For those who believe that human
life begins at conception and that all human life is sacred the
issue of abortion is a simple one. Whether based on the natural law
or Divine Revelation the taking of innocent pre-born human life is
seen as an "unspeakable crime" (Vatican II, Gaudium et
spes, 51).
- Others, however, are not so sure. Either they do not know the
scientific facts that each human being is a unique biological
individual when the parents genetic material combines to form a
new being, or, if they do they argue about when that new
human life is a person deserving of full legal respect. In the
absence of a consensus on when such legal protection ought to
begin, they either tolerate, or argue on behalf of, a right to
abortion.
Remarkably, in doing so they overlook something quite simple in
the moral order, we may not act blindly where human life MIGHT be
present. Consider a couple examples which illustrate this principle.
- #1. A man hears a noise downstairs in his house. Grabbing his
gun he goes down to investigate and enters the darkened room
from which the noise emanates. Without ascertaining whether a
human being is present, the home owner sprays the room with
gunfire, killing his son who was rummaging around looking for
something. Is this reasonable behavior? Is it criminally
culpable, in either the civil or moral sense?
#2. A man goes out in deer season to bag his limit of bucks.
Losing sight of a deer he creeps forward for a shot. When some
bushes shake the man fires, assuming it to be the deer. In reality
it was another hunter using the bushes for a blind. Is this
reasonable behavior? Is it criminally culpable, in either the civil
or moral sense?
In both cases the reasonable diligence required for moral action
was lacking. In both cases fatal assumptions about the target were
made, killing innocent human beings with an absolute right to life.
While courts and juries might treat these fatal errors of judgment
with some sympathy, not holding the guilty to the full force of the
law, the regrets and sense of guilt could stay with the shooters
throughout life.
- The case of abortion is no different. The doctor, with a
mother's permission, enters a darkened room (the womb) and kills
what is certainly her biological offspring (child) by any
scientific definition. They kill what MIGHT be a human being,
even by the criteria of the most liberal proponents of abortion,
who at best are uncertain if it is a human life or person, and
at worse simply don't care. No individual or society can long
survive such moral blindness, since if such callous disregard is
exercised with respect to the foundation of the civil order, the
inalienable right to life, then all other rights and issues
necessarily are less trouble to the conscience. Why respect
marriage and family, the justice system, the integrity of the
nation and its secrets, and so on. There is little that would be
out of bounds to the conscience of the person who is capable of
ignoring the simplest moral axioms on the gravest of issues.
Further, consider the regrets of an individual or a nation which
later discovers it has sanctioned the murder of the innocent by the
palest of moral sophistries. What will be the judgment of their own conscience,
of history, of God? Thankfully, we have a merciful God who forgives
anything to the repentant, saving strictest justice only for the
unrepentant.
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