Here is the Garrett Riley belief on this issue. The majority of evangelicals believe in abstinence ONLY education in our schools, studies have shown however that when you do not educate kids about contraception such as condoms, and birth control pills, when kids do have sex they are exponentially more likely to not use a condom, thus dramatically increasing the chance of an unwanted pregnancy. Obama pointed out that abortions have increased since W has been in office, and I believe this could be an indirect result of the abstinence only dogma that Bush supports.
Don't get me wrong, abstinence is a perfectly valid choice for kids to make, but it should be presented as only one of a variety of choices to stop an unwanted pregnancy, or dramatically curb STD's . But telling kids not to have sex because it is "not gods perfect design for his creation" is foolish because it does not stop kids from having sex in most cases. And as I have already mentioned increases the likely outcome of an unwanted pregnancy.
So where does life begin? It is easy for people to say "at conception" I would ask christians who have this opinion to consider why nearly half of all pregnancies spontaneously abort without the woman ever even knowing it. If this is in "gods perfect design" it would seem that god really likes abortion would it not? Also the use of birth control pills does terminate a wholesale amount of zygotes without anyone knowing it as well. I do not think that life begins at conception. What happens at conception is that one cell becomes two, and so on and so forth, laying the groundwork for a growing organism that has the potential to become a human life, that is of course if it is not spontaneously rejected and aborted by the mothers body. I believe life is fully formed somewhere around the second trimester I believe (I could be wrong on this and I reserve the right as always to alter my view on this specific question) That is why abortion is only allowed in the first trimester.
I agree with most all of the clear thinking pro-choicers on this very difficult and emotional issue..I hate abortion, I want them to be rare and have restrictions on them. But I cannot restrict the right of a mother to terminate her own pregnancy if that is her choice. I want to council her and educate her on how to stop the unwanted pregnancy from ever occuring.
For everyone of my readers who is a strong pro-life christian...consider this. If nearly fifty percent of all pregnancies terminate naturally that makes your god yahew the biggest abortionist that has ever existed! Jesus never said anything about abortion. Yahew killed hundreds and thousand of innocent babies and children in the great flood.
I would love thoughtful comments on this one folks!
P.S. I am still voting for McCain
P.P.S. I was impressed with the way Warren handled this forum. As far as I can tell he is not a hateful man and does not not demonize people like my favorite sociologist, James Dobson. That being said, this forum had no business taking place at a church. Why not at a secular free thought center? Or a Mosque, a Jewish temple, a LDS church etc.?
3 comments:
Garrett, I would be interested to hear your definition of 'life.' What is it that begins somewhere around the second trimester? Thanks.
A Zygote becomes a fetus, gets a nervous system, a growing brain, etc, Has the ability to feel pain, can react to stimuli. The Zygote becomes a sentient being. Before this it is not "life" as we know it. This is why abortions are only legal within the first trimester as I understand it. I am not for any late term abortions, and I am all for restrictions on abortion. As far as definition of life...your bible tells you in genesis it is when breath occurs (god breathed into adam and eve and gave them breath right?) I will go beyond that primitive fable..Life is when an organism can reproduce, respond to stimuli, have a metabolism etc. And there are different stages and forms of life. Back to abortion.. again the key is to prevent the unwanted pregnancy from ever occuring, this is done through contraception education. A couple questions for you.
Do you think abstinence only education does more harm than good in the sense that when kids that are taught this do have sex they are far less likely to use contraception thus increasing the chance for unwanted pregancy?
If abortion is murder are you for the death penalty for the dr who performed the procedure and the woman who elected to "murder" her own baby? If so why or why not?
As a thoroughly educated pastor give me your opinion as to why god terminates 45% of all pregancies, one could nickname him "the great abortionist" could one not?
sorry, Gar, I responded a few days ago, but I guess it never posted. Basically I just said I thought your response was curious for such a simple question. I was wondering if you would be willing to clarify one point. You mention that you believe life is defined by the ability to reproduce. Would this be reproduction in the sense of one cell becoming two or as in a teenager going through puberty?
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