This past Sunday was Sanctity of Life Sunday. My church prayed for our local crisis pregnancy resource center and for orphans. It seems only appropriate, therefore, to discuss the tragedy that is occurring in ostensibly Christian colleges concerning the sanctity of life.

In a saddening investigation of 725 colleges and universities proclaiming to be Christ-centered institutions and having publicly proclaimed the traditional understanding of Christian faith, a significant number promoted the services of Planned Parenthood and/or allowed the nation’s largest abortion mill to set its hooks in student life. The research team, Students for Life’s Demetree Institute for Pro-Life Advancement (IPA), found that Planned Parenthood has some type of relationship with one in seven of these schools, either working directly with students for “health services” or recommending Planned Parenthood as a “healthcare” resource.

The IPA’s list, which encompasses both Catholic and Protestant schools, is by no means exhaustive. Schools were eliminated if their denomination affirms abortion, and others were dropped if they jettisoned the claim of being a Christian school altogether.

Students for Life of America President Kristan Hawkins stated:

Most surprising, even [Pope Leo’s] alma mater, Villanova University, got an F in our report, for listing several abortion organizations on its career connection website. The last thing we want is for our best and brightest students to reject the teachings of their faith by taking a job with any organization dedicated to destroying Life in the womb. Our hope is that the Holy Father, parents, alumni, donors, and students demand that our Christian schools practice what our faith preaches.

I am proud to say that my alma mater received an A+ rating from this investigation, which means it promotes crisis pregnancy resource centers and pro-life resources for its students who may need support and assistance.

The spirit of this age has done a malevolently masterful job of persuading even purported Christ-followers to believe lies. Perhaps it starts with the first lie — that sex is divorced from conception. Thanks to birth control, that’s easy to assimilate into a worldview. Because one of the main purposes of sex is now utterly separated from the act itself, self-control when it comes to copulation has gone out the window as well.

Then there is that precious life that is created through intimacy. Sex was designed by God for procreation, to make little humans. Sex was also supposed to be reserved for marriage. It protects both the husband and the wife and creates the most stable situation for a child to be born into.

As inherent sinners, people do sometimes fall short of that expectation, and children are conceived out of wedlock. What, then, are these Christian colleges signaling to their students who think they are getting a biblical education? Why would schools offer to send poor young women to Planned Parenthood, where they are treated like a number and then sent home to mourn in solitude? What sort of witness, let alone a Christian college, does that to one of their own?

These schools are, I am sad to say, reinforcing the lies of the sexual revolution — and the devil himself.

On the positive side of this heart-wrenching investigation, 50 ties to Planned Parenthood were cut by some of the schools on the list. This was thanks to awareness-raising efforts that allowed alumni, students, parents, and patrons to provide input on these schools’ regrettable decisions.

The fight for the lives of preborn children is pervasive and prolific. Even our Christian schools can stray from their professed biblical stances. It’s up to all of us in the pro-life community to care for the mothers and fathers in crisis and give them hope for the future, not compound sin with more sin by sacrificing innocent life.