Should Medical Abortion Be Restricted?

[Silver Girl]

I cannot use my own name here, someone else has taken the name "Lehi" on this forum. He has not posted in four or five years, maybe longer, but the name is locked up.

As noted above, I have made exactly the same statement several times this year (and long before that, too).

I do sign every message "Lehi" for all 9,000 or so messages I've written (although many are no longer on the data base due to at least two upgrades to the system). I'd hope that is not lost on those who read them.

Lehi

Well, please accept my sincere apologies for not knowing... I guess I have missed your previous statements, since this is one of the only posts from you I have read...

It won't be a problem again...

Silver Girl

[LeSellers]

Well, please accept my sincere apologies for not knowing... I guess I have missed your previous statements, since this is one of the only posts from you I have read...

It isn't so terribly important, just my preference. I take no offense, and don't have any illusion that people ought to know and are purposefully trying to insult me.

It won't be a problem again...

It wasn't a problem in the first place. But I appreciate your efforts.

Lehi

[3DOP]

26 to 1 against my position so far. Allow me to admit that I have no argument for those who deny that unborn babies are innocent human life. Of course I agree that if the innocent life is non-human, it has no rights under the laws of God or man to occupy the body of someone that would like to get rid of it. I also see no possible course except the protection of each and every innocent human life, no matter how it was conceived.

Before legalized abortion had become the law in the "civilized world", Pope Pius XII offered some important and I think timeless principles which make it impossible for me to distinguish between an innocent life that cannot be aborted and an innocent life which can be aborted because the father was a rapist or relative. The third and fourth quotes lay out principles regarding the sometimes sad medical necessity to save the life of the mother or child in such a way that the death of the other, though not desired, is inevitable.

The inviolability of the life of an innocent human being does not depend on its greater or lesser value

---Pope Pius XII (1952) , Papal Pronouncements on Marriage and the Family, Greenwood Press (1982), p. 81

"To save the life of the mother is a very noble act; but the direct killing of the child as a means to such an end is illicit."

---Pope Pius XII, Allocution to the Conference of Catholic Obstetricians, October 29, 1951

Speaking of the divine commandment, "Thou shalt not kill":

The principle is as valid for the life of the child as for the mother's. Never and in no case has the Church taught that the life of the child must be preferred to that of the mother. It is erroneous to put the question with this alternative: either the life of the child, or that of the mother. No, neither the life of the mother nor that of the child can be subjected to an act of direct suppression. In the one case as in the other, there can be but one obligation: to make every effort to save the lives of both, of the mother and of the child.

---Pope Pius XII, Allocution to the Congress of Large Families, November 28, 1951

On purpose We have always used the expression "direct attempt on the life of an innocent person," "direct killing." Because if, for example, the saving of the life of the future mother, independently of her pregnant state, should urgently require a surgical act or other therapeutic treatment which would have as an accessory consequence, in no way desired nor intended but inevitable, the death of the fetus, such act could no longer be called a direct attempt on an innocent life. Under these conditions the operation can be licit...

---Papal Pronouncements on Marriage and the Family, Greenwood Press (1982), p. 83

[Hughes]

26 to 1 against my position so far. Allow me to admit that I have no argument for those who deny that unborn babies are innocent human life. Of course I agree that if the innocent life is non-human, it has no rights under the laws of God or man to occupy the body of someone that would like to get rid of it. I also see no possible course except the protection of each and every innocent human life, no matter how it was conceived.

26 to 1?

I'd argue that human life has value based on it's intrinsic nature not what it's capable of doing or not.

In essence, that once the zygote forms at conception it is innocent human life. And should be protected from all attackers.

[3DOP]

26 to 1?

I'd argue that human life has value based on it's intrinsic nature not what it's capable of doing or not.

In essence, that once the zygote forms at conception it is innocent human life. And should be protected from all attackers.

Hi Hughes. Thirty votes cast. It is now 29 to 1. I am the only one who cannot endorse the deliberate killing of the innocent unborn child whose father was a rapist or relative of the mother.

