Abortion Overview

What is the path to becoming pro-LIFE? Are you willing to start a journey?

Reasons to reject being pro-death …

Many of us didn’t start out being pro-LIFE. For me it has been a journey. My guess is that for you it either has been or will be.

You have great reasons you believe what you believe. I can attack those reasons directly but that probably won’t help you radically change how you are thinking about this. I want to help if you are willing to consider a journey.

Here are some steps to consider if you want to start. If you don’t, God bless you. I hope you come back. We all need to change. LIFE is at stake.

• Come to know Jesus as your Saviour — I have missed God’s goal (aka sin). It is a gift from God that Jesus paid the price for me. Jesus saves me from death and brings me into life. LIFE starts with accepting Jesus as having saved me. I now have life and know the author of life. If you haven’t started, this is the first step.

Consider this about LIFE: “This has now been made evident through the appearing of our Savior the Messiah Jesus, who has abolished death and has brought life and immortality to light through the good news.” ~Apostle Paul (2 Timothy 1)

• Commit to Jesus as your Master — Jesus is King of God’s country. Jesus is in charge. I am not. Jesus is my Master. I am His slave. This is tough, but it is essential. Nothing happens without this change in how I think and act.
• Begin to radically change how you think and change your mind — This is known as repenting. Commit to how to live a new LIFE. The truth is you are wrong about lots of things. I am as well. What if you are wrong about LIFE? Please step back. You are in fact very wrong. I had to change how I was thinking. You do as well.
• Become a disciple — Salvation is the start, not the end. Jesus calls me to learn (aka be a disciple). One important part of learning that Jesus is King of God’s country is to learn about LIFE. This is journey. I radically changed how I think and I learn from Jesus, who is LIFE.
• Hear what Jesus says — When you hear Jesus, you hear about LIFE. Jesus is clear. Read the four Good News books (aka Gospels); Matthew, Mark, Luke and John. Read them again. Read them every day. Get what Jesus is saying into your heart and soul. Talk with God, your Father and with Jesus. Ask to hear the truth. Jesus is the TRUTH.
• Jesus (and God) say our job is to love — That means we are to love LIFE. There aren’t any exceptions. Jesus does not say it is okay to love everyone but the unborn. Jesus is clear.

Consider the Apostle John: “We know that we have passed from death to LIFE because we love our brothers and sisters. The one who does not love remains in death.” It is easy to think it is okay to kill the unborn when you “remain in death” yourself. This isn’t being harsh. Love requires some pain in recognizing our own condition.

Is it love to kill the unborn? It is a serious question to consider.

• The big final thing is the “day of judgement” — I will stand before God. So will you. I will answer for love and LIFE. Will I hear “Good and faithful slave” from Jesus? Will you?

So what will happen? I am confident, based on this journey, you will decide in favor of LIFE. If you don’t, please let me know what else I can do to be of help.

*Why don’t I believe in abortion and being pro-choice?

I believe that LIFE is sacred, both in the womb and outside the womb. There are numerous teachings in Scripture that make it abundantly clear what God’s view of abortion is. Jeremiah 1:5 tells us that God knows us before He forms us in the womb.

The word of the Lord came to me: I chose you before I formed you in the womb; I set you apart before you were born. I appointed you a prophet to the nations.

Christian Standard Bible. (2017). (Je 1:4–5). Nashville, TN: Holman Bible Publishers.

Psalm 139:13-16 speaks of God’s active role in our creation and formation in the womb.

For it was you who created my inward parts; you knit me together in my mother’s womb. I will praise you because I have been remarkably and wondrously made. Your works are wondrous, and I know this very well. My bones were not hidden from you when I was made in secret, when I was formed in the depths of the earth.
16 Your eyes saw me when I was formless; all my days were written in your book and planned before a single one of them began.

Christian Standard Bible. (2017). (Ps 139:13–16). Nashville, TN: Holman Bible Publishers.

Exodus 21:22-25 prescribes the same penalty — death — for someone who causes the death of a baby in the womb as for someone who commits murder. This clearly indicates that God considers a baby in the womb to be as human as a full-grown adult.

For the disciple of Jesus, abortion is not a matter of a woman’s right to choose. It is a matter of the life or death of a human being made in God’s image (Genesis 1:26-27; 9:6).

