Help in replying to a pro-abortion "classmate"

[cockatoo]

I don’t know if this is the place I should post this, but here I go.

Well I don’t really have classmates because of online school, but we have forums(private student only forums). I need help responding to the blob of cells argument and this, “But no mind. It can’t think or feel until it develops a brain, and at that point, it becomes murder, because you’re killing a person.” This student is responding to an anti- abortion student, I want to join in, and help the anti-abortion student(who is generally poor on facts on everything he post). I know it’s wrong, and I know there is something out there that says when babies start to feel, but I can’t find anything. What is a good response?

 

[vern_humphrey]

I don’t know if this is the place I should post this, but here I go.

Well I don’t really have classmates because of online school, but we have forums(private student only forums). I need help responding to the blob of cells argument and this, “But no mind. It can’t think or feel until it develops a brain, and at that point, it becomes murder, because you’re killing a person.” This student is responding to an anti- abortion student, I want to join in, and help the anti-abortion student(who is generally poor on facts on everything he post). I know it’s wrong, and I know there is something out there that says when babies start to feel, but I can’t find anything. What is a good response?

One argument you can count on being used against you is, “You have no right to force your religious values on me.” Therefore I usually don’t even mention religion. Here’s an argument I have found highly effective:

The right to life is the most fundamental of all human rights. Without a right to life, all other rights are valueless. What good does freedom of speech do a dead man? How can a corpse exercise the right to trial by jury?

The right to life accrues to each of us as a part of our basic humanity. It is as much a part of us as our minds, our personalities, or our arms and legs. It is given to us by no one. It is ours merely because we are living human beings.

There are those who say that “society” or the government decides when we get the right to life. If that is so, then it is no right at all, but merely a privilege, for if the government can grant the right to life, it can surely withhold it. Once you accept that the government has this power, you must accept, willy-nilly that the government can decree some people – perhaps Jews, or Blacks or Catholics – never get the right to life.

If, therefore there is such a thing as a right to life, it must accrue to every living human being. This sets up a simple, three-part test.

 Is the unborn child living? If it were not, we would not be having this debate!

 Is it human? Check the DNA. If it has rabbit or squirrel DNA, then it is not human. But if it has human DNA, it is human.

 But is it a being? Check the DNA again. If it has the mother’s DNA, then it is a part of her body. But if it has its own DNA, then it is a being – a separate and distinct human life.

Very clearly, the unborn has the same right to live as any other living human being. Who denies that, denies the whole concept of human rights.

You might also point out the right to life is mentioned in the Declaration of Independence ("All men are endowed by their creator with certain unalienable rights. Among these are life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness.) And in the Constitution in two Amendments, the 5th and 14th:

Amendment V
No person shall be held to answer for a capital, or otherwise infamous crime, unless on a presentment or indictment of a grand jury, except in cases arising in the land or naval forces, or in the militia, when in actual service in time of war or public danger; nor shall any person be subject for the same offense to be twice put in jeopardy of life or limb; nor shall be compelled in any criminal case to be a witness against himself, nor be deprived of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law; nor shall private property be taken for public use, without just compensation.

(My emphasis)

Amendment XIV

Section 1.
All persons born or naturalized in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the United States and of the state wherein they reside. No state shall make or enforce any law which shall abridge the privileges or immunities of citizens of the United States; nor shall any state deprive any person of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law; nor deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws.

(My emphasis, again, non-relevant clauses omitted because of the space limitation of this forum…)

Ironically, the 14th Amendment, which guarentees all persons the right to life was cited as the basis for denying the right to life!!

 

[TraderTif]

nodding in agreement Here are questions that come into my mind whenever I hear someone use the “it’s not a person until it can think and feel pain” argument.

Is my personhood dependent on my capacity to feel pain?

If an already-born person cannot feel pain, should we legally be allowed to kill them?

If a fetus is not a person because it can’t feel pain, think, or feel, then what if I dig up a chimpanzee which *can *feel pain, think, and feel…should the chimpanzee be declared a person?

And *why *does thinking, feeling, and pain sensitivity suddenly turn a “blob of cells” into a person?
Tif

 

[cockatoo]

I like those arguments, but before I reply to this person, is there anything on when the brain develops, this person is against late term abortions because of the brain being developed or something like that, if it develops earlier, the debate will be much easier.

