False assertion, fetus is a potential child not an actual child

[ccmnxc]

This is not an answer to my question. The point of baptising in the womb in some way would be the same as the point of baptising out of the womb: to remove the effect of original sin and allo the child to enter a state of grace. In its most important action, the Church treats the born and unborn as different. If the unborn are people, why do we allow so many of them to die without having a sacrament to remove original sin, as we do for born people. Any why, if this was Christ’s view, did he not institute such a sacrament?

Baptism includes pouring or dunking in water, and anointing with oil, neither of which can be done with the baby in the womb. If all that was needed was a simple prayer, or something like that the sacrament would lose its meaning. The Catholic church does not condemn a miscarried or aborted fetus to hell. Even limbo has been called into question, and it is believed more likely that the child enters Heaven. The child would be in a state of original sin, but not have personal sin upon death. The only reason the church treat the born and unbord differently is because they cannot phyically interact with the fetus in the mother’s womb. As far as Christ and the sacraments, He didn’t actually list the sacraments, but we see things He performed or took part in.
Baptism: Jesus is baptized by John the Baptist.
Eucharist: Jesus gives His body and blood in the Last Supper.
Confirmation: Jesus sends the Holy Spirit to the Apostles.
Reconciliation: Jesus forgave sins.
Anointing of the Sick: Jesus physically and spiritually healed people.
Matrimony: Jesus gave and sumbitted Himself to His Father’s will just as spouses are supposed to submit to each other.
Holy Orders: Jesus comissions the Apostles to go and Spread the Good News while He does this Himself.

I am unaware of anyting Jesus did that would indicate a sacrament for the unborn. You cannot perform a legitimate baptism on the unborn simply due to the fact that the mother is physically separating the priest from the fetus.

 

[Hokomai]

Baptism includes pouring or dunking in water, and anointing with oil, neither of which can be done with the baby in the womb. If all that was needed was a simple prayer, or something like that the sacrament would lose its meaning. The Catholic church does not condemn a miscarried or aborted fetus to hell. Even limbo has been called into question, and it is believed more likely that the child enters Heaven. The child would be in a state of original sin, but not have personal sin upon death. The only reason the church treat the born and unbord differently is because they cannot phyically interact with the fetus in the mother’s womb. As far as Christ and the sacraments, He didn’t actually list the sacraments, but we see things He performed or took part in.
Baptism: Jesus is baptized by John the Baptist.
Eucharist: Jesus gives His body and blood in the Last Supper.
Confirmation: Jesus sends the Holy Spirit to the Apostles.
Reconciliation: Jesus forgave sins.
Anointing of the Sick: Jesus physically and spiritually healed people.
Matrimony: Jesus gave and sumbitted Himself to His Father’s will just as spouses are supposed to submit to each other.
Holy Orders: Jesus comissions the Apostles to go and Spread the Good News while He does this Himself.

I am unaware of anyting Jesus did that would indicate a sacrament for the unborn. You cannot perform a legitimate baptism on the unborn simply due to the fact that the mother is physically separating the priest from the fetus.

Exactly. If an unborn person is a full person, why would Christ and the Church not have made provision for them to be saved from the effects of original sin in a sacramental way? It does not answer the ‘why’ in my question to repeat and elaborate on the fact for which I am seeking explanation.

 

[ccmnxc]

Exactly. If an unborn person is a full person, why would Christ and the Church not have made provision for them to be saved from the effects of original sin in a sacramental way? It does not answer the ‘why’ in my question to repeat and elaborate on the fact for which I am seeking explanation.

If this still doesn’t answer your question, I apologzie. We’d probably be at a communication impasse.
The Church doesn’t have one (sacrament) because Christ didn’t institute one. Christ probably didn’t institute one because His Father would pardon the fact that the child still has Original Sin due to the fact that punishing the child for the sin of Adam would be neither just nor merciful, which God is. If there is an opportunity to cleanse the child through a Baptism it should be taken. Since a Baptism as found in the Bible cannot be performed on a fetus, we should wait for him/her to be born. If it dies before birth, we believe God, in His Mercy and Justice would acknowledge the fact that there wasn’t an opportunity for Baptism in the child’s life.

