00:58USA: 'God vs. satan' in abortion showdown
USA: 'God vs. satan' in abortion showdown
About 2,000 anti-abortion demonstrators in blue staged a rally that heavily invoked God and Biblical teachings in front of the Texas State Capitol on Monday, showing support for two proposed state bills that would ban abortions after 20 weeks of pregnancy. Roughly 100 metres away, about 1,000 orange-clad abortion-rights protesters gathered to march through the Texas capital of Austin.
As the anti-abortion protesters sang "Amazing Grace," abortion rights activists appeared to heckle them with the chant "Hail Satan!". The Rev. Robert Jeffress, the controversial pastor of the First Baptist Church in Dallas, told the anti-abortion protesters the debate over abortion is a fight "between the kingdom of God and the kingdom of Satan." He went on to say that "by the authority of the word of God: anyone who opposes this bill whether he or she realises it, is a tool of Satan!"
Abortion, the ending of a pregnancy before it has come to term, has been a controversial issue in the United States for decades. The 1973 US Supreme Court case Roe v. Wade ruled that women have a right to an abortion, a ruling anti-abortion activists have long sought to overturn. Many Christian organisations have spoken out against abortion, arguing that the Bible teaches that abortion is murder and that life begins at conception.
00:58USA: 'God vs. satan' in abortion showdown
About 2,000 anti-abortion demonstrators in blue staged a rally that heavily invoked God and Biblical teachings in front of the Texas State Capitol on Monday, showing support for two proposed state bills that would ban abortions after 20 weeks of pregnancy. Roughly 100 metres away, about 1,000 orange-clad abortion-rights protesters gathered to march through the Texas capital of Austin.
As the anti-abortion protesters sang "Amazing Grace," abortion rights activists appeared to heckle them with the chant "Hail Satan!". The Rev. Robert Jeffress, the controversial pastor of the First Baptist Church in Dallas, told the anti-abortion protesters the debate over abortion is a fight "between the kingdom of God and the kingdom of Satan." He went on to say that "by the authority of the word of God: anyone who opposes this bill whether he or she realises it, is a tool of Satan!"
Abortion, the ending of a pregnancy before it has come to term, has been a controversial issue in the United States for decades. The 1973 US Supreme Court case Roe v. Wade ruled that women have a right to an abortion, a ruling anti-abortion activists have long sought to overturn. Many Christian organisations have spoken out against abortion, arguing that the Bible teaches that abortion is murder and that life begins at conception.