Chances are, you’ve at least heard about the video that everybody is talking about online (maybe you’ve seen it), the one about Planned Parenthood, abortions, and the “selling” of fetal body parts.
I rarely discuss the topic of abortion online.
Personally, I don’t like abortion—but does anybody really like it?—I don’t think so.
But I’m slow to speak up about this topic because…
1) I’m a guy. And I think it’s very easy for a man to rage against abortion.
2) I know that abortion, regardless of which side you’re on, is a deeply personal issue to many people and I desire to respect that…
And 3) despite being an advocate for life—life before birth and life after birth—if my wife and I were put in a situation in which the life of our baby put the life of my wife in danger, if I’m honest, I would want us to have the ability to make a choice. I’d want options. And I wouldn’t want to have to jump through any state regulations or church hoops in order to have those options, either. If somebody I know and loved was raped and became pregnant, I’d want her to have the power to make a choice, whatever choice that might be.
Moreover 4) despite believing that God creates life, I do not believe that my religious understandings should control other people’s choices.
But having said all of that, I watched that undercover video about Planned Parenthood and I was grieved by its content.
Yes, I know it was made by a right wing group that looks for every opportunity to bring down Planned Parenthood and paint them as devils.
And yes, I do think that video was misleading in how it was edited. It felt choppy from the beginning. It was clearly made by people with an agenda.
And no, I do not think Planned Parenthood is actually selling fetal organs. However, I do think that the health care organization’s practices should be thoroughly investigated.
But despite the right wing spin, that video is still quite telling. The casual manner in which Deborah Nucatola, a Planned Parenthood director of medical research, talked about her processes for extracting a late term fetus was disturbing and seemingly callous.
Now, I’m well aware that Planned Parenthood performs numerous procedures that have nothing to do with abortion, and often these practices are provided to low income families. So I’m certainly not going to pan an entire organization based on Nucatola’s uncaring demeanor. But my heart ached when I listened to Nucatola describe in gross detail her careful process for aborting a fetus without harming its organs.
In fact, I haven’t been able to get her words out of my head.
Which is why I decided to say something about how her words made me feel. Yes, I’m progressive. Yes, I’m not as hardcore on this issue as evangelicals. But I care about life, all life.
While I know that many Christians seem certain beyond all reason that life begins at conception, I’m frankly unsure when life begins. Maybe life does begin at conception. Or maybe it’s a few days or weeks later.
But at some point it does begin.
And certainly, by all accounts, Nucatola’s words were describing a life.
Maybe dehumanizing the procedure is the only way she’s able to perform it. Or perhaps, like many doctors and medical professionals, she’s fallen prey to all of those years spent discussing health care using only medical terms. Whatever the reason, the blunt manner in which she talked about what to “crush” and what to preserve felt terrible, a verbal scene that broke my heart.
It still breaks my heart.
I waited until now to speak up because I do not trust most right wing pro life groups. I think they’re dishonest. I think the makers of the video in question were being dishonest in how they sold their narrative. That video wasn’t ever really about “selling organs”—that was just a headline they used to get people to hear how heartless Nucatola sounded as she described her methods.
I think many pro life groups’s tactics, memes, and political strategies are terrible—often dehumanizing and mean spirited. Furthermore, I believe if they were half as concerned with life after birth as they are with life before birth, we might actually reduce the number of abortions that happen in this country, which I think all of us can agree would be a very good thing. It’s very easy to be ultra pro life when that life is unborn. All it requires is a strong point of view and a sign. Being pro life after birth is much harder and actually requires more skill than the ability to be obnoxious.
And that’s why I waited to speak up. Because almost every organization and influencer that talked about it on Tuesday did so not as ambassadors for life but rather as @ssholes with an agenda.
However, I’m not going to let the right-to-lifers’ tendencies to be terrible keep me from speaking up for all of those little baby boys and girls who Nucatola referred to as “livers.” Or “hearts.” Or “lungs.”
