Political Insider

By Copyleft

September 18, 2008 11:34 AM | Link to this

That assumes, of course, that “serious Catholics” have no respect for the Constitutional separation of church and state…

Which the right-to-life wingnuts have never cared about anyway. Christian Nation! Christian Nation! To h-ell with freedom!

By rustylynn

September 18, 2008 12:53 PM | Link to this

Yeah, the Dems came up with this line a few years ago…. made famous by Kerry’s, ” I PERSONALLY oppose abortion….but I can’t push my convictions on anyone else”

It just shows no political backbone by these guys.

Here’s the secret that the press and their liberal friends in the media don’t tell you: If a terrible law, Rowe v. Wade, is overturned, it will not outlaw abortions. We would just see different laws consernining the procedure state by state.

Abortion is the Holy Sacrament of the left. It all boils down to the unfair consequesence of casual sex between a man and a woman. “If HE doesn’t have to carry a baby, then neither do I!”

Here’s a question I’d like asked of Biden or B. Hussein Obama “Is there ever a case where an abortion should be illegal?” Perhaps copyleft and GHtrash could answer that for them.

By Jack P

September 18, 2008 12:54 PM | Link to this

Biden is a CINO (Catholic in name only). He neither believes nor speaks the truth. He is a politician.

By letsgetreal

September 18, 2008 12:54 PM | Link to this

why do Catholic leaders want voters to hold the dems accountable on abortion but say nothing about the GOP violating the church’s “just war” finding in Iraq? Surely, innocents are dying there. Its the height of hypocracy

By hmmm.....

September 18, 2008 12:59 PM | Link to this

Would Jesus support the Republican position on gun control?

Would Jesus support allowing 47 million people to go without basic healthcare in the richest country in the world?

Would Jesus support the notion that other countries are inferior to us?

Would Jesus support wars of choice?

Would Jesus support a system that people can become financially ruined for life because of an illness?

Would Jesus pay a woman 77 cents for the same job a man does?

Would Jesus go support Hagee, Parsely, Pat Robertson and Falwell’s view of the world?

Would Jesus throw as many stones as Shawn Hannity?

*I don’t understand why the Catholic church zeros in on a few issues to deny communion, etc. to Politicians.

There is a lot of stuff in the Bible that contradicts both parties. Of course, I don’t think we should base our government and laws on what shepards and fisherman thought thousands of years ago.

These people didn’t know the world was round or understand the laws of gravity.

The Bible should shapte policy.

By wondering

September 18, 2008 1:18 PM | Link to this

Jack P, who are you to judge another person’s faith?

By Just curious

September 18, 2008 3:33 PM | Link to this

Hey, at what moment does a marriage end in the Catholic Church? I only ask because I remember something about the Church threatening to deny communion to Kerry voters over the abortion issue, but yet happily placed wafers on the tongues of Giuliani and his who—, I mean, third wife whom he was putting up in an apartment on taxpayer funds while married to wife #2. Of course this in no way means the Church is in any way overtly partisan or anything.

By Copyleft

September 18, 2008 3:40 PM | Link to this

The church doesn’t have to be partisan; the Republican morons who attend the church will take care of that for them.

Really, Republican Catholics; how DO you live with yourselves for supporting a war and a divorce-culture by voting Republican, in direct defiance of your own faith?

By Dr. Lyn

September 18, 2008 4:32 PM | Link to this

As a serious, faithful Catholic I understand that I can argue or disagree about “just war” theory or capital punishment (I don’t, though); however abortion and euthanasia are non-negotiables. Abortion and euthanasia (and human embryo stem cell research) are the direct killing of innocent humans. Also, how do Democrats vote for a party that wants to allow women to kill innocent pre-born babies for all 9 months of pregnancy and for any reason or no reason? Joe Biden is also in direct defiance of his faith. And, if we didn’t base our laws on biblical morals, what should they be based on? Who gets to make the rules?

By Jack P

September 18, 2008 4:43 PM | Link to this

Dear “Wondering”

EVERYONE and ANYONE can judge Biden’s “faith”…

Matthew 7:16 You will know them by their fruit.

By knarahs

September 18, 2008 4:47 PM | Link to this

Dear CopyLeft - there is NO Constitutional “separation of church and state” clause. There is a Constitutional “ESTABLISHMENT” clause. The Constitution states that the government shall not “ESTABLISH” a religion. Thomsa Jefferson, wrote to a group of Baptists (who didn’t want religion mentioned at all in the Constitution) that the Constitution puts a “wall of separation between the church and state.” The Baptists didn’t want the state to tell anyone how to worship, where to worship, when to worship, etc. Jefferson assured them this would never happen. Unfortunately, he was WRONG. Ask any high school class that wants a prayer at their graduation, but are told TO WHOM they can, or cannot pray — or the college student denied a scholarship because their declared major is religion and it’s a “state” scholarship — or the little girl who takes her Bible to school to read at recess and gets detention — or the missionary who is fined for passing out tracts on a bus — all clear examples of the “state” crossing that wall that Thomas Jefferson said they would NEVER be able to cross. I suggest you study the history of the Constitution a little before your next blog.

By Dave

September 18, 2008 8:06 PM | Link to this

It is my opinion and belief, there is no excuse for any church allowing any pro-abortion candidate to stay on their church roles until they repent of supporting abortion on demand. These should all be put out of their churches, whether they be Catholic or Protestant, they should be expunged which is in line with New Testament Church discipline which says,’Therefore put away from among yourselves that wicked person” This is a private matter between the church and their members and is NO business of the United States Government and it protected by the Constitution of the United States in the First Amendment which says (so many people can’t read) “Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof;” “prohibiting the free exercise thereof”…. As I said..this IS church discipline and IS protected by the Constitution of the United States and again, is no business of the government

By LMG

September 19, 2008 8:46 AM | Link to this

I have a friend who says Jesus came to take away our sins, not our minds. In that spirit, a few geniune questions that all of this raises for me -

Are (unborn) American lives worth more than the innocent victims of an unjust war? (Because Iraq ia also non-negotiable at this point, according to both John Paul II and Benedict XVI.)

Will Bishops deny communion to Catholic politicians who continue to support this unjust war?

Will Catholics demonstrate against in vitro fertilization?

Will Christians (Catholic or otherwise) ever admit that politicians have shamelessly exploited the pro-life vote?

By LMG

September 19, 2008 8:50 AM | Link to this

I have a friend who says Jesus came to take away our sins, not our minds. In that spirit, a few genuine questions that all of this raises for me -

Are (unborn) American lives worth more than the innocent victims of an unjust war? Because Iraq is also non-negotiable at this point, according to both John Paul II and Benedict XVI.

Will Bishops deny communion to Catholic politicians who continue to support this unjust war?

Will Catholics demonstrate against in vitro fertilization?

Will Christians (Catholic or otherwise) ever admit that politicians have shamelessly exploited the pro-life vote?