[Deborah]

A woman certainly has the right to control her own body. When she becomes pregnant, however, a couple of things happen. First and primarily, she voluntarily (in the vast majority of cases) acted in a way that led directly to the pregnancy; there are, in spite of the news, very few rapes in any place in the world:

Lehi, I am shocked you would say such a thing. Do you have any idea how many rapes are not reported? Do you have any idea how many women in third world countries get raped as a matter of course? Why do you think AIDS is so rampant in some areas of the world.

I would agree that many women may put themselves in dangerous situations, often unwittingly, but that doesn't excuse a man who when it comes down to it continues to force himself on a woman who is trying to fight him off.

[Hughes]

Hi Hughes. Thirty votes cast. It is now 29 to 1. I am the only one who cannot endorse the deliberate killing of the innocent unborn child whose father was a rapist or relative of the mother.

Well, I'd agree with you, but the life of the mother is coupled with the other two. It seems to me that the life of the mother has to be taken into account.

[CV75]

Hi Hughes. Thirty votes cast. It is now 29 to 1. I am the only one who cannot endorse the deliberate killing of the innocent unborn child whose father was a rapist or relative of the mother.

In those rare cases where God condones a particular decision to abort it should be accepted as His will.

[mfbukowski]

In those rare cases where God condones a particular decision to abort it should be accepted as His will.

Thanks to the Lord for personal revelation.

[LeSellers]

Lehi, I am shocked you would say such a thing. Do you have any idea how many rapes are not reported? Do you have any idea how many women in third world countries get raped as a matter of course? Why do you think AIDS is so rampant in some areas of the world.

Sigh!

Yes, I realize all of these things. That's why, in a later message, I did the math. The official guess is that, in USmerica, 1 in 6 rapes is reported. There were 9,500 reported in 2008. That means there were approximately 60,000 total incidents that year.

As for third world countries, the data are spotty at best. Yes, AIDS is rampant, and due, partly to rape, but more to prostitution and homosexual activity. Like it or not, prostitution is not rape.

Rape as a weapon of war is quite common. But even there, as in all of the examples you raise, we re comparing it to the incidence of consensual sexual intercourse. In USmerica, the calculation is about 1:4,000 sexual events is rape. If this were increased by a factor of 100, it would still be a relatively small fraction. I am not trying to diminish the harm inflicted by a rape, but we are not investigating rape here, we're looking at whether abortion ought to be restricted. The point of my raising rape statistics was to demonstrate that the argument typically thrown in the faces of opponents of unlimited abortions is "we have to protect women who've been raped." The number of rape-induced pregnancies is trivial in comparison to the numbers of pregnancies due to consensual intercourse. Their arguments are corner cases. As I quoted earlier: "Hard cases make bad law."

I would agree that many women may put themselves in dangerous situations, often unwittingly, but that doesn't excuse a man who when it comes down to it continues to force himself on a woman who is trying to fight him off.

I'm trying to figure out how you arrived at the conclusion that I am trying to defend the attacker.

Did you see my suggested punishment for a rapist? I suggest you search for the word "frozen" in this topic (or see msg #44).

Lehi

[3DOP]

Well, I'd agree with you, but the life of the mother is coupled with the other two. It seems to me that the life of the mother has to be taken into account.

I offered two our of four quotes to make it clear that the life of the mother is no less important than that of the child.

[Hughes]

In those rare cases where God condones a particular decision to abort it should be accepted as His will.

Please explain a case where God condones a particular decision to abort.

I offered two our of four quotes to make it clear that the life of the mother is no less important than that of the child.

Yeah. I know. I'm not disagreeing with you, only explaining why I didn't vote as you did. I actually am in full agreement with you.

[3DOP]

Yeah. I know. I'm not disagreeing with you, only explaining why I didn't vote as you did. I actually am in full agreement with you.

Hey again Hughes:

You probably don't think of it in these terms. If it comes to the life of the mother...of course there is equality. I think many of you are considering the pain, preference, inconvenience, discomfort, sorrow, and anger of afflicted mothers. I don't think I am failing to understand that I have no experience to compare with such a situation. I think these factors make it heroic when a woman values the innocent human life who only she can keep alive. But I cannot possibly see how that the alleviation of those factors can allow the deliberate destruction of an innocent human life. If you think those non-lethal factors permit innocent human life to be deliberately killed, then we are far from full agreement.