In short:
Church: No sacrament because on cannot be found that is instituted by Christ.
Christ: Didn’t institute sacrament because the Father, in His Mercy and Justice, wouldn’t likely punish the child not in a state of grace through no fault of his/her own.

I use the term “wouldn’t likely punish” just because the Church doesn’t have a set doctrine on what exactly happens to the child.

 

[Edward_H]

Well, if you are speaking of complete human DNA, why do you call it ‘life’? Why complicate it? Life is not the same thing as ‘complete human DNA’. "Life’ does not begin at conception. I am alive, my father’s sperm was alive, my mother’s ovum was alive, they were alive, their parents’ sperms and ova were alive, and their grandparents’ and so on, all the way back ast our hon-human ancestors, to the beginning of life.

A totally unique, genetically complete life is underway. Its identity is complete; its development continues.

Identity DRIVES development. It’s not the other way around. It’s not like there is some point in development that the life receives unique identity. No, the unique identity is there and it’s as complete and whole as it will be until the life dies.

Development continues. An infant’s reproductive system is not complete till some years later.

“State of development” arguments fail.

 

[Marc_Anthony]

If this still doesn’t answer your question, I apologzie. We’d probably be at a communication impasse.
The Church doesn’t have one (sacrament) because Christ didn’t institute one. Christ probably didn’t institute one because His Father would pardon the fact that the child still has Original Sin due to the fact that punishing the child for the sin of Adam would be neither just nor merciful, which God is. If there is an opportunity to cleanse the child through a Baptism it should be taken. Since a Baptism as found in the Bible cannot be performed on a fetus, we should wait for him/her to be born. If it dies before birth, we believe God, in His Mercy and Justice would acknowledge the fact that there wasn’t an opportunity for Baptism in the child’s life.

In short:
Church: No sacrament because on cannot be found that is instituted by Christ.
Christ: Didn’t institute sacrament because the Father, in His Mercy and Justice, wouldn’t likely punish the child not in a state of grace through no fault of his/her own.

I use the term “wouldn’t likely punish” just because the Church doesn’t have a set doctrine on what exactly happens to the child.

Right, I’m actually one of the few who still believes in the Limbo of the infants.

Anyway, I think that we CAN say with very little doubt that those conceived unbaptized embryos were conceived for some very specific, important, definite purpose, and that God will provide for them wonderfully after death.

 

[Bill_7154]

I have been questioning my friends over on facebook about their suppositions on abortion. Most of these folks will say that abortion should be rare, and shouldn’t be used as birth control. My question was why? If abortion is just a removal of cells, why should it be rare? From there they argue that the fetus is a potential life, and that should not be taken lightly. I’m not quite sure how to get at the root of this issue. I could ask when the “potential” life comes to fruition, but everyone is going to have a different opinion on that. Or I could ask why is “potential” life more valuable that non potential life? Not really sure where to go from here in examining their presuppositions.

As I understand it, ‘legally’ the argument in support of abortion is that the fetus is not a ‘person’ and therfore does not have rights. It is about personhood legally.

It is not about life. A life is something that takes in nourishment and grows. A human zygote is a human life, I don’t think there is a valid scientific argument that can demonstrate it is a ‘non life’.

Lots of people like to think it it as ‘a cluster of cells’ becuse it makes it easier for them to compromize their morals and have or support abortions, be they athiest or whatever.

But I don’t think there is legitimate scientific support that it is dead or a non life. The ‘legal’ issue, as I understand it, centers around ‘personhood’ and the rights afforded to a person.

 

[Bill_7154]

Ummm - what are the sperm and ovum if they are not alive? Dead? Life does not begin at conception. It is present before. It is arguable that human beings begin at cnception, but not life. That is there before.

