It is false to claim that no one knows when life begins and dishonest to argue that abortion does not kill a human being.
An accurate understanding of prenatal development makes it impossible to argue that abortion is the mere removal of undifferentiated cell tissue or that the developing embryo is simply a part of the mother's body.
The slogan, "My Body, My Choice", betrays a tragic misunderstanding of what is taking place inside the womb. At no point in pregnancy is the developing embryo or fetus simply a part of the mother's body.
Some ethicists try and defend abortion on the assertion that sperm and egg cells are just as "alive" as an embryo or fetus. Biologically speaking, this is an absurd and unfounded claim.
By definition, humanity and personhood go hand in hand. Developing humans in the womb have an intrinsically personal nature and even demonstrate "personality" in many of the same ways that newborn babies do.
While some surgeries carry a risk of harm, abortion is intended to harm. It may be one of the most common surgical procedures in the world, but it is hardly a harmless one. A better understanding of the techniques involved makes this abundantly clear.
The Hippocratic Oath was revolutionary in its unyielding devotion to the preservation of individual human life. It stood in marked contrast to the more primitive medical traditions that blurred the lines between killing and curing. In its original form, the oath prohibits both euthanasia and abortion.
Whether or not abortion is a painful experience to the unborn child being aborted, the child is left no less dead as a result. In talking about the question of fetal pain, we must remember that it ultimately has no bearing on the morality of abortion.
Significant pain is often involved in the abortion procedure. This doesn't make abortion right or wrong, but the abortion industry's consistent efforts to downplay the physical pain of abortion hints at a broader agenda. They seem far more concerned with selling abortions than with giving women an accurate understanding of what abortion actually does.
There is simply no way to accurately comprehend the barbarity of abortion without being exposed to the photographic evidence which so clearly demonstrates that abortion is a brutal act of violence.
Educators have long understood the appropriateness of using graphic photographs to teach about harsh realities. Nevertheless, the educative use of abortion photos is broadly condemned. This is politically-driven hypocrisy. Withholding photographic evidence is not being liberally-minded; it's simply being dishonest.
For as long as photography has existed, graphic images have helped to inform and shape the public conscience. They help take an abstraction and make it much more concrete. Atrocities that remains unseen are much easier to trivialize and much easier to ignore.
The Center for Bio-Ethical Reform (CBR) maintains the largest known abortion-image archive in the world and has meticulously verified the accuracy and authenticity of their photographs and video. The content of these pictures have not been digitally altered in any way.
The only way people can successfully live together in community is to give up a measure of personal freedom. Personal choices that infringe on the life or livelihood of another human being must be legislated against. Therefore, it is impossible to justify abortion by simply arguing that women should be "free to choose".
Though "pro-life" is an imperfect and often criticized label, it is more accurate than the alternative ("anti-abortion") and more honest than its counterpart ("pro-choice").
Some have suggested that prohibiting a woman from having an abortion is to place the value of an embryo or fetus above that of the woman herself. Restricting abortion does not imply that the child is more valuable than the mother. Rather, it recognizes that the child's right to not be killed is more fundamental than the woman's right to not be pregnant.
There are all sorts of circumstances that people point to as justification for their support of abortion. Since none of these circumstances are sufficient to justify the killing of human beings after birth, they're not sufficient to justify the killing of human beings before birth.
Human beings inside the womb are smaller, less developed, and more dependent than human beings outside the womb. These are differences of degree, not differences of kind. We can all point to other people who are bigger, stronger, smarter, or less dependent than we are, but that doesn't make our life any less valuable, or any less deserving of protection.
Networks of killing centers across the globe are eliminating "unwanted, unborn" children at a staggering rate. Were the context not abortion, the world would be outraged. Call it what you want, when an innocent group of human beings is targeted and exterminated by the millions, that is an injustice on par with any of history's most egregious atrocities.
From an ideological perspective, there are many connections between abortion and slavery. Both fit the classic "pro-choice" model. Both are built on legal decisions which classified specific human beings as property – property that could be legally abused or destroyed.
Killing is one of the worst crimes because of the impact it has on the victim. Killing deprives the victim of life. The loss of life is the greatest possible loss anyone can suffer because it deprives us of all the experiences and enjoyments that otherwise would have been part of our futures, which we now value or would have come to value. If the loss of our valuable future is what makes killing you and me wrong, then abortion is equally wrong, because it deprives the fetus of its “future like ours”.
