Need help refuting Abortion position

[Namg]

My mom, who is protestant used this website to defend that the church did not always have a moral position against abortion, and she challenged me to refute it. Could you please help?

liberalslikechrist.org/Catholic/abortionteaching.html

Also, it would be very helpful if you could direct me to a link that could answer in the negative this specific question:

Did the Catholic church ever teach that it is morally acceptable to have an abortion if the health of the mother is in danger?

Thanks!

 

[Wowbagger]

The Church has always maintained a position against abortion. This goes all the way back to one of the earliest non-Scriptural documents in the first-century document known as the Didache:

“Thou shalt do no murder; thou shalt not commit adultery”; thou shalt not commit sodomy; thou shalt not commit fornication; thou shalt not steal; thou shalt not use magic; thou shalt not use philtres [love potion or aphrodisiac]; thou shalt not procure abortion, nor commit infanticide; “thou shalt not covet thy neighbor’s goods”;

No magisterial teaching has ever contradicted the immorality of abortion. No serious theological consensus has ever contradicted the immorality of abortion. The question has never been, “Is abortion evil?” but always, “How evil is abortion?” In other words, “Is abortion murder, or something less?” Popes never varied on the evil of abortion, but they made the penalty for abortion sometimes greater, sometimes less, based on their understandings of fetal ensoulment. This is perfectly normal Catholic teaching at work: while the teachings remain the same, canonical enforcement of them varies based on pastoral concerns and the Curia of the moment.

Aquinas is, as usual, the best exponent of high medieval Catholic thought. He concluded that the soul was not infused until quickening. Based on his understanding of pregnancy, there was no evidence of an animate force working within the foetus until the child “leapt in the womb”, as John in the womb of Elizabeth. Thus, it was at least possible that abortion was not murder. The question was eventually settled not by advances in theology, but by advances in medicine. Improved understanding of the process of pregnancy revealed that, in fact, the human creature is a separate, animate substance from the moment of union between sperm and egg. This proves it has a soul. That means abortion is murder, and there is not one great Catholic theologian or saint in the past two thousand years who would disagree, if they had access to the information we do. Their arguments that abortion was a lesser crime depended on a flawed understanding of human biology.

In any event, while our understanding of what abortion actually is has varied somewhat, our understanding that it is a serious evil has been continuous since the inception of Christianity. Although the question has been raised for legitimate inquiry at various points down the centuries, the Catholic Church has never at any time taught that direct abortion is ever acceptable, even if the life of the mother is in danger.

However – and this is a big however – the Church does maintain that life-saving medical procedures may be performed on the mother, even if those procedures are certain or all but certain to lead to the unintended death of the fetus. For example, a mother with cancer may take chemo therapy. A mother with an ectopic pregnancy may not kill the child with poison or surgical abortion, but may (and perhaps must) have the fallopian tube removed before it kills her, even though it is extremely unlikely that her child will survive the procedure. These are very grave circumstances, but they do arise, and life-saving procedures, with love of both mother and child in mind, are permitted.

Does that make sense?

 

[fermat]

I didn’t see anything on that site that directly quoted or reference church documents. There was a lot of conjecture and supposition.

At the end of the day, it comes down to this: Show me a magisterial document that says that life does not begin at conception. Don’t show me what one of the fathers taught, don’t show me what one of the popes said. Show the me official teaching.

Once you do that, you have an opportunity for education on the difference between a true teaching of the church and a comment made by someone in the church. Not every word uttered by a Catholic is to be considered doctrine. That is a very critical point that the people at this website and your mother clearly don’t understand. Don’t condemn her for that, educate her instead.

 

[Namg]

Thanks for the answers.

Wowbagger, although your answer is very thorough (and I agree with it), I don’t see anything that I could use to show as proof of the church’s official position (i.e. my mom could argue that what you presented is your own opinion). Unless of course you are proposing that I use the Didache as proof? Do you have any official church sources I can refer to?

 

[Hokomai]

I do not agree with the Church’s position on abortion (how could I, since I do not believe in God, and it is belief in God that is at the basis of the church’s position). I have my own conclusions about abortion with coincide in some respects with the church’s position, but not in others. I have done quite a lot of reading on the Church’s position over history and agree that it has changed. the changes are not in the ‘bottom line’ but in deciding the issue of ‘what is a human being’. The Church sees this as something driven mainly by observable fact (that is, science). When science was less advanced, it was unsure when people became people. Now science is more advanced, it says it is sure. At the time the first Catholics were writing about abortion, science such as it was dis not even know about sperm and egg. the Church, however, was pretty much consistent in opposition to abortion. A more fruitful area of study for change is contraception. Again, it has virtually always been opposed, but in earlier days was itself seen as a form of homicide. This has changed. The website cited by the OP is an example of intra-religious propaganda, and quite a sophisticated example of its type. But from my study it contains no facts that have not been well explained within the Catholic tradition. As I said at the start, I reach different conclusions from the Church, and there are reasons to disagree with its teachings on abortion (in my view). But the linked site’s argument are not them.

