Why do we as Catholics believe that life begins at conception?

[Micosil]

I was not talking just about legality, the opinion of majority of the world agrees with my view - that opinion counts for a lot.They deny that terminating a fetus is the same as killing a human being - in other words that the fetus is not a human being. These rights are human rights - the right to control what is inside the woman’s own body. The right not be forced to carry a fetus in her own body.

My contention is that the Christ will agree with this view, and it is best for people not to assume that they know what is right and to try to force the poor women into something they don’t want.

There’s two problems here:

1. 
   *]You seem to think majority makes right. Sorry, but science isn’t a democracy. You have facts and proof and evidence, and nothing else. And as you saw, science definitively settles the issue on whether a fetus is a human being or not.
   *]You got the balancing act wrong; OK, so the woman is suffering, is under a lot of stress, her health is degrading, that all may be true. But if what is in her a human being, do her “rights” to be relieved of these burdens outweigh the dignity and intrinsic value of the human life of the fetus?

 

[Rau]

…However, a majority of the world’s population and countries do not consider that a fetus is a human being…

No, people know their offspring is human life. They rationalise why the mother has a superior right to their offspring, up until a point where the rationalisation is untenable.

 

[openmind77]

No, people know their offspring is human life. They rationalise why the mother has a superior right to their offspring, up until a point where the rationalisation is untenable.

You can believe whatever you choose - that your own beliefs are sincere and everyone else’s are insincere, rationalized or ‘manufactured’. But the fact is your group and the rest of the world has a difference of opinion which will only be resolved when the Christ returns.

To believe that the Christ will automatically agree with you is to be in denial - there will be an unpleasant shock to learn that he does not agree with everything that you profess.

The main point is that if anyone has spent their time in persecuting these women in belief that they are doing “God’s” work will have to answer for their actions.

 

[guanophore]

I was not talking just about legality, the opinion of majority of the world agrees with my view - that opinion counts for a lot.They deny that terminating a fetus is the same as killing a human being - in other words that the fetus is not a human being.

Do you have any sources to support this assertion?

These rights are human rights - the right to control what is inside the woman’s own body. The right not be forced to carry a fetus in her own body.

Human rights protect all humans, including the unborn. Taking innocent life is not a way of respecting human rights.

Most people that get abortions do not do so because they feel “forced to carry a fetus”. They willingly and knowingly engaged in the activity that creates offspring, then decide they don’t want to accept the consequences.

 

[Rau]

You can believe whatever you choose - that your own beliefs are sincere and everyone else’s are insincere, rationalized or ‘manufactured’. But the fact is your group and the rest of the world has a difference of opinion…

The difference of opinion is not about the meaning of humanity, but about whose rights can be said to prevail.

 

[openmind77]

The difference of opinion is not about the meaning of humanity, but about whose rights can be said to prevail.

This difference in opinion is between the rights of woman to control what is inside her body, decide if she will or will not carry the fetus to birth and the right of the fetus to be born.

However, you and I, have no rights in this difference of opinion, we are observers with no right to interfere. You (I don’t mean you personally) should not be dictating to the woman what she can or can not do.

When the Christ returns he will explain how the rights of these two - the pregnant woman and the fetus, can be resolved. And you may be quite surprised by his resolution - we all should not be so sure of our own beliefs.

 

[guanophore]

This difference in opinion is between the rights of woman to control what is inside her body, decide if she will or will not carry the fetus to birth and the right of the fetus to be born.

Well, yes and no. It is not a “what” that is in her body, but a “who”. If we are going to say that women should be able to have control, why just limit it to the unborn? Why not make it legal for her to kill her infant? She did, after all, bring it out of her own body, and so it is hers to decide, right?

You are correct, it is also about the right of the child within her to be born.

However, you and I, have no rights in this difference of opinion, we are observers with no right to interfere. You (I don't mean you personally) should not be dictating to the woman what she can or can not do.

If we follow this reasoning, then we will not dictate to rapists that they are not allowed to rape, not dictate to gangsters that they cannot do home invasions, not dictate to car thieves that they are not allowed to steal cars.

You see, the truth is that we “dictate” plenty of things.

When the Christ returns he will explain how the rights of these two - the pregnant woman and the fetus, can be resolved. And you may be quite surprised by his resolution - we all should not be so sure of our own beliefs.

He has already done so. There will be no surprises for those who have already accepted what He has revealed.

“It is a poverty to decide that a child must die so that you may live as you wish.”
~ Blessed Mother Teresa ~

Pro Life Quotations of Mother Teresa

 

[Micosil]

This difference in opinion is between the rights of woman to control what is inside her body, decide if she will or will not carry the fetus to birth and the right of the fetus to be born.

However, you and I, have no rights in this difference of opinion, we are observers with no right to interfere. You (I don’t mean you personally) should not be dictating to the woman what she can or can not do.