 

[sprout]

I need help responding to the blob of cells argument and this, “But no mind. It can’t think or feel until it develops a brain, and at that point, it becomes murder, because you’re killing a person.” …What is a good response?

I have a bumper sticker on my car that reads “If it’s not a baby, then you’re not pregnant”. Alot of people don’t understand that saying, but women who’ve been told “it’s just a blob of cells” understand perfectly well that statement. It’s not just a blob of cells, it’s a human being, a person in his/her earliest stage of development.

according to Fr. Tadeusz Pacholczyk, Ph.D.

The embryo and the adult are both “beings that are human,” and the embryo is just a younger version of the adult - the two, in fact, are different developmental stages of the same human being. Hence embryos are NOT potential human beings; rather, they are actual human beings with the potential to become adults with arms, legs and checking accounts.

*from article entitled “Acorns & Embryos” *ncbcenter.org/FrTad_MSOOB_23.asp

and one of my favorite quotes from Fr. Tad is:

…in the United States we have stringent federal laws that protect not only the national bird, the bald eagle, but also that eagle’s eggs. If you were to chance upon some of them in a nest out in the wilderness, it would be illegal for you to destroy those eggs. By the force of law, we recognize how the egg of the bald eagle, that is to say, the embryonic eagle inside that egg, is the same creature as the glorious bird that we witness flying high overhead. Therefore we pass laws to safeguard not only the adult but also the very youngest member of that species. Even atheists can see how a bald eagle’s eggs should be protected; it’s really not a religious question at all. What’s so troublesome is how we are able to understand the importance of protecting the earliest stages of animal life but when it comes to our own human life, a kind of mental disconnect takes place. Our moral judgement quickly becomes murky and obtuse when we desire to do certain things that are not good, like having abortions, or destroying embryonic humans for their stem cells.

from article entitled “Imposing Our Beliefs” on Others
ncbcenter.org/FrTad_MSOOB_3.asp

I encourage you to read more of Fr. Tad (he’s a really, really smart guy, check out his bio) at “Making Sense of Bioethics” ncbcenter.org/makingsense.asp

By the time a woman even realizes she’s pregnant, has a pregnancy test, and is scheduled to have an abortion she’s between 8 and 12 weeks pregnant. At just 9 weeks development this human being in it’s earliest stages will curve its fingers around an object placed in the palm of its hand - This is amazing to see! At only nine weeks, if you happen to have an ultrasound, you may observe your infant fascinated by everything he or she can lay their fingers on (mainly other fingers, toes, ears and nose!

Apparantly a child is aware of itself and it’s surroundings at 9 weeks!

You can see pictures and read about each stage week by week inlcuding brain development (which btw: continues throughout a human beings life; one can hope & pray the brain does not stop developing at birth, but in the case of your colleague??? who knows) here:
pregnancy.org/pregnancy/fetaldevelopment1.php#week8

 

[cockatoo]

You can see pictures and read about each stage week by week inlcuding brain development (which btw: continues throughout a human beings life; one can hope & pray the brain does not stop developing at birth, but in the case of your colleague??? who knows) here:
pregnancy.org/pregnancy/fetaldevelopment1.php#week8

that link is useful , just making sure is it basically a nuetral site on this issue, so I dont get “oh that is a prolife website, of course they will say that.”

 

[cockatoo]

Well, I just posted anyway, I am sure my prolife school friends will be happy, I used one fact each for weeks 9-11 since they seemed to have what I needed most, now I will sit and wait, or sleep lol. I’ll likely get a response by morning.

 

[1ke]

I suggest you get a copy of Randy Alcorn’s excellent book Pro Life Answers to Pro Choice Arguments to help you in reasoning through these questions for yourself and composing answers you can defend.

You can probably get it from the library.

 

[cockatoo]

I suggest you get a copy of Randy Alcorn’s excellent book Pro Life Answers to Pro Choice Arguments to help you in reasoning through these questions for yourself and composing answers you can defend.

You can probably get it from the library.

The only thing is that I am going to be deleted from that online school(finnished courses, and the next one will hopefully lack a politics and religion forum, or at least have to limited time to get into serious disscusion). I don’t usually have to argue too often, I may need it when I go to college though.

 

[sprout]

that link is useful , just making sure is it basically a** nuetral site on this issue, so I dont get “oh that is a prolife website, of course they will say that**.”

that’s why I chose to link that one

but before rushing off to bed, take a few minutes to read up on Fr. Tad’s stuff.

