Why do some Catholics support legal abortion?

[fix]

Really well put! When dealing with abortion, I have to go to the default priority of conscience. I know a woman who had to choose between her life and the life of her children, and she decided not leave her other four children orphans. I would not begrudge her that choice, and would hate to think that she would need to save herself and her other children with a coat hanger. Abortion as birth control is wrong, but there are cases where I can understand the need for abortion as an option.

Erroneous conscience is never above truth.

 

[sedonaman]

Because some people require constant change in the social status quo.

 

[Bookcat]

“Guest appearance” on Catholic Answers Forum…

Q: Why do some Catholics support legal abortion?*

A: Pope Benedict XVI:

"It strikes me as significant that here in America, unlike many places in Europe, the secular mentality has not been intrinsically opposed to religion. Within the context of the separation of Church and State, American society has always been marked by a fundamental respect for religion and its public role, and, if polls are to be believed, the American people are deeply religious. But it is not enough to count on this traditional religiosity and go about business as usual, even as its foundations are being slowly undermined. A serious commitment to evangelization cannot prescind from a profound diagnosis of the real challenges the Gospel encounters in contemporary American culture.

Of course, what is essential is a correct understanding of the just autonomy of the secular order, an autonomy which cannot be divorced from God the Creator and his saving plan (cf. Gaudium et Spes, 36). Perhaps America’s brand of secularism poses a particular problem: it allows for professing belief in God, and respects the public role of religion and the Churches, but at the same time it can subtly reduce religious belief to a lowest common denominator. Faith becomes a passive acceptance that certain things “out there” are true, but without practical relevance for everyday life. The result is a growing separation of faith from life: living “as if God did not exist”. This is aggravated by an individualistic and eclectic approach to faith and religion: far from a Catholic approach to “thinking with the Church”, each person believes he or she has a right to pick and choose, maintaining external social bonds but without an integral, interior conversion to the law of Christ. Consequently, rather than being transformed and renewed in mind, Christians are easily tempted to conform themselves to the spirit of this age (cf. Rom 12:3). We have seen this emerge in an acute way in the scandal given by Catholics who promote an alleged right to abortion.

On a deeper level, secularism challenges the Church to reaffirm and to pursue more actively her mission in and to the world. As the Council made clear, the lay faithful have a particular responsibility in this regard. What is needed, I am convinced, is a greater sense of the intrinsic relationship between the Gospel and the natural law on the one hand, and, on the other, the pursuit of authentic human good, as embodied in civil law and in personal moral decisions. In a society that rightly values personal liberty, the Church needs to promote at every level of her teaching – in catechesis, preaching, seminary and university instruction – an apologetics aimed at affirming the truth of Christian revelation, the harmony of faith and reason, and a sound understanding of freedom, seen in positive terms as a liberation both from the limitations of sin and for an authentic and fulfilling life. In a word, the Gospel has to be preached and taught as an integral way of life, offering an attractive and true answer, intellectually and practically, to real human problems. The “dictatorship of relativism”, in the end, is nothing less than a threat to genuine human freedom, which only matures in generosity and fidelity to the truth."

(Such is really his words…make sure to read all of the above…you will see he answers the question I fictiously put to him in his real answer to a question posed to him)

*(real Q) The Holy Father is asked to give his assessment of the challenge of increasing secularism in public life and relativism in intellectual life, and his advice on how to confront these challenges pastorally and evangelize more effectively.

(more of his ansser vatican.va/holy_father/benedict_xvi/speeches/2008/april/documents/hf_ben-xvi_spe_20080416_response-bishops_en.html)

 

[CatSci]

I don’t think that some abortions should be illegal because they aren’t murder. A blastocyst isn’t a person so it doesn’t have any legal rights. The mother is and does.

Ultimately, its the mother’s choice as to what happens to the conseptus. I’d rather those who don’t want to be pregnant have a medical option over the other termination alternatives. Too, society shouldn’t be forcing those women to do things with their own bodies.

 

[fix]

I don’t think that some abortions should be illegal because they aren’t murder. A blastocyst isn’t a person so it doesn’t have any legal rights. The mother is and does.

Ultimately, its the mother’s choice as to what happens to the conseptus. I’d rather those who don’t want to be pregnant have a medical option over the other termination alternatives. Too, society shouldn’t be forcing those women to do things with their own bodies.

When is a baby a human?

 

[CatSci]

When is a baby a human?

Huh? Are you asking when does a conceptus become a person?

Medically, I don’t know. There doesn’t seem to be a “point” as its all very gradual. Even the conception phase isn’t really a “point”.

Legally, its at birth.

 

[fix]

Huh? Are you asking when does a conceptus become a person?

Medically, I don’t know. There doesn’t seem to be a “point” as its all very gradual. Even the conception phase isn’t really a “point”.

Legally, its at birth.

If it is all “gradual” then why kill the person? In fact, claiming the person is not a person based on developmental stages is arbitrary. Any time other than conception is arbitrary.

 

[sedonaman]

When is a baby a human?

Never. It is the property of the mother.

 

[Bookcat]

Legally, its at birth.

Try murdering a pregnant woman…and see how far you get on avoiding 2 counts of murder! (*rightly so!)