• God said “Before I formed you in the womb I knew you, and before you were born I consecrated you.” (Jeremiah 1:5)
• David said “For You formed my inward parts; You wove me in my mother’s womb. I will give thanks to You, for I am fearfully and wonderfully made; Wonderful are Your works, And my soul knows it very well. My frame was not hidden from You, When I was made in secret, And skillfully wrought in the depths of the earth.” (Psalm 139:13-16)
• Luke said “When Elizabeth heard Mary’s greeting, the baby leaped in her womb; and Elizabeth was filled with the Holy Spirit.” (Luke 1:41)
• God said “You shall not murder.” (Deuteronomy 5:17)
• King Solomon said “There are six things which the LORD hates, Yes, seven which are an abomination to Him: Haughty eyes, a lying tongue, And hands that shed innocent blood.”  (Proverbs 6:16)
• Biblical authors unanimously refer to the preborn as people.
  • Job describes miscarried babies as “infants who never saw the light” (Job 3:16).
  • Pregnant mothers are referred to throughout the New Testament as being “with child” (Matthew 1:18, Luke 2:5).
  • Of Rebekah and Abraham’s twin sons, Moses records “the children struggled together within her” (Genesis 25:22).
  • Luke refers to Elizabeth’s baby with the exact same word, υἱὸν (Greek for “son”), both before and after his birth (Luke 1:36, 57).
  • They’re not ambiguous “blobs of cells” or “scrambled eggs” but sons, daughters, children, infants.

Does life begin at conception?

Yes! At the moment when a human sperm penetrates a human ovum, or egg, generally in the upper portion of the Fallopian Tube, a new entity comes into existence. “Zygote” is the name of the first cell formed at conception, the earliest developmental stage of the human embryo, followed by the “Morula” and “Blastocyst” stages.

The zygote is composed of human DNA and other human molecules, so its nature is undeniably human and not some other species. Thus, human life begins at conception.

It is also quite clear that the earliest human embryo is biologically alive. It fulfills the four criteria needed to establish biological life: metabolism, growth, reaction to stimuli, and reproduction.

Here are just a few of many medical and scientific opinions.

Dr. Alfred M. Bongioanni, professor of pediatrics and obstetrics at the University of Pennsylvania:

“I have learned from my earliest medical education that human life begins at the time of conception…. I submit that human life is present throughout this entire sequence from conception to adulthood and that any interruption at any point throughout this time constitutes a termination of human life….

I am no more prepared to say that these early stages [of development in the womb] represent an incomplete human being than I would be to say that the child prior to the dramatic effects of puberty…is not a human being. This is human life at every stage.”

Dr. Jerome LeJeune, professor of genetics at the University of Descartes in Paris, was the discoverer of the chromosome pattern of Down syndrome.

“After fertilization has taken place a new human being has come into being.” He stated that this “is no longer a matter of taste or opinion,” and “not a metaphysical contention, it is plain experimental evidence.” He added, “Each individual has a very neat beginning, at conception.”

Professor Hymie Gordon, Mayo Clinic:

“By all the criteria of modern molecular biology, life is present from the moment of conception.”

Is abortion really about a “woman and her body”?

An extremely popular argument asserts that because a woman has a right to control her own body, she therefore has a right to undergo an abortion for any reason she deems fit. Although it is not obvious that either the law or sound ethical reasoning supports such a strong view of personal autonomy (e.g., laws against prostitution and suicide), this pro-choice argument still logically fails even if we hypothetically grant that its strong view of personal autonomy is correct.

The unborn baby within the pregnant woman’s body is not part of her body. The conceptus is a genetically distinct entity with its own unique and individual gender, blood type, bone-structure, and genetic code. Although the unborn baby is attached to its mother, it is not part of her.

To say that the unborn baby is part of its mother is to claim that the mother possesses four legs, two heads, two noses, and—with the case of a male conceptus—a penis and two testicles. Since scientists have been able to achieve conception in a petri dish in the case of the “test-tube” baby, and this conceptus if it has white parents can be transferred to the body of a black woman and be born white, we know conclusively that the unborn baby is not part of the pregnant woman’s body.

Pro-choice advocates argue, “Every woman has the right to choose what she does with her own body.” Ironically, the choice of abortion assures that something like 530,000 females in the United States each year don’t have the right to choose what they do with their bodies. (That’s roughly the number of girls aborted every year—approximately half of all aborted children.)

Philosopher Mortimer Adler claimed, as have many others, that the unborn is “a part of the mother’s body, in the same sense that an individual’s arm or leg is a part of a living organism. An individual’s decision to have an arm or leg amputated falls within the sphere of privacy — the freedom to do as one pleases in all matters that do not injure others or the public welfare.”

However, a body part is defined by the common genetic code it shares with the rest of its body. The unborn child’s genetic code differs from his mother’s. Every cell of the mother’s tonsils, appendix, heart, and lungs shares the same genetic code. The unborn child has a different genetic code, and every cell of his body is uniquely his, each different than every cell of his mother’s body.

