abortion OK if mother's life is at stake?

shakewell

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I am against legalized abortion in the U.S., but I have a question:
If abortion is banned except in the case of the mother's life being at stake, what's to stop women who want an abortion for convenience to falsely claim their life is at stake? How can a claim of the 'mother's life being at stake' ever be disproved?
 

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I am against legalized abortion in the U.S., but I have a question:
If abortion is banned except in the case of the mother's life being at stake, what's to stop women who want an abortion for convenience to falsely claim their life is at stake? How can a claim of the 'mother's life being at stake' ever be disproved?
Why do you assume that the claim is almost impossible to prove false?
 
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jimmyjimmy

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I am against legalized abortion in the U.S., but I have a question:
If abortion is banned except in the case of the mother's life being at stake, what's to stop women who want an abortion for convenience to falsely claim their life is at stake? How can a claim of the 'mother's life being at stake' ever be disproved?

I'm sure that it would happen, and some doctors would be happy to falsify records. All laws are broken, yet we sill have laws.
 
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Landon Caeli

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I am against legalized abortion in the U.S., but I have a question:
If abortion is banned except in the case of the mother's life being at stake, what's to stop women who want an abortion for convenience to falsely claim their life is at stake? How can a claim of the 'mother's life being at stake' ever be disproved?

Don't c-sections solve most cases where a mothers life is at risk?
 
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shakewell

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Why do you assume that the claim is almost impossible to prove false?
Well if your car acts up intermittently and every time you take it in to the mechanic it runs just fine, can the mechanic prove that it doesn't act up? It seems like any woman with an imagination could concoct a story: "when the baby kicks, I can't breathe and my heart stops beating". Of course the baby never "kicks" when she's in the doctor's office.
 
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JackRT

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These very serious questions of person-hood arise only if we assume that the soul is infused at conception and that the brand new zygote is fully a person. Is there a more reasonable understanding? I believe there is. Personally I believe that the developing fetus becomes a person only when it is able to survive outside the womb. Sentience occurs at about the same point in the pregnancy very late in the second trimester. For this reason I am against abortion beyond the twentieth week except in very rare extreme circumstances.. Otherwise I believe that abortion should be legal, it should be safe, it should be available and it should be the woman’s informed choice but most important of all --- it should be rare. In conclusion, we should always keep in mind that there is no more powerful abortifacient in the world than poverty.
 
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Ave Maria

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Abortion is never okay, not even when the mother's life is in danger. One can never do evil to bring about good. However, one should know about the principle of double effect. You can learn about it here:

Abortion and Double Effect | Catholic Answers
 
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JackRT

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Abortion is never okay, not even when the mother's life is in danger. One can never do evil to bring about good. However, one should know about the principle of double effect. You can learn about it here:

Abortion and Double Effect | Catholic Answers

There are situations in which the RCC permits abortions. In 1969 I took my wife to St Josephs Hospital in Hamilton Ontario. She was almost immediately diagnosed with an ectopic pregnant and was within minutes of death. They performed an immediate surgical removal of the embryo and one ovary. Better to save the mother than both die wouldn't you agree?
 
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Wolfe

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It's kind of a grey area for me.

I once read that if the baby puts the mothers life at risk, the baby is likely to die during pregnancy anyway.
In that case, and only that case, is it barely tolerable I feel.
It's better to lose 1, than to lose 2. I hold the belief that aborted babies go to Heaven, but the mother may not yet be with Jesus.
In any case, I would not feel good about doing it, I still think it's a detestable thing to do no matter the circumstances.

But sometimes you have to do detestable things, sadly.
It's no more tragic, but yes, I do feel it's just barely tolerable.
 
