Does the Vatican endorse a Presidential candidate?

[TLara]

It is not murder, at least in this country and in most of the world. Pejorative words do not help the discussion.

The point is somebody’s rights are going to be violated. We have so far opted that the functioning adult is to be preferred up to a point in this difficult issue.

To suggest that the situation is a sad one, and that abortion is a cruel and unhappy choice is true. To rant convinces no one, and simply fans the flames of extremism and causes people to go out and do things which land them in prison as common criminals themselves.

The unfortunate thing is that present Catholic teaching against birth control leaves the Church with virtually no alternative to help women in need other than to offer to support their pregnancy and take the child. Such is not a solution for many. Would that we could offer people safer and better means to avoid pregnancy when they are not ready for that responsibility. We cannot of course, since we have gotten into such a silly mess regarding birth control. The so-called natural method is but a pretense. It’s just birth control with a new name. And sadly, not nearly effective enough to be used by all.

When people realize that when you use birth control pills you are having regular abortions maybe they will understand why the church teaches what it does!!! When a married man and woman come together as one they are renewing the marriage covenant with God, to use condoms, etc… means you have a lack of faith in our creator to provide all things that are nessaccery for you. When you learn to accept and love God on his terms and not on yours you’ll understand.

 

[RodneyJ]

When people realize that when you use birth control pills you are having regular abortions maybe they will understand why the church teaches what it does!!! When a married man and woman come together as one they are renewing the marriage covenant with God, to use condoms, etc… means you have a lack of faith in our creator to provide all things that are nessaccery for you. When you learn to accept and love God on his terms and not on yours you’ll understand.

I happen to agree 100% on the Church’s teaching as far as ABC goes. I admit, I’m scared that I’ll have kids that at the time I feel I can’t afford to support, but I know God is more than capable of meeting my needs and those needs of my family.

 

[Tim_Kirchoff]

If you could have used a better example, maybe. That example is horrible as it is 99% true.

I only changed one word:shrug:

Why is robbery illegal? Isn’t saying that I have a right to this propety imposeing my own morality on anyone who might like to steal it?

 

[RodneyJ]

I only changed one word:shrug:

Why is robbery illegal? Isn’t saying that I have a right to this propety imposeing my own morality on anyone who might like to steal it?

You compared people who are pro-choice to Nazis? Wrong picture to paint, Picasso!

 

[Tim_Kirchoff]

You compared people who are pro-choice to Nazis? Wrong picture to paint, Picasso!

Very well, then. Describe the philosophy of the Nazis to me.

 

[RodneyJ]

Very well, then. Describe the philosophy of the Nazis to me.

Or we agree to disagree on the basis of one, if not both, of us looking childish.

 

[Goth_Catholic]

You compared people who are pro-choice to Nazis? Wrong picture to paint, Picasso!

Really? Both sanction the mass murder of defenceless innocents. The only difference is one does not have a voice. The Nazis de-humanized the Jews. Pro-choicers de-humanize babies. By pro-choice logic it was acceptable for the Nazis to murder the Jews, afterall, they didn’t want to be “forced” to share their country with them, just as a woman shouldn’t be “forced” to share her body with a child she doesn’t want.

The unfortunate thing is that present Catholic teaching against birth control leaves the Church with virtually no alternative to help women in need other than to offer to support their pregnancy and take the child. Such is not a solution for many. Would that we could offer people safer and better means to avoid pregnancy when they are not ready for that responsibility. We cannot of course, since we have gotten into such a silly mess regarding birth control. The so-called natural method is but a pretense. It’s just birth control with a new name. And sadly, not nearly effective enough to be used by all.

We already do…it’s called abstinence and NFP 100% effective when used correctly (which inculdes abstaining). Yes, heaven forbid, sex be forbidden for a few days.

 

[Tim_Kirchoff]

Or we agree to disagree on the basis of one, if not both, of us looking childish.

I make the contention that all civil law is based on the morality of the populace (or the most powerful segment thereof). In a society where cannibalism is not immoral, it will not be illegal. However, it is rarely necessary to make a thing illegal if the act is not even possible, and it would not be declared illegal in the first place unless such an action was taking place or might be anticipated to take place.

Let’s go to a hypothetical. In 17th century Boston, it is declared illegal to beat one’s wife. From the fact that wife-beating is declared illegal, we can infer that 1. the lawmaking body in 17th century Boston was opposed to wife beating and that 2. the lawmaking body feared that wife-beating was taking place and that they wanted it to stop, but presumably those who were beating their wives would prefer if it were not illegal. We now come back to the 21st century.