Good questions. What forms of life are sperm and ovum? Are they human life or something other than human life. I know they come from human beings but are they human lives or something other than human lives.

If a finger is cut off of a person, is it living or is it dead? If living in the moments/hours after being cut off, is it a human life or is it something other than a human life? It comes from a human being, but is it ‘a’ human life or something other than that which is both living but not actually in and of itself a human life? I don’t have the answer, maybe a doctor does.

 

[Bill_7154]

"Life’ does not begin at conception.

If not, exactly when does a ‘human life’ begin? Lots of things are alive, most of them are not human. A sperm is not human, it comes from a human. Same with an ovum. A zygote, a fetus, is a separate and distinct human life.

The argument, ‘legally’ in ‘the government’ ‘the courts’ is not about whether or not a fetus is a human life, it is centered around whether or not it is a ‘person’. The courts have ruled it is not a person, not guarenteed the rights of ‘personhood’, and therefore able to be killed without violating it’s rights, becuase it has been deemed it is not a person, it has not been deemed it is not human, or that it is not a human life.

You can try and justify abortion to your hearts content, but justifications are justifications.

And human life is human life. It is a separate and distinct human life, taking in nourishment and growing, into a distinct human being with every moment since the sperm penetrates the egg.

A sperm can not and will not ever grow into a 2 year old child. Nor will an egg. A zygote will though. It is not dead. It is not a cockroach.

You can refer to it as a ‘parasite’ human life if it makes you feel better, but it is most certainly a human life.

 

[Bill_7154]

A man has no rights. My wife could have aborted our daughter and according to the doctors I had no say in the matter. If I would have interfered, I probably would have been arrested.

This is an interesting aside. Females are allowed to sever their financial and legal obligations from the human being she created with a man, even her husband, without even his consent. This is even if the man offers to pay her cash to carry the baby to term and take full legal and financial responsibility for the child once born. This matters not to the court.

If a man, discovering he has an unborn child, wishes to sever his financial and legal obligations to the child prior to it being born (which I do not advocate), he has no legal recource to do so.

If men and women truely had equal rights, shouldn’t a man be allowed the same right to sever his legal and financial responsibilities from the unborn child as the female can? Such as signing some court document waiving legal and financial responsibilities to the unborn child? Then the female goes on with her choices, whatever they may be (speaking legally specifically and only now, morals aside) choosing to give the child up for adoption, choosing to raise it herself…

Men do not get equal rights in this regard. They are forced to be finacially responsible for the unborn child while the woman can choose to sever that responsibility even if it is her husbands baby. Heck, she can even blackmail a man threatening abortion, even her own husband, and he has no legal recourse.

This is yet one of the many reasons marriage is so important and it is soo important to really know the person you marry.

My comments above are not meant to advocate not taking care of one’s offspring or to support abortion in any way, shape or form. Simply pointing out a circumstance where males do not have equal rights with females.

 

[Hokomai]

You can refer to it as a ‘parasite’ human life if it makes you feel better, but it is most certainly a human life.

I don’t think I have said this Bill, and I don’t think I would. Why suggest I did?

 

[Bill_7154]

I don’t think I have said this Bill, and I don’t think I would. Why suggest I did?

Where did I suggest you did? I am suggesting that you may, if you choose to, refer to a fetus as such. But to refer to it as something other than a human life is factually incorrect.

 

[Hokomai]

Where did I suggest you did? I am suggesting that you may, if you choose to, refer to a fetus as such. But to refer to it as something other than a human life is factually incorrect.

I do not choose to, and did not. This sort of debate is not helpful to understanding.

 

[JaKael02]

Then why is there no sacrament for them equivalent to the baptism of the born? Why does the Church treat the unborn differently is they are human children just like the born ones?

Because the unborn child receives the Sacraments via the mother. It’s not until the two are seperated that the child will need to receive his/her own Sacraments. This is why Jesus did not create a Sacrament for the unborn.

Kindly - James