team is going to be a classmate. And depending on what school they go to, is going to be curriculum in their school, that’s going to be teaching them things that are outside of what we will want to teach our children. And so it’s imperative that we not be reactive, we’ll be proactive. And the way that we’re proactive is by setting the standards of truth on this issue, from what the Word of God says, and so that they will be able to identify where something doesn’t line up with it. Yeah. But also telling them that, hey, you might mess up. Some of the things that prohibit parents, I think, sometimes from engaging in this conversation is that we are scared that our kids are going to ask us to question we don’t want to answer. And what we forget is that we have received the grace of God, and that we can demonstrate to them, I did this, I may have done this, I may have done this, right. But my story doesn’t have to be your story. And all of our stories are redeemed by the blood of Jesus. But we have to be proactive on this.

Collin Hansen
You know, teach them the good so that they can recognize the bad and teach them grace, because they will almost certainly fall short. As we all have and all do. They’re they’re good guidelines. Their last question is want to give you an opportunity here, Ben, tell us about some ministries, or some pro life activists, and especially working among African Americans who inspire you.

Ben Watson
There’s a great friend, she actually wrote the foreword to my book, her name is Cherylin Holloway, she was an organization called pro black pro life. She lives in Ohio. She is a speaker mentor. She runs training for churches actually. So if you’re in a church and you want someone to come even talk about or unpack some of the things I talk about in the book from a ethnic as well as abortion standpoint, she does those sorts of things. A good friend that I know you know, Justin given me with the ad campaign, Whole Life Project, I’ve been a great supporter of theirs and he’s he’s a guy who is a is a leader in that in that respect, and is able to kind of present this both and biblical justice as well as addressing social issues on a bunch of different topics. He’s He’s somebody I mean, there, there are some of the Christina Bennett is a friend. She works for live action. Check her out. But um, you know, I think there’s also this misnomer this misconception I should say, among many that that that pro life is is only attached to a certain political group or a certain ethnicity. Yeah. And what I’ve seen and what I’ve really loved about my opportunities, and speaking and writing and connecting with so many different pro life organizations like Stanford life, and even human coalition that I work with, is that there are people in every ethnic group that’s represented in America in different socio economic statuses in different denominations who hold this issue as foundational and important, and no one faction has a death grip on what it means to be pro life. Now, we definitely, I may speak about a differently, we might use words like whole life or wound Mattoon or pro life or whatever it may be. If you’re Catholic, you know, whatever it is, but there is such complexity in the movement. And so in this post roe era, one thing I talked about in the book is we have to have a willingness to, as Frederick Douglass say, unite with anyone to do what’s right in order to do what’s wrong. Yeah. And be able to connect across those lines. That’s difficult. That’s hard. We’re not trained that way as Americans. But if we want to sort of serve women, and we want to save children, that’s what we need to be about.

Collin Hansen
And what could be better and more important. My guest today on gospel bound has been Benjamin Watson. We’ve been talking about his new book, The New Fight for Life, row race and a pro life commitment to justice. It’s published by Tyndale momentum. Ben, my friend. Thanks again for this conversation. I look forward to the next time we get to talk.

Ben Watson
Man, thank you—next time hope we can do it in person man, we got to catch up.

Collin Hansen

I would love that. Thanks, Ben.