A thought experiment for Catholics: support legal abortion. Then what?

[Bradski]

Are there such programmes being advocated?

There’s one that’s meant to work. You become a Catholic and abortion then becomes a mortal sin. What could be more persuasive than to realise that you are risking your very soul should you consider it.

But even that doesn’t seem to work that well. So maybe we could make it illegal for all Catholics. If a majority agrees, of course. Then, if that works, we can extend it to include everyone else.

 

[Corki]

No problem from me here. But Catholics, because they consider ‘artificial’ contraception to be against natural law, and therefore an evil whoever uses it to regulate conception, will not advocate for better use of better contraceptive techniques. I have yet to see a comprehensive programme aimed at making it less likely that pregnant women will choose abortion being advocated either. There are certainly efforts, but these seem to be marked by voluntarism, a dependence on donations, and a focus on pregnancy and birth rather than the life issues which affect many women in making these decisions. Are there such programmes being advocated?

Sure there are. There are programs through organizations such as Catholic Social Services that provide material aid to women. If the rationale to consider abortion is that a pregancy would be financially devastating, help is available. There are also programs giving support to women with small children -both material support and non-material support such as counseling. There are lots of programs that help women in abusive situations or who have been assaulted. And there is the program the government just pulled its support out of that was designed to provide options and support for women who have been victims of human trafficing. There are also programs through Catholic hospitals and schools that focus on certain population groups and there are programs that ensure that a woman who finds herself pregnant but unable to raise a child will always have a loving adoptive family in which to place that child. **All of these programs **include a focus on being life-affirming and treating the woman and her family wholistically. The reason you don’t see it is that you have the opposite side comparison, organizations like Planned Parenthood, which treat women as sexual beings but not much else. There is not a Catholic sex organization that would be a conterpart to PP. The life-affirming an woman-supporting elements are in many, many Catholic (and other, particularly faith based) programs. It is also an element in the sex ed programs in Catholic schools.

 

[Hat4]

If you don’t get pregnant, you don’t need an abortion.

To not get pregnant, you can either not have sex (sounds simple doesn’t it?) or you can use contraception.

A combination of the two would seem like a good idea. If you find you can go through life not having sex, then that would work. If you can’t then someone needs to be using contraception.

There are still plenty of unplanned pregnancies when people use contraception. It’s funny how there weren’t many unplanned pregnancies all that long ago and yet now that contraception is pushed they are rampant.

 

[Contarini]

This isn’t really a hypothetical since only a small percentage of Catholic pro-life activity is focused on changing the law. The majority of what pro-life Catholics do is to educate as many people as possible on what abortion is and on the value of human life, to support those facing “crisis” pregnancy issues, to encourage adoption instead of killing and to pray. We would also continue to support politicians and leaders who value all human life in the hopes of creating a more life affirming country at some point in the future.

I agree–the only problem I have with your post is that it seems that in recent years there’s been a trend toward Catholics focusing primarily on this issue with regard to political choices. And I think that’s dubious–one could quite legitimately make the pragmatic argument that abortion will best be ended through other means, and thus, for instance, vote Democratic because of the Democrats’ positions on other issues. I find the Republican ideology as expressed in this year’s convention utterly repugnant morally. The language of individual responsibility is being abused to promote a kind of systematic selfishness that denies the common good. This is just basically, fundamentally evil.

Mind you, I could not in good conscience vote for Obama given his position on abortion (I’m a resident alien so it’s an academic question anyway), and given his continuation of many of the morally repugnant practices of the previous Republican administration, and particularly his intensification of drone attacks. But the way folks on this forum vilify any Catholic who even considers voting for Obama, and in some cases anyone who doesn’t jump on the Republican bandwagon actively, clearly implies that only political means really count in opposing abortion.

Edwin

 

[manualman]

It’s hard NOT to villify actions that enable horrific evils. Other emotionally charged issues in history help to illustrate the matter. Certain militant slavery abolitionists were considered dangerous radicals in their own day, and yet historians today are often far kinder to them than their own contemporaries. Look at John Brown and his brand of violent resistance to slavery. He was the Eric Rudolph of his day, an advocate for the murder of slave owners. Yet my history books actually treat him somewhat sympathetically. Why? The cynic might respond that it’s because the victors write history. But perhaps deeper than that is that however horribly wrong Brown was about the use of violence, he got there via frustration and rage over the way society refused to face the atrocity they were committing in broad daylight.