By Jan Fredericks

September 19, 2008 9:30 AM | Link to this

You will know them by their fruit (gentleness, mercy, etc.).
Hunters in the Bible were not part of God’s chosen and fishermen left their fishing careers to follow Jesus. I don’t think I’ll vote. Both sides don’t seem to care about life, only the economy. Tens of thousands of innocent civilians were bombed in Iraq. What about their lives?
While the fetus is living, the Old Testament doesn’t see the loss of life in the womb as murder. I’m anti-abortion AND pro-life for all (including the billions of God’s creatures suffering in factory farms just for our appetites). God’s Creatures Ministry

By Jan Fredericks

September 19, 2008 10:01 AM | Link to this

We are responsible not only for the unborn, but for all life including the billions of God’s creatures in factory farms. see Hebrews 4:13. You can not serve money and God. God’s Creatures Ministry Jan Fredericks, Founder

By Will Jones

September 19, 2008 10:06 AM | Link to this

With three children granted to me by G-d’s blessing, I say anyone opposed to abortion should not have one.

Who in Georgia wants to repeal the American Revolution and restore Tory tyranny to power by voting for someone who endorses never-excommunicated Roman Catholic Adolph Hitler’s anti-abortion philosophy?

Sarah Palin, like effeminate, Hitler-Youth Benedict, believes the government should force girls raped by their fathers, or anyone else, to carry any pregnancy to full term…and as a false prophet, vainly counts it as righteousness on her part.

The faction pushing the same abortion policy as Adolph Hitler are those promoting illegal immigration to build power over the rest of us, with amnesty, naturalization and voter registration, at the ballot box.

It was only their co-religionists on the Supreme Court who were willing to violate the Constitution and all precedent to appoint Hitler’s banker’s homosexual draft-dodging grandson, and good buddy to Saxby Chambliss, as POTUS.

All well and good if such insanity were being proposed only by a fiction writer of a horror story, but America was created to provide a free People - men, women, families, boys and girls - safe-haven from tyranny.

Our Creed, embraced in true and patriotic faith by all genuine Americans, includes Novus Ordo Seclorem, The New Secular Order. There was no “old” secular order to compare but there was the Ancien Regime (old order): the Old Sectarian Order of king and pope - caesaropapism - which was noted by Our Founder to have provided thousands upon thousands of years of despotism before The Founders “arrested” its course in human history.

Hence the “Wall of Separation” between the Sacred and the Profane…between the Secular and the Sectarian…between America and sectarian factionalism wishing to divide and conquer us: the threat we still are to monarchy and papacy.

Then their agents killed Lincoln to rape the Jeffersonian, Jew-loving Protestant South. Then we fought their Nazi catspaw wishing to fulfill the lessons in Germanic Europe’s catechism of “noble Roman soldiers slaughtering Jews as proof of Divine Judgment against those who murdered Our Saviour.” Then their agents killed John and Martin to get us killed keeping their Buddhist on their slave plantation in Indochina.

…and they want to tell us, by force, who should bear a child and when? Psychotic lying hypocrite should have tried better to keep her own house in order…particularly when it is readily apparent only G-d cut Sarah short of grace for all to see and know.

Her fifteen minutes are almost up. Hope they kept the heat on so the pipes don’t freeze in their double-wide.

Clinton was whitetrash and no good too, but at least he had brains and kept those of us not outside Waco from dying in wars for lies. She’s so stupid she’s still trying to tie Iraq to Bush/Cheney’s 9/11 treason…and wonders how great it will play at the polls if her son’s Alaska Army National Guard unit gets hit.

What a mother. What a monster. Maybe the Plan holds that in some way she’ll do better by her last child…but I doubt it.

http://www.theamericanfundament.blogspot.com

By Jeff C

September 19, 2008 10:47 AM | Link to this

Where in the Constitution does the phrase “separation of church and state” appear? IT DOESN’T!!

By Mike F

September 19, 2008 12:02 PM | Link to this

Life begins at conception. That’s biological fact, not a religious one:

Dr. Fritz Baumgartner:

There is no more pivotal moment in the subsequent growth and development of a human being than when 23 chromosomes of the father join with 23 chromosomes of the mother to form a unique, 46-chromosomed individual, with a gender, who had previously simply not existed. Period. No debate. There is no more appropriate moment to begin calling a human “human” than the moment of fertilization. And don’t let anyone tell you otherwise, because it would be a degradation of factual embryology to say it would be any other moment. For example, some pro-abortion zealots and even, shockingly, some disingenuous physicians claim it is the moment of primitive notochord formation (nonsense!) or, even more absurdly, the moment of implantation. (It defies sanity to claim that the implantation of a developing blastocyst onto a uterine wall defines humanity more than does the completion of an entirely new DNA map, which defines a new organism’s existence). And to say that “size” is a determinant of humanity, of course, is an unscientific reason to deny an embryo his or her human status. In any event, it is an embryological reality, which no embryology textbook on earth denies, that at the moment of fertilization a new human being is formed.

By Mike F.

September 19, 2008 12:29 PM | Link to this

For those who are confused about Catholic teaching on abortion/euthanasia vs. war and the death penalty, please read the following statement by our current Pope when he was head of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith:

“Not all moral issues have the same moral weight as abortion and euthanasia. For example, if a Catholic were to be at odds with the Holy Father on the application of capital punishment or on the decision to wage war, he would not for that reason be considered unworthy to present himself to receive Holy Communion. While the Church exhorts civil authorities to seek peace, not war, and to exercise discretion and mercy in imposing punishment on criminals, it may still be permissible to take up arms to repel an aggressor or to have recourse to capital punishment. There may be a legitimate diversity of opinion even among Catholics about waging war and applying the death penalty, but not however with regard to abortion and euthanasia.” Cardinal Ratzinger (Pope Benedict XVI)

I can’t understand how women - whose nature is to protect and nurture their children, who themselves have suffered under the aggression of those more powerful than themselves - could ever have come to believe that killing their unborn children was a sign of progress and empowerment.

By Mike F.

September 19, 2008 12:31 PM | Link to this

For those who are confused about Catholic teaching on abortion/euthanasia vs. war and the death penalty, please read the following statement by our current Pope when he was head of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith:

“Not all moral issues have the same moral weight as abortion and euthanasia. For example, if a Catholic were to be at odds with the Holy Father on the application of capital punishment or on the decision to wage war, he would not for that reason be considered unworthy to present himself to receive Holy Communion. While the Church exhorts civil authorities to seek peace, not war, and to exercise discretion and mercy in imposing punishment on criminals, it may still be permissible to take up arms to repel an aggressor or to have recourse to capital punishment. There may be a legitimate diversity of opinion even among Catholics about waging war and applying the death penalty, but not however with regard to abortion and euthanasia.” Cardinal Ratzinger (Pope Benedict XVI)

I can’t understand how women - whose nature is to protect and nurture their children, who themselves have suffered under the aggression of those more powerful than themselves - could ever have come to believe that killing their unborn children was a sign of progress and empowerment.

By Mike F.

September 19, 2008 12:33 PM | Link to this

For those who are confused about Catholic teaching on abortion/euthanasia vs. war and the death penalty, please read the following statement by our current Pope when he was head of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith:

“Not all moral issues have the same moral weight as abortion and euthanasia. For example, if a Catholic were to be at odds with the Holy Father on the application of capital punishment or on the decision to wage war, he would not for that reason be considered unworthy to present himself to receive Holy Communion. While the Church exhorts civil authorities to seek peace, not war, and to exercise discretion and mercy in imposing punishment on criminals, it may still be permissible to take up arms to repel an aggressor or to have recourse to capital punishment. There may be a legitimate diversity of opinion even among Catholics about waging war and applying the death penalty, but not however with regard to abortion and euthanasia.” Cardinal Ratzinger (Pope Benedict XVI)

I can’t understand how women - whose nature is to protect and nurture their children, who themselves have suffered under the aggression of those more powerful than themselves - could ever have come to believe that killing their unborn children was a sign of progress and empowerment.