Sometimes both sides get so hung up on the what—whether it’s the fight against abortion or the fight for the right to choose—we far too often forget the who involved, a mother, an unborn child, a family who may or may not know their loved one is pregnant, and even a medical professional like Nucatola who seemingly has grown numb to what the procedure entails…
We like to add our own stories to all the whos involved. And in most cases, we really don’t know the stories. We too often don’t care about the stories. We simply hate abortion. Or we simply support abortion.
But at some point amid pregnancy, life does begin. Maybe that’s at the beginning. Maybe it happens later during the gestation period. I don’t know. If we’re honest, none of us know. We might believe we know. But we don’t know for sure.
However, at some point, abortion becomes a procedure that takes life away. And if nothing else, that video about Planned Parenthood reminds us of that. And we need reminding of that. All of us. Women. Men. Conservatives. Progressives. Believers in God. Non believers. All of us need to remember that…
I know I’m a guy.
I know I’m talking about an issue that is deeply personal and I respect that.
And I know this issue is layered and involves a multitude of stories, most of which I’ve never heard.
But at some point, abortion is an issue that involves a person who has no voice. She’s not a liver. Or a heart. Or a pair of lungs. She’s a life.
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well said. Not that there is anything good to say about this whole situation. I agree on many points you make but the one I have tossed around in my mind the most for the last five years or so is this – “Furthermore, I believe if they were half as concerned with life after birth as they are with life before birth, we might actually reduce the number of abortions that happen in this country, which I think all of us can agree would be a very good thing. It’s very easy to be ultra pro life when that life is unborn. All it requires is a strong point of view and a sign. Being pro life after birth is much harder and actually requires more skill than the ability to be obnoxious.” I have joked, though it isn’t funny, that Republicans (generalizing) care about you before you are born and the Democrats care about you after you are born. No idea how to address this other than person by person. Life by life.
Good response! However, the pro lifers do not seem to care about the mother’s life.
Also the video was done by a group calling themselves CENTER FOR MEDICAL PROGRESS which sounds important , but it is not part of the MANHATTAN INSTITUTE’S CENTER FOR MEDICAL PROGRESS.
It was done deceitfully and it is amazing how much credence it is given.
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Thank you for this, Matthew.
Thanks! Heartfelt. Needs to be heard!
Very well said. Thank you.
I cant bring myself to watch it. I am pro-choice but it breaks my heart that this happens. If only the anti-abortion coalitions would focus their resources on creating more programs to help struggling pregnant women even well after childbirth, instead of relying on shaming techniques and legalese to control them, it could make for a different situation. More love, sympathy, compassion. Less hate, judgement, and dehumanization. 🙁
Check out The Pregnancy Resource Center and Birth Choice. These are just 2 of the amazingly helpful organizations who are in everyday life with mommas after they choose life whether that is adoption, single parenting, or traditional parenting. They never get the media attention because Planned Parenthood always has the spotlight, but those who live and breathe love for women and babies know all about these centers. They even provide post-abortive counseling for women who deal with the unseen emotional scars of abortion.
Lynsey et al, there are a lot of places like the two you mentioned. They are all over the country, and they are funded generally by Christians who are usually Republicans. If you Google Pregnancy you will find Crisis Pregnancy centers. People like me and my friends contribute our time, money, furniture, clothing, etc. to them. Sorry to burst your bubble, Robin.
Matthew, I think you are well intentioned but confused. The ultimate question is not “when does life begin”, but rather when does “personhood” begin. Physicians, Scientists, even Planned Parenthood agree already in when life begins. That scientific question was answered a decade ago. Now we must ask, when is a fetus a person deserving of the protection accepted universally by civilization after the Nuremberg Trials and expressed in the Belmont Principles that guide all of medicine: Respect for Persons, Benificence, and Justice. Michelle, decades of abortion (56 M dead, the majority Afican Americans) leads to “dehumanizations”, as does using fetal “parts” to promote unethical research. Pro-Lifers open their homes to single pregnant mothers, pay for their medical expenses, buy them food and clothes, cribs, and lovingly care for them. My family and I are one of thousands who act on our beliefs. Matthew, I’m so glad you stand up for the unborn, and I love your compassionate voice. However, you don’t need to apologize for your stance so much, because when you do, you negate its morality. This is an ethical and moral issue, not a scientific one.