 

[cockatoo]

I read it, hehe wouldn’t it be ironic if this kid posted the article Fr. Tad was responding to. Unfortunately that is highly unlikely.

 

[Delphinus85]

I don’t know if this is the place I should post this, but here I go.

Well I don’t really have classmates because of online school, but we have forums(private student only forums). I need help responding to the blob of cells argument and this, “But no mind. It can’t think or feel until it develops a brain, and at that point, it becomes murder, because you’re killing a person.” This student is responding to an anti- abortion student, I want to join in, and help the anti-abortion student(who is generally poor on facts on everything he post). I know it’s wrong, and I know there is something out there that says when babies start to feel, but I can’t find anything. What is a good response?

One thing you might mention is that by the time most women find out they are prgnant, the fetus already had a beating heart and a developed brain.

 

[vern_humphrey]

One thing to remember is that “personhood” is a neologism. It was invented after Roe v. Wade to make sense out of the paradox that ruling created – that a human being has no rights before birth. The pro-abortion faction decided there is such a thing as “personhood” that not all humans have.

I recommend getting a copy of In The Womb, a DVD produced by the National Geographic. This video shows the development of a baby girl from conception to birth, using 4D sonogram, and also includes twins playing womb, corrective surgery being performed on an unborn child, and so on.

This video will answer all your questions about the child in the womb. You won’t be able to watch it and come away unmoved.

 

[SoCalRC]

I like those arguments, but before I reply to this person, is there anything on when the brain develops, this person is against late term abortions because of the brain being developed or something like that, if it develops earlier, the debate will be much easier.

Synapses in the brain form relatively late, at about 25 weeks. Before that there are nerve pathways in the body, but they do not ‘talk’ to a working brain.

Biologically, there are no easy ‘gotchas’. Perhaps it is best to tell the truth. Jesus was born into essentially the only remotely pro-life religion and culture at the time. A new born infant was seeing as a human being under Jewish law and abortion was, for the most part, prohibited (the principle exception being to protect the life ofthemother).

By contrast, the Greek and Roman state religions, the various mystic religions, and all the organized states permitted wide spread infanticide, the most common form of birth/population control in the ancient world. When our faith spread to the Gentile world there were many among the faithful who assumed that laws about reproduction were only for the Jews, but the majority of early Christian writers argued strenously otherwise. We treasure life.

If you have not done so I suggest you read Pope John Paul II’s encyclical, “Gospel of Life”. You will see that we are not a faith of just abortion, but also murder, euthenasia, and even capitol punishment. Although he stopped short of declaring it an infallible teaching, the pope condemned the last in the strongest of terms.

So, tell your friend that we are called by our Love to love, unconditionally, and not to judge. Our pope instructs us that we can take steps to safe guard society, but we must strive to try to recognize even the most seemingly foul among us as a unique creation of God whose life is of extreme value. Given that, is it any wonder that we treasure innocent life when it is vulnerable and weak?

Best Regards

 

[SoCalRC]

One thing to remember is that “personhood” is a neologism. It was invented after Roe v. Wade to make sense out of the paradox that ruling created – that a human being has no rights before birth. The pro-abortion faction decided there is such a thing as “personhood” that not all humans have.

Such a distinction existed in Jewish law at the birth of Christ. We also maintained a distinction in Church law for most of history. In fact, the distinction was not dropped until the very end of the 19th Century and was not reflected in Canon law until the beginning of the 20th century.

One thing that is not helpful when debating abortion with secular society is to cloud the issue with the easily refutable.

Best Regards

 

[Des]

I need help responding to the blob of cells argument and this, “But no mind. It can’t think or feel until it develops a brain, and at that point, it becomes murder, because you’re killing a person.” This student is responding to an anti- abortion student, I want to join in, and help the anti-abortion student(who is generally poor on facts on everything he post). I know it’s wrong, and I know there is something out there that says when babies start to feel, but I can’t find anything. What is a good response?

A blob never grows, develops or directs it’s own development from within. It does not differentiate in order to grow. A blob is inert and lifeless and remains a blob. A Zygote is not and does not.

