Defending the Unborn

Speak up for those who cannot speak for themselves… -Proverbs 31:8

At the time of this writing, since the American legalization of abortion, 59.8 million human beings have been aborted in their mother’s wombs in the U.S. That number worldwide, since 1980, is close to 1.5 billion. Almost 30 years after America helped fight a war that ended the Jewish Holocaust, our country hypocritically legislated that some of the most vulnerable among us can be killed on a whim.

As an apologetics ministry…as Christians period, we must speak out in defense of those who cannot speak for themselves. The Constitution of the United States of America proclaims “We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights, that among these are Life, Liberty, the Pursuit of Happiness…” Meaning it’s obvious that God has given us certain rights that cannot be taken away. A chance at life being one of them.

The Bible says we are all created in the imago Dei (image of God). Genesis 1:26-27

Secular humanism says that morality comes from considering what’s best for the human species. How is killing our unborn best for the human species?

While the abortion debate has raged on for decades, it will continue as long as caring people speak out against injustices done to the innocent. Here I intend to provide some arguments against abortion. While, I know this is one pro-life blog out of thousands, maybe millions, we can’t keep quiet on the issue. If these words help save even one life then it is worth it.

Perhaps the most common argument pro-choice advocates use is that the child in the womb is not a person but merely a clump of cells. A zygote. A fetus. “Personhood” is what’s at stake. Does abortion just terminate a growing group of human cells like removing a skin tag? Or is it the termination of a human being?

S.L.E.D.(pro-life argument)
This argument outlines the only 4 differences between a baby inside and outside the womb.
Size– Does the size of a person determine personhood? Is an infant less of a person than the tallest person? Of course not. Therefore size shouldn’t matter in the case of the fetus. Why is it different than any other “human cells”? Because given the chance it will grow into a full grown adult human.
Level of Dependency– Just because the fetus depends on his mother for life, does that make his life any less valuable? Does that exclude personhood from him? What of the newborn that must still depend on others for life? What of the severly disabled or elderly that depend on others to sustain life? Are they persons? They are all people.
Environment- How does changing from one location to another determine personhood? Especially since the change of location is literally a matter of inches.
Development– Pro-choice advocates argue that it’s not a child, but it has the potential to be a child. Yeah. And the newborn has the potential to be an adult. Is the newborn that can’t sit up on his own less of a person than the crawling toddler? Is the toddler that can barely form words less of a person than the greatest orator? Is a prepubescent child less of a person than an adult? None of this matters in determining whether a person is a human being. Most of us would consider it self-evident that they are all people. Logic states the same is true for the unborn child.

TROTTING OUT THE TODDLER (pro-life argument)
Many can understand the same rationale used for abortion can be applied to the toddler. Any argument the pro-abortionist uses must be taken to it’s logical conclusion. If it is OK for the unborn then is it OK to do to the toddler? Most would argue no. If not, then why is it logical to do to the unborn?

WOMEN’S RIGHTS ARE NOT MEN’S ARGUMENTS (pro-choice argument)
Answer: It goes without saying that the child grows in the woman’s body. It is the woman’s body that nourishes the baby growing inside her. So it’s often argued that it’s the women’s rights that are being infringed upon by pro-lifers. And since men cannot carry babies or understand firsthand what childbearing entails, then we as men have no right saying what a woman should do with her body.
This has only a bit of truth to it. A woman does have the right to do with her body as she chooses. But even that has limits. Heroin use is illegal. Driving without a seat-belt is illegal. However, when a woman is pregnant, then the conversation is no longer about one person’s right or one person’s body. Its about the other person growing inside her having a chance at life. And anyone, male or female, understands living and has the inherent right to that chance. It doesn’t take a special gender to speak out in defense of someone’s life.

WHAT ABOUT WHEN THE LIFE OF THE MOTHER IS IN DANGER BECAUSE OF CHILDBEARING? (pro-choice argument)
Answer: An ectopic pregnancy is the occasion in which the fertilized egg did not complete the journey to the uterus but instead implanted in the fallopian tube. The fetus cannot grow if not implanted to the wall of the uterus and if it stays in the fallopian tube it can be seriously detrimental to the mother. Ectopic pregnancies cause 40 deaths a year in the US. However, pregnancy terminations due for reason of the health of the mother only account for .1% of all abortions. Some places don’t even consider the termination of an ectopic pregnancy as an abortion. Also, there have been medical records of a successful transplant of the fertilized egg from the fallopian tube into the uterus which is another option instead of termination discussed in one of our papers HERE. Either way, stopping the growth of a child in a place that would likely kill both the child and the mother is different then intentionally taking the life of a growing child in the womb.

