Mennonite Church USA delegates approved a new policy that rejects most abortions as ``counter to biblical principles'' but also discourages members from lobbying for laws to limit the practice.
The statement says Mennonite tradition opposes ``using the government to force others to comply with our Christian standards,'' and that laws would target women without regard to fathers and disproportionately affect the poor.
A bid to delete that anti-legislation wording was defeated 486-356, after which the statement passed overwhelmingly.
The 118,000-member denomination says the fetus ``in its earliest stages'' shares humanity with the parents. It says abortion could be justified to save a mother's life, but not to end unwanted pregnancies, limit family size or destroy a fetus with possible mental or physical handicaps.
The Bible does not speak directly to abortion, the church states, but gives ``a high value to human life'' and urges ``special concern for the defenseless'' that should extend to the human fetus.
``We stand in opposition to sacrifice of life in the womb, in the death chamber and through war in all its forms,'' the pacifist church said in its policy.