Re: Abortion
 

How old need the fetus be before someone can take out a life insurance policy for it? Whole life/term?

Re: Abortion
 

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A soul by definition is really what we think of as "life". Perhaps animation is a better word. People tend to confuse the notion of soul with some sort of magical smoky thing zapped into us.

A rational being (a person) is deemed to have an immortal soul because it is capable of immaterial understanding. Irrational beings, such as animals, have mortal souls.

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In that case, my pet cat has a soul. Humane shelters
are inhumane because they put animals to sleep.

Try again, you're immaterial

Re: Abortion
 

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But I would like to point out that the Catholic Church has never taught that the death penalty is wrong

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I was stating the position of certain non-religious persons who believe both the death penalty and abortion to be wrong. However the church does teach the death penalty should not be used in most cases.

Catechism: "The traditional teaching of the Church does not exclude, presupposing full ascertainment of the identity and responsibility of the offender, recourse to the death penalty, when this is the only practicable way to defend the lives of human beings effectively against the aggressor.
"If, instead, bloodless means are sufficient to defend against the aggressor and to protect the safety of persons, public authority should limit itself to such means, because they better correspond to the concrete conditions of the common good and are more in conformity to the dignity of the human person.
"Today, in fact, given the means at the State's disposal to effectively repress crime by rendering inoffensive the one who has committed it, without depriving him definitively of the possibility of redeeming himself, cases of absolute necessity for suppression of the offender 'today ... are very rare, if not practically non-existent." link

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or that life begins at the very moment of conception.

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Catechism:"Human life is sacred because from its beginning it involves the creative action of God and it remains for ever in a special relationship with the Creator, who is its sole end. God alone is the Lord of life from its beginning until its end: no one can under any circumstance claim for himself the right directly to destroy an innocent human being" link

"Human life must be respected and protected absolutely from the moment of conception." (see first link above)

Also for those Christians who think they can maintain that abortion is permissible in certain circumstances because the word "abortion" is not used in the bible, they should consult a book called the Didache, also called the Teaching of the Twelve Apostles. This book while not being part of scripture, was written most likely in the 2nd century A.D. and gives the shortest and most clear exposition of Christian moral principles and life ever written outside scripture, and denounces both abortion as well as infanticide, thus making clear Christians cannot try to imply that the bible only condemns infanticide since early Christians not far removed from apostolic times taught otherwise. link

Re: Abortion
 

[ QUOTE ]
A soul by definition is really what we think of as "life". Perhaps animation is a better word. People tend to confuse the notion of soul with some sort of magical smoky thing zapped into us.

A rational being (a person) is deemed to have an immortal soul because it is capable of immaterial understanding. Irrational beings, such as animals, have mortal souls.

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The big thing that is "wrong" with what you are saying
is that it did not address my post.

Christian infanticide
 

Yes I think abortion is wrong, but surely the christian argument has a few problems.

1 Samuel 15:3 - Divinely ordained infnticide

"...Do not spare them; put to death men and women, children and infants, cattle and sheep, camels and donkeys.'"


Psalm 137 v. 8-9 - Condoning it?>

"8 O Daughter of Babylon, doomed to destruction, happy is he who repays you for what you have done to us--
9 he who seizes your infants and dashes them against the rocks."

Oh yes and we are all looking forward to the day of the lord when he punishes the wicked.

Isiah 13:16

"Their infants will be dashed to pieces before their eyes; their houses will be looted and their wives ravished."

Oh by the way I do actually believe the book is innerrant.
Just trying to understand the 'religious argument.'
The book clearly condones infanticide in certain contexts but abortion is condemned by its later interpreters- what gives.
I personally find both abortion and infanticide abhorrent, but know better than to ask God what he was doing when he wrote the above text.

Re: Christian infanticide
 

Obviously if God orders something in a particular instance as when he ordered the Israelites to slaughter all their enemies, then it is correct. He however was not giving a general permission for infanticide. Surely this is obvious.

Re: Abortion
 

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I also belive that women should have the right to choose to do as they will with their bodies. As men we will never be faced with the dilemma of having to give birth.

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But we will face the dilemma of raising children and developing a 20+ year relationship with the mother. If we're going to have reproductive freedom -- then let's have it both ways. How about if I as the father decide, within the first trimester, that I am going to exercise my choice not to have the child. Do I get a financial waiver for life if the mother has the child anyways? Think of how drastically that would change the dynamics of the argument -- even if it didn't change anyones mind. [img]/images/graemlins/wink.gif[/img]

Genie is out of the Bottle
 

Everyone has an opinion, and whether it's legal or not -- it will never go away.

There are other issues though, like States rights and the right of association. When I was in young, a woman had to go to New York or California. It wasn't illegal, it just was where I lived.

Clearly there is no Constitutional right to abortion, so it's a States right issue.

I like the idea that cities with contrasting laws like Provo Utah and Las Vegas Nevada can co-exist so close together. That gets to the right of free association.

Re: Abortion
 

6 months after birth. Go with Universal life instead of term or perm.

Re: Abortion
 

The new Catholic Catechism, as everything introduced post Vatican II is seriously flawed. It cannot be held as authoritative as there is a serious modernist influence on the book, and certain passages go so far as to contradict previous teachings, which in Catholic circles is anathema.

Moral questions are best answered by a pre 1963 Moral Theology guide. Fr. Heribert Jone's guide translated by Fr. Urban Adelman is the standard.

The direct killing of a foetus is murder and always wrong. However, the indirect killing of a foetus in a grave circumstance is not sinful.

Those "pro-lifers" whether religious or not, who insist that we should never kill anybody for any reason are wrong.

We are even allowed to kill people for the preservation of temporal goods if a grave reason exists.