A single woman in her late 30’s starts to feel the pressure of her ticking biological clock. The woman is raped, and finds herself pregnant. Despite her desire to have a baby, after days of anguished thought she realizes she can’t bear to have a rapist’s child. We are grateful she had a choice.
A happily married couple is overjoyed to be expecting their first child. But the woman has a chronic illness, and despite all the careful medical care and preparation for the pregnancy, her health quickly begins to fail. The couple must make a hard decision. Thank goodness they have a choice.
A 12-year-old girl becomes pregnant after years molestation by her father. Luckily, she lives in a state that does not require parental consent for an abortion. It is fortunate she has a choice.
A woman learns she is pregnant with her second child. Her husband has been abusing her and their first child for years. She has tried to leave him repeatedly, but he manages to find her and woo her back every time. She is too afraid to file charges against him, and too afraid to bring another child into the situation. Spousal notification on abortion is not required in her state. At least she has a choice.
These are just a few situations thousands of women across the
I know that it is difficult to accept a pro-choice position if you are a Christian. Abortion is considered murder to many Christians, and murder is immoral. Yet I have to wonder, in light of everything Jesus says in the New Testament, if it is not more immoral to keep these women from having a choice when faced with a difficult pregnancy under harsh circumstances. Is it not immoral to force desperate women to maul themselves with coat hangers or other, equally dangerous methods of ending their pregnancies?
There is one thing that many pro-lifers don’t seem to know or understand: rarely is it easy for any woman to make a decision to have an abortion. It isn’t a game. It isn’t a source of joy. It doesn’t bring pleasure. If you could release the collective grief of all the women in the world who have had abortions, the sadness would be more than the world could bear. It is a choice rarely made lightly. But at least there is a choice.
We must keep abortion safe and legal.
We must always allow women the choice.
Thanks to the folks at BushvsChoice for the blogging effort.
7 comments:
Thank you
great post.
gosh mel, i wish you would stop being so superficial.
;
I'm not here to stir up trouble, love your blog as always Mel, but....
You said: "If you could release the collective grief of all the women in the world who have had abortions, the sadness would be more than the world could bear"
How true this is. The taking of a life is something you can never go back on. Those unborn children are human beings. Someone needs to protect THEM, too. The grief of knowing you took the life of an innocent person who could not defend themself must be immense.
and
"....a difficult pregnancy under harsh circumstances...."
I really can't see where difficult, and harsh, justifies taking a life. The examples you give are regularly given by Pro Choice supporters, as if in some way the misery of the examples justifies murder. The taking of a life is never justified, by anybody, for any reason. There are no grey areas.
I cry, literally cry, when I see such injustice in the world. The injustice of a rape victim. The injustice of a sexual abuse victim. The murder of an innocent person, unable to protect themselves. I cry.
The examples you give are extreme. They happen, but they are extreme. It is true to say that a larger majority of women who choose abortion do so for 'lifestyle' reasons. Whilst you can have sympathy with someone who has suffered, a woman who chooses abortion for lifestle reasons deserves none.
I am yet to see any valid reason that justifies the murder of innocent children.
Thanks Mel, for being so eloquent about this issue.
I guess there's almost no way to convince someone who believes that abortion is murder to come around to the other side. But I'm glad you acknowledged what a difficult decision it is to have an abortion, and why that makes it necessary for choices to be available.
Thanks Mel, for being so eloquent about this issue.
I guess there's almost no way to convince someone who believes that abortion is murder to come around to the other side. But I'm glad you acknowledged what a difficult decision it is to have an abortion, and why that makes it necessary for choices to be available.
Jay, I appreciate your point of view, I really do. I understand that some people consider abortion to be murder (including my husband) but as you see even he thinks abortion should be legal and safe. I don't think a baby is a baby from the point of conception. Obviously, a baby can't survive without the mother up to a certain period of time, and at least until that time, when it is a parasite only, the mother should have a choice. I don't think abortion should be used as birth control but it happens. I can't and won't judge other women's decisions. I just want them to have a way to do it safely, because even if it wasn't legal, they would try. And the results are even more terrifying in those cases.
Obviously, Thanos and I disagree about the spousal consent issue, which we debated a bit this time last year here on the blog. It is another situation where I don't feel I can judge why a woman wouldn't want to tell her spouse about a pregnancy or abortion, but there are cases where it would certainly place an undue burden.
Post a Comment