The House of Lords is not usually a place that generates strong feelings among churchgoers. But last week's vote — in which peers rejected an amendment that would have prevented the decriminalisation of late-term abortion — has drawn a sharp response from across the Christian community. The Baptist Union of Great Britain has expressed deep concern, and they are not alone.

The amendment, put forward during debate on the Criminal Justice Bill, would have maintained existing legal safeguards around abortion after 24 weeks. Its rejection means that the path towards decriminalisation of late-term abortion remains open — a development that many Christian organisations regard as a profound erosion of the value of human life.

The Baptist Union's statement is measured but clear. The concern is not simply about the outcome of a single parliamentary vote. It is about the direction of travel — the sense that complex ethical questions about the beginning and end of life are being resolved through procedural manoeuvres rather than careful, considered debate. Peers also rejected a bid to make in-person consultations mandatory before prescribing abortion medicine, a provision that many medical professionals and ethicists had argued was a basic safeguard.

For churches, this is a moment to engage — not with anger, but with the kind of thoughtful, compassionate advocacy that takes both the dignity of women and the value of unborn life seriously. The Baptist Union has consistently argued that these are not competing values, but complementary ones. That argument needs to be heard in Parliament, and it needs to be made by the Church.