Well said
Here is my daughter’s redeeming story of abortion and stillbirth. You will be exceedingly blessed by Hannah Rose’s story from Darkness to Light!
http://www.roseandherlily.com/2010/06/DarknesstoLight.html
As someone who tends to identify with progressive Christians but was brought up evangelical, I have had issues with a lot of “liberal-ish” views on different issues. This helped me tremendously. Thank you for posting it.
I really appreciate the way you framed this conversation. Well done.
I’m glad at the very least that you want to stand apart from the worst of the pro-life movement on this, but I think you’re trying to have it both ways. You start by rejecting the grounds of the pro-life positions you find extreme, but then take a stand that assumes them (i.e., fetal personhood). If you actually believe what you say at the end of the post (“abortion involves a person who has no voice”), then your criticism of pro-lifers is cynical and unprincipled; to not be as forceful as they are are in defense of a person with no voice would be contemptible. But if in fact you support the rights of mothers to make difficult choices about their pregnancies, then this kind of emotional, argument-free rhetoric about “life” (a meaningless term in this context) and fetal personhood doesn’t make any sense.
The pro-life movement has derived a lot of its success from the way it has redefined and expanded the concept of life. There is no debate about the “aliveness” of a fetus in the biological, cellular sense; what we are really talking about is personhood, which they have tried to make synonymous with biological life in order to claim scientific authority. But personhood is a moral and ethical concept, not a biological or scientific one, so there will naturally be eternal disagreement over it. Let there be no mistake: fetal personhood is a moral concept specific to 20th-century conservative Christianity. You can agree with that moral concept without being a conservative Christian, but if that is the basis of your moral reaction to abortion, you can’t coherently And if it is the basis of your legal and political opinion about abortion rights, then you do, despite what you claim, support the imposition of a religious belief (not a scientific fact) on everyone.
If on the other hand you reject the conservative moral concept of fetal personhood, then however icky you may find abortion, there is no sense in talk about being “the voice of the voiceless.” A lot of surgical and medical procedures are icky, and a lot of scientific research would be revolting to non-scientists and non-doctors. Fetal tissue is tissue from the human body like any other. There is no person to be dramatically defended, because the fetus never became a person. It’s fine if you think pictures of aborted fetuses are gross and sad, but I also find pictures of adult human corpses, amputated limbs, and even skeletons gross and sad. The non-living human body disturbs us in all its forms because it reminds of the reality of death, something we are hard-wired to fear. But us laypeople don’t go around moralizing about the “callousness” required to be a surgeon or mortician, and the “dehumanizing” way those professionals talk about their work. Unless you agree with fetal personhood, the basis of the pro-life position, that would be childish and absurd.
It is possible to be morally concerned about specific types of uses of human body tissue and the ways they are procured. You can oppose late-term abortion because it’s too hard to stomach the idea of killing a baby that could survive outside the womb, or the scientific use of fetal tissue because that is too close to the commodification of human body parts. Those specific positions, none of which you argue for, would be ways to say, “I’m ok with some abortion rights, but we should have strong guards against becoming indifferent to the value of potential human beings.” I would disagree with those positions, but they would at least be coherent, unlike trying to reject and affirm the pro-life position at the same time. Support for abortion rights is incompatible with vague, sentimental moralizing about the rights of the fetus.
TL;LR: It’s fine to be grossed out and sad about graphic discussions of abortion. It’s doesn’t make sense to make that feeling into a moral crusade for voiceless persons, and pretend that’s any different from the movement dedicated to that very moral crusade.
“fetal personhood is a moral concept specific to 20th-century conservative Christianity”
Even a brief glance at the historical conversation about fetal personhood challenges this assertion. Philosophers, physicians, and people of faith have held a variety of views about fetal personhood stretching all the way back to ancient times.
It matters not what people say about fetal personhood, does it Micah? All that matters is what God Almighty says about fetal personhood or anything else, for that matter!
David,
I agree that personhood is a moral concept, and that laws related to its defense are therefore “the imposition of a religious belief (not a scientific fact) on everyone.”