A Chinese zygote (a new human in the earliest stage of development) implanted in a Swedish woman will always be Chinese, not Swedish, because his biological identity is based on his genetic code, not that of the body in which he resides. If the woman’s body is the only one involved in a pregnancy, then she must have two noses, four legs, two sets of fingerprints, two brains, two circulatory systems, and two skeletal systems. Half the time she must also have testicles and a penis. (Can anyone seriously argue that a male child’s reproductive organs are part of his mother’s body, just because he resides there?) It’s a clear scientific fact that the mother is one distinctive and self-contained person, and the child is another.

A woman has a right to control her own body, but the unborn baby, though for a time living inside her body, is not part of her body.

Abortion is not justified, since no one’s right to personal autonomy is so strong that it permits the arbitrary execution of others. In this respect this argument also begs the question, because it assumes that the unborn are not fully human.

The new human zygote has a genetic composition that is absolutely unique from itself, different from any other human that has ever existed, including that of its mother (thus disproving the claim that what is involved in abortion is merely “a woman and her body”).

This DNA includes a complete “design,” guiding not only early development but even hereditary attributes that will appear in childhood and adulthood, from hair and eye color to personality traits.

Fetuses feel pain during the abortion procedure. According to Kanwaljeet J. S. Anand, MBBS, DPhil, Professor of Pediatrics, Anesthesiology and Neurobiology at the University of Tennessee Health Science Center, “If the fetus is beyond 20 weeks of gestation, I would assume that there will be pain caused to the fetus. And I believe it will be severe and excruciating pain.”

Does science supports the Pro Life argument?

Scientists define an organism as a complex structure of interdependent elements constituted to carry on the activities of life by separately-functioning but mutually dependant organs. The human zygote meets this definition with ease.

Once formed, it initiates a complex sequence of events to ready it for continued development and growth: The zygote acts immediately and decisively to initiate a program of development that will, if uninterrupted by accident, disease, or external intervention, proceed seamlessly through formation of the definitive body, birth, childhood, adolescence, maturity, and aging, ending with death. This coordinated behavior is the very hallmark of an organism.

By contrast, while a mere collection of human cells may carry on the activities of cellular life, it will not exhibit coordinated interactions directed towards a higher level of organization.

Thus, the scientific evidence is quite plain: at the moment of fusion of human sperm and egg, a new entity comes into existence which is distinctly human, alive, and an individual organism – a living, and fully human, being.

The baby (aka fetus) IS a PERSON

“Not a person” is a decidedly unscientific argument: it has nothing to do with science and everything to do with someone’s own moral or political philosophy, though that someone may not readily admit it. Here is a good time to recite the scientific proofs, and maybe make a philosophical point of your own: We’re either persons or property; and even the staunchest abortion defender will be reluctant to call a human child a piece of property.

Development also shows obvious signs of human life. The cardiovascular system is the first major system to function. At about 22 days after conception the child’s heart begins to circulate his own blood, unique to that of his mother’s, and his heartbeat can be detected on ultrasound.

At just six weeks, the child’s eyes and eye lids, nose, mouth, and tongue have formed.
Electrical brain activity can be detected at six or seven weeks, and by the end of the eighth week, the child, now known scientifically as a “fetus,” has developed all of his organs and bodily structures.

By ten weeks after conception the child can make bodily movements.

Medicine Treats the baby (aka fetus) as Human Life

Medicine confirms the existence of the child before birth as a distinct human person. Fetal surgery has become a medical specialty, and includes the separate provision of anesthesia to the baby.

You can cite some of the surgeries now performed on children before their birth, such as shunting to bypass an obstructed urinary tract, removal of tumors at the base of the tailbone, and treatment of congenital heart disease.

There are many others. This is the truth and it may pain those who believe in abortion but we must all radically change our mind about this. Why not ask, what if what I believe about it being okay to abort (murder) a baby is wrong?

Is abortion really about Women’s Health?

Taking a life isn’t really about anybody’s health. Taking a life is murder. If you want to take care of your own health, there is a lot you can do for yourself. There is no sense in the position of “I made a sexual decision and now I want to kill you because it is about my health”. Well what about rape you say? What about it. Life is life and it shouldn’t be taken. Period. That is the truth and we know it.

Abortion increases the likelihood that women will develop breast cancer. In early pregnancy, levels of estrogen increase, leading to breast growth in preparation for breastfeeding. When a pregnancy is interrupted by abortion, immature cells are left in the woman’s breasts, increasing the potential risk of breast cancer.

Since 2006, eight medical organizations, including the Breast Cancer Prevention Institute, the Catholic Medical Association, and the National Physicians Center for Family Resources, have recognized the connection between abortion and breast cancer. Abortions cause psychological damage. A 2002 peer-reviewed study published by the Southern Medical Journal of more than 173,000 American women found that women who aborted were 154% more likely to commit suicide than women who carried to term.

