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Fifty seven million babies have been killed in their mother’s wombs in the United States since Roe versus Wade. In the UK there have been more than 8 million abortions since 1967. In this country this is not even a political issue; in the US it is. Increasingly it seems as though those in favour of abortion are at least willing to admit it is a human life which is being extinguished although they argue over when life begins. I never found a card in the shops with the message ‘congratulations on your foetus’. We are all aware of the hard cases – they were the reason the Abortion Act in the UK was passed in the first place – but if someone really believes that nearly 200,000 women’s lives were in danger last year, then I have a title-deed for Manhattan Island for sale at a very reasonable price, so do get in touch.
If we are honest – and some are – then we know that the majority of abortions are to do with a different sort of choice – the choice of the putative mother to take time off work and have her career/life disrupted by the demands of a baby; the choice of parents who both need to be working to afford high house prices, not to have a child because of the cost and the life-style consequences. When I was born my father got a family allowance, and there were tax-breaks for mothers and for families; married couples also got tax breaks. The State realised that taking on the responsibilities of a family was a commitment it needed t support – how else, in a purely utilitarian way – was it going to keep its tax base up and fill the jobs that needed to be filled? We know the answer now – immigration – so who needs babies?
Professor Tina Beattie has recently been arguing that in the early church early abortion was only a small sin. Like a lot of her arguments, it is disingenuous with a kernel of truth. The truth is that there was a debate in the early church, as now, about when life began, the disingenuous part is gliding past the fact it was always considered a sin. One of the marks of the early Christians was that in a society where abortion and the exposure of unwanted children on hillside was common, the Christians cherished every life as being from God. Even slave women were as valuable in the eyes of God as the Emperor – in fact, as Jesus taught, it was more likely that the latter would be amenable to the call of the Spirit than the latter, blinded as he would be by flatterers and wealth.
For Christians abortion has always been a ‘hot button’ issue. We live in a society which appears happy to offer up to Moloch its young. Those who argue about when life begins at least show some sign of realising that you shouldn’t kill young humans; but there are others who simply argue that a woman has that right. Apart from praying for them, and their dead children, I don’t know what can be done. But when I read that the sin that cries out to heaven the most is sodomy, I despair – this evil, this vile industry which preys on the lives of the most vulnerable, is the sin that cries to Heaven. If we, as Christians, will not unite to protest again slaughter on this industrial scale, then I don’t see the point in our protesting against lesser evils. The Pope recently said that it seemed as though the church was always talking about abortion. Unlike some here, I admire this Pope, and to be fair, he himself has spoken about the evils or abortion, but I disagree if he was implying we can say too much about this. We can’t. Let us pray to the Lord for the souls of the lost, and for the mothers and fathers concerned – but let us as Christian communities, ensure we make sure our legislators know what we think. In the UK, actually just enforcing the law as passed would make a difference.
NEO said:
Personally, I can not believe anyone who pays more than lip service to Christianity, can actually believe abortion is anything less than infanticide. It is the major problem I have with my church. That said, and truly; does little to help.
Why? because it is a divisive statement, and what we need to do is reach out to those who are contemplating this. Many don’t see it as such, and our secular states have taught them so. But so many of them, mostly women, do hear that still small voice, when it is too late, and some percentage of them are destroyed by the knowledge, and even those who aren’t, often are scarred by the experience.
Yes, the UK should enforce the law as written, and the US should defund PP, and at least enforce health regulations on these so-called clinics. But I think we all know that morality is not enforceable in law, it must be taught, by parents, by schools, and by churches. How we get to that point, I don’t know, but there is an answer. How do I know that? Because we did it once, almost 2000 years ago.
Mind, I personally think support for abortion is hypocritical. Most of the supporters have, I’ve found, a hidden motive. Many believe in state control of everybody’s lives, and the best way to make people dependent on the state is to destroy other support structures, such as the family, and the church. I don’t believe it to be some vast conspiracy, but I do think that a lot of education tends toward this view.
In the US, the educational system was intentionally built on Bismarck’s model in Prussia, and that was designed to produce docile soldiers and workers for the state. Why we did that instead of continuing the former Anglo-American model which taught people to think for themselves is another question, which needs asking.
I also think that is why men are usually excluded from the decision. While the financial consequences can be severe, men, real ones anyway, have an innate instinct to preserve their families, loved ones, and communities. That’s counterproductive to state dependency, as well
So perhaps that limns the wider questions a bit, and so maybe we can start coming up with actual solutions, instead of simply screaming at each other.
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NEO said:
Earlier I said that some percentage of women are themselves harmed by having abortions. I was working from memory, and so didn’t quantify. But the numbers are appalling, as I was just reading. here’s the link.
http://thefederalist.com/2016/05/25/does-pro-abortion-rhetoric-harm-women/
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Bosco the Great said:
One state here in the states, Kansas or some where abouts, wants to make abortion murder and the doctor who performs it goes to jail.
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Bosco the Great said:
The post, which was shared on Lee Chatfield’s public Facebook page but signed with Stephanie Chatfield’s name, was titled “Be Pro-Life — But offer help to women in need.” It told the story of an alcohol-laden high school party, an alleged rape, an abortion and years of regret — a story made all the more distinctive because she is now married to an antiabortion lawmaker running for reelection this year.
Lee Chatfield, also 28, is the co-sponsor of a bill that would ban and criminalize “dismemberment abortion,” the most common method for terminating a pregnancy in the second trimester, according to the AP. While other procedures would remain available, opponents of such bans have argued that they would force women to seek medically unsafe abortions.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/morning-mix/wp/2016/05/25/its-haunted-me-after-threats-wife-of-anti-abortion-gop-state-lawmaker-goes-public-about-abortion/?tid=a_inl
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JessicaHof said:
Thank goodness my church does not take the ghastly inhuman line that aborted babies cannot go to heaven. What sort of God is it you believe in? One who says that aborted or unbaptised babies cannot have access to eternal bliss. You are welcome to such a fictitious figure – but why you would want to worship such a creature, you alone know.
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NEO said:
Not actually what his church says, actually although they used to act like it. They’ve come to say what mine always has, ” Baptism is essential, but in the case of an infant who couldn’t be for medical reasons, well we simply can’t know, but we should pray for his/her soul.” In any case, I’m not sure the article applies to abortions. If you haven’t been born yet, when one is murdered, is one sinful, seems a bit hard to sin in Utero
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JessicaHof said:
I’d be glad to hear it if it is so – it seems to me the only loving view.
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NEO said:
Rev Karl Hess and I went thru this on NEO quite a while ago, I don’t remember all the details, but essentially both Rome, and the Lutheran church (don’t know about you guys, but usually Anglican tracks with Lutheran) say that baptism is essential to salvation, but in these cases where no fault attaches because of time, well we simply can’t know, but we can ask God to be merciful. That would be even more so, I would think, in the case of the unborn.
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JessicaHof said:
Hope so 🙂 xx
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NEO said:
As do I 🙂 xx
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JessicaHof said:
Stick to churchianity and worshipping dead people – I choose the living Jesus.
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JessicaHof said:
We do, as does our understanding. But I suppose it is hard to learn anything if you know it all.
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