By Mike F.

September 19, 2008 12:34 PM | Link to this

For those who are confused about Catholic teaching on abortion/euthanasia vs. war and the death penalty, please read the following statement by our current Pope when he was head of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith:

“Not all moral issues have the same moral weight as abortion and euthanasia. For example, if a Catholic were to be at odds with the Holy Father on the application of capital punishment or on the decision to wage war, he would not for that reason be considered unworthy to present himself to receive Holy Communion. While the Church exhorts civil authorities to seek peace, not war, and to exercise discretion and mercy in imposing punishment on criminals, it may still be permissible to take up arms to repel an aggressor or to have recourse to capital punishment. There may be a legitimate diversity of opinion even among Catholics about waging war and applying the death penalty, but not however with regard to abortion and euthanasia.” Cardinal Ratzinger (Pope Benedict XVI)

I can’t understand how women - whose nature is to protect and nurture their children, who themselves have suffered under the aggression of those more powerful than themselves - could ever have come to believe that killing their unborn children was a sign of progress and empowerment.

By Mike F.

September 19, 2008 12:34 PM | Link to this

For those who are confused about Catholic teaching on abortion/euthanasia vs. war and the death penalty, please read the following statement by our current Pope when he was head of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith:

“Not all moral issues have the same moral weight as abortion and euthanasia. For example, if a Catholic were to be at odds with the Holy Father on the application of capital punishment or on the decision to wage war, he would not for that reason be considered unworthy to present himself to receive Holy Communion. While the Church exhorts civil authorities to seek peace, not war, and to exercise discretion and mercy in imposing punishment on criminals, it may still be permissible to take up arms to repel an aggressor or to have recourse to capital punishment. There may be a legitimate diversity of opinion even among Catholics about waging war and applying the death penalty, but not however with regard to abortion and euthanasia.” Cardinal Ratzinger (Pope Benedict XVI)

I can’t understand how women - whose nature is to protect and nurture their children, who themselves have suffered under the aggression of those more powerful than themselves - could ever have come to believe that killing their unborn children was a sign of progress and empowerment.

By Mike F.

September 19, 2008 12:54 PM | Link to this

Jan,

You might want to talk with Orthodox Rabbis about the Hebrew Scriptures (Old Testament). Orthodox Jews are drastically closer to the Catholic position on abortion than they are to liberal, secular humanists who support abortion on demand. According to Planned Parenthood’s research arm, Alan Guttmacher, the vast majority of abortions are for reasons that would be considered unacceptable within Orthodox Judaism.

“In the absence of severe health danger, a woman must carry the fetus to full term. With 1-in-6 American couples infertile, giving up the baby for adoption is an obvious option.”

Rabbi Shraga Simmons

Reasons for abortions:

In 2000, cases of rape or incest accounted for 1% of abortions. Another study, in 1998, revealed that women reported the following reasons for choosing an abortion:

25.5% Want to postpone childbearing 21.3% Cannot afford a baby 14.1% Has relationship problem or partner does not want pregnancy 12.2% Too young; parent(s) or other(s) object to pregnancy 10.8% Having a child will disrupt education or job 7.9% Want no (more) children 3.3% Risk to fetal health 2.8% Risk to maternal health 2.1% Other

By Will Jones

September 19, 2008 1:25 PM | Link to this

Keep your anti-American Creed sectarian factionalism treason to yourself. You and your illegal immigrants are not long for Our Land.

Just as false Jews helped Bush and Cheney commit 9/11 (recalling the now deported Mossad agents who were taping the WTC from across the river before the first plane crashed), false Jews helped Bush’s Auschwitz-profiting Knight of Malta grandafther’s client Adolph Hitler rise to and stay in power.

How ironic now that those who tout the theology of a gay Hitler Youth pope and the institution which is, with two other popes, “morally, legally and ethically culpable of the Holocaust” (Viz. “A Moral Reckoning,” Goldhagen) should cite the moral authority of Orthodox Rabbis to justify Hitler-in-Drag, Sarah Palin’s, evil demand that girls raped by their fathers be forced to carry a pregnancy to term.

Push your papacy from afar.

Georgia, like Virginia, is likely still “mission” country for those who ran the global slave trade from Rome, Italy, for two thousand years, slaughtered our ancestors on St. Bartholomew’s Day and from whom we, Black, White, Jew and Gentile freemen escaped to establish this New Secular Order, Whig paradise.

Keep the GayOldPerverts out of America’s bedrooms and wombs.

By Mike F.

September 19, 2008 2:06 PM | Link to this

Will,

Bigotry has many faces. You’ve exposed yet another - anti-Catholic bigotry.

There are only two questions that must be asked in regard to abortion. Is the being inside its mother’s womb human? And - may we kill it?

The science is plain in regard to #1. Human life begins at conception. Even the secular humanist unwittingly gives witness to this - why else do they wear condoms? To prevent the commencement of new human life.

You believe we may kill human life. This places you squarely with the Nazis, who also tried to dehumanize a whole class of human beings - the Jews. Untermenschen. Sub-human. Parasites. Having no rights.

Shame on you.

By Mike F.

September 19, 2008 2:08 PM | Link to this

Bigotry has many faces. Will has exposed yet another - anti-Catholic bigotry.

There are only two questions that must be asked in regard to abortion. Is the being inside its mother’s womb human? And - may we kill it?

The science is plain in regard to #1. Human life begins at conception. Even the secular humanist unwittingly gives witness to this - why else do they wear condoms? To prevent the commencement of new human life.

Will believes we may intentionally kill innocent human life. This places him squarely with the Nazis, who also tried to dehumanize a whole class of human beings - the Jews. Untermenschen. Sub-human. Parasites. Having no rights.

Shame on him.

By Gawd

September 19, 2008 2:23 PM | Link to this

Mikey F,

Who made u God?

By Mike F.

September 19, 2008 2:31 PM | Link to this

By taking innocent life, it is the pro-abortionists who make themselves God.

Thou shalt not kill.

or, more accurately:

Thou shalt not murder (kill the innocent).

(Exodus 20:13; Deuteronomy 5:17)

By Phil

September 19, 2008 2:51 PM | Link to this

Questions for “Copyleft” and the other foaming-at-the-mouth anti-Catholics:

Since you are so filled with rage at all things religious, why do you spend so much time reading and commenting upon religious-themed articles? That’s much like hitting your injured hand with a hammer and then complaining because it hurts. Is it that you enjoy the pain, or is it that you want the attention that comes from complaining, or is it that you can’t figure out how to stop hitting yourself?

And those of us with religious beliefs are the “nut” cases? It must be very interesting living in your parallel universe.

By the way, I am strongly pro-life, strongly Catholic, and neither a Democrat nor a Republican.

By Tony

September 19, 2008 9:48 PM | Link to this

LMG - to answer your questions:

Are (unborn) American lives worth more than the innocent victims of an unjust war? Because Iraq is also non-negotiable at this point, according to both John Paul II and Benedict XVI. This has not been a matter of official Church teaching. You do not have to accept that World War II was a just war or that the Iraq war was unjust in order to be received into the Church. You do however have to accept that Jesus was the Son of God, that abortion is wrong, etc. Therefore your claim that it is an “unjust war” is not an official teaching of the Church and the Pope is not speaking infallibly when saying one thing or another on the war(s). If he says Jiffy peanut butter is the best, I can still eat Peter Pan peanut butter and not be denied Communion. If he says abortion is wrong I must be denied if I promote it. I know that is an extreme example but I hope you get my drift.