When the Christ returns he will explain how the rights of these two - the pregnant woman and the fetus, can be resolved. And you may be quite surprised by his resolution - we all should not be so sure of our own beliefs.

You wouldn’t be saying that once the child is born; the mother is a single woman struggling to make ends meet and trying to finish college, and the child is a week old, say. Let’s go ahead and just kill it! That logic sounds messed up, doesn’t it? So, ontologically speaking, what separates a fetus from a newborn baby? Or from a toddler? Or a child? Or a teenager, adult, or old person? According to Scott F. Gilbert, the Howard A. Schneiderman Professor of Biology (emeritus) at Swarthmore College, there is none.

Traditional ways of classifying catalog animals according to their adult structure. But, as J. T. Bonner (1965) pointed out, this is a very artificial method, because what we consider an individual is usually just a brief slice of its life cycle. When we consider a dog, for instance, we usually picture an adult. But the dog is a “dog” from the moment of fertilization of a dog egg by a dog sperm. It remains a dog even as a senescent dying hound. Therefore, the dog is actually the entire life cycle of the animal, from fertilization through death.

— Scott Gilbert, Developmental Biology

 

[Brendan]

I was not talking just about legality, These rights are human rights - the right to control what is inside the woman’s own body. The right not be forced to carry a fetus in her own body. .

You still didn’t answer the question, WHO gave them these rights, if not the civil law?

Where can I find where this right was given?

 

[estesbob]

You wouldn’t be saying that once the child is born; the mother is a single woman struggling to make ends meet and trying to finish college, and the child is a week old, say. Let’s go ahead and just kill it! That logic sounds messed up, doesn’t it? So, ontologically speaking, what separates a fetus from a newborn baby? Or from a toddler? Or a child? Or a teenager, adult, or old person? According to Scott F. Gilbert, the Howard A. Schneiderman Professor of Biology (emeritus) at Swarthmore College, there is none.

— Scott Gilbert, Developmental Biology

The law recognizes this with every species but the human being. For instance the fine for destroying a bald eagle egg is the same as it is for destroying a bald eagle

 

[guanophore]

You still didn’t answer the question, WHO gave them these rights, if not the civil law?

Where can I find where this right was given?

After reading this thread, it seems clear to me that the rights are being assigned by the Almigthy and Omnipotnet OpenMinded One!

 

[Micosil]

The law recognizes this with every species but the human being. For instance the fine for destroying a bald eagle egg is the same as it is for destroying a bald eagle

Not to mention the double standard of charging people with homicide if a fetus is killed by external aggression against the mother. But when she wants it gone, she’s proclaimed a national hero. Go figure.

 

[openmind77]

You still didn’t answer the question, WHO gave them these rights, if not the civil law?

Where can I find where this right was given?

Everybody has a right to control their own body. I am not sure why anybody needs to give it to us.

If you are alone on an island with your family without a government or civil law, each member of the family has a right to control their own body, that should be obvious - it is their personal, individual property, nobody else’s - no civil law is needed to understand that.

The pregnant woman’s body belongs to her, nobody has a right to dictate that she carry something inside her for any length of time. She therefore has a right to ask that anything inside her body be removed. Of course if the fetus is viable on its own, we should always try to save it. That way both rights are preserved. Of course, the rest of us busybodies have no rights in this situation.

When the Christ returns he will no doubt explain this far more clearly, but in the meantime if anyone attempts to take away this woman’s rights, they will have to answer for their actions to the Christ.

 

[StevenFrancis]

The woman has the right to control her body and has the right to decide what is inside her own body.

This is true, unless that which is in her own body is another person. Then the right to decide, (which would be properly exercised when deciding whether or not to participate in actions designed to create new human beings), becomes a responsibility to nurture the new life, from a moral and biological and ethical stand point. The ‘right’ usually referred to has it’s creation in western modern politics. It is not supported by ethics, morals, or biology.

She is not killing anyone, she is asking that a fetus (which is not yet a human being) be removed from her own body.

The science just simply isn’t there to support the political argument that a human life is a life on day x, but not a life on day z. It’s not a fact of biology. It is an immoral and unethical claim of modern leftist politics only. The fact is that a human life is created at fertilization of an egg by a sperm. This is not hidden esoteric knowledge. It is widely available knowledge.

Of course some people will say that the body does not belong to the woman and belongs to God (or something like that). In either case, it is not anyone else’s, God is quite capable of taking care of his interests, so all these other people should just mind their own business.

The reason that religious people have taken the lead in presenting the ethical, and moral argument is because there weren’t enough secular sources doing so at first. Now there are plenty. It is NOT a “religious” issue. It is an ethics, morals and biological issue. God need not be involved in order for the pro-life cause to be true and correct. They are simply the ones leading the charge, out of a sense of social justice which goes hand in hand with their theology. But this issue goes much farther than the scope of religion. In fact the cause is natural. It is simply humans seeing the injustice in killing or preventing other human beings from their natural right to live. To come to be. Just as the parents were given the right to come to be.