 

[Bookcat]

Catechism:

2270 Human life must be respected and protected absolutely from the moment of conception. From the first moment of his existence, a human being must be recognized as having the rights of a person - among which is the inviolable right of every innocent being to life.

…no matter how young or how small…be it 1 week…or 23 weeks or 1 second old.

 

[CatSci]

If it is all “gradual” then why kill the person?

Since it is all gradual, then at the early stages it isn’t a person that you’re “killing”.

In fact, claiming the person is not a person based on developmental stages is arbitrary. Any time other than conception is arbitrary.

A blastocyst is not a person. And conception is just as arbitrary as any other “point”.

 

[anonymousdollz]

The Church isn’t perfect. Yes we are all called to be saints. But first and foremost it is a church of sinners. Church is to partake in the Eucharist and to answer our call to holiness.

 

[Bookcat]

Since it is all gradual, then at the early stages it isn’t a person that you’re “killing”.

A blastocyst is not a person. And conception is just as arbitrary as any other “point”.

Yellow is white and black is actually red.

Oh and a person is not a person until they get a college degree.

 

[CatSci]

Try murdering a pregnant woman…and see how far you get on avoiding 2 counts of murder! (*rightly so!)

The people who push for the unborn to be counted in homicides are the same ones who push for the criminality of abortion. If they’re wrong on one then they’re wrong on the other, so the former isn’t an argument for the latter.

Catechism:

2270 Human life must be respected and protected absolutely from the moment of conception. From the first moment of his existence, a human being must be recognized as having the rights of a person - among which is the inviolable right of every innocent being to life.

Laws aren’t supposed to be based on religion.

And if you’re so concerned about every single conceptus, then what about all the ones that are naturally aborted? Only about 40% of conceptions come to term. Rather than pushing for the criminality of abortion, shouldn’t you be funding scientific research in the prevention of lost conceptions? Pragmatically, you’d be saving a heck of a lot more souls that way.

 

[CatSci]

Yellow is white and black is actually red.

Oh and a person is not a person until they get a college degree.

Sorry, I thought you were going to be serious.

The thread is a question of legality. Personhood has a legal definition that does not include blastocysts.

 

[Bookcat]

Rather than pushing for the criminality of abortion, shouldn’t you be funding scientific research in the prevention of lost conceptions? Pragmatically, you’d be saving a heck of a lot more souls that way.

Aaaa…who says there are not prolife institutions that are not working on saving the lives of those who miscarry…

Miscarriage is (all things being equal) an involuntary happening – like other deadly medical events that happen that people do not want…

Abortion is the direct murder of an unborn child.

 

[Bookcat]

Sorry, I thought you were going to be serious.

.

I was.

If one wants to be arbitrary --might as well go all out.

 

[Bookcat]

Laws aren’t supposed to be based on religion.

.

Your in the wrong forum. This is the Catholic Answers forum. The question is about Catholics.

(PS: but I will note that a law recognizing the inviolable right of an unborn child from the moment of conception is not per se a religious thing. Sure Christians recognize such and teach the truth regarding such -but the matter is not just a Christian matter)

 

[Roy5]

Permit me to repeat a case study personally familiar to me.

A couple - devoutly Catholic - had six young children. They always had depended upon the church-approved form of birth control. The wife had been warned by her doctor that she should have no more children as it likely this could mean her death and that of the baby. The husband wanted to use artificial birth control but the woman consulted the priest who told her that this would be a big sin. The couple should welcome as many children as ‘God sent them’. Anyway, she became pregnant again. The doctor warned her again, too, and so did the priest.

The husband favored a very early abortion. He found evidence that in the early church men like Augustine had taught that the baby did not receive a soul until two months or so after conception. The wife refused and attended church every day, praying to the Blessed Virgin Mother and various sints to keep her and her baby safe. 

 As the doctor had warned, both died. The husband was both in deep grief and incensed and blamed the priest and the church. Six children under 12 were now motherless and also mourning. 

 In that sort of situation, I think the priest should have told the mother that the decision was hers to make, according to her conscience, rather than emphasize the 'sin' involved. I am inclined to think that the bigger sin was risking the life of the mother and her baby - and the happiness and well being of the other six children and their father.

 The father immediately left the Church, brought his children to the Episcopal Church, and has nothing but bitterness toward Catholicism.

 There are rules and then there are exceptions to rules. Jesus promoted exceptions as when he stopped the men from stoning the women condemned of adultery, or when he healed on the Sabbath - etc. Christianity should  not be a straight-jacket that does more to imprison than to free. Jesus didn't say a word about abortions. As for 'thou shalt not kill' we make exceptions all the time, in cases of self-defense, and certainly when we go to war. (Yes, I know about the just war theory.)

 Abortion is usually wrong - agreed. Far better is artificial birth control which 90% of Catholics practice at sometime in their lives anyway. It is one of the advancements made by medical science, along with brain surgery, various transplants, artificial limbs, etc. The Church's position on it causes deaths by increasing abortions. Besides, if God wants to give babies to women the approved method of birth control also should be condemned. And besides that, mother nature (God, ultimately?) is responsible for the most abortions, which we call miscarriages.

 

[Bookcat]

Permit me to repeat a case study personally familiar to me.

It is NOT simply about “rules”. It is about truth and life. Nor is the evil of contraception simply about “rules”…(as if they were some rules of a game or something one can make an exception to…)