By Mike F.

September 20, 2008 12:36 AM | Link to this

Basically true, Tony.

The decision to wage war or use capital punishment is a prudential one that properly remains within the discretion and jurisdiction of the duly elected authorities. That’s Catholic teaching. There is such a thing as a just war and just application of the death penalty. There is no such thing as a “just abortion” or a just case of euthanasia. Never.

However, we have to be careful not to dismiss what the Holy Father has said about this war (and JPII before him) The Vatican clearly did not approve of it.

Even so, there are two factors to consider: 1) Now that we are there, the Vatican has ALSO made it clear that they believe we should not leave precipitously because that might create a far worse catastrophe (civil war, etc,). 2) The amount of people killed in the entire Iraq war is dwarfed by the number of innocent human beings who are intentionally killed through abortion in a single year - approximately 1.3 million. Over 40 million unborn children have been killed by abortion in this country since Roe V. Wade.

One wonders if the liberal baby-boomers who promoted abortion will someday understand that all of these children they aborted would be paying into Social Security and Medicare now to take care of them…..

By Peter

September 20, 2008 9:56 AM | Link to this

Would Jesus support the Republican position on gun control? -Guns are for self-defense and survival. I’m pretty sure Jesus didn’t have anything against fishermen using nets.

Would Jesus support allowing 47 million people to go without basic healthcare in the richest country in the world? -I’m pretty sure Jesus taught to put your faith in him and to prepare yourself for eternity, not to worry about the infinitely short time you spend on earth.

Would Jesus support the notion that other countries are inferior to us? -Would Jesus support the notion that our children or elderly are inferior to us? (abortion and euthanasia)

Would Jesus support wars of choice? -I don’t think Jesus supports the Genocide of millions either.
Iraq war tally (civilians +soldiers): a few million, abortion: 40 million and growing quickly genocides in darfur/burma/sudan: millions? and growing as we do nothing.

Would Jesus support a system that people can become financially ruined for life because of an illness? -I don’t know if that matters a whole lot to Jesus. Your goal shouldn’t be financial stability but spiritual stability, in fact Jesus told everyone to give their money away and follow him.

Would Jesus pay a woman 77 cents for the same job a man does? -Jesus didn’t get paid for his service, he got killed.

Would Jesus go support Hagee, Parsely, Pat Robertson and Falwell’s view of the world? -I think the real question is: do Hagee, Parsely, Pat Robertson and Falwell support Jesus’ view of the world.

Would Jesus throw as many stones as Shawn Hannity? -Jesus throws people into hell.

*I don’t understand why the Catholic church zeros in on a few issues to deny communion, etc. to Politicians.

-Because the issue of abortion (and euthanasia) is a non-negotiable, never correct, intrinsically evil thing. There is no argument in the catholic church over it. However, Just war, capital punishment, and social issues are all arguable issues in the church on how to best go about them so there is room for debate among catholics.

There is a lot of stuff in the Bible that contradicts both parties. Of course, I don’t think we should base our government and laws on what shepards and fisherman thought thousands of years ago. -Everything in the bible contradicts both parties. Those shepherds and fisherman began a movement which billions upon billions of people belong to. Also, the leader was God himself, so i’d rather listen to God then to some new-age hypocrites who think they know better than Catholicism which has God and millions of past and present theologians on its side… who always mysteriously turn out to be right in the end.

These people didn’t know the world was round or understand the laws of gravity. -No one knew the world was round, and if you can explain the laws of gravity to people today you’d be doing very good for yourself.

The Bible should shapte policy. -I think commonsense and logic combined with sound moral reasoning should shape the policy.

You cannot have any respect for human life in its mature form and complain about wars or social issues when you do not even respect life in its most fragile or basic forms. Until you do, you have no right to speak of the horrors of war or the plague of poverty. You must respect life to begin with.

By modern man

September 20, 2008 10:20 AM | Link to this

I think conception starts when the nipple makes its 1st appearance, I’ve made love to over 200 hundred of your daughters, sex is natural, sex is fun, lighten up and enjoy your loins. Religion is bogus mind control, do ants have a heaven, give me a break.

By moralist

September 20, 2008 10:59 AM | Link to this

Sarah is pro-retard, how selfish to birth normal kids, we should abort all children except for retards, they are god’s special mistakes and must be multiplied

By Mike F.

September 20, 2008 12:48 PM | Link to this

Modern Man and Moralist have done a fine job reminding us all of just how “enlightened” and “caring” secularists are.

Thanks to them both.

I have news for both Moralist and Modern Man. Man was designed to worship. The only question is what or who we worship. Modern Man and Moralist worship themselves - just as Lucifer does. And the fruits of their narcissism are evident. Hence the need for abortion - let me use women as objects, to hell with the children.

Yes, promiscuous sex is natural - for unthinking animals driven by hormones. So is murder. If one wants to delude oneself into thinking that “free sex” has no consequences, that’s one’s choice. But one cannot deny the science. The amount of sexually transmitted diseases ranging from chlamydia, to genital warts, to herpes, to HIV is staggering. Let alone the effects on families and children. Russian Roulette anyone?

If I own a car, I have every right to ignore the owner’s manual and believe that putting beer into the gas tank is a good idea. But I’ll still going to be a pedestrian.

Sex is a great thing. God made it. But it was made to help bond a man and a woman together (as husband and wife) and to bring children into the world. It is the secularists who don’t appreciate sex enough.

By Bullshevick

September 20, 2008 3:19 PM | Link to this

Life is to be lived, making wild passionate dirty love, enjoying God’s gift, sharing our hot bodies in celebration, love whoever whenever or not, just don’t push your fictional god on me, my god is mine and he/she/it don’t judge people live and let live there for the grace of god go i, see you in the afterlife!

By Prairie Pitbull

September 20, 2008 6:00 PM | Link to this

If anyone here knows Will Jones - you should strongly consider an intervention. The man clearly needs help.

Please…I think he’s living in a 1972 Buick in the back of a junkyard somewhere. Find him and get him some help.

P.S. - Keep him away from sharp objects!

By PaulTe

September 20, 2008 6:46 PM | Link to this

Biden’s Poor Logic Biden believes human life begins at conception; so, how can he not say abortion is murder? If abortion is murder, then how can he not believe it’s illegal?

By War is Murder

September 20, 2008 8:38 PM | Link to this

if your so sure their is a magical place called heaven where all good souls go, why do you care about abortion, all seeing all knowing God will allow the egg/sperm in with open arms.

By F Mike

September 20, 2008 10:55 PM | Link to this

If God made sex, did the omnipresent one also create rape, child abuse, war, pestilence, and religious bbbb shhhhhttttttttt mumbo jumbo!

By Mike F.

September 22, 2008 11:15 AM | Link to this

To “War is Murder”: We oppose abortion because murder is evil. Thou shalt not kill…or, more accurately: Thou shalt not murder (kill the innocent). (Exodus 20:13; Deuteronomy 5:17) Your question is silly. Life is sacred. And the one who intentionally kills the innocent is in dire peril of eternal damnation.

To “F Mike” (very “clever” by the way): No, God did not create rape, child abuse and pestilence. Man did that. God gave man free will to choose evil or to choose good.

