To quote a little old nun you might have heard of, “When a mother can kill her baby, what is left of civilization to save?”

If you respect life, then you seek not to take it, no matter what the circumstance.

Those that don’t have no compunction when it comes to the taking of a life. They seek to justify it in any way possible.

The right to choose advocates that a woman has a right to do as she wishes with her body, but doesn’t she have an obligation to act responsibly? Doesn’t the desire for an abortion denote irresponsibility in and of itself? It is the utter disregard for a consequence for irresponsible behavior. The fact that we normalize a “get out of jail free card” (add welfare to that too) shows that our society is continuing to seek absolution for any and all responsibilities.

There is no safe, legal, and rare abortion. Ask someone who has had an abortion. There are immense risks to the woman, both present and future. And it is certainly not rare. It encourages the same behavior that has led to the rampant rise in AIDS cases, STD’s, et al. And we all know what it is doing to the African-American community. A-A women are #1 in abortions per year. You can fill in the blanks from there as to where they rank in other cases too.

The moral depravity we see should not be suprising, especially if you are one of faith. It is foretold to us one and all.

They’re very manipulative people — always watch your back!

Josh,
Is there any way (except through faith) to believe that any human (regardless of age or development) has a soul?

Since when does feeling pain give someone or something the right not to be killed?

Every fetus has a brain and brain cells. By only thirty days after conception (when the unborn child is considered an embryo) the 3 primary parts of the child’s brain are already present according to “From Conception to Birth” by Roberts Rugh, Ph.D., Landrum B. Shettles, Ph.D., M.D. Harper & Row, (New York), 1971, p. 41

Maybe you meant “embryo” instead of “fetus?”

There certainly is room for compromise both scientifically and theologically . St. Thomas Aquinas theorized that human life began several weeks after conception. That human life began at “the quickening” of the fetus was the most common opinion among our founding fathers. I agree with Pres. Reagan that if you don’t know then you have to error on the side of life.

Regardless the debate on life at conception the legislators could rule it most appropriate to return the issue to the states by nullifying Roe v Wade. They choose not to.

The fact is that Democrats want no compromise. Clinton, the originator of the “safe but rare” talking point vetoed partial birth abortion and opposed parental notification; neither safe nor rare.

An exceptional example of the progressive mindset is the recently passed Stem Cell bond issue in California. This bill funded by a rich Democrat and supported by Gov. Arnold poses to be aimed at furthering research. In actuality the bill ignores funding for the most promising cord blood stem cells or the most proven adult stem cell lines. All the billions of dollars HAVE to be spent on cells from harvested embryos. Why would they write this limitation into this bill?

These people are determined to enshrine the right to kill babies. They will only compromise when they’re driven to their knees. God willing Americans will increasingly be driven to disgust by their relentless focus on death over life.

Here’s a syllogism:

(1) Taking the life of innocent human beings is wrong;

(2) The unborn, from the moment of conception, are innocent human beings;

(3) Therefore, taking the lives of the unborn, from the moment of conception, is wrong.

Note that I haven’t said anything about the soul. And that I haven’t cited the Bible.

I presume you agree with premise one. Do you agree with premise two? If not, why not?

I must say, I have trouble seeing how the unborn is not a human being from the moment of conception. Before that moment, there is nothing that could develop naturally into an adult. After that moment, there is. But in between conception and adulthood there is no comparable moment where an essentially new entity comes into being. Or is there?

I also have trouble understanding why not feeling pain, or not being conscious, or not being viable, or not being whatever should disqualify the unborn from deserving protection against being killed. I mean, adult cows feel pain, are aware, are viable, etc., but it’s ok to kill and eat them. In other words, the point isn’t so much being able to do such things as it is being a human being.

The decisive threshhold isn’t reached when the new human actually starts to do X, Y, and Z. It’s reached when you go from a sperm and an egg that will never, ever be able to do X, Y, Z to a new human.

To put it another way, a human being in the zygote phase is not a potential human being, but an actual human being on its way to maturity. If its immaturity doesn’t change WHAT it is—already is—then why should it constitute even the slightest reason for removing from it the protections due human beings?

Or am I missing something?

Cordially,

Adrian

What basis can we use to “enshrine the right to choose” on the earlier end that will not ALSO work for later ends?

(Frankly, I’ve even heard people that don’t think this right to choose should end at birth but, rather, when the child is able to support themselves.)

I would welcome such a proposal as a step toward the right from where we are now. But I would not stop fighting until all the children were safe. I do believe we will come to the day when most people look back and go “How did America go so long thinking this was okay?” the way we do now about slavery.

esp with every increase in technology 1) Allowing babies to live that were born more and more premature (My sister had her third child last year, that survived in conditions that just five years ago, he would have died of because the technology did not exist) 2) And showing earlier and earlier in the pregnancy how “alive” the baby truly is.

You SAY they can not feel pain at that age — but frankly, it could as much be that we don’t yet have the technology to detect it. (Not to mention it is not a good excuse for being okay to terminate a human life.)

I am primarily secular. I believe in a higher power. Here is how I come down on the issue.

1) The fetus is a human (or at least homo sapiens). By definition.
2) Whether that human has a soul is purely faith based. By definition.
3) At an early enough stage, the fetus cannot feel pain and has ZERO intellectual capacity (it doesn’t yet have brain cells or neurons – in fact no cells are differentiated).
4) Every moral argument I have heard against killing the fetus at that early stage was based purely on faith. (Note, I’m not backing away from non-pc terms like killing).

Going beyond that stage, to when the embyo has any differentiated neurons, and still trying to argue – “well, its not fully aware”, is completely subjective.

Like euthanasia, it is not a slippery slope – it is cliff. Still, REMOVING FAITH, I believe it is possible to reach a clear moral decision that killing the human at very early development, such as with a morning after pill, is ok. Admittedly, I find it disconcerting to use the phrase “killing the human”.

Partial Birth abortion is clearly a monstrosity. Even if there is a reason to remove the baby for the mothers health (unlikely), why do we have to kill it in the process?

Am I fooling myself? Is there room for any compromise? For instance, would any of you enshrine some protection to a right to choose at the earlier end in exchange for illegality for the rest of it?

Non-viability does not render that life any less human. I’d love to be a fly on the wall when someone makes that argument on the Day of Judgment.