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JackRT

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It's kind of a grey area for me

In our world moral decisions are often complex --- not clearly black or white, but a murky shade of gray. Actions often seemingly immoral may still be the better choice. For example, a German Lutheran minister, Dietrich Bonhoeffer, participated in a plot to kill Adolph Hitler. Although he believed murder was immoral, the horrible situation in Germany under the Nazi regime overrode his commitment to pacifism and nonviolence, and brought him finally to the murder plot. He reasoned that the guilt accruing to him for murder would be less than his guilt for doing nothing. As he saw it, he had to choose between the lesser of two evils. It wasn't the right choice but it wasn't the wrong choice either. Decisions about unplanned pregnancies are not infrequently like Bonhoeffer's choice, a very dirty shade of gray --- however much anti-abortionists try to convince us that the choice is always black and white. For people of conscience, however, legal actions are not always moral, nor are illegal actions always immoral. It depends on the situation.

Above taken from:
(MIS)USING the BIBLE in ARGUMENTS AGAINST ABORTION by Charles W. Hendrick, Professor Emeritus, Missouri State University
 
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DrBubbaLove

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There are situations in which the RCC permits abortions. In 1969 I took my wife to St Josephs Hospital in Hamilton Ontario. She was almost immediately diagnosed with an ectopic pregnant and was within minutes of death. They performed an immediate surgical removal of the embryo and one ovary. Better to save the mother than both die wouldn't you agree?
no doctor myself but the intent of the surgery mentioned was to save a life. The intent in an abortion procedure is to end a life.
While you could say the resulting death is the same result as a successful abortion the difference is still the intent. So it is appropriate to not lump the two procedures into the same label of "abortion", at least in discussions of the wrongness of what one is doing. Medically the term is probably used absent a judgement of morality. The difference between a murder and manslaughter, even though a death was the result of both.
 
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DrBubbaLove

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In our world moral decisions are often complex --- not clearly black or white, but a murky shade of gray. Actions often seemingly immoral may still be the better choice. For example, a German Lutheran minister, Dietrich Bonhoeffer, participated in a plot to kill Adolph Hitler. Although he believed murder was immoral, the horrible situation in Germany under the Nazi regime overrode his commitment to pacifism and nonviolence, and brought him finally to the murder plot. He reasoned that the guilt accruing to him for murder would be less than his guilt for doing nothing. As he saw it, he had to choose between the lesser of two evils. It wasn't the right choice but it wasn't the wrong choice either. Decisions about unplanned pregnancies are not infrequently like Bonhoeffer's choice, a very dirty shade of gray --- however much anti-abortionists try to convince us that the choice is always black and white. For people of conscience, however, legal actions are not always moral, nor are illegal actions always immoral. It depends on the situation.

Above taken from:
(MIS)USING the BIBLE in ARGUMENTS AGAINST ABORTION by Charles W. Hendrick, Professor Emeritus, Missouri State University
Saint Thomas once wrote:
"Natural law is simply the light of intelligence placed within us by God; by it we know what we should do and what we should avoid. God bestowed this light, or this law, with the creation."

This is the law that is a part of us, "written on hearts'. So we know it is wrong before we do it. Part of that law would be not taking another human life. Under that law the act of taking another life is always wrong, but an individual doing it can be justified in committing a wrong act.
I do not see justification, as in saving another life, as creating the huge grey area most pro-choice advocates would have us believe exists. It is not like they would stop being pro-choice if no abortions were performed to supposedly save a life.
 
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JackRT

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"Natural law" is an ancient and very iffy concept. It has been used to argue all sorts of strange concepts --- example: There can be only four gospels because there are four winds and four corners of the world.
 
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pdudgeon

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In our world moral decisions are often complex --- not clearly black or white, but a murky shade of gray. Actions often seemingly immoral may still be the better choice. For example, a German Lutheran minister, Dietrich Bonhoeffer, participated in a plot to kill Adolph Hitler. Although he believed murder was immoral, the horrible situation in Germany under the Nazi regime overrode his commitment to pacifism and nonviolence, and brought him finally to the murder plot. He reasoned that the guilt accruing to him for murder would be less than his guilt for doing nothing. As he saw it, he had to choose between the lesser of two evils. It wasn't the right choice but it wasn't the wrong choice either. Decisions about unplanned pregnancies are not infrequently like Bonhoeffer's choice, a very dirty shade of gray --- however much anti-abortionists try to convince us that the choice is always black and white. For people of conscience, however, legal actions are not always moral, nor are illegal actions always immoral. It depends on the situation.