By Copyleft

September 22, 2008 12:08 PM | Link to this

Catholics are required by their faith to believe that abortion is murder.

WHERE are Catholics required to insist that their faith be made into law over the United States?

Seems to me that Biden’s the principled one here. He recognizes that his personal faith is just that—personal. It has no place in determining what laws should be passed.

By MikeF

September 22, 2008 5:51 PM | Link to this

Copyleft,

It is not a mere matter of “faith” to say that abortion is the killing of an innocent human being. Embryology tells us that at the moment of conception, a new, genetically unique human life comes into existence. This is the mistake you and others like you keep falling into.

What you are saying is not unlike what the Nazis argued about Jews. They are sub-human - untermenschen - and therefore may be killed. You are conflating biological fact with personal judgments vis a vis the VALUE of any particular human life.

Can you tell me in official Church teaching where it says that we must support laws against murder? Child abuse? Torture?

If you can’t, then by your logic, a person who steadfastly blocked laws against murder, child abuse, rape, etc, etc. because he didn’t want to force his “religious beliefs” on others would be a perfectly good Catholic. Complete nonsense.

But it just so happens that the Church has repeatedly addressed the responsibility Catholics have in regard to the law.

In the “Gospel of Life” (1995), Pope John Paul II wrote: “In the case of an intrinsically unjust law, such as a law permitting abortion or euthanasia, it is therefore never licit to obey it, or to ‘take part in a propaganda campaign in favor of such a law, or vote for it’….This task is the particular responsibility of civil leaders….they have a duty to make courageous choices in support of life, especially through legislative measures.”

John Paul II approved a “doctrinal note” in 2002 advising Catholic politicians of their duty “to oppose any law that attacks human life.” Ruling out dissent, Pope John Paul II said democracy risked becoming tyranny if it did not defend the weak and dismissed claims by politicians who oppose abortion but feel compelled to uphold laws allowing it. Catholic politicians must oppose such laws, he said, intellectuals have a duty to argue against them, and doctors and nurses have a fundamental “human right” not to implement them and not to be discriminated against for doing so.

And then we have this from the current Pope while he was head of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith:

“those who are directly involved in lawmaking bodies have a «grave and clear obligation to oppose» any law that attacks human life. For them, as for every Catholic, it is impossible to promote such laws or to vote for them.” (From “The Participation of Catholics in Political Life”)

“It may be true that the law cannot make a man love me, but it can keep him from lynching me, and I think that’s pretty important.” Martin Luther King

By MikeF

September 22, 2008 5:53 PM | Link to this

Copyleft,

It is not a mere matter of “faith” to say that abortion is the killing of an innocent human being. Embryology tells us that at the moment of conception, a new, genetically unique human life comes into existence. This is the mistake you and others like you keep falling into.

What you are saying is not unlike what the Nazis argued about Jews. They are sub-human - untermenschen - and therefore may be killed. You are conflating biological fact with personal judgments vis a vis the VALUE of any particular human life.

Can you tell me in official Church teaching where it says that we must support laws against murder? Child abuse? Torture?

If you can’t, then by your logic, a person who steadfastly blocked laws against murder, child abuse, rape, etc, etc. because he didn’t want to force his “religious beliefs” on others would be a perfectly good Catholic. Complete nonsense.

But it just so happens that the Church has repeatedly addressed the responsibility Catholics have in regard to the law.

In the “Gospel of Life” (1995), Pope John Paul II wrote: “In the case of an intrinsically unjust law, such as a law permitting abortion or euthanasia, it is therefore never licit to obey it, or to ‘take part in a propaganda campaign in favor of such a law, or vote for it’….This task is the particular responsibility of civil leaders….they have a duty to make courageous choices in support of life, especially through legislative measures.”

John Paul II approved a “doctrinal note” in 2002 advising Catholic politicians of their duty “to oppose any law that attacks human life.” Ruling out dissent, Pope John Paul II said democracy risked becoming tyranny if it did not defend the weak and dismissed claims by politicians who oppose abortion but feel compelled to uphold laws allowing it. Catholic politicians must oppose such laws, he said, intellectuals have a duty to argue against them, and doctors and nurses have a fundamental “human right” not to implement them and not to be discriminated against for doing so.

And then we have this from the current Pope while he was head of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith:

“those who are directly involved in lawmaking bodies have a «grave and clear obligation to oppose» any law that attacks human life. For them, as for every Catholic, it is impossible to promote such laws or to vote for them.” (From “The Participation of Catholics in Political Life”)

“It may be true that the law cannot make a man love me, but it can keep him from lynching me, and I think that’s pretty important.” Martin Luther King

By MikeF

September 22, 2008 5:55 PM | Link to this

It is not a mere matter of “faith” to say that abortion is the killing of an innocent human being. Embryology tells us that at the moment of conception, a new, genetically unique human life comes into existence. This is the mistake you and others like you keep falling into.

What you are saying is not unlike what the Nazis argued about Jews. They are sub-human - untermenschen - and therefore may be killed. You are conflating biological fact with personal judgments vis a vis the VALUE of any particular human life.

Can you tell me in official Church teaching where it says that we must support laws against murder? Child abuse? Torture?

If you can’t, then by your logic, a person who steadfastly blocked laws against murder, child abuse, rape, etc, etc. because he didn’t want to force his “religious beliefs” on others would be a perfectly good Catholic. Complete nonsense.

But it just so happens that the Church has repeatedly addressed the responsibility Catholics have in regard to the law.

In the “Gospel of Life” (1995), Pope John Paul II wrote: “In the case of an intrinsically unjust law, such as a law permitting abortion or euthanasia, it is therefore never licit to obey it, or to ‘take part in a propaganda campaign in favor of such a law, or vote for it’….This task is the particular responsibility of civil leaders….they have a duty to make courageous choices in support of life, especially through legislative measures.”

John Paul II approved a “doctrinal note” in 2002 advising Catholic politicians of their duty “to oppose any law that attacks human life.” Ruling out dissent, Pope John Paul II said democracy risked becoming tyranny if it did not defend the weak and dismissed claims by politicians who oppose abortion but feel compelled to uphold laws allowing it. Catholic politicians must oppose such laws, he said, intellectuals have a duty to argue against them, and doctors and nurses have a fundamental “human right” not to implement them and not to be discriminated against for doing so.

And then we have this from the current Pope while he was head of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith:

“those who are directly involved in lawmaking bodies have a «grave and clear obligation to oppose» any law that attacks human life. For them, as for every Catholic, it is impossible to promote such laws or to vote for them.” (From “The Participation of Catholics in Political Life”)

“It may be true that the law cannot make a man love me, but it can keep him from lynching me, and I think that’s pretty important.” Martin Luther King

By Copyleft

September 22, 2008 6:51 PM | Link to this

Mike: Thank you for explaining why devout Catholics are ineligible to hold public office.

Since public officials must swear to uphold the Constitution, and their faith clearly requires them to violate that same Constitution, the conclusion is obvious: Catholics cannot run for office.

(And yes, calling abortion “murder” IS a judgment of faith, not fact. Murder involves the killing of a PERSON, and a fetus is not a person under the law. Your church may say otherwise; my church may say that acorns are trees, but that doesn’t mean the law has to agree with me.)