Today’s pro-lifers may get tunnel vision on the abortion issue sometimes. Is that a bad thing? I’d argue not. History doesn’t remember what any of Jefferson Davis’s OTHER policy issues were (besides “states rights to slavery”). He got the defning moral issue of his day wrong, so all the things he did right are eclipsed in history to his major failure. And you know what? Southerners DID have some legitimate gripes and fears with attempts at domination by the north. But in the larger scheme of things, the horror of chattel slavery eclipsed them in importance and he’ll be forever principally known as the man that lead the forces fighting to perpetuate slavery in America (southern revisionist attempts notwithstanding, and I’m not wanting to start a tangent battle over the civil war).

My point is that enormous over-riding moral issues DO need to take precedence over other policy issues, even important ones. There simply is no other policy issue in American life over which 55 million human beings have lost their lives. You set your priorities and act on them. If catholics actually did that, we’d have put abortion to rest 40 years ago and could have moved on to other structuraly injustices. But we don’t and that’s why some of us “villify.” We’re frustrated that catholics have refused to objectively prioritize issues and have thus squandered our potentially overwhelming political influence. Instead we cancel each other’s votes out and see smaller, but more unified interest groups determine the national agenda.

 

[hannajomar]

This isn’t really a hypothetical since only a small percentage of Catholic pro-life activity is focused on changing the law. The majority of what pro-life Catholics do is to educate as many people as possible on what abortion is and on the value of human life, to support those facing “crisis” pregnancy issues, to encourage adoption instead of killing and to pray. We would also continue to support politicians and leaders who value all human life in the hopes of creating a more life affirming country at some point in the future.

This. In the past I volunteered at a prolife pregnancy center which functioned with no government funds. Since I am unable to volunteer there now, I help support them with money. There are already plenty of organizations doing this without directly trying to change laws. Often, they just try to provide another option to pregnant women who are in distress. Too often, if a woman is not in an ideal situation to have a baby, people will just encourage them to have an abortion. These organizations help these women and their babies:
ababysbreath.org/services.asp
severalsourcesfd.org/

 

[Hokomai]

This. In the past I volunteered at a prolife pregnancy center which functioned with no government funds. Since I am unable to volunteer there now, I help support them with money. There are already plenty of organizations doing this without directly trying to change laws. Often, they just try to provide another option to pregnant women who are in distress. Too often, if a woman is not in an ideal situation to have a baby, people will just encourage them to have an abortion. These organizations help these women and their babies:
ababysbreath.org/services.asp
severalsourcesfd.org/

Are any of these organisations truly secular? I think many unbelievers, including some pro-choice people would be willing to support organiations genuinely assisting women who choose to have their babies.

 

[JRKH]

Are any of these organizations truly secular? I think many unbelievers, including some pro-choice people would be willing to support organizations genuinely assisting women who choose to have their babies.

Why would they need to be “truly secular”?

Peace
James

 

[hannajomar]

Are any of these organisations truly secular? I think many unbelievers, including some pro-choice people would be willing to support organiations genuinely assisting women who choose to have their babies.

Both of these I mentioned are “genuinely assisting women who choose to have their babies.” Neither of them pushes religion on anyone. I don’t know what you mean by being truly secular - I suppose that would be in the eye of the beholder. In my experience, the vast majority of these kinds of places are founded by and run by Catholics and other Christians. Some might push religion, but all that I have seen are run on the basic pro-life philosophy of abortions bad, babies good. That’s largely associated with religion.

But most secular people are unaware these kinds of organizations exist. Catholic women handing out baby clothes and formula to mothers is usually much less newsworthy than a pro-life politician saying something dumb, like “legitimate rape.”

If anyone wants a purely secular place that assists women to give women the choice to have their babies in non-ideal circumstances, they are free to start a place like that.