To further debunk this sad blob theory, one must realize that if we were to reduce a developing human person in Zygote form to being nonhuman simply because that person still hasn’t reached his/her full physical and mental potential, then they must also believe a child who’s brain, or skeletal tissue that has not fully developed is less of a human than a full grown adult who’s brain has. How about a person born without an arm or leg. Not as much of a human as you or I? A mentally handicapped person…same thing? These people who make these claims never seem to weigh out exactly what they are stating, and are perhaps unknowingly giving support for Genocide.

 

[Palladio]

We are all blobs of cells, collections of cells, systems of cells.

So pro-deathers arguing with these sorts of phrases goes nowhere, except to euthanasia.

I would also argue that, much deeper than the Constitution, the Declaration of Independence holds as “self-evident” the right to life.

Not the right to life for some but not for others. But the right to life pure and simple, for everyone.

That it is so because “endowed by our Creator” will not persuade some, but that is also part of our American heritage.

 

[vern_humphrey]

Such a distinction existed in Jewish law at the birth of Christ.

No, that’s not true. While Jews considered the child to form in the body and Augustine made conjectures abouit “ensoulment” these were based neither on science nor on sound theology.

We also maintained a distinction in Church law for most of history. In fact, the distinction was not dropped until the very end of the 19th Century and was not reflected in Canon law until the beginning of the 20th century.

No, we did not. The Didache (1st Century) forbids abortion. Tertulian mentions it as forbidden.

One thing that is not helpful when debating abortion with secular society is to cloud the issue with the easily refutable.

Where’s the refutation?

The definition of “person” as distinct and superior to “human” was not used prior to Roe v. Wade

 

[vern_humphrey]

Catholic Positions on Abortion

The Didache

“The second commandment of the teaching: You shall not murder. You shall not commit adultery. You shall not seduce boys. You shall not commit fornication. You shall not steal. You shall not practice magic. You shall not use potions. You shall not procure [an] abortion, nor destroy a newborn child” (Didache 2:1–2 [A.D. 70]).

The Letter of Barnabas

“The way of light, then, is as follows. If anyone desires to travel to the appointed place, he must be zealous in his works. The knowledge, therefore, which is given to us for the purpose of walking in this way, is the following. . . . Thou shalt not slay the child by procuring abortion; nor, again, shalt thou destroy it after it is born” (Letter of Barnabas 19 [A.D. 74]).

The Apocalypse of Peter

“And near that place I saw another strait place . . . and there sat women. . . . And over against them many children who were born to them out of due time sat crying. And there came forth from them rays of fire and smote the women in the eyes. And these were the accursed who conceived and caused abortion” (The Apocalypse of Peter 25 [A.D. 137]).

Athenagoras

“What man of sound mind, therefore, will affirm, while such is our character, that we are murderers?
. . . [W]hen we say that those women who use drugs to bring on abortion commit murder, and will have to give an account to God for the abortion, on what principle should we commit murder? For it does not belong to the same person to regard the very fetus in the womb as a created being, and therefore an object of God’s care, and when it has passed into life, to kill it; and not to expose an infant, because those who expose them are chargeable with child-murder, and on the other hand, when it has been reared to destroy it” (A Plea for the Christians 35 [A.D. 177]).

Tertullian

“In our case, a murder being once for all forbidden, we may not destroy even the fetus in the womb, while as yet the human being derives blood from the other parts of the body for its sustenance. To hinder a birth is merely a speedier man-killing; nor does it matter whether you take away a life that is born, or destroy one that is coming to birth. That is a man which is going to be one; you have the fruit already in its seed” (Apology 9:8 [A.D. 197]).

"Among surgeons’ tools there is a certain instrument, which is formed with a nicely-adjusted flexible frame for opening the uterus first of all and keeping it open; it is further furnished with an annular blade, by means of which the limbs [of the child] within the womb are dissected with anxious but unfaltering care; its last appendage being a blunted or covered hook, wherewith the entire fetus is extracted by a violent delivery.

"There is also [another instrument in the shape of] a copper needle or spike, by which the actual death is managed in this furtive robbery of life: They give it, from its infanticide function, the name of embruosphaktes, [meaning] “the slayer of the infant,” which of course was alive. . . .

“[The doctors who performed abortions] all knew well enough that a living being had been conceived, and [they] pitied this most luckless infant state, which had first to be put to death, to escape being tortured alive” (The Soul 25 [A.D. 210]).

“Now we allow that life begins with conception because we contend that the soul also begins from conception; life taking its commencement at the same moment and place that the soul does” (ibid., 27).