An Apr. 1998 Journal of Social and Clinical Psychology study of men whose partners had abortions found that 51.6% of the men reported regret, 45.2% felt sadness, and 25.8% experienced depression

Roe V Wade decision permits murder and should be overturned

The Court ruled that abortion must be permitted for any reason a woman chooses until the child becomes viable; after viability, an abortion must still be permitted if an abortion doctor deems the abortion necessary to protect a woman’s “health,”defined by the Court in another ruling issued the same day as “all factors–physical, emotional, psychological, familial, and the woman’s age–relevant to the well-being of the patient.”

In this way the Court created a right to abort a child at any time, even past the point of viability, for “emotional” reasons. Stated another way, the Supreme Court gave abortion doctors the power to override any abortion restriction merely by claiming that there are “emotional” reasons for the abortion.

Viable literally means “capable of living.” If the fetus is capable of living, then it is a human being.

Murder is defined as the unlawful premeditated killing of one human being by another. Roe V Wade has essentially created a murder loophole where one person can kill another legally for “emotional reasons.”

This is sad. This is wrong. We need a better way. We need The WAY of Jesus.

For the disciple of Jesus, abortion is not a matter of a woman’s right to choose. It is a matter of the life or death of a human being made in God’s image (Genesis 1:26-27; 9:6).

• God said “Before I formed you in the womb I knew you, and before you were born I consecrated you.” (Jeremiah 1:5)
• David said “For You formed my inward parts; You wove me in my mother’s womb. I will give thanks to You, for I am fearfully and wonderfully made; Wonderful are Your works, And my soul knows it very well. My frame was not hidden from You, When I was made in secret, And skillfully wrought in the depths of the earth.” (Psalm 139:13-16)
• Luke said “When Elizabeth heard Mary’s greeting, the baby leaped in her womb; and Elizabeth was filled with the Holy Spirit.” (Luke 1:41)
• God said “You shall not murder.” (Deuteronomy 5:17)
• King Solomon said “There are six things which the LORD hates, Yes, seven which are an abomination to Him: Haughty eyes, a lying tongue, And hands that shed innocent blood.”  (Proverbs 6:16)
• Biblical authors unanimously refer to the preborn as people.
  • Job describes miscarried babies as “infants who never saw the light” (Job 3:16).
  • Pregnant mothers are referred to throughout the New Testament as being “with child” (Matthew 1:18, Luke 2:5).
  • Of Rebekah and Abraham’s twin sons, Moses records “the children struggled together within her” (Genesis 25:22).
  • Luke refers to Elizabeth’s baby with the exact same word, υἱὸν (Greek for “son”), both before and after his birth (Luke 1:36, 57).
  • They’re not ambiguous “blobs of cells” or “scrambled eggs” but sons, daughters, children, infants.

The People ARE actually ProLife

Many advocates for abortion argue that it is popular with the American public. This is not the best argument but it is relevant in terms of public policy. Even if very few agreed with my perspective, I would still be in favor of LIFE over death. Here is some polling data that contradicts what we hear so often from the abortion lobby.

• 61% of Americans say abortion should be illegal after the fetal heartbeat has begun, which occurs in the first month of pregnancy.
• 72% of Americans say abortion should be illegal after the first 3 months of pregnancy.
• 86% of Americans say abortion should be illegal after the first 6 months of pregnancy.
• Only 6% -17% of Americans (depending on how the question is asked and by whom) believe abortion should be legal at any time, in all circumstances.

Supply Doesn’t Meet Adoption Demands: Over two million couples are waiting to adopt, and only 134,000 US children were available to be adopted as of June 2002. The percentage of infants given up for adoption has declined from 9% of those born before 1973 to 1% of those born between 1996 and 2002. instead of having the option to abort, women should give their unwanted babies to people who cannot conceive.

Abortion is the Utmost Form of Discrimination

Abortion disproportionately harms African Americans. Black women are 4.5 times as likely as white women to have an abortion, and 1,876 black babies are aborted every day. Between 1882 and 1968, 3,446 Blacks were lynched in the United States, but in less than three days in 2010, a higher number of black babies were killed by abortion. Selective abortion based on genetic abnormalities (eugenic termination) is overt discrimination. Physical limitations don’t make those with disabilities less than human. The Americans with Disabilities Act of 1990 provides civil rights protection to people born with disabilities so they can lead fulfilling lives. To discriminate against these unborn children and deny them the right to life is the highest and most unacceptable form of discrimination. What if we were to find a gay gene? Would we allow people to abort their unborn children because they carry the gay gene?