I don't mean to press the point when you say you agree, but I don't see that you are in full agreement with me. Go change your vote! I'll welcome you into my one man club! But so far it appears to me your full agreement is with everybody else when it comes to innocent human life whose father is a rapist or near relative of the mother.

3DOP

[Hughes]

Hey again Hughes:

You probably don't think of it in these terms. If it comes to the life of the mother...of course there is equality. I think many of you are considering the pain, preference, inconvenience, discomfort, sorrow, and anger of afflicted mothers. I don't think I am failing to understand that I have no experience to compare with such a situation. I think these factors make it heroic when a woman values the innocent human life who only she can keep alive. But I cannot possibly see how that the alleviation of those factors can allow the deliberate destruction of an innocent human life. If you think those non-lethal factors permit innocent human life to be deliberately killed, then we are far from full agreement.

I don't mean to press the point when you say you agree, but I don't see that you are in full agreement with me. Go change your vote! I'll welcome you into my one man club! But so far it appears to me your full agreement is with everybody else when it comes to innocent human life whose father is a rapist or near relative of the mother.

3DOP

The only time I think that an abortion is even thinkable is when the life of the mother is threatened.

Should abortion be restricted?

Yes. Exclusions being. Life of the Mother, Rape and Incest

Or

Yes it should be restricted in all cases.

I'm still going to have to stay with Life of the Mother.

If the question was should abortion be illegal in all cases, except for the cases where the mothers life was in danger, then I'd pick that one.

[Stargazer]

Nah, I don't think he was name dropping- he was just emphasizing that he wanted her to know his first name.

Lehi's a cool guy!

Yes, he is a cool guy, and I am one of his biggest fans. Still, throwing two US Presidents into the mix is name-dropping. Not that there's anything wrong with that, understand. From time to time I like to mention that I served in the same mission at the same time as Elder Bruce D. Porter, and even went tracting on a trade-off with his companion when they were Assistants to the MIssion President, Rudolf Poecker. Heck, Elder Porter and I were Branch Presidents together in the Stuttgart Germany Serviceman's Stake in 1983! He in Munich, me in Neu Ulm.

[Stargazer]

There is no intentional connection.

Good. Didn't think so.

To quote our friend mfb, "I don't think he was name dropping- he was just emphasizing that he wanted her to know his first name."

He's dead on.

OK, I see you were just throwing that out there as a memory-aid. I don't have a problem with name-dropping, per se, by the way. I just thought you had an actual connection with these gents where they actually called you by your first name, and that interested me. One of my barracks mates at the Ft. Gordon signal school got assigned to White House Communications after completing his course, so I knew active-duty folks sometimes found themselves serving the President in various capacities.

Dying to tell is not only a gross overstatement, but represents the antithesis of my position. I really do not relish talking about either man.

Well, I know your politics, so I can understand this easily.

My direct (albeit at a distance) connections with Clinton were both painful: First he delayed our taking off from LAX while he got his $500 hair cut, and the second was having to wait, at 10:30 at night, while desperately trying to get back to base the the Presidio of San Francisco so I could sleep before an important briefing I was giving to the commander the next morning. His motorcade blocked the road I was on for twenty minutes while I was nodding off. The motorcade turned left a block before the intersection where I was waiting.

(I had a similar experience with Joe Biteme a few months ago. His motorcade blocked the freeway for a half hour while I was trying to get to work. I'd have been there 20 minutes early but actually arrive nearly an hour late because of the egotistical narcissism of yet another political hack.)

As to the incidents where each called me by my first name, Carter signed my commission as a First Lieutenant and Clinton signed my retirement papers. In addition to the official paperwork, there were "personal" letters thanking me for my service. Both named me as "Lehi", just as my birth certificate (I actually have one and will show it to anyone who asks, unlike some federal officials), school records, and passport all show.

I just prefer "Lehi" to "LeSellers" in this forum. That's all.

Lehi

Right on.

Having been enlisted, no President's signature can be found on any of my paperwork, but if there had been it would have been Carter and Reagan. Joseph Fielding Smith's is on my mission call, however.

[3DOP]

The only time I think that an abortion is even thinkable is when the life of the mother is threatened.

I'm still going to have to stay with Life of the Mother.