“The law of Moses, indeed, punishes with due penalties the man who shall cause abortion [Ex. 21:22–24]” (ibid., 37).

Minucius Felix

“There are some [pagan] women who, by drinking medical preparations, extinguish the source of the future man in their very bowels and thus commit a parricide before they bring forth. And these things assuredly come down from the teaching of your [false] gods. . . . To us [Christians] it is not lawful either to see or hear of homicide” (Octavius 30 [A.D. 226]).

Hippolytus

“Women who were reputed to be believers began to take drugs to render themselves sterile, and to bind themselves tightly so as to expel what was being conceived, since they would not, on account of relatives and excess wealth, want to have a child by a slave or by any insignificant person. See, then, into what great impiety that lawless one has proceeded, by teaching adultery and murder at the same time!” (Refutation of All Heresies [A.D. 228]).

(Continued in next post)

 

[vern_humphrey]

Catholic Positions on Abortion (Continued)

Lactantius

"When God forbids us to kill, he not only prohibits us from open violence, which is not even allowed by the public laws, but he warns us against the commission of those things which are esteemed lawful among men. . . . Therefore, let no one imagine that even this is allowed, to strangle newly-born children, which is the greatest impiety; for God breathes into their souls for life, and not for death. But men, that there may be no crime with which they may not pollute their hands, deprive [unborn] souls as yet innocent and simple of the light which they themselves have not given.

“Can anyone, indeed, expect that they would abstain from the blood of others who do not abstain even from their own? But these are, without any controversy, wicked and unjust” (Divine Institutes 6:20 [A.D. 307]).

Council of Ancyra

“Concerning women who commit fornication, and destroy that which they have conceived, or who are employed in making drugs for abortion, a former decree excluded them until the hour of death, and to this some have assented. Nevertheless, being desirous to use somewhat greater lenity, we have ordained that they fulfill ten years [of penance], according to the prescribed degrees” (canon 21 [A.D. 314]).

Basil the Great

“Let her that procures abortion undergo ten years’ penance, whether the embryo were perfectly formed, or not” (First Canonical Letter, canon 2 [A.D. 374]).

“He that kills another with a sword, or hurls an axe at his own wife and kills her, is guilty of willful murder; not he who throws a stone at a dog, and unintentionally kills a man, or who corrects one with a rod, or scourge, in order to reform him, or who kills a man in his own defense, when he only designed to hurt him. But the man, or woman, is a murderer that gives a philtrum, if the man that takes it dies upon it; so are they who take medicines to procure abortion; and so are they who kill on the highway, and rapparees” (ibid., canon 8).

John Chrysostom

“Wherefore I beseech you, flee fornication. . . . Why sow where the ground makes it its care to destroy the fruit?—where there are many efforts at abortion?—where there is murder before the birth? For even the harlot you do not let continue a mere harlot, but make her a murderess also. You see how drunkenness leads to prostitution, prostitution to adultery, adultery to murder; or rather to a something even worse than murder. For I have no name to give it, since it does not take off the thing born, but prevents its being born. Why then do thou abuse the gift of God, and fight with his laws, and follow after what is a curse as if a blessing, and make the chamber of procreation a chamber for murder, and arm the woman that was given for childbearing unto slaughter? For with a view to drawing more money by being agreeable and an object of longing to her lovers, even this she is not backward to do, so heaping upon thy head a great pile of fire. For even if the daring deed be hers, yet the causing of it is thine” (Homilies on Romans 24 [A.D. 391]).

Jerome

“I cannot bring myself to speak of the many virgins who daily fall and are lost to the bosom of the Church, their mother. . . . Some go so far as to take potions, that they may insure barrenness, and thus murder human beings almost before their conception. Some, when they find themselves with child through their sin, use drugs to procure abortion, and when, as often happens, they die with their offspring, they enter the lower world laden with the guilt not only of adultery against Christ but also of suicide and child murder” (Letters 22:13 [A.D. 396]).

The Apostolic Constitutions

"Thou shalt not use magic. Thou shalt not use witchcraft; for he says, ‘You shall not suffer a witch to live’ [Ex. 22:18]. Thou shall not slay thy child by causing abortion, nor kill that which is begotten. . . . f it be slain, [it] shall be avenged, as being unjustly destroyed" (Apostolic Constitutions 7:3 [A.D. 400]).