Until the Christ returns (which will be very soon) we can talk about this in circles for ever. But in the meantime those people who continue to make this unfortunate woman’s life miserable and difficult and harder than it already is, will have to answer to the Christ for their actions when he is here.

It sounds as if you are a religious person. You are mentioning Christ, and His return. Do you honestly believe, in your heart of hearts, that those fellow religious persons who pray for the unborn babies and their mothers have more to answer for at the judgement than those who hired people to go inside their own bodies to stop the heart and crush the head of their own sons and daughters? Speaking personally, I have much to answer for in this life, and God will be just in His judgement of me. I am sorry for many things I have done in this life. Loving unborn life, and praying for them publically and privately, and standing up for their God given right to exist is not one of things I’m particularly troubled about having examined at the judgement.

 

[Brendan]

Everybody has a right to control their own body. I am not sure why anybody needs to give it to us. .

If no one gives something to us, we do not have it. That is a simple fact of existence itself.

We have bodies, because God gave them to us, for example. God gave them existence.

So if these rights exist, they must have been given existence. If they were given existence by people, they are legal rights.

So either these rights were given to us, or they do not exist. Which one is it?

If they exist, the who gave them us, the legal system, or God?

If you are alone on an island with your family without a government or civil law, each member of the family has a right to control their own body, that should be obvious - it is their personal, individual property, nobody else’s - no civil law is needed to understand that.

If there is property, there is ownership. And ownership is conferred. For material goods, that is conferred by the government. So is the body material, and thus ownership is a government right, or did this ownership come from someplace else.

 

[guanophore]

Everybody has a right to control their own body. I am not sure why anybody needs to give it to us.

I agree that everyone has a right to control one’s own body, but perhaps you do not realize what great lengths the woman’s body must go to prevent rejection of the fetus as a foreign body BECAUSE IT IS ANOTHER PERSON.

If you are alone on an island with your family without a government or civil law, each member of the family has a right to control their own body, that should be obvious - it is their personal, individual property, nobody else’s - no civil law is needed to understand that.

This flawed reasoning, thinking of one’s body as “property” leads to lowing the dignity of all human beings, especially when we make other human beings “property” and take ownership over their bodies.

What about the rights of the father, of whom that child is 50%? Why are his rights set aside, so that the woman has the right to kill his offspring?

The pregnant woman’s body belongs to her, nobody has a right to dictate that she carry something inside her for any length of time. She therefore has a right to ask that anything inside her body be removed. Of course if the fetus is viable on its own, we should always try to save it. That way both rights are preserved. Of course, the rest of us busybodies have no rights in this situation.

The person growing inside her is not a 'whatever" but a 'WHO".

When the Christ returns he will no doubt explain this far more clearly, but in the meantime if anyone attempts to take away this woman’s rights, they will have to answer for their actions to the Christ.

Since we do not recognize any human being has the right to take the life of an innocent for their own convenience this will not be a problem.

 

[openmind77]

,
We have bodies, because God gave them to us, for example. God gave them existence.
…
If they exist, the who gave them us, the legal system, or God?
…

Sure God gave us the bodies. He also gave the pregnant woman her body not to anyone else. She has the sole right to her own body not anyone else. So yes, God gave her the body and the sole right over it, not any government or any group of people.

You could say God owns her body, but does not give anyone else the right to dictate what she does with her body. She has the right to ask anything inside her body be removed. Those who interfere with this right and make her life harder, make her suffer more than she is already, will have to answer for those actions on Judgment Day,

 

[JimG]

It seems that openmind has a closed mind on the subject. Facts are of no avail. Embryology is useless. Subjectivism rules. The child in the womb is defenseless, to be killed at will.

 

[clem456]

Sure God gave us the bodies. He also gave the pregnant woman her body not to anyone else. She has the sole right to her own body not anyone else. So yes, God gave her the body and the sole right over it, not any government or any group of people.

You could say God owns her body, but does not give anyone else the right to dictate what she does with her body. She has the right to ask anything inside her body be removed. Those who interfere with this right and make her life harder, make her suffer more than she is already, will have to answer for those actions on Judgment Day,

No individual has an absolute right to their own bodily autonomy. The right of every person to exist is paramount, and is not subject to the convenience, or state of mind, or state of life, etc… of another.
Your position is barbaric. It allows for genocide and slavery, since the rights of one person are subject to the whims of another

You keep referring to Christ and judgment day, yet you are a Hindu.
Can you explain this inconsistency?

 

[Porknpie]

These rights are human rights

This is a very interesting comment.

Who determines what is a human “right” and on what basis is this done?