 

[thistle]

Thanks for the answers.

Wowbagger, although your answer is very thorough (and I agree with it), I don’t see anything that I could use to show as proof of the church’s official position (i.e. my mom could argue that what you presented is your own opinion). Unless of course you are proposing that I use the Didache as proof? Do you have any official church sources I can refer to?

See the Church teaching below. The part I highlighted is a quote from The Didache which is one of the Church references to support the teaching against abortion. The answer to your question is yes you may use The Didache.

CCC 2271 Since the first century the Church has affirmed the moral evil of every procured abortion. This teaching has not changed and remains unchangeable. Direct abortion, that is to say, abortion willed either as an end or a means, is gravely contrary to the moral law:

You shall not kill the embryo by abortion and shall not cause the newborn to perish.75

God, the Lord of life, has entrusted to men the noble mission of safeguarding life, and men must carry it out in a manner worthy of themselves. Life must be protected with the utmost care from the moment of conception: abortion and infanticide are abominable crimes.76

 

[Don_Roberto]

Dear NAMG, as Wowbagger says, the Church is open to learning and growing, under the guidance of the Holy Spirit. It soes so slowly and carefully, and has been consistent for 2,000 years. (The myriad other Christian sects can change at will, insofar as the members believe the Holy Spirit speaks to them personally, i.e., they know best.)

The web page your mother refers to obviously took someone a lot of work. Why? Why would anyone go to such lengths to argue that it is okay for a parent to kill his or her own child? (What would such a person not do?) We are very good at rationalizing in our own self interest. Your mother should consider this. If you know it is not a person and it is in fact not a person, then abortion is okay. If you either know it is a person or do not know (whether it is in fact one or not), abortion is wrong. So the only way abortion can be okay is if you correctly know that the unborn child is not a person. And how could someone assert that they know this? (If it’s not a baby, you aren’t pregrnant. If you are a person, so is your baby.) If I can kill one person, what’s to stop me from killing another? If I want to kill a person, is it likely that I do so from some pure motivation?

Godspeed,

Don Roberto †

 

[Namg]

Thanks for the replies. This helps.

 

[Marc_Anthony]

I do not agree with the Church’s position on abortion (how could I, since I do not believe in God, and it is belief in God that is at the basis of the church’s position).

Well, personally I disagree with that for the simple reason that I was for abortion in specific circumstances, such as rape, until rational arguments convinced me otherwise. The arguments that convinced me were not based on a belief in God.

But this is a digression from the thread topic, I just thought it was worth pointing out that not everybody in the Church is anti-abortion for religious reasons. Were I an atheist, my position would be the same (and I nearly became one).

I have my own conclusions about abortion with coincide in some respects with the church’s position, but not in others. I have done quite a lot of reading on the Church’s position over history and agree that it has changed. the changes are not in the ‘bottom line’ but in deciding the issue of ‘what is a human being’. The Church sees this as something driven mainly by observable fact (that is, science). When science was less advanced, it was unsure when people became people. Now science is more advanced, it says it is sure. At the time the first Catholics were writing about abortion, science such as it was dis not even know about sperm and egg. the Church, however, was pretty much consistent in opposition to abortion.

 

[PrayHarder]

Did the Catholic church ever teach that it is morally acceptable to have an abortion if the health of the mother is in danger?

Thanks!

You should look at the principle of double effect for the answer to this one (en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Principle_of_double_effect).

 

[Wowbagger]

Wowbagger, although your answer is very thorough (and I agree with it), I don’t see anything that I could use to show as proof of the church’s official position (i.e. my mom could argue that what you presented is your own opinion). Unless of course you are proposing that I use the Didache as proof? Do you have any official church sources I can refer to?

You are asking me to prove that the Church has not ever taught that abortion is morally acceptable, and then you ask me to show proof. If you think about this for a moment, this is actually a very odd request: how can I prove that the Church never said something? I can’t produce the absence of documents for you.

The burden of proof is actually on your mum: she must show you one single (1) papal bull or encyclical or (2) anathema of an ecumenical council, anywhere in history, where it is written that abortion is morally licit for any reason. She will not be able to produce one, because none exists.

She will be able to produce (A) papal bulls increasing and decreasing the penalties for abortion, as opinion about the soul of the fetus fluctuates through the centuries, (B) the opinions of some theologians that directly intended abortion is or can be, in some circumstances, a lesser sin than murder, or (C) the teaching that accidental or indirect loss of the child is permitted if (and only if) it happens in the course of a medical procedure necessary to preserve the life of the mother (that teaching is, of course, still applicable today). None of these will suffice to prove her point; they are only the tattered armor for an obstinate resistance to the clear and unambiguous teachings of the modern Church in accord with modern science.

