I wrote the following essay last March for a pro-life essay contest and wanted to share it with all of you since January is Respect Life month. Yesterday was the March for Life, and today is the anniversary of the Roe v. Wade decision which legalized abortion in all 50 states and the national day of prayer for the unborn. I encourage you to take some time today to pray for the protection of all human life. Pray boldly! Our God is a God of miracles. With Him on our side, we can be confident that the pro-life movement will win the fight against abortion.
Abortion: The Unnecessary American Controversy
Abortion is one topic in American culture that need not be controversial. All evidence provided by science, reason, and faith, point to the fact that the unborn are living, human beings who have the right to life.
The American Government claims it upholds the right to life in the Declaration of Independence. This document declares that all are created equal and have been given certain rights, including the right to life. Because of this vital statement, we can see that all Americans, from the moment of conception, are to be valued, and deserve to live. Tragically, today in America, this right is not being upheld as thousands of American children are killed every year due to legalized abortion. The following argument invalidates any argument that one might have in support of legal abortion.
The first proposal of this argument is that the unborn are living human beings. This can be proven by basic biological facts. From the moment of conception, the unborn meet the qualifications for life. These include being formed out of cells, growing, changing, using energy, adapting to the environment, developing an ability to reproduce in the future, maintaining homeostasis, reacting to the environment, and being based on a universal genetic code. Based on these qualifications, the unborn are, indeed, alive.
Some pro-abortion activists will agree that the unborn are alive but will question if they are human. This question has a simple answer. Scientifically, if a human man and woman conceive a child, there is nothing their offspring can be or change into, other than a human.
To prove the second part of our argument, we need to use some basic logic and philosophy. According to Boethius, a Roman scholar of the late fifth and early sixth centuries, the definition of a person is “an individual substance of rational nature.” Catholic and pro-life apologist, Trent Horn, says in his book, Persuasive Pro-Life concerning Boethius' definition of the person: “What this means is that a particular being is a person, or has basic rights, if it is a member of a rational kind.” (Horn, pg.128) Therefore, since all persons have one basic thing in common, human nature, all should be treated respectfully. Though the unborn are not yet self-aware, they are still rational creatures and persons because they are of the human race. This personhood gives the unborn the unalienable right to life.
When we prove that the unborn are living human beings who have the right to life, we can then understand why abortion is wrong. The Oxford Dictionary defines abortion as, “The deliberate termination of a human pregnancy, most often performed during the first 28 weeks of pregnancy.” From the first part of this definition, we can see abortion takes the life of a human. If something is terminated, it is ended. Pregnancy is the condition of having a child in the womb. If pregnancy is terminated, the child is no longer in the womb. One could argue that birth also terminates pregnancy, so what makes abortion different? Abortion is different from birth because it terminates the life of a human being. This, too, can be proven by science because the child no longer meets the qualifications for life after it is aborted because he or she has been killed.
By proving the argument that the unborn are living human beings and have the right to life, we can effectively disprove any arguments in favor of legalized abortion. If one can accept basic scientific facts, widely agreed upon philosophical definitions, the validity of the founding American documents, and use simple logical thinking skills, they can easily see there is no case in which abortion can be justified. Because of this, there is no need for the morality of abortion to be so widely debated in American society. The fact that the unborn are living human beings and have the right to life is undeniable. The children of our country are alive and they deserve to keep their lives until the moment of their natural death. There is no need for controversy on this topic. When one looks at the facts, it is evident that abortion is killing America’s most innocent citizens and violating their right to life bestowed upon them by their country and their Creator.
Bibliography:
· “Abortion.” Lexico.Com, www.lexico.com/en/definition/abortion. Accessed 26 Feb., 2021.
· “Fetal Development.” Students for Life, 18 June 2020, studentsforlife.org/fetaldevelopment.
· Lee, Megan. “You Are What You Eat...And Also What Your Mother Ate.” Science in the News, 15 Aug. 2009, sitn.hms.harvard.edu/flash/2009/issue57.
· Trent Horn. Persuasive Pro Life: How to Talk about Our Culture’s Toughest Issue. Catholic Answers Press, 2014.
· Shiel, James. “Anicius Manlius Severinus Boethius | Roman Scholar, Philosopher, and Statesman.” Encyclopedia Britannica, 1 Jan. 2021, www.britannica.com/biography/Anicius-Manlius-Severinus-Boethius.
· “The Declaration of Independence: Full Text.” ushistory.org, www.ushistory.org/declaration/document.
· All other facts contained in the essay come from biology class notes and notes from former pro-life training.
If you or someone you know have questions related to abortion or other pro-life topics, feel free to email me using the contact field on the home page of the blog, or leave a comment below. I will address all questions in an upcoming post. God bless!
Comments