SFLA Study: Some Christian Schools Increased Their Support for Abortion After Dobbs

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By reading this report, students, parents, alumni, and donors can determine which Christian schools remain committed to biblical values and which are embracing the world’s values.

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Across the country, the pro-life movement has spent the month of January celebrating the fall of Roe v. Wade, while also mourning the loss of millions of unborn babies amid a culture that continues to celebrate and push for more abortion.

To that end, a recent report published by the Demetree Center of Pro-Life Advancement, an initiative of Students for Life of America (SFLA), found that support for abortion rights among Christian schools has actually increased by 10 percent since the Supreme Court’s decision in Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization overturning Roe.

“At this critical time in history, when women and children need life-affirming pregnancy and parenting help, an alarming number of Christian schools have abandoned the biblical value of the sanctity of life in favor of propping up the abortion industry,” the report concluded. “Supporting and facilitating abortions is neither helping our neighbor nor training up the next generation in the way they should go. Instead, Christian schools which perpetuate the acceptance of abortion violence negatively impact human rights for years to come. “

This finding was established based on whether or not 767 Christian-affiliated colleges committed various pro-life “infractions.” These include any official publicizing or touting of Planned Parenthood or other abortion providers as a health resource on the school website; the use of abortion industry leaders as campus or class speakers; actively promoting Planned Parenthood as a featured internship, career opportunity, or volunteer opportunity; using Planned Parenthood as a class resource; and school administrators or academic departments publishing direct support for Planned Parenthood specifically or abortion generally. Added to the infraction category for this year’s report was whether or not the school included a statement on the school website commenting on or condemning the reversal of Roe.

Christians schools could earn anywhere from an “A+” down to an “F” based on the number of infractions they incurred. A school with no infractions and a relationship with a local pro-life pregnancy center received an “A+” grade, while a school with four or more infractions would receive a failing grade.

The report explained that “‘F’ grade schools made no life-affirming changes between 2021 and 2023, with some institutions doubling down on their support of Planned Parenthood and the abortion industry.”

SFLA staff members have been evaluating data from college websites since 2019 in order to develop a system that could effectively determine the pro-life beliefs of Christian colleges. Through this effort, SFLA’s Christian Schools Project was able to target its awareness and interventions efforts with Christian schools and also have a baseline by which to identify shifts in support for the pro-life cause.

Michelle Hendrickson, the director of SFLA’s strategic initiatives team and head researcher for the report, said that her goal was to “make students aware of what their university is willing to sacrifice when it comes to Biblical values. We hope that parents of students, alumni, and donors are or will become aware.”

Initially, SFLA staff discovered found that 103, or 1 in 8, Christian schools had fostered some sort of relationship or support for Planned Parenthood or other abortion provider. By 2021, that number had dropped to 69, thanks to SFLA’s targeted outreach efforts. However, in 2002, that number reversed again, jumping back up to 76 schools, or 10 percent.  

The report noted that many schools went backwards specifically because of the Dobbs decision.

Among them was Holy Cross College, a Catholic school in Massachusetts, which earned an “A+” in the 2021 report, but dropped to a “B” rating in this year’s report, thanks to the school’s decision to allow the Women and Gender Studies Department to condemn the Dobbs decision on its website.

By contrast, since the 2021 report, 42 Christian schools “have made life-affirming improvements” by cutting ties with Planned Parenthood and other abortion providers. Among these are Mount St. Mary College in New York, which leapfrogged from a “C” to an “A” by removing several Planned Parenthood events from their website, and Baylor University, which went from a “B” to an “A” by removing Planned Parenthood as an internship/job opportunity.

Liberty University, of course, has maintained an SFLA A+ rating from the start, which is hardly surprising given that it has long been a leader in maintaining a Biblical culture of life that both advocates for the unborn and provides ongoing support for pregnant women. It has also been named one of the country’s “Top 5 Most Conservative Colleges” by the Washington Stand.

As the world’s largest Christian university, with a residential population of over 16,000 students and an online population of over 110,000, Liberty has the enrollment numbers to change the culture of the nation and the world with a Christian approach to the pro-life issue as delivered through biblical content implemented in their more than 700 high-quality degree programs. Liberty University never has to worry about its SFLA rating because its pro-life stance and commitment permeates every area of the institution.

This includes Liberty’s Standing for Freedom Center, a non-profit think tank that promotes a biblical approach to constitutional and public policy issues — among them anything affecting the cause of life.

When the Dobbs ruling came out, for example, the Freedom Center published numerous articles about what the reversal of Roe really meant and what Christians need to do to continue to advance the pro-life movement and ensure pro-life wins at the state level. More recently, the Freedom Center registered more than 1,000 students for the national March for Life in Washington D.C, on January 19, 2024, and will also coordinate Liberty’s attendance at the Virginia March for Life on February 21.

“If the pro-life movement wishes to change the entire landscape of higher education in the United States to become life-affirming,” the SFLA study concludes, “it is essential to start with religious schools that already should align with the Christian belief that all life is valuable and worthy of protection.”

Ziad Munson, a sociology professor and chair of both the sociology and anthropology departments at Lehigh University in Pennsylvania, argued that all institutions of higher learning, including Christian ones, have to figure out how much to espouse their values while still giving students room to explore different ideas.

Christina Littlefield, an associate professor of journalism and religion at Pepperdine University, an L.A. area school affiliated with the Church of Christ, says she teaches students who strongly believe both that abortion is wrong and others who feel that it should remain an individual choice. Littlefield says she has seen constructive debate, particularly in her Christianity and Culture course, wherein she introduced a section on religious and secular arguments, both for and against abortion, in the fall of 2022 after the Dobbs decision was rendered.

While it remains important for Christian colleges to allow freedom of speech and for students to arrive at their own conclusions on important issues, it is also necessary for these institutions to foster a culture of morality and adherence to truth that goes beyond the immediate demands of the culture.

Across the country, the vast majority of colleges and universities are pushing “puritanically progressive” ideologies, a push that serves to indoctrinate its students in culturally Marxist and anti-American and anti-Christian ideas and morals while also alienating free-thinking conservative students.

 Christian schools have an obligation to offer an alternative academic path grounded in biblical truth. That obligation mandates that these schools maintain an approach that challenges, rather than surrenders, to the current demands of the culture, all while still maintaining a commitment to dialogue and critical thinking that allows students to grow and develop their perspectives freely.

Many Christian schools, like Liberty University, will never abandon their biblical principles, but as this report shows, that can’t be assumed of all faith-based schools. For this reason, Christian families must do their research and make sure that whichever school they choose will stand firm on foundational Christian tenets — including, most critically, the belief that all human life is made in God’s image and should always be valued and protected.

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