By Pope

September 22, 2008 8:57 PM | Link to this

I like boys

By MikeF

September 23, 2008 3:17 AM | Link to this

So, I guess copyleft would have advised Germans to be dutiful Nazis under the Third Reich, helping to LEGALLY exterminate Jews? I guess Copyleft would have defended slave-owner’s LEGAL rights? The law is the law, right?

Jews are not actually human persons. Right? It’s just an OPINION that Jews deserve the same rights and protections as the rest of us non-Jews. Ditto for blacks. Don’t you force your personal OPINION on us, Copyleft!

And Copyleft missed the import of the Pope’s words. Catholics are not anarchists. We work within the the law. Catholic legislators have a moral responsibility to do what they can in oder to curtail the murder of innocent human beings. But the law cannot compel one to do that with is immoral. And merely following the “law” or following “orders” has not sufficed to exculpate one from the guilt of wrong-doing ever since the Nuremberg trials. There is a long and storied history of civil disobedience in this country.

Copyleft challenged Catholics to provide proof regarding a Catholic’s responsibility to oppose abortion through means of the law. I provided the evidence. And he chose to ignore the evidence, opting instead to form another (false) argument.

The “personally opposed, but can’t force my personal views on others” is, was and will always be a bogus argument in regard to abortion.

Copyleft might want to be careful what he argues for. Should he find himself in an “inconvenient minority” one day, his own “personhood” may be summarily and “legally” stripped from him, too.

Here are a few quotes from renowned scientists and doctors to consider:

“From the moment a baby is conceived, it bears the indelible stamp of a separate, distinct personality, an individual different from all other individuals.” Ultrasound pioneer, Sir William Liley, MD 1967

“After fertilization has taken place a new human being has come into existence. This is no longer a matter of taste or opinion. Each individual has very neat beginning, at conception. ”
Dr. Jerome Lejeune, genetics professor at the University of Descartes, Paris. He discovered the Down Syndrome chromosome.

“It is scientifically correct to say that an individual human life beings at conception.”
Professor M. Matthew-Roth, Harvard University Medical School

“By all the criteria of modern molecular biology, life is present from the moment of conception.”
Professor Hymie Gordon, Mayo Clinic

I can’t understand how women - whose nature is to protect and nurture their children, who themselves have suffered under the aggression of those more powerful than themselves - could ever have come to believe that killing their unborn children was a sign of progress and empowerment.

By MikeF.

September 23, 2008 3:57 AM | Link to this

“Almost all higher animals start their lives from a single cell, the fertilized ovum (zygote)… The time of fertilization represents the starting point in the life history, or ontogeny, of the individual.” [Carlson, Bruce M. Patten’s Foundations of Embryology. 6th edition. New York: McGraw-Hill, 1996, p. 3]

“Human development begins after the union of male and female gametes or germ cells during a process known as fertilization (conception). “Fertilization is a sequence of events that begins with the contact of a sperm (spermatozoon) with a secondary oocyte (ovum) and ends with the fusion of their pronuclei (the haploid nuclei of the sperm and ovum) and the mingling of their chromosomes to form a new cell. This fertilized ovum, known as a zygote, is a large diploid cell that is the beginning, or primordium, of a human being.” [Moore, Keith L. Essentials of Human Embryology. Toronto: B.C. Decker Inc, 1988, p.2]

“Although life is a continuous process, fertilization is a critical landmark because, under ordinary circumstances, a new, genetically distinct human organism is thereby formed…. The combination of 23 chromosomes present in each pronucleus results in 46 chromosomes in the zygote. Thus the diploid number is restored and the embryonic genome is formed. The embryo now exists as a genetic unity.” [O’Rahilly, Ronan and Müller, Fabiola. Human Embryology & Teratology. 2nd edition. New York: Wiley-Liss, 1996, pp. 8, 29. This textbook lists “pre-embryo” among “discarded and replaced terms” in modern embryology, describing it as “ill-defined and inaccurate” (p. 12}]

By MikeF.

September 23, 2008 3:59 AM | Link to this

“Almost all higher animals start their lives from a single cell, the fertilized ovum (zygote)… The time of fertilization represents the starting point in the life history, or ontogeny, of the individual.” [Carlson, Bruce M. Patten’s Foundations of Embryology. 6th edition. New York: McGraw-Hill, 1996, p. 3]

“Human development begins after the union of male and female gametes or germ cells during a process known as fertilization (conception). “Fertilization is a sequence of events that begins with the contact of a sperm (spermatozoon) with a secondary oocyte (ovum) and ends with the fusion of their pronuclei (the haploid nuclei of the sperm and ovum) and the mingling of their chromosomes to form a new cell. This fertilized ovum, known as a zygote, is a large diploid cell that is the beginning, or primordium, of a human being.” [Moore, Keith L. Essentials of Human Embryology. Toronto: B.C. Decker Inc, 1988, p.2]

“Although life is a continuous process, fertilization is a critical landmark because, under ordinary circumstances, a new, genetically distinct human organism is thereby formed…. The combination of 23 chromosomes present in each pronucleus results in 46 chromosomes in the zygote. Thus the diploid number is restored and the embryonic genome is formed. The embryo now exists as a genetic unity.” [O’Rahilly, Ronan and Müller, Fabiola. Human Embryology & Teratology. 2nd edition. New York: Wiley-Liss, 1996, pp. 8, 29. This textbook lists “pre-embryo” among “discarded and replaced terms” in modern embryology, describing it as “ill-defined and inaccurate” (p. 12}]

By MikeF.

September 23, 2008 4:00 AM | Link to this

“Almost all higher animals start their lives from a single cell, the fertilized ovum (zygote)… The time of fertilization represents the starting point in the life history, or ontogeny, of the individual.” [Carlson, Bruce M. Patten’s Foundations of Embryology. 6th edition. New York: McGraw-Hill, 1996, p. 3]

“Human development begins after the union of male and female gametes or germ cells during a process known as fertilization (conception). “Fertilization is a sequence of events that begins with the contact of a sperm (spermatozoon) with a secondary oocyte (ovum) and ends with the fusion of their pronuclei (the haploid nuclei of the sperm and ovum) and the mingling of their chromosomes to form a new cell. This fertilized ovum, known as a zygote, is a large diploid cell that is the beginning, or primordium, of a human being.” [Moore, Keith L. Essentials of Human Embryology. Toronto: B.C. Decker Inc, 1988, p.2]

“Although life is a continuous process, fertilization is a critical landmark because, under ordinary circumstances, a new, genetically distinct human organism is thereby formed…. The combination of 23 chromosomes present in each pronucleus results in 46 chromosomes in the zygote. Thus the diploid number is restored and the embryonic genome is formed. The embryo now exists as a genetic unity.” [O’Rahilly, Ronan and Müller, Fabiola. Human Embryology & Teratology. 2nd edition. New York: Wiley-Liss, 1996, pp. 8, 29. This textbook lists “pre-embryo” among “discarded and replaced terms” in modern embryology, describing it as “ill-defined and inaccurate” (p. 12}]

By CK1

September 23, 2008 1:23 PM | Link to this

I have just read all thisd dialogue and the debate between COPYLEFT and MIKEF seems to get to the heart of the matter. COPYLEFT, I would like to hear more from you to dispute the facts that MIKEF has out in front of you if you can. You asked for evidence, he has supplied it. You argued when life begins with nothing but your opinion, he supplied quotes from the scientific community. You argue about Catholics in public office not being able to follow the constitution since all have an obligation to follow the law, he sticks it in your face with showing how it must have been a German citizens’s responsibility to accept the Third Reich’s view on life in the late 30s early 40s. Where are your arguments to this.

