EDITOR’S NOTE: The first section of this article includes additional reporting from Baptist Press.
JEFFERSON CITY – Pro-abortion Amendment 3 was passed in Missouri, Nov. 5, with 51.742% of Missouri voters supporting the state constitutional amendment and 48.258% voting against the amendment. But one pro-life leader in Missouri is calling Missouri Baptist church members and leaders to increase their efforts to protect pre-born babies and help women choose life.
Missouri wasn’t alone on Tuesday to consider abortion at the ballot box: “Florida became the first state to defeat a pro-abortion ballot initiative when voters on Nov. 5 rejected pro-abortion Amendment 4, which would have made abortion a constitutional right,” Baptist Press reported earlier today. Although 57% of Florida voters supported the ballot initiative, pro-abortion votes fell shy of the 60% threshold required to amend Florida’s state constitution.
Florida and Missouri were among “10 states with abortion initiatives on state ballots Tuesday, with South Dakota and Nebraska following Florida’s example in defeating measures designed to loosen any restrictions on abortion. Nebraska had both a pro-life and pro-abortion initiative on the ballot. The former passed; the latter failed.” According to Baptist Press, “Pro-abortion amendments passed in Arizona (62 percent), Colorado (61 percent), Maryland (74 percent), … Montana (57 percent), Nevada (55 percent) and New York (62 percent). South Dakota defeated a pro-abortion constitutional amendment with 60 percent of the vote.”
Missouri Right to Life’s Susan Klein calls churches to increase pro-life ministry
Missouri’s Amendment 3 codifies expansive “rights” to abortion within the Missouri state constitution. Prior to the election, Missouri Right to Life warned that, with the passage of Amendment 3, abortion may be allowed through all nine months of a woman’s pregnancy. Abortions could be performed on minors without the permission from or notification of parents. Existing state laws requiring the health and safety standards at abortion clinics may be eliminated – threatening the health and safety of women. Women may not be able to sue abortion clinics or doctors for malpractice. Pro-life pregnancy resource centers could be forced to refer women to abortion facilities. And taxpayers could be forced to fund the abortion industry.
This morning (Nov. 6), The Pathway spoke with Susan Klein – who is both the executive director for Missouri Right to Life and a Missouri Baptist pastor’s wife – about how Missouri Baptist churches can protect pre-born babies and mothers in the wake of the passage of Amendment 3. She told The Pathway that Missouri Right to Life is speaking with its attorneys and with lawmakers about how best to respond to Amendment 3 on legal, legislative and political levels. But she was also clear that churches and individual Christians will be essential in the pro-life movement in years to come.
The Pathway asked Klein about what Missouri’s election results revealed, especially when compared with state’s like Florida (See Florida’s election results above).
On the one hand, Klein responded, “Florida had a 60% threshold to change their constitution, so that was huge. In Missouri, we tried to do that in the 2024 legislative session, and it did not succeed in our Missouri State Senate. So that was a huge impact on what we saw happen with our numbers here in Missouri. … Even though more people (in Florida) voted to support abortion (than in Missouri), they had a higher threshold to change their constitution. So it was unfortunate that Missouri did not have the same kind of threshold.”
On the other hand, Klein said that Tuesday’s vote on Amendment 3 make it clear that the work of churches and individual Christians isn’t over. Churches must be actively engaged in protecting life not only during election seasons, but “year round, all the time.”
“While the churches just did a fabulous job in this election cycle,” Klein said, “I think we’re going to have to work harder in our interaction with people – so they see Christians are compassionate, caring people. I think that is going to have to grow and develop as we move through the days ahead of us, especially when abortion clinics start popping up on every street corner, in every city.”
Especially since organizations providing alternatives to abortion may run into difficulties because of Amendment 3, Klein encouraged churches to find ministry avenues for helping women choose life for their pre-born children. “Our churches are going to become more important in getting the message out” that women in crisis situations can choose life, she said. “They may even become more important in walking alongside that woman.”
Small acts of kindness can go a long way in helping women choose life for their babies, Klein added. One woman, for example, was considering an abortion because “she had too much laundry, and she didn’t have a washer and dryer at home.” But she chose life for her baby after people showed her kindness and bought her a washer and dryer.
“It may be something just as simple as that,” Klein said. In any case, she added, “Church outreach is going to be the key to helping keep our abortion numbers down until we can get the law changed back to where we can protect babies and women.”