One question: would you then agree that all murder laws are essentially the imposition of a religious belief? That the personhood of an adult is no less a moral concept than that of a child in the womb? Or an infant?
Nice, as always, to bump into in the random waysides of the internet.
Mark
David, that is no doubt well thought out and probably (at least to your mind) unassailable logic; however, I think Matthew has a right / room to be deeply conflicted, even if illogically so; he has a right to feel both things at once and come to certain conclusions that appear to be at odds; and he has the right to express those things in the way that makes the most sense to him. Human opinion is not worthless if it’s slightly or even egregiously illogical.
Jen, I must say I find this a depressing comment. Of course we all have a right to be confused, to struggle with our thoughts, and to try to understand feelings of which we don’t have a complete grasp. But on important social and political matters, we do indeed have an obligation to try to be rational and consistent, and conclusions that are illogical or incoherent are indeed less worthwhile than ones that are carefully reasoned. Obviously there are many different forms of expression, and no one has the obligation to be making a rational argument at all times (I’m not a Reddit philosophy bro or an internet libertarian). No one will ever solve all their intellectual dilemmas or be perfectly consistent, but there’s also no reason we should affirm contradiction and illogicality for its own sake. And when someone expresses themselves on an important and controversial issue in a relatively large public forum, they should expect responses, and those responses should point out inconsistencies and argumentative problems.
This sounds like tone policing to me. And I cannot stress enough how tiresome it is when the way a person of color or a woman speaks about something is viewed as more important than what he/she is saying. Women have to fight for a right to have a legal medical procedure and sometimes have to walk through a torrent of verbal abuse and physical intimidation to exercise that right. But by all means lets police how the abortion provider describes a late term abortion procedure.
Also, when she is talking about crushing a fetus, does anyone think about the fact that it is scientifically proven that a fetus can feel pain (in the mouth area) as early as eight weeks, and full on sensation in all body parts at 16 weeks? These HUMAN ORGANISMS (since we aren’t allowed to call them babies) can FEEL THEMSELVES being dismembered or scissors stabbed in their brains, or being burned alive by saline!
So regardless of how anyone feels about the abortion debate, if or when or how or why… Just remember that someone other than the mother is feeling pain. (At the VERY LEAST laws should be passed to sedate the fetus first!)
Matthew,
I am with you point for point, right down the line– that wavy, sometimes contradictory/always emotional tightrope of a line. (Except for the ‘being a guy’ part. I’m pretty clear where I am on that point.)
Bless you for being honest about where your heart, logic, politics and belief system collide, and articulating how difficult it is to find a place to stand that feels personally authentic.
There is no such thing as a progressive Christian. To be a progressive is to be a pro death and anti-Christian. A progressive is an Atheist. Learn some history.
No. Not true.
I am one of the minority of conservatives who regularly comes to read Matthew’s blog, so I’ll say this to all who read this: askmarc is in error, and he certainly doesn’t speak for me or most conservatives.
asmarc, the criteria for becoming a Christian applies to those who have repented of their sin and believed in Jesus. Period. There is no scriptural support for the idea that adherence to a political ideology is part of what makes a person a Christian.
If the anti-abortion crowd really wanted to end abortions they would wholeheartedly support the mission of Planned Parenthood. Over the past 10 years the number of abortions per year has declined, primarily because of the increased availability of low cost contraception. We have seen in states that have defunded Planned Parenthood, there has been no effort to replace the other services that the organization provided, mostly to poor women and men. Indiana celebrated the closing of the PP clinic in Scott County with an outbreak of Hepatitis C and HIV. The clinic had been in the forefront of providing these health screenings, now the state of Indiana will spend millions more than it would have cost to maintain the contract with PP (a facility that did not perform abortions) to provide the same services and to care for the stricken individuals. This in a situation where the state’s action had no effect on the number of abortions performed in Indiana.
If you are serious about supporting life beyond the pro-life/pro-choice binary, please be in touch with SisterSong, an organization dedicated to reproductive movements, largely made up of women of color. They advocate for an intersectional approach that includes not just access to birth control or choice regarding birth and abortion, but ALSO for justice in our communities, support for children and families long after the birth of a child, pre-natal health, etc etc. The website: http://sistersong.net
This work is already being done. No need to reinvent a movement. But you could certainly use your platform to amplify their voices.