We are all biased by our personal views and our religious stance. I challenge you all to try to put those asside and consider the abortion debate. I have been on both sides of the argument throgh my life. Regarding the typical pro-choice arguments: 1) The beginning of life does not happen at conception: MikeF did a much better argument than I could to show this is not true. Many pro-choice people would like to argue that life is dependent on which side of the womb the baby’s head is on. Deliver a baby feet first and it can be aborted while the head is still in the uterus, but when the head comes out, it would no longer be an abortion, but would be murder. Does this make sense to any of you from a secular or scientific perspective? Nonsense. 2) Should a woman who has been raped be forced to carry her baby to term (or other similar pregnancies)? The purely religious view would be that all abortions are wrong (except possibly when the life of the mother is in serious jeopardy). So, the secularists focus on this aregument that they see as unfair. But the secularist and logical view should be: if such pregnancies as in regards to rape make up only a small percentage of abortions, should we allow all abortions to be legal allowing the killing of millions of innocent babies to protect the small percentage of raped women to be forced to go to full term? Is that logical? MIKEF quotes the stats on reasons for abortions above. 3) What about the innocents being killed in Iraq and other “hypocrisies” claimed above. MIKEF expalined the difference from the Catholic Church’s view. Lets look at this secularly. The simple logical argument is what the heck does one have to do with the other. If you are totally against the war in Irag, more power to you. Fight it. But that has nothing to do with the abortion debate. And, thge hypocrisy crosses the partisan line in both directions. I see it with many pro-choice people who are adamantly against capital punishment. I can not see how someone is willing to protect a convicted murderer from death and willing to pay the cost of keeping them in jail for many years but does not see that an innocent baby inside the mother’s womb is a life worthy of protection. 4) Most babies that are aborted would have been a public charge or would have lived poor unloved lives, etc.. What are the stats on this? It was quoted above that 1 in six families have fertility problems. I am a father to three adopted girls. Adoption is an under valued option for all unwanted births. Regardless, is this still a logical argument? should we murder innocent babies because they may not have loving parents/ Sounds familiar to me — oh yes, it was the Nazis that made such arguments about certain unworthy humans.

The pro-life argument from secular perspective is very simple: Life begins at conception and should be protected from that point forward. The scientific basis has been described by MIKEF above. you can disagree. But it is based in science even though MIKEF is clearly Roman Catholic. I remeber reading about a doctor that argued pursuasively that based on certain cognitive ability, life doesnt begin until the baby is about 1 years old. Does that mean we should allow infanticide to be legal?

By Copyleft

September 23, 2008 2:09 PM | Link to this

Scientific opinions on the beginning of life are indeed interesting and useful… but also irrelevant, since the laws against murder apply to PEOPLE, not just lifeforms.

And no scientist OR theologian has a good answer for why a zygote should be treated as a “person,” legally. Nor has Mike, or anyone else, offered one.

Roe v. Wade offered a more useful definition for the cutoff date of abortion: viability. Since an unwanted pregnancy violates a woman’s personal freedoms, this seems the most ethical choice… although an argument based on neural development and the ability to suffer and feel pain is worth considering as well.

I haven’t “ignored” Mike’s arguments—I’ve just heard them all before, ad nauseam. They all focus on defining “life” instead of defining what constitutes a “person,” because that’s an easier question to answer. And advocates like Mike simply HOPE that people will equate the two.

Unfortunately, it doesn’t work that way. A census count doesn’t include embryos; a death certificate isn’t issue for a miscarriage; and if a woman turns out to have a fertilized egg implanted in her when a car hits her, there aren’t two counts of manslaughter offered in court. Why? Because no one has yet offered a good reason why a fetus should be considered a “PERSON,” other than purely religious views—which, obviously, are inadequate to establish laws in our secular system.

By Dr. Aborto

September 23, 2008 3:48 PM | Link to this

I have hope that liberals will eventually abort themselves into the dust bin of history.

By MikeF.

September 23, 2008 7:05 PM | Link to this

Copyleft implied that there was no Catholic teaching regarding the responsibility of Catholics to oppose abortion vis a vis the law. He was wrong and he ignored the evidence – moving on to other things. His arguments are evolving in terms of human life, too. It’s Interesting.

And by the way, Copyleft is also wrong even regarding the law. President Bush signed the Unborn Victims of Violence Act into law in 2004 (Laci and Connor’s Law). Here’s some of the text of the law: Sec. 1841. Protection of unborn children (a)(1) Whoever engages in conduct that violates any of the provisions of law listed in subsection (b) and thereby causes the death of, or bodily injury (as defined in section 1365) to, a child, who is in utero at the time the conduct takes place, is guilty of a separate offense under this section.

`(2)(A) Except as otherwise provided in this paragraph, the punishment for that separate offense is the same as the punishment provided under Federal law for that conduct had that injury or death occurred to the unborn child’s mother. (END LAW)

Many states have laws that allow those who kill unborn children to be charged with murder or manslaughter depending upon the situation. Another issue to consider: what does science typically use to determine the end of life? Heartbeat and brainwaves. When does an unborn child’s heart begin to beat? 3 weeks after conception. Brainwaves? 6 weeks after conception. When do almost all abortions occur? After both of these milestones. Why? Because women don’t even know they’re pregnant until both of these milestones have come and gone.

So, even if Copyleft doesn’t like the moment of conception, he still has serious problems to overcome. Should we expect him to at least agree to outlaw abortions that occur after the heartbeat and brainwaves have commenced? Not likely.

Let’s look at a parallel scenario, should one buy into Copyleft’s “not sure when personhood begins” argument. You’re a hunter in the woods. You see something in the distance. You’re not sure what it is. Do you fire? If you’re Copyleft, apparently you do. After all, it might not be a human. Hopefully it’s just a deer.

There are obvious defects with the “viability” argument, as well. Depending upon the country in which one resides, viability is different. Depending upon the decade, the timing of viability is different. To say that one’s personhood is dependent upon location or the overall advancement of medicine is irrational and morally unacceptable. A person today is a person tomorrow.

The issue of the commencement of human life is a scientific one, not a religious one. The dichotomy Copleft would like to make between human life and “personhood” is arbitrary. And it is precisely in this arbitrariness, this relativism that movements like Nazism find a useful foothold.

What a strange, strange conversation. Is it okay to kill very young human life? The fact that we are even asking such questions should wake us up and make us realize that the German people were not monsters so completely unlike ourselves. How could they do it? We would never do such a thing as they did! Really?

By MikeF.

September 23, 2008 7:50 PM | Link to this

correction:

should read “after one or both of these milestones.” and “Many women”, not simply “women.”

By MikeF.

September 24, 2008 11:14 AM | Link to this

Objection 1 : A fetus or embryo is only POTENTIAL human life, it’s not really human life until it is born.

Answer: This is scientifically inaccurate. A sperm by itself, or an unfertilized egg by itself is “potential human life”. Either one, by itself, is not a human being. Either is genetically incomplete and does not develop in isolation. However, once the egg is fertilized by the sperm, a process begins which we call a “lifetime”. At 3 weeks the unborn child has a heartbeat. At 6 weeks she has measurable brainwaves. (Both of which, by the way, are used to determine life and death for those who are post-birth).