WHAT ABOUT RAPE OR INCEST? (pro-choice argument)
Answer: Rape and incest are horrendous acts. The victim should be treated with care and compassion. Any women who are victimized by these crimes have gone through traumatizing experiences. And the perpetrators of these crimes should be held criminally accountable for their actions.
While I can’t put myself in the shoes of a woman who has become pregnant due to rape or incest, it is a fact that the child (who also didn’t ask for this) should not have the death sentence placed upon him or her because of it. Two wrongs do not make a right. Aslo, there is evidence that many women who have gone through the termination of a pregnancy due to rape report regret for taking the life of the unborn baby and would not recommend abortion to other women in their situation.

Kathleen Dezeeuw, who gave birth to a child conceived in rape said “I, having lived through rape, and also having raised a child ‘conceived in rape’, feel personally assaulted and insulted every time I hear that abortion should be legal because of rape and incest. I feel that we’re being used to further the abortion issue, even though we’ve not been asked to tell our side of the story.” And, “I am not sorry, nor ever will be, that I kept and raised my son. The life I tried to snuff out was the very tool that was used to bring me to a place where I could forgive those involved in what happened to me. God truly did work it out….”

NO ONE KNOWS IF IT’S A PERSON (pro-choice argument)
Answer: Does using a condom cause abortion to the sperm, as some pro-choicers have argued? No. No matter how much a sperm is nurtured, it will stay a sperm until it dies. The same goes for the unfertilized egg. When a woman has her monthly cycle the unused egg is voided from her body. But it would always remain just an egg. But when the sperm and egg come together, they have together made a tiny human being that will grow into a bigger human being. It doesn’t matter if it senses it’s surroundings or its own existence. It doesn’t matter if it can feel pain. There are plenty of older people that many of us may know that lack some of the basic sensory perceptions that most of us take for granted. That doesn’t make them any less human than the rest of us. Even if we don’t know it’s a human being does that mean we shouldn’t error on the side of caution. If I’m going to demolish a building would me saying I don’t know if anyone is inside be any reason to go ahead and knock it down? If I’m driving at night and see a pile of clothes in the road that could be a person, should I just drive through it?

“There is simply no doubt that even the early embryo is a human being. All its genetic coding and all its features are indisputably human. As to being, there is no doubt that it exists, is alive, is self-directed, and is not the the same being as the mother–and is therefore a unified whole.” Dr. Bernard Nathanson, ex-abortion doctor and former director of the Center for Reproductive and Sexual Health, The Hand Of God, Regnery Publishing, 1996, p.131.

ABORTIONS OCCUR NATURALLY (MISCARRIAGES) (pro-choice argument)
Answer: It’s illogical to place miscarriages and abortions in the same moral category. One is happenstance of nature and the other is caused by man. No one is held morally responsible for naturally occurring miscarriages, nor should they be.

ABORTION IS LEGAL (pro-choice argument)
Answer: What’s lawful and what’s moral are not always congruent. Slavery was once lawful in our country. That didn’t make it moral.

SEPARATION OF CHURCH AND STATE (pro-choice argument)
Answer: Why is defending human life a religious only argument? It’s probably a safe bet that even the most secular modern civilized society has laws against killing. No religion has to be brought into the conversation. Anti-abortion advocates don’t just come from the “religious right”. There is even a pro-life movement for the non-religious. However, of it take those of us that believe man has intrinsic worth – that human beings were created with purpose. If it takes believing that God, the Creator of the universe, cares enough for the well-being of people, to speak out against atrocities done mostly in the name in inconvenience, then so be it. Legislation has already deemed it illegal to do violence against another human being. It should be consistent and include the unborn as well.

Facts about the unborn and abortion:

• With our current medical technology, just 21 weeks after conception, babies can survive outside the womb.
• 9 weeks after conception, all the baby’s structures that are necessary for pain sensation are functioning.
• A baby’s brainwaves can be detected at 6 weeks from conception.
• 62.7% of abortions occur after 6 weeks.
• 21 days from conception, the baby is making and pumping her own blood through a closed circulatory system but the baby’s heart first began to beat at just 18 days.
• The baby’s genetic makeup which includes gender, physical characteristics, facial features, body type, hair color, eye color, skin tone, etc. are determined at the moment of conception.

Derrick Stokes with input from Clark Campbell
Theologetics.org