Useless Information

After President Obama’s commencement speech at Notre Dame, I posted this as my Facebook status:

“Mr. President, if the unborn are not living, human persons, then WHY on earth should we strive to have fewer abortions?”

I encouraged others to do the same.  Not surprising, I got a lot of affirmative responses.  It didn’t surprise me because the majority of the country is now pro-life and it makes sense that people I’m friends with on Facebook would agree with me.  I did get a couple of challenges to the idea.  One person in particular sent me several messages in passionate disagreement.

I won’t post her personal message to me (since she chose not to make it public).  But the main thrust of her thoughts were that we will never come to an agreement on abortion so we should at the very least agree to seek ways to reduce the number of abortions in our country.  She said that she couldn’t defend abortion but wouldn’t want to make the decision for some one else. (this is becoming a common viewpoint)

She also sent me these links:
http://www.whchurch.org/whchurch/pdfs/Christians-and-Abortion.pdf
http://salsa.democracyinaction.org/o/2518/t/2447/p/dia/action/public/?action_KEY=973

The following is my response to her:

Hi, thanks for the links. I’ll check them out. I appreciate your respectful and thoughtful tone. I’ll try to reciprocate it. The basic premise I’m approaching the topic from is this:

If the unborn are living human persons, then there is simply no justification for killing them (except for the life of the mother). Any justification for killing them can be extended on out throughout their entire lives.

If the unborn are not living human beings, there is no justification for preventing abortions. It’s has the same consequence as removing a mole or laser eye surgery. It should be free reign all the way until the hour before delivery.

These are the two consistent positions. Obama’s position actually alienates both sides by recognizing that there is something fundamentally wrong with abortion, but does nothing to stop it.

I agree with the President, there should be fewer abortions. I think he needs to answer the fundamental question on “why”. Once he starts probing the deeper aspects of “what is it?” I think he would recognize that the right to kill another person, regardless of her location is not a right we should be protecting.

One of government’s jobs is to protect the rights of the weak from the abuses of the strong. The government interferes in deeply personal choices everyday on behalf of the weak. Owning slaves was a deeply personal choice that many had personal qualms about but thought others should be allowed to do. Once we recognized that all humans are persons our government saw that it had a duty to protect the weak. There are all kinds of things that government will not allow women to do to their bodies that have no affect on other people. You cannot pay a doctor to cut your hand off. Why do you let government impinge on that freedom over your body? If government will not allow you to harm yourself, why should it allow you to harm someone else?

I recognize that abortions will still happen even if it is made illegal. Slavery still happens to this day. That doesn’t mean the government shouldn’t do what it can to stop it.

You asked “I am curious to know if you truly see abusive parents as more loving than someone who makes the decision to abort–for any reason.” I recognize the opportunity for both of us to have passionate responses to my answer. So please take a deep breath before reading more. . .and I’ll do the same. . . .

Do you think there is any loving reason for a parent to kill an 8 year old? Downs Syndrome? Product of incest or rape? Poverty? Single parent?

As little as I think of abusive parents, I think the parent who kills their child is more abusive no matter the good intentions they perceive themselves under. Death is the ultimate abuse.

The unborn are living – if they were not living they would not grow

The unborn are human – they aren’t pig fetuses or rabbit fetuses inside the womb. They are human fetuses

The unborn are persons – they have all the same character traits as their mothers. They have their own individual DNA, separate from their mothers. Like a newborn, if given the right environment in which to grow they will become mothers themselves. Like a newborn, if you stop their life they will not become mothers.

Thanks for taking the time to dialogue on this very important issue.

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I was deeply influenced by this Stand to Reason podcast

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photo credit: size8jeans