There is no justification for legalized abortion on the grounds that one does not wish to impose one’s morality on others- that is the whole point of civil law! You cannot oppose it on the grounds thqat people are going to break the laws anyway- that is why we have a criminal justice system! If you want to keep abortion legal, but are “personally opposed”- then why don’t you use that same reasoning to repeal all laws?

 

[Brendan]

It is not murder, at least in this country and in most of the world. Pejorative words do not help the discussion. .

Does legality determine if it is murder or not?

Do you believe that the Holocaust was not murder because it was legal in the countries where is was done?

If not, why not?

 

[Brendan]

You compared people who are pro-choice to Nazis? Wrong picture to paint, Picasso!

Hmm,

Let’s see.

They both classify a group of homo sapiens as ‘non humans’

They both legalized the killing of the group they declared to be ‘non humans’

They both advocated using public funds to accomplish this task.

Seems like there is a lot in common at least.

 

[Neil_Anthony]

Dear SpiritMeadow,
I haven’t seen you post for a while. I hope you’ve been doing well.

I cannot be wishwashy. I speak for me. I am past the time of child bearing, so one can say I can easily say that I would not abort. The truth is, could I, I would not. ***I believe in the spirit that enters life at the first joining of sperm and egg. Yet, I do not condemn anyone for believing differently. ***I leave it to God to decide if someone is wrong here.

I’ve been wondering for ages why people call this a religious issue, when to me it’s always been a human rights issue. Thanks for explaining that… I guess some people think its about whether a fetus has a soul? Of course then it would be wrong to impose our unproven ideas upon others in the form of laws. I think many of us who support abortion laws support them because we want embryonic people to be protected… mainly because we’re all very happy that we were not killed in the womb and we don’t think its fair for other’s lives to be cut off before they even get to experience life. That’s why we think it belongs in the realm of law… not just because of religious theories about a soul.

The complete and utter disdain of the woman is troubling in the extreme and seems a basic holdover from the earliest old paternalistic beliefs that women are by nature evil and must be controlled by men. This goes back to Eve, and many here would agree that Eve was the evil tempted one who led Adam astray.

It’s so painful to read this, that people will think that I oppose abortion because I do not trust women to make their own decisions In fact I think it is men who often want their girlfriend to get the abortion… Also part of why some men are so shocked by abortion is that we hold such a high view of women that it’s literally stunning to conceive of a woman wanting an abortion. I suspect few women really want them, but feel they have no choice. I think a vulnerable woman would have a lot easier time refusing to listen to a controlling husband/boyfriend ordering her to get an abortion if it was illegal… I hope anyway.

I have to add that it isn’t only a moral choice faced by women. It’s very scary for a man to find out that the woman he doesn’t really love might be pregnant by him. Of course not as scary as it is for the woman, but the temptation to do something wrong is there for the man too… in his case the temptation to encourage her to do the wrong thing. It’s not right to compare this to the situation a woman is in when pregnant, but still, don’t think that men will never face the moral dilemma at all.

 

[LittleOne1]

I have a problem with what many people say of not wanting to force our opinions on others and legislate morals.
One problem with that: any law you make does that! I mean can a person robbing the bank be allowed to decide whether the bank clerk lives or dies based upon their own opinion of righ and wrong. If you say murder is wrong and punishable; are you not legislating to others what to do? Abortion is in the same sense. We are saying to people, no you can not murder your children, just like the robber cannot murder the bank teller.
Another issue I have is people saying well you will still have abortions and now tons of women dying. First of all, I do not see how people choosing to do wrong forces us to keep immoral laws. We have a responsibility to pass laws that reflect truth and protect others. Scenario: should we legalize drugs so people can get free needles and not transmit Hep C? I mean we may help many drug users cut down on the risk of catch a chronic disease and save lives by permitting drug use… and hey its their bodies ( I say this more than the abortion even where one kills another; destroys another’s body). Also, those numbers of deaths reported at the Roe v Wade trial were inflated; Dr. Benard Nathenson who has become prolife admitted that is what they did and also how at the time legalization did not save women’s lives, more like better hospital treatment and antibiotics emerging. The same abortionists who were illegal now set up sho illegally.
Another point: If you have noticed, places that have made very restricting abortion laws or have kicked out abortion mills have seen strong cuts in number of abortions and not some rapid increase in illegal abortions or rapid increase in maternal death. Restricting and removing abortion mills does work (Clinton really had nothing to do with Abortion going down in the 90’s; it was local legislation and drop in abortion mills).
If you allow for personal relativism of when it comes to laws and morals, you have no ethics because people can say and feel what they want; its that simple. If you cannot legislate morality; right and wrong, you cannot make laws.