If the question was should abortion be illegal in all cases, except for the cases where the mothers life was in danger, then I'd pick that one.

Great. We're getting there then! My position does not allow the direct killing of either life, but it allows the indirect killing of one for the other. My position has options for ectopic pregnancies and other problems that permits procedures that will result in the indirect death of the fetus, but for purpose of saving the mother when the child is going to die anyway.

On purpose We have always used the expression "direct attempt on the life of an innocent person," "direct killing." Because if, for example, the saving of the life of the future mother, independently of her pregnant state, should urgently require a surgical act or other therapeutic treatment which would have as an accessory consequence, in no way desired nor intended but inevitable, the death of the fetus, such act could no longer be called a direct attempt on an innocent life. Under these conditions the operation can be licit...

If theoretically a mother is going to die if the child lives or vice versa, then medicine cannot choose one for the other because:

The inviolability of the life of an innocent human being does not depend on its greater or lesser value.

On what possible grounds could a doctor decide who should live and who should die? Why would the one who lacks a voice die before the one who does? Medicine must, in such an instance do its best to provide for both.

Do you believe that someone who has been in a car crash and whose vital signs are failing should be killed immediately so that his heart can be used to save someone? I bet you agree that we can't directly kill someone who is going to die anyway...even for the purpose of permitting someone else to live with their organs. We cannot deliberately take innocent human life, no matter how precarious that life is, and no matter how much good we think it would do.

I have to ask myself...what if a condemned criminal had the same heart? He is scheduled to die on Friday, but if we can get his heart on Monday it will save someone. Here we are talking about guilty human life. In such an instance, I might be willing to okay the acceleration of the death of the guilty for the sake of the innocent. But you know...I wouldn't want even that on my head. I couldn't even make that decision when the party in question is guilty...how much less for an innocent baby.

3DOP

[Mudcat]

Hi Hughes. Thirty votes cast. It is now 29 to 1. I am the only one who cannot endorse the deliberate killing of the innocent unborn child whose father was a rapist or relative of the mother.

3DOP,

Not Hughes, but I hope you don't mind me interjecting that at the moment you are in a class by yourself (at least on the forum). But that's okay, because your a classy guy IMO.

I do want to bring the thread back into focus for a moment.

I understand you are saying that you disagree with abortion in all cases and can't endorse a position that agrees with it, or at least accepts it in certain circumstances.

To clarify your position I would ask you directly.

Do you believe that abortion for any circumstance should be illegal and restricted under all circumstances?

If so, what charges should be laid upon the woman that kills her unborn child?

This question is equally directed at the forum voters and anyone else for that matter.

If a person is prepared to say that "The buck stops here." wherever "here" may actually be in the terms of restricting abortion. I hope there is a clear understanding that beyond that point, if such abortion were to occur, then it has occurred as the willful and contemplated taking of human life. It's premeditated murder... I don't know if it could be seen differently.

Seems most seem to say that rape, incest and life of the mother are at least justifiable reasons for abortion, even if they disagree that abortion is the best course of action.

Personally, I have been happily perplexed by the number of LDS that have voted that abortion should be restricted at all. I suppose that given the restriction of such impinges free agency in some respect, I had anticipated different results.

Regards,

Mudcat

[CV75]

Please explain a case where God condones a particular decision to abort.

Church policy recognizes this and so provides for these rare cases. I can point to a few things that show that it is entirely reasonable to expect God to confirm the “rare case” decision to abort.

1) God has wiped out groups of men, women (presumably some of which were pregnant) and children by commanding natural disaster, fire and brimstone from heaven, and warfare. I know people throw this out as reasons to hate or not believe in God, to blame religion for such things, but let’s say if one believes in God he will believe that God has commanded the destruction of human beings, including the unborn. I think this was a rare case.

2. Just one of the reasons God commands such things is to prevent further trouble and unfair disadvantage against others, including future generations and their unborn, to find Him and follow Him. I think this was a rare case.