Above taken from:
(MIS)USING the BIBLE in ARGUMENTS AGAINST ABORTION by Charles W. Hendrick, Professor Emeritus, Missouri State University

the problem in all of this is that
1. it wasn't Bonhoeffer's decision to make because he couldn't see the future any more than satan could.
2. it's one thing to agree that Hitler had to be stopped,
3. but it's another decision entirely to say that Bonhoeffer was the only person capable of killing Hitler,
4. or that he needed to be killed before he could be stopped.

any time something in the situation puts us in the place of God,
that's the wrong place to be.
 
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pdudgeon

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DrBubbaLove

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"Natural law" is an ancient and very iffy concept. It has been used to argue all sorts of strange concepts --- example: There can be only four gospels because there are four winds and four corners of the world.
LOL, have never heard anyone claim such about natural law. I think that is taking the root word of "nature" way farther than the theological concept of there being a "natural law" intended. That some protesting preacher may have declared the concept you mentioned as a "natural law" I would not doubt, but that declaration is not even in the same wheel house as the philosophical concept.

There is nothing inherent in human nature that mandates a right to having a gospel, let alone 4 gospels or corners of the world. There is however a right to life concept that is inherent in our human nature - so that the idea can be naturally reasoned that taking another life is wrong. IOW exposure to Scripture is not required to know that unjustly taking a life is wrong.

For anyone unfamiliar with the concept, here is a part of the Catholic view:
www.scborromeo.org/ccc/p3s1c3a1.htm#1953
" 1956 The natural law, present in the heart of each man and established by reason, is universal in its precepts and its authority extends to all men. It expresses the dignity of the person and determines the basis for his fundamental rights and duties:"
 
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JackRT

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There is nothing inherent in human nature that mandates a right to having a gospel, let alone 4 gospels or corners of the world.

That was a claim by one of the Church Fathers. Can't remember who at the moment.
 
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DrBubbaLove

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That was a claim by one of the Church Fathers. Can't remember who at the moment.
Ah, Saint Ireneaus Against Heresies (Book III, Chapter 11)
ANF01. The Apostolic Fathers with Justin Martyr and Irenaeus - Christian Classics Ethereal Library

Perhaps I was not plain as I was clearly misunderstood on the meaning of "natural law".
Just because someone makes an analogy or association with something from nature (meaning everything around us) to something relating to human life they are NOT making a declaration of natural law - that is not what we mean when theologians or philosophers talk about "natural law". We are talking about what is inherent in human nature - in us - a part of us. Not what we can see in "nature" around us.

If you won't read catholic sources given to understand what I meant, then look at wiki
Natural law - Wikipedia
"a philosophy that certain rights are inherent by virtue of human nature and can be understood universally through human reason."
 
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JackRT

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Ah, Saint Ireneaus Against Heresies (Book III, Chapter 11)
ANF01. The Apostolic Fathers with Justin Martyr and Irenaeus - Christian Classics Ethereal Library

Perhaps I was not plain as I was clearly misunderstood on the meaning of "natural law".
Just because someone makes an analogy or association with something from nature (meaning everything around us) to something relating to human life they are NOT making a declaration of natural law - that is not what we mean when theologians or philosophers talk about "natural law". We are talking about what is inherent in human nature - in us - a part of us. Not what we can see in "nature" around us.

If you won't read catholic sources given to understand what I meant, then look at wiki
Natural law - Wikipedia
"a philosophy that certain rights are inherent by virtue of human nature and can be understood universally through human reason."

Having had a Jesuit education I am thoroughly familiar with the concepts. The ability of human reason without any hard evidence to back it up can lead to bizarre conclusions. It not only "can ", it has led to bizarre conclusions.
 
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