The only things that will stop this process of development are natural factors such a genetic abnormalities, disease, serious accidents and unfortunately, the purposeful destruction of that human life by another. This purposeful destruction of human life by another is commonly and euphemistically called “abortion” in regard to those who have yet to pass through the birth canal and commonly called “murder” in regard to those who have passed through the birth canal.

To emphasize this point, consider the difference between a 9 month old pre-born child and a newborn. Now consider the difference between a newborn and a 70 year-old. Which has more in common? Yet, the first child can be legally killed and is not considered human under law while the second and third are both legally protected as “human persons”. Does this make good sense objectively speaking? We develop and change throughout our lifetimes.

Objection 2: An embryo or fetus is part of a woman’s body and cannot survive without the mother, so it’s not a human life until it’s born.

Answer: This is scientifically inaccurate also. From the moment of conception, a child has a completely unique DNA that is neither it’s mother’s nor it’s fathers. It will NEVER be repeated again. An unborn child also has its own blood supply, completely distinct from the mother. In fact, oftentimes, the child has a different blood type.

In regard to not being able to survive without the mother, one should acknowledge that even a BORN child cannot survive without its mother. While it is outside its mother’s womb, it still is far from independent. The mother must still feed it, usually still from her own body (breast milk), shelter and clean the baby.

Additionally, one must weigh the full consequences of such a position (i.e. not being independent equals not being human life). What ramifications does such a position have for those who are on life support even if they will eventually become independent of that life support again at some point (as will an unborn baby, by the way)? Does such a person go from being a human life deserving of legal protection to NOT being a human life while on complete life support back to being a legally recognized human life again once independent of life support machinery? No one could credibly hold such a position.

Objection 3: I can understand limiting abortions after the fetus becomes “viable” (i.e. it can survive outside the womb). But, before then, it’s not really a distinct human person.

Answer: First, refer to the answer above. Additionally, such a position poses serious ethical and moral difficulties. Today, children with birth weights under one pound and less than 5 full months gestation have survived and thrived. Even 15 years ago this was not possible. Would one then say that a 5 month old unborn child is a human life NOW, but WASN’T 15 years ago? This leaves the definition of human life entirely up to the level of scientific advancement. And what about the advancement of medicine in different countries? Is an unborn child a “human life” in America at 5 months, yet NOT a human life in Zaire until 7 months gestation because Zaire is less medically advanced? The ethical and moral impossibilities are obvious.

Objection 4: But women will be forced to have dangerous back-alley abortions if it becomes illegal!

Answer: Only China forces woman to have abortions (where it is also legal, by the way). In this country especially, there are much better alternatives to abortion. There are numerous organizations that will provide shelter, career counseling, medical and financial aid to those women who believe they have no real “choice” but to abort. Additionally, the number of abortions each year very closely mirrors the number of couples who would like to adopt a child. Women can even help to choose the parents who will adopt the child. Adoption is a wonderful option.

The common complaint that “I would have trouble dealing with the fact that I have a child and don’t know where he or she is and don’t know how he or she is doing” is countered by noting that today woman can choose to remain in touch with adoptive parents. Additionally, while it may seem harsh, one is forced to ask the legitimate question, “How could it possibly be more comforting to know that your child is dead (aborted)?”

Objection 5: But abortion is legal! If it’s legal, it must be okay.

Answer: There was a time in this country when it was perfectly legal to own other persons, and the Supreme Court of the United States guaranteed that “right”. Likewise, there was a time when it was legal to discriminate against people of color and women…..again, protected by the Supreme Court. So, are you so sure that what is legal is right? Are you sure that one day we won’t look back at those who support abortion in the same way we look at those who supported slavery and discrimination?

Objection 6: Okay, your arguments make sense, but I don’t believe you should make a law about it. I’m personally opposed to abortion, but I don’t have the right to tell others what to do.

Answer: What would you think if someone said, “I’m personally opposed to child abuse, but I don’t think we should make laws about it, I don’t have the right to tell other people that they can’t abuse their own children.”? What if they said exactly what many slavery supporters said before the Civil War, “I’m personally opposed to slavery and have none myself, but I believe every person has to make that choice and the government should stay out of it.”? Does that sound familiar? It’s true, this argument was commonly used.

The issue comes back to this: is this unborn baby a human being? If the answer is “yes”, and it is clear that it is (it’s surely not a frog), then we must protect him or her as stridently as we would protect any innocent human being. The fundamental right to life MUST trump the lesser right to “choice”.

Objection 7: But what about rape, incest or when the life of the mother is at risk? Shouldn’t there at least be an exception for these difficult circumstances?

Answer: Let’s examine rape and incest first. There is no question that both rape and incest are traumatic and tragic. One ought to have deep sympathy for any woman who has suffered either of these. However, there are two problems with this objection. The first is very basic. Even if a child is the product of rape or incest, he or she is still a human being. The child is not at fault for the rape or incest. Therefore, there is no moral or ethical basis by which one can justify the killing of the innocent for the crime and sin of another. This is summed up by the old adage: two wrongs don’t make a right.

Additionally, there is no proof that abortion provides any emotional, physical or spiritual healing for the woman who has been raped or incested. In fact, on all these counts, recent studies have illustrated just the opposite. Emotionally, a woman who has an abortion after rape now has two separate wounds to deal with. Women who deliver their babies generally have a higher sense of emotional well being in comparison.

Physically, abortion is more dangerous than childbirth, both in the process and in the after-effects. Woman who abort appear to have a significantly higher risk of breast cancer, clinical depression and even suicide. In regard to the “life of the mother” objection, the medical fact is that there is essentially never truly a case wherein a doctor must purposely and directly kill an unborn child to save the life of his or her mother. There ARE very rare cases, however, wherein a doctor may have to take actions to save the life of the mother that may subsequently end up causing the death of an unborn child.

There is a stark difference between directly killing a baby, and having a baby die indirectly as the result of efforts to save his or her mother. The first is immoral, the second is not.

Last, it is worth noting that while this argument is a favorite of those who favor abortion rights, statistically it is a weak argument. Only a tiny fraction of abortions are performed in cases of “rape, incest or life of the mother”. The vast majority (around 94%) are performed for convenience. The so-called “health exception” is a deception. Under federal law, so-called “health exceptions” include everything from tiredness to “general stress” related to raising children…a rather broad category.

Objection 8: Okay, I agree. But we shouldn’t vote for candidates just based on one issue like abortion or euthanasia. That’s just narrow-minded.

Answer: All other rights require that one be ALIVE to exercise and enjoy them. The right to life is the supreme right, without which, all other rights are meaningless. Some issues must trump all others. The dignity of the human person must be protected from the moment of conception until natural death.

For instance, what would you think if someone said, “I know that Hitler was wrong about the Jews, but he supported national health care (which he did, by the way), gun control (also true) and had a great economic plan (also arguably true). I don’t want to condemn him because of ‘one issue’, when he had so much good to offer. That’s just narrow-minded!”?

Facts of Life: From conception, an unborn child’s DNA is as complete as an adult’s. At 3 weeks an unborn child has a heartbeat and her own blood supply. At 6 weeks she has measurable brainwaves. Yet, in this country, she can be killed by “choice” through all 9 months of pregnancy for any reason or no reason whatever. Since Roe vs. Wade, over 45 million baby boys and girls have died by a “choice” not their own. One out of four conceived babies never see the light of day.