1/22/09
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WORD: November 17
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To date, I've only received one comment on this post and I didn't publish it because although I don't believe it was the writer's intention, it might have been hurtful to some who struggle with these issues faithfully and prayerfully.
ReplyDeleteI read this post last night. My dreams were filled with haunted, dreadful memories, all due to a bad choice many years ago. I doubt the comment you didn't publish, could be any worse than what I already think about myself because of a past abortion.
ReplyDeleteThis was difficult to watch.
ReplyDeleteHowever, I am still Pro-Choice. And I still believe that makes me Pro-Life.
Emma: I keep you in my prayers... I pray that you will be able to forgive yourself as God forgives those who come to him burdened with the bad choices they have made.
ReplyDeleteThank you, concordpastor. I pray for that for myself, also.
ReplyDeleteHi. I'm anonymous Xavier.
ReplyDeleteMary, could you explain how being pro-choice makes you pro-life? Thanks.
Hello Xavier. I touched on this a bit in my response to the other post.
ReplyDeleteI suppose my feeling is our primary objective should be for the person who will be dealing with/suffering the consequences of this sort of decision. I am concerned for the quality of life of the person who is living and breathing and who will ultimately be responsible for bringing and caring for another being in this world. I am Pro their Life.
An unwanted pregnancy/birth can be both traumatic short term and devastating long term. To avoid this is pro life (IMO). Pro life is giving someone a chance to improve or even salvage their own life under seemingly unyielding circumstances.
My opinion on this matter does not come lightly and it doesnt come without any misgivings. I guess my heart says one thing, but my mind says and has seen another. I respectfully submit these words with no intention of hurting or stepping on anyone's beliefs.
Xavier said... (on 1/24/09)
ReplyDeleteThank you, Mary. I think I read the post you refer to. I suppose it's the one where you use the word "tissue" to refer to the unborn baby.
And I understand your position. But I think you fall in the common mistake to consider this subject a matter of faith.
It's not a matter of faith. When human life starts is not a matter of faith--it's a biological fact subject to all the scientific rules of evidence.
Talking to a friend who is also pro-choice, he said that he does not believe there is nothing but a "bunch of cells" inside the pregnant woman's uterus. I answered that, for me, that is not a matter of belief. I know it for a fact, a scientifically verifiable fact that all of us are "bunches of cells." We are all "tissue", a tissue made up of living human cells.
As you may know, each one of those cells carries the genetic information (the DNA) that determines every single trait of the person. For science, there's no mistaking DNAs. There are not two identical DNAs in the world. Each one of your cells will invariably lead to one single person: you.
The first one of those cells is "created" at the moment of conception, with the union of ovum and spermatozoon, and it carries the same genetic information that is contained in any of your cells today.
After that, there is no biological phenomenon other than the reproduction of that cell until it evolves into an embryo, a fetus, a baby, a child, an adolescent, a grown-up, a mature person, an old person. From the moment of conception, until death, there is a continuum of life, one only and unique living being.
Once you have determined this, not by faith, but by science, then you have to decide if there is any circumstance that justifies deliberately terminating the life of this one human being at any point of his/her development. Even renowned pro-choice author Naomi Wolf recognized that "the death of a fetus is a real death."
I agree with you that all our sympathies should be with the woman that feels forced to face this terrible decision. No words of condemnation; only words of charity and compassion.
Let me just finish with words by somebody who knew (and did) infinitely more than I do about love and compassion:
"I feel that the greatest destroyer of peace today is abortion, because it is a war against the child - a direct killing of the innocent child - murder by the mother herself. And if we accept that another can kill even her own child, how can we tell other people not to kill one another? How do we persuade a woman not to have an abortion? As always, we must persuade her with love, and we remind ourselves that love means to be willing to give until it hurts." Saint Teresa of Calcutta