As painful as this issue is and regardless of where one falls on the issue, I’m glad this video has surfaced to remind us of what the horror of abortion actually is. Perhaps it will be a wake-up call. One can only hope. A quibble in the midst of your honest reflection, which I do appreciate: You paint pro-life groups with an awfully broad brush. There are many, many pro-life organizations who do take interest in the moms during AND after the birth. In the early days of the pro-life movement, that was sadly lacking, but as a member of a church that started a very strong pro-life movement with several pregnancy care centers in a major city, I can assure you women there are not only counseled about their options of keeping the baby or putting the baby up for adoption, but they are also offered nutrition and parenting classes along with provision of diapers, formula, clothing, and continued mentoring after the birth of the baby as well as additional medical care as needed. While there are still folks who embarrassingly spend time with signs and yelling, there are many more who are actively being the hands and feet of Jesus, walking alongside those in need.They do not find fault nor do they condemn. It seems that the behind-the-scenes-folks just do not make for very interesting news stories.
I’ve lived in the gray on this issue for a very long time. When this story appeared, I quietly read both sides. Watched as much of the unedited footage as my time allowed. My first reaction has stayed the same. This should be a discussion of bioethics. Not another flame war between the Prolife/Prochoice camps.
I somehow didn’t hear her as heartless. I heard a doctor speaking in, for lack of better words, in Vulcan about her procedures and process with other clinicians. Had she known she was being recorded, I am sure her tone would be different. If a civil discourse on bioethics within this supercharged emotional topic of abortion, some of these questions would be answered.
Bottom line. No one wins in this war. Whether prolife, prochoice, woman alone, researcher on the cusp of a cure, father robbed of a child, progressive, conservative, potential life interrupted, doctor, clinician or baby.
And that’s all I have to say about that.
I am grateful that you have raised your voice on this. Thank you.
I see you wrote this post a couple of days ago. Just saw this info tonight. Unfortunately they are selling fetal organs.
http://www.christianitytoday.com/edstetzer/2015/july/want-fetal-liver-add-it-to-your-stemexpress-wish-list.html
http://stemexpress.com/product-category/fetal-liver/
With all due respect, you are wrong in many ways. You are wrong in your position that pro-lifers don’t care as much about life after birth. This statement ignores the numerous pregnancy help centers in the USA that provide loving, compassionate, practical care to mothers and babies, most of whom are dealing with a crisis pregnancy. It ignores the many adoption centers that are run or supported by pro-life groups. It ignores the many hospitals that are run by religious groups that are predominantly pro-life (e.g., Catholic, Baptist, Adventist…) It ignores the many charities and relief organizations that are helping people in need around the world that are pro-life (e.g,, Samaritan’s Purse, Focus on the Family, and countless evangelical church missionaries and agencies).
It also a condescending and illogical statement. Would you chastise the people who are were trying to save the lives of those who were at risk of being eliminated by the Nazis for not being equally concerned about the lives of who were not a target of the Nazi’s. Would you scold the abolitionists for not being as concerned about the lives of non-slaves? I hope not. But that is what you are effectively saying when you accuse us of caring too much about the 56 million lives lost to abortion since 1973, and the countless others who are about to lost their lives.
You are wrong to say that if pro-lifers are “half as concerned with life after birth as they are with life before birth, we might actually reduce the number of abortions that happen in this country…”. The fact is that abortions have gone down in this country: http://www.usnews.com/news/blogs/data-mine/2015/06/08/number-of-abortions-nationwide-declining. So does this mean that pro-lifers a little more concerned with life after birth that you’d thought? Or do you give all the credit to the pro-abortionists?
You are also condescending and wrong in saying that pro-lifers use dehumanizing and mean spirited tactics. The pro-life tactic’s is to reveal the reality of the unborn child’s HUMANITY. You consider that dehumanizing and mean spirited? And what about the tactic of ripping a human baby from the womb, butchering her up in pieces and selling it for profit? Isn’t that just a bit more dehumanizing and mean spirited?
You are wrong that Planned Parenthood is actually not selling fetal organs. In the video, Deborah Nucatola said, “I think for affiliates, at the end of the day, they’re a non-profit, they just don’t want to—they want to break even. And if they can do a little better than break even, and do so in a way that seems reasonable, they’re happy to do that.” Doing better than breaking even means making a profit. Making a profit requires selling a product or service. For Planned Parenthood, selling dismembered body parts from aborted babies is its “side” business.
Additionally, the Center for Medical Progress has obtained an advertisement to Planned Parenthood clinics (http://www.centerformedicalprogress.org/wp-content/uploads/2015/05/StemExpress-flyer.pdf) from StemExpress, LLC, one of the major purchasers of Planned Parenthood’s aborted fetal tissue. This flyer advertises 4 different times the financial benefit that Planned Parenthood clinics can receive from supplying fetal tissue, with the words: “Financially Profitable,” “Financial Profits,” “financial benefit to your clinic,” “fiscal growth of your own clinic.” The advertisement carries an endorsement from Planned Parenthood Medical Director Dr. Dorothy Furgerson.
You are wrong that most pro-life groups are dishonest. Dishonest about what? That every unborn deserves a chance to take his / her first breath? That an unborn child is a human being regardless of her size or the circumstance of her conception (which she can’t control)? That every child – born or unborn – is valuable, precious and worthy of protection? Isn’t the dishonesty label more fitting for abortion providers like Planned Parenthood, as the video clearly shows?
You are wrong is say that CMP was “dishonest in how they sold their narrative” and video that the video wasn’t ever really about “selling organs”. The entire video was about how PP sells organs of aborted babies! How could have CMP “sold their narrative” any differently to be more honest? The video speaks for itself.
You are wrong to say that the video was “misleading in how it was edited”. CMP has released the full unedited version of the video (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H4UjIM9B9KQ). Watch the entire thing and answer this question – how is the edited version misleading? The fact is that it isn’t misleading and the full video proves it.
Perhaps most egregiously, you are wrong to say that “if we’re honest, none of us know” when life begin. I believe that life begins at conception and I know many other pro-lifers who believe the same way (I have yet to meet one who doesn’t). Does this make us “dishonest”? Do you believe that science is honest? (As a progressive I would think that you’d place a lot of value in the integrity of science). Here is biology science 101: when a living cell (a sperm) joins another living cell (an egg), it becomes a new living being which, being alive grows and grows and grows. It can grow at such a rapid rate because… it is alive! A new life begins at conception – it is a scientific fact: http://www.princeton.edu/~prolife/articles/embryoquotes2.html.
Isn’t it incredible how Planned Barrenhood usually refers to an unborn baby as a blob of tissue, but now they are distinguishing between limbs, organs and heads? Scratching my head over this turn-around.
Thank you for your piece. We need more progressive voices standing up for marginalized groups which don’t typically appear in Democratic talking points. “The moral reality of the child is erased from the scenario, with the only thing left being a mere object to be crushed, used and thrown away – especially when there is a financial profit to be made” http://www.abc.net.au/religion/articles/2015/07/17/4275662.htm
Thank you for expressing your thoughts on this issue, Matthew. I’m often curious about your opinion.