Whatever the intent of the abortion industry may be, by functional standards, abortion is a racist institution. In the United States, black children are aborted at 5 times the rate as white children and Hispanic children don't fare much better.
Planned Parenthood, then called the Birth Control League, once shared office office space and board members with the American Eugenics Society. They openly advocated the thinning of minority populations through birth control and sterilization.
During her lifetime, Margaret Sanger publicly urged the elimination of "human weeds", the "cessation of charity", and the sterilization of "genetically inferior races." She championed the "science" of eugenics, ridiculed God and marriage, and founded Planned Parenthood, which has grown to become the largest abortion-provider in America.
Abortion is a lucrative business. Those who defend it the most ardently often have a financial interest in keeping it legal and commonplace. Couple this with the abortion industry's consistent opposition to measures requiring more full patient disclosure, and there is good reason to wonder if they care more about profits than they do about women.
Are all abortionists simply "in it for the money"? Probably not. But how many abortionists would there be if they had to volunteer their services, or even pay for the opportunity to put their principles in practice? It's very easy to follow your "principles" when those principles earn you lots of money.
Abortion is often sold as a means of avoiding financial stress. For a few hundred bucks you can free yourself from the cost of raising a child, while also freeing yourself from the eventual care and support of a grown son or daughter. In the process, you free society from the long-term production and influence of an utterly unique human being.
Planned Parenthood has an entire website devoted to sexualizing America's youth while happily lifting the restraints of God, parents or marriage. They tout it as being ""values-free". In reality, it simply espouses those values which will help ensure that abortion remains an extremely lucrative business.
The psychological implications of abortion are as disputed as the act of abortion itself. Whether or not Post-Abortion Syndrome is a real or imagined condition, there is no denying the fact that abortion has left countless women with feelings of profound regret.
The morality of abortion is not directly tied to the risks it poses to the mother. Giving birth certainly carries its own set of risk factors. Nevertheless, shouldn't a woman considering abortion know about the potential damage it could do to her own body?
The available data shows that legal abortion has not reduced child abuse in America, as theorized by some, but rather may have contributed to its increase.
In the United States, there are thousands of pregnancy care centers which all exist to help women through the emotional and financial stress of an unplanned pregnancy. Couple their services with the widespread availability of adoption, and it should become immediately apparent that women need not kill their "unwanted" children.
Every law on the books serves as a reminder that we can and do "legislate morality". Unrestricted, personal "choice" is just another name for anarchy. When the Supreme Court invalidated all state laws against abortion, it was nothing less than the application of their own morality – one that believes you're not a person until you're born.
While feminism today in the U.S. is largely in favor of abortion, seeing it as necessary to ensure equality for women within society, the early feminists found abortion to be a societal evil that dishonored woman and killed children.
This page is still being researched and written. Check back soon.
No matter what anyone believes about abortion in theory, no matter how adamantly a woman argues for abortion rights in public, most women go to great lengths to ensure that their own abortion remains a secret. This desire for secrecy has provided cover for much abuse over the years.
The issue of abortion is never directly dealt with in Scripture, but it says plenty about children inside and outside of the womb. In light of what is explicitly stated about children, and what is explicitly stated about murder, it is fair to conclude that God hates abortion.
It's a mistake to assume that because so many aborting women in America identify themselves as Protestant or Catholic, that the Bible is ambivalent towards abortion. What these numbers do tell us is that lots of self-professing Christians are not behaving very Christ-like, and lots of churches are not sufficiently educating their members about abortion.
In writings from the beginnings of Christianity to the Reformation, Christians have stood uniformly against abortion, believing it to be an act of murder and deserving of God’s judgment. Because they viewed life in the womb as the object of God’s care, they believed it should therefore be the object of neighborly love.
Whether Exodus 21:22-25 is talking about a miscarriage or a live, premature birth, it is impossible in either case to conclude from this passage that God is indifferent towards abortion.
Arguing that the government should never restrict "choice" is nothing more than an argument for anarchy. Anyone who understands the biblical role of government and deals honestly with the Bible's portrayal of human life (inside and outside the womb) should recognize that biblically speaking, the government must protect innocent human life.