3. The passages in the Book of Mormon that address baptism for little children, the disposition of little children who die before the age of accountability for baptism, etc. demonstrate that God would rescue any unborn or little child if it were expedient for that spirit to continue in mortality (at that place and time, at least) in order to fulfill the requirements for eternal life. “But little children are alive in Christ, even from the foundation of the world; if not so, God is a partial God, and also a changeable God, and a respecter to persons; for how many little children have died without baptism!” “And he that saith that little children need baptism denieth the mercies of Christ, and setteth at naught the atonement of him and the power of his redemption.” I think intervening to rescue an unborn or little child from death is somewhat of a rare case, but far more common than many realize and certainly more common than 1 and 2 above.

[CV75]

Personally, I have been happily perplexed by the number of LDS that have voted that abortion should be restricted at all. I suppose that given the restriction of such impinges free agency in some respect, I had anticipated different results.

It needs to be limited in application so as not to impinge on the agency of others as attitudes toward human life erode. Acceptance and facilitation of easy, thoughtless abortions for convenience and birth control undermine public safety by undermining a higher regard for human life.

[Hughes]

Church policy recognizes this and so provides for these rare cases. I can point to a few things that show that it is entirely reasonable to expect God to confirm the “rare case” decision to abort.

1) God has wiped out groups of men, women (presumably some of which were pregnant) and children by commanding natural disaster, fire and brimstone from heaven, and warfare. I know people throw this out as reasons to hate or not believe in God, to blame religion for such things, but let’s say if one believes in God he will believe that God has commanded the destruction of human beings, including the unborn. I think this was a rare case.

God destroying with natural destruction isn't equal to abortion by humans on other humans. No example there where God is confirming the decision of man to kill or abort a human.

2. Just one of the reasons God commands such things is to prevent further trouble and unfair disadvantage against others, including future generations and their unborn, to find Him and follow Him. I think this was a rare case.

God commands man to do abortions? is that what your saying? To prevent further trouble or unfair disadvantage?

Please give an example. I've never heard of such a thing.

3. The passages in the Book of Mormon that address baptism for little children, the disposition of little children who die before the age of accountability for baptism, etc. demonstrate that God would rescue any unborn or little child if it were expedient for that spirit to continue in mortality (at that place and time, at least) in order to fulfill the requirements for eternal life. “But little children are alive in Christ, even from the foundation of the world; if not so, God is a partial God, and also a changeable God, and a respecter to persons; for how many little children have died without baptism!” “And he that saith that little children need baptism denieth the mercies of Christ, and setteth at naught the atonement of him and the power of his redemption.” I think intervening to rescue an unborn or little child from death is somewhat of a rare case, but far more common than many realize and certainly more common than 1 and 2 above.

So, what your saying is that God says it's ok to abort little humans because they are innocent and will surely go to Heaven if aborted/killed?

[thesometimesaint]

Hughes:

Yes God does command to kill. It is right there in the Old Testament.

[mfbukowski]

I think abortions past the first trimester should be severely punishable, and abortions during the first trimester should only allowable in cases of incest, rape, and where the life of the mother would be put in jeopardy, after much fasting, prayer and a decision confirmed by the Holy Ghost for both the woman and her spiritual adviser that such is the best course of action.

I think there is enough doubt about when the spirit enters the body to allow these as guidelines in extreme situations where death or trauma to the mother would be so severe as to make her incapable of recovering a "normal" life afterwards.

It's gotta be a really really bad situation for the mother in other words.

I don't think there are any "absolute" moral prohibitions which may not be altered in extraordinary circumstances, and the law and society need to recognize that.

Would there be abuse of the above guidelines? Of course, unfortunately, but the consequences of forcing a life-changing trauma or perhaps death upon a woman because she has been forcefully impregnated with what may not yet even be a "child" is just intolerable to me.

THAT is the bottom line imo. If we "knew" that the spirit entered the body at the time of conception, I think I would see it differently, but we don't know that.

The world is just too complex a place to make social polices rigid and absolute. There have to be reasonable escape clauses and allowances for extraordinary conditions.

But we also need to make sure that if we allow for special circumstances, that those special circumstances better be there before abortions are allowed.

Perhaps a legal hearing first? Has anyone proposed that? Abortion only legal during the first trimester after a judge says it fits legally restricted parameters?

[Questing Beast]

And the OT is a reliable book on what "God" says and does? I hardly think so....

[thesometimesaint]

Questing Beast:

The Saints accept the OT as the word of God.