Exodus 20:30 states one of the Ten Commandments, ‘You shall not commit murder.’ This is what the Roman Catholic teaching of abortion is about and states that abortion is wrong and cannot be committed in any circumstances because it is murder.
Isaiah 49:5 – ‘…the Lord who formed me in the womb to be his servant...’ If you do perform an abortion then you kill a servant of God, God has a purpose for every life and so if you destroy a life how can it fulfil its’ purpose.
Psalm 139:13-15 – ‘Thou it was who didst fashion my inward parts; thou didst knit me together in my mother’s womb… Thou knowest me through and through’ What this quote means is that while god was making you, knitting you together in your mother’s womb he knew you.
Jeremiah 1:5 – ‘before I formed you in this womb I knew you.’ This quote, like the last means that God knew you before you were born and so it would be wrong to have an abortion because the foetus inside would already be living and would have a bond with God.
Luke 1:44 – ‘I tell you, when your greeting sounded in my ears, the baby in my womb leapt for joy.’ This quote is from a story in the Bible of when Elizabeth greeted Mary and the two babies, John the Baptist in Elizabeth’s womb and Jesus in Mary’s womb seemed to be able to sense each other and Mary proclaims that Jesus leapt inside her womb for joy at the greeting.
The next three quotes state that children are precious and should not be harmed or revoked from what they want to do. Jesus especially liked and had a special place in his heart for children, which shows that even the smallest of children should not be harmed.
Psalm 127:3 – ‘Sons are a gift from the Lord and children a reward for him.’
Matthew 18:10 – ‘Never despise one of these little ones; I tell you, they have their guardian angels in heaven, who look continually on the face of my heavenly father.’
Luke 18:15-18 – ‘They even brought babies for him to touch. When the disciples saw them they rebuked them, but Jesus called for the children and said, “Let the little ones come to me; do not try and stop them; for the kingdom of God belongs to such as these. I tell you that whoever does not accept the kingdom of God like a child will never enter it.”’
This quote from 1 Corinthians 3:16-17 proclaims that if you destroy a person, a life then you are destroying Gods temple and in doing so you are destroying the spirit of God. ‘Surely you know that you are God’s temple, where the spirit of God dwells. Anyone who destroys Gods temple will himself be destroyed by God, because the temple of God is holy; and that temple you are.’
Section B
Christians are generally against the idea of abortion and so will probably consider it as wrong.
Depending on what denomination of the Christian faith they come from will make them have different opinions towards abortion and how strict they are when it comes to this subject.
The General Synod (governing body) of the Church of England in 1983 stated that ‘all life, including that developing in the womb, is created by God, in his own image and is therefore, to be ‘nurtured, supported and protected’. However in February 1993 the General Synod of the Church of England passed a resolution on the subject of abortion, which was the first for ten years. This resolution, which was quite lengthy gave no stronger statement than that abortion is ‘a procedure which should not be undertaken lightly but only after the most serious moral reflection’, and referred to occasions ‘when abortion has to be undertaken’. A number of major denominations, for example, the United Reformed Church and the Baptist Union have produced no resolution or agreed statement.
Jesus said nothing about abortion but he had a special concern for children. He also taught much about the need to care for the weak in society, so many Christians feel that he would favour a law protecting the defenceless unborn child.
The Orthodox and Roman Catholic churches take the firmest line against abortion. The present Pope has called abortion one of the ‘abominable crimes’ and a Russian Orthodox priest, Father Dmitri Dudko who was imprisoned by the Communist Regime, has said that abortions are never allowable just as murder is also never allowable.
The sanctity of life would play a crucial part in the debate of a Christian mind of trying to think of how to respond to the question of abortion. As I have briefly explained in Section A, the sanctity of life is a belief that comes from both the Jewish and Christian religions. Human beings alone out of all God’s creations are said to be ‘like God’ and share something of God’s nature. As such every human being is holy and must be treated with the greatest of respect. The idea or belief that God has a unique value and path for every human being, that no one should be despised or denied the chance to live, sets a strong case to suggest that if an abortion is carried out then you kill one of God’s messengers, or servants who then obviously can not complete their unique task and follow their path to serve God.
Although there is another principle of the ‘quality of life’ which in modern times refers to the judgements that may be passed on the quality of a particular person’s life. For example in our society is thought that a rich individual will live and have a better standard or quality of living than one of a very poor person. So in extreme cases the ‘quality of life’ may override the ‘sanctity of life’ because if the quality of life is going to be very bad then will there be such thing as sanctity of life for that individual? If a baby is severely damaged in the womb and it is certain that if that baby is born that it will have such a poor quality of life that it is permissible to abort him or her.
This is the way of thinking of the Methodist Church.
The Methodist church in 1976 said that abortion is morally justifiable in cases of handicap, large families, poverty and bad housing. These churches regard the principle of quality of life as being in some cases more important than the sanctity of life.
The Roman Catholic Church, basing their teachings on the commandment ‘Thou shalt not kill’ and the doctrines established by the Early Fathers, have always maintained that the direct and deliberate killing of the unborn human is wrong in all circumstances.
The fundamentalist Protestant Churches agree with the Roman Catholic and Orthodox Churches on this issue because of their belief in the sanctity of life.
The Didache, the earliest known Christian document other than the New Testament states, ‘Thou shalt not kill the foetus in its’ mothers womb.’
The quotes from the different sections of the Bible stated in Section A clearly show that abortion on the whole is wrong and so Christians will look to this when making their decision on how they deal with the subject of abortion and would refer to the quotes when responding to the question of abortion.
Section C
I personally am inline with the way of thinking of the Methodist Church, I believe that in some circumstances abortion is acceptable and can be performed. Although I am not a devote Christian, if I were then I would have a lot of problems making my decision because of the many different opinions within the Christian faith which all stem from the lack of teaching of this subject in the Bible. I think that Christians rely too much on the Bible to make decisions and although it does hold the teachings of their Lord, it was written hundreds of years ago. Since then there have been many changes and advances, immature babies which are born now which would not of had a chance of surviving back in those times, can now be put in life support and do live. Someone, somewhere has to really think about the sanctity of life and when life begins because the technology is getting to the stage where babies are being born within the specified times of allowed abortion and could still be killed even though they have been born.
From the point of view of the Catholic Church no abortion can be performed because it would be committing murder, but if some of these ‘damaged babies’ are left to be born and are disabled they may live an incredibly hard life in which they can not comprehend the world around them or maybe can’t do things for themselves which we take for granted, and may prefer to be dead than live a life like this, because is this way of life really living?
The Human Fertilisation and Embryology Act states that no legal abortion can take place after 24 weeks except in the case of severe impairment of the child or risk to the mother’s life, and so this is in accordance to my beliefs and way of thinking because I do not believe that a life of severe impairment is a life at all.
Then again their have been many very successful disabled people in the world who have made something out of their life and have not let their physical or mental boundaries stop them in achieving their goals. An example of one of these people is Stephen Hawking who is the main genius of our time; he is extremely disabled and cannot really move any part of his body and has to type whatever he wants to say onto a small computer just so that other people can hear his thoughts.
There are other versions of impairment though, would you like to be a child born into poverty or an unloving family?
In conclusion, if you strongly belief in the sanctity of life then your view on abortion is most likely to be in accordance with the Roman Catholic and Orthodox Church teachings, but if you are like me and believe that a life of impairment is wrong and can not really be a life then you will accept abortion in some circumstances.