I will give you a little bit of a head start, by (briefly) going through every one of the sources listed in the article you linked:

Gratian’s Decretals (1140), Case 32, Question 2, Part 5:

One who procures abortion before the soul is infused into the body is not a murderer. An embryo which is not yet formed cannot be murdered, nor can it properly be considered a human being in the womb. This depends on the soul, for when something is unformed and has no soul, it cannot be murdered. Something cannot be deprived of a soul if it does not have one… oul does not exist before there is a form. Thus, as it must be infused in an already formed body, this cannot occur at the conception of the body with the introduction of the seed. For if the soul existed as both seed and soul together, many souls would perish daily, whenever seed was emitted that did not result in a birth. (Online Source)

Gratian held that abortion was not murder if performed before the formation of the body. Once the body is formed, of course, there would be a soul, and, according to Gratian, abortion would be murder. Gratian believes, thanks to the contemporary state of biology, that conception is a very gradual process which culminates in the formation of the body and infusion of the soul at quickening, months into the pregnancy. (These are people, remember, who still consider Aristotle’s theory of conception credible – Aristotle believed that the ejaculate was a nourishing fluid which fed the menstrual fluid, retained in the uterus, until it blossomed into an embryo.) We now know that the body actually forms a few days after intercourse, in an event we understand as fertilization. Thus, Gratian’s distinction is a distinction without a difference: it is impossible to perform an abortion before the formation of the body. By definition, abortion takes place after the formation of the body. Today, what Gratian called “abortion before the formation of the body”, we call “contraception” – the killing of sperm before it is able to join with the female seed to form a new organism.

And Gratian is not nice about contraception, by the way. Immediately above his discussion of abortions, he writes, “Those who use contraceptives are not spouses but fornicators.”

Next is Aquinas. The most direct discussion he makes of abortion is in his commentary on the Sentences of Peter Lombard, Book 4, Dist. 31, Question 2, Article 3. Unfortunately, the only text I can find is in Latin, so you will have to bear with my rough on-the-fly translation:

They who actually procure poisons for the purpose of sterility are not spouses, but fornicators. Although (?) this is very much a sin, and must be reckoned among crimes, and is against nature, because they [anticipate the animate fetus] (?), nevertheless it is less than homicide, because here the conceptus has been able to be impeded in another way . Nor must it be judged so very irregular, unless the abortion should be administered when the offspring is already formed.(Source)

Apologies for my rough translation. We see something similar here: Aquinas does not understand that the fetal body is formed and animate prior to quickening, because he has absolutely no idea how conception actually works. Thus, he understands pre-animate abortion to be an act of contraception – which he also judges a very grave evil. He was, of course, wrong about this. There is no such thing as “pre-animate abortion” in the real world, because the new human life becomes animate at fertilization.

The article then says some handwavy stuff about “fifteenth century moralists”. I’m already working way harder than the article’s author here, so I am not going to chase down whatever he/she is talking about.

Augustine, to make a long story short, does the same thing as Aquinas and Aristotle. He draws a distinction between pre-animation and post-animation abortion, condemns both as seriously evil, but only the latter as murder. This distinction is, once again, based in the mistaken believe that the embryo is not immediate animate from the moment of conception. I’m sorry I’m too lazy to provide the citation; it’s just that it’s 3AM out here. If you really need it, I can dig it up.

As for the Popes, you can read Effraenatam for yourself right here. Pope Sixtus V was very, very annoyed about both abortion and sterilization, and prescribed the severest canonical penalties to all of the above – an excommunication which could only be lifted by the Pope himself, irrevocable loss of priestly faculties, and a secular punishment “in the same manner as… against laymen truly and really murderers and assassins.” In addition to applying these canonical penalties (which are a matter of prudence and judgement, and can be changed), he also said that both abortion and contraception are very, very bad. This last part was proclaimed in his pontifical character as an infallible teacher on a matter of faith and morals formally promulgated in an apostolic constitution, and cannot be changed.

Gregory XIV, in his follow-up constitution, Sedes Apostolica, heavily modified the penalties for the crimes of abortion and contraception (the changeable part), not the moral teaching that abortion and contraception are grave evils (the unchangeable part). He restored the theoretical difference between pre-animate abortion and post-animate abortion for the purposes of penances, and reduced the penalties for contraception. Abortion of any kind still incurred excommunication, mind you, but that excommunication could be lifted by the local bishop, instead of just the Pope, and the bishop could further delegate those faculties to his bishop – a system which survives to this day. (Even now, abortion is one of the only crimes that incurs automatic excommunication, as well as mortal sin. Murder of a born person is a mortal sin, but does not incur excommunication automatically.) The sanctions under civil law were also lifted by Pope Greg.

And so the article actually proves my point for me, using the very sources it cites. There is, of course, much more out there, because the Church has had a rich conversation about God and Man for two thousand years. Here are a couple of useful articles: One. Two.

I hope this helps.

 

[Namg]

Wowbagger, that was awesome and helps tremendously. Thanks for taking the time.

 

[fermat]

You are asking me to prove that the Church has not ever taught that abortion is morally acceptable, and then you ask me to show proof. If you think about this for a moment, this is actually a very odd request: how can I prove that the Church never said something? I can’t produce the absence of documents for you.

…

I hope this helps.

:clapping: