Not Just an Article of Faith

A Fact of Science.

There is a theological debate currently at play in the undercurrent of political life in America and it is very contentious with a dividing line pretty much down party lines. I am told some rabbis and Jewish Law hold that a "person" is only created once it is born. In other words that thing in the womb is not a "person" so should have no legal status or rights and the mother can do with it what she wants. The Christian/Catholic world holds that "life" begins at conception and should be legally protected and certainly at the point of "viability" "Life" is human enough by virtue of it being able to survive on its own without that mother (could be adopted, etc.) the States can regulate when abortions are legal-and so they have regulated things like parental consent, notification periods, etc. The Supreme Court does not hold that a woman can do whatever she wants with what is growing inside her until it is naturally "born." The Supreme Court says the States have an interest in regulating when a mother will terminate after the point of viability because implicitly that entity is human enough to create legal personhood protections. The Supreme Court thus rejects what some think is the Jewish law -e.g. a woman can do whatever she wants with a fetus in her until point of natural birth. People holding the Jewish view say that the Christian view should not be able to dictate to people who do not hold that view anything about it because constitutionally that violates the freedom of religion/separation of church and state principles. The Christian view is that the Constitution guarantees everyone LIFE before Liberty and the pursuit of happiness can take place so they also have a constitutional argument. Clearly Congress can regulate "health" and "welfare" and it is pretty much basic that congress can attribute "health" and "welfare" regulations to entities that are human even though not "born." What does Science tell us? Science tells us that there is a life form created of DNA of two parents distinct from a mother- not necessarily the mother's gender, blood type, phenotype or genotype. A different form-not the mother, something she is hosting that is not just her. Its not a cellular clone or reconstruction of any part of her, not a mole, a wart, a skin tag or a tumor-it is a distinct human species life form. That life form is dependent upon the mother until a point of "viability" and science is making the case that this is earlier and earlier as even one in four 22 week old fetuses can survive outside the womb now. So is it "advancement" as Hillary keeps saying, to insist that people can kill fetuses in the womb over what happened 50 years ago in abortion mills? No. It isn't advancement according to Christian theology- it is a reversion to barbarism. It is an arrogant egoism that insists on a right to kill something that is not just a piece or part of them they can lob off like a skin tag or a mole. We freak out when trees are cut down because trees have capabilities that can help the earth-they generate from carbon oxygen. What capabilities to help the earth and humanity do fetuses have? We were all once Zygotes. I am a grown up Zygote and so are you. I am no less a human when a zygote than I am now. I wasn't a lobster zygote or a cat zygote. I was a human zygote with the same DNA construction that flowered into a human just as you did. So this rhetoric about "going back" is not accurate or particularly smart. The move to resensitize people to understanding that abortion kills human potential and human beings is morally driven by superior advanced conscience of a peaceful life affirming kind. The insistence on the ability to refuse to acknowledge the personhood of a fetus is scientifically ignorant and morally bankrupt. That is what the difference between the parties really is. Your body is not your business when it isn't your body-it is someone else's body that you are merely hosting for a season.