“Each of us has a unique beginning, the moment of conception. As soon as our program is written on our DNA, there are twenty-three different pieces of program carried by the spermatozoa and there are twenty-three different homologous pieces carried by the ovum. As soon as the twenty-three chromosomes carried by the sperm encounter the twenty-three chromosomes carried by the ovum, the whole information necessary and sufficient to spell out all the characteristics of the new being is gathered. Inside the chromosomes is written the program and all the definitions. Chromosomes are the table of the law of life. When the information carried by the winning sperm, out of thousands vying for the special position, and by the ovum has encountered each other, then a new human being is defined because its own personal and human constitution is entirely spelled out. It is a personal constitution which is entirely typical of this very one human being which has never occurred before and will never occur again. The information which is inside this first cell obviously tells to this cell all the tricks of the trade to build herself as the individual, this cell is already, to build that particular human person we will call Sylvie or Hannah or Lily; it’s already there, but its so small that we cannot see it. It’s what is life, the formula is there; if you allow this formula to be expanded by itself, just giving shelter and nurture, then you have the development of the full person. A first cell knows more and is more specialized than any cell which is later in our organism. When we split at the beginning of our life, it is at the three cell stage that a message goes from one cell to the two other cells, comes back to the first one and suddenly realize we are not a population of cells. we are bound to be an individual. At the very beginning of life, the genetic information and the molecular structure of the egg, the spirit and the matter, the soul and the body must be that tightly intricated because it’s a beginning of the new marvel that we call a human. The first cell is knowing how to differentiate the progeny, the cell progeny. If we take one cell of a chimpanzee embryo, of a human embryo, of a gorilla embryo and give it to one of my students in the Certificate of Cytogenetics in Paris, and if he cannot tell you this one is a human being, this one is a chimpanzee being, this is one is a gorilla being, he would fail his exam; it’s as simple as that. The amount of information which is inside the zygote, which would if spelled out and put in a computer tell the computer how to calculate what will happen next, this amount of information is that big that nobody can measure it. You have to realize that this enormous information which makes a man is enormous compared to the information which makes a computer, because it’s a man who has made the computer; it’s not the computer which has made the man. Surely it’s much more complicated to build a human being, to determinate on one cell the wiring of his brain so that he will some day invent machine to help his own brain to understand the law of the universe. There is something peculiar to the human beings compared to others. What defines a human being is: He belongs to our species. So an early one or a late one has not changed from its species to another species. It belongs to our kin. And I would say very precisely that I have the same respect, no matter the amount of kilograms and no matter the amount of differentiation of tissues. The duty is not to kill, and that duty is universal. And I would say that if by technique I as looking at the chromosomes of this baby, and I see the chromosomes abnormal, say for example, he has a trisomy twenty-one, I would say that this is the disease. But if I look at the other forty-six chromosomes that are normal I would see the mankind of the baby, and I don’t condemn a member of my kin. If I was convinced that those early human beings are, in fact, piece of properties, well, property can be discarded, there is no interest for me as a geneticist. But if they are human beings, which they are, then they cannot be considered as property. They need custody.” ~Jerome Lejeune, M.D., Ph.D., professor of fundamental genetics on the faculty of Medicine of Paris, held the Kennedy Prize for being first to discover a disease caused by chromosomal abnormality – Down’s Syndrome, a member of a number of prestigious medical and scientific organizations
As a conservative, ‘right wing’ Christian and one who adopted a child through a crisis pregnancy center – let me say, “Thank you!” I know this may not be a popular stand with some but thank you for taking a bold one.
Wow, that was so thoughtful and well-written. It put words to many of my own thoughts on abortion. Thank you.
http://www.factcheck.org/2015/05/does-a-fetus-feel-pain-at-20-weeks/
I remember the 10 week sonogram of Faith Hartman, my first child.
I sat there (honestly, somewhat disinterested) as the doctor searched for the “tissue” that would become my child. I say “tissue”, for that is what I was lead to believe by the relentless pro-abortion message.
As soon as the doctor found Faith and the live image appeared, I jumped out of my chair and moved in close. Oh my God. My breath was taken away.
Never have I had a false premise so obliterated by a flood of truth.
There she was, at 10 weeks… body, arms, legs, head.
Moreover, she was DANCING for the camera. I am tearing up as I type this.
A little baby girl was right there before me.
Not tissue. Not a blob of cells. Not a bunch of organs to be harvested for research.
Get out of your head and peer into the womb. The truth will set them free.
Life begins at conception. This is a biological fact. At that point there is a new being with new DNA and all that is added after is time and nutrition, which continues to be added throughout the life cycle. I don’t think you are wondering when life begins, but when woth or value as a human begins.
I have a tendency to believe that there is something holy about a human’s first breath. But that’s just my “best guess”. God knows — and possibly like “proving that God exists”, we’ll never be able to know exactly the point when “humaness” begins. I hate abortion, but I can no longer attach a judgement of “morality or immorality”.