 

[CapIV]

You people who don’t recognize abortion as genocide do not understand abortion at all and are only hurting the movement. Abortion is the direct murder of a child. I am not going to put a nice spin on it. It is not anti-woman, or paternalistic.

You sound like the people who when the Americans killed Indians or Blacks or Jews and Catholics too who said, “oh well some people believe they aren’t human, so we need to respect their decision.”

Abortion is murder. Our government is funding murder. We have thousands of infanticide clinics across the country. People fight to keep infanticide legal. Wake up and see the horror for what it is.

 

[Ridgerunner]

The U.S. has the most liberal abortion law on earth, which is to say, essentially no law at all. It’s not this way because the people or their legislators made a decision about whether to allow it or what its limits should be. It’s this way because a court declared that, as a practical matter, the people could have no power over it. Seventy percent of the populace support at least some regulation of it, but it can’t happen. It is for the continuation of THAT that the abortion-supporting candidates are steadfast.

When I was a young man, the government exercised a power; one it still has but does not exercise, to tell me what to do with my body. It could tell me to put my body in a green unifrom and move it to a fever ridden jungle where I would be shot at or, if captured, tortured hideously as long as my captors could manage it and wished to do it. And virtually no one, even now, questions the right of the government to do that.

If I do not pay my taxes, the government will regulate my body in a very serious manner and for a very long time, and nobody questions that.

The very healthcare system regulates my body, and it’s not even the government. If I don’t have the money to pay for it, the medical system can tell me I can’t have lifesaving care and I’ll just have to die. And nobody questions that.

In all of this argument about political candidates’ stands on abortion, it ought to at least be recognized that the debate is not really about whether abortions will disappear if we do this or do that. It’s about whether the populace will have any right to act in the matter. The pro-abortion candidates say “no”, we have the right to send your son to be blown to pieces by artillery, but you do not have the right to restrict the right of anyone to destroy an unborn life.

If you ask me, our body politic has lost its senses in even arguing that the people should have no power at all over one “life issue” when they have so much power over others and it’s accepted that
they do and should.

 

[CapIV]

Well, the US definitely doesn’t have the most liberal laws on abortion. Many states have required waiting periods or parental notification or cut-offs dates. In China and Russia, abortion is their form of birth control. I know several women in the USSR who went through FORCED abortions. So the US definitely isn’t the worst, but we are definitely no good either.

 

[estesbob]

The Church doesn’t support a presidential candidate. But, when it comes to the Iraq war, it is worth mentioning that over 1 million abortions happen PER YEAR. So I doubt even if in some way the Church did support a candidate, that she would choose a pro-abortion candidate simply because she may or may not want America out of Iraq.

To do so would violate Church teaching. Benedict made it very clear that Catholics in good consoicience can diagreee with the decision to wage war but that the same does not apply to abortion.

 

[CapIV]

To do so would violate Church teaching. Benedict made it very clear that Catholics in good consoicience can diagreee with the decision to wage war but that the same does not apply to abortion.

yes, that was the point.

 

[estesbob]

Dear SpiritMeadow,
I haven’t seen you post for a while. I hope you’ve been doing well.

**I’ve been wondering for ages why people call this a religious issue, when to me it’s always been a human rights issue. **

.

Could not agree more. I can not for the life of me understand why anyone would need the Church or any religion for that matter to tell them killing ones child is wrong.

 

[SpiritMeadow]

When people realize that when you use birth control pills you are having regular abortions maybe they will understand why the church teaches what it does!!! When a married man and woman come together as one they are renewing the marriage covenant with God, to use condoms, etc… means you have a lack of faith in our creator to provide all things that are nessaccery for you. When you learn to accept and love God on his terms and not on yours you’ll understand.

Birth control pills prevent a union of egg and sperm capable of reproducing by setting up an unfriendly atmosphere. To use “natural” methods of contraception as is acceptable within the Church, is also to lack faith in the creator to provide all things necessary. If he does not want you pregnant, you will not be so. So why the use? Thanks for your judgmental approach. I understand quite perfectly I believe. I’ve never found sanctimony a great way to sell an argument.

 

[SpiritMeadow]

Does legality determine if it is murder or not?

Do you believe that the Holocaust was not murder because it was legal in the countries where is was done?

If not, why not?

Murder is a legal definition and means “unlawful taking of life.” Abortion is not murder period. You are the one trying to convince. Use of pejorative words which are technically wrong decreases the value of what you are saying and doesn’t further your cause.

The holocaust was genocide, an international crime of murder of an entire people. I do not know of a Nazi “law” that allowed for the killing of Jews for no reason. I believe it was the policy of the dictator himself, and carried out under orders by his followers. None were saved by their claim to having “only followed orders.”