God created us with great care and he has our lives mapped out since birth as every small particle in our body is so intricately designed.
“For it was you who formed my inward parts; you knit me together in my mother's womb.” Psalm 139:13
All life comes from God and life must be protected at any cost. This is a quote from the bible stating that God made life and that all life comes from God:
‘Be fruitful and increase in number, fill the Earth and subdued it. Rule over the fish of the sea, and the birds of the air, and every other living creature that moves on the ground’ Genesis 1:26-28
Because God made life this instates that life is sacred, here is quote from the New Testament, which shows that life is sacred:
‘Your body is a temple of the Holy spirit’ 1 Corinthians 6:19
Life must also be protected because it is a sin to take life away as it is a gift from God. For this reason it would be wrong and against Christian teaching to commit suicide or to take life of another person.
As one of the 10 commandments is ‘thou shall not kill’ Exodus 20:30
Christian ideas of when life begins are varied at some points for example:
Saint Augustine thought the foetus received a soul 60 or 80 days after conception, English law at the time agreed with what he had said, although they distinguished between abortion before and after the quickening which is the first sign of movement. Haring stated that the foetus received its genetic coding at the conception and had the idea that this may be the point when it received its own personal and unique soul.
The Catholic idea is that God had created us to love and be loved in his own image, as evidence of his love. For this reason killing at vulnerable times is the greatest evil and life begins when the baby has evolved from fertilization. Also that abortion is wrong and the child should be put in an orphanage, instead of killing it, if the parent does not want it.
The Roman Catholic belief about the beginning of life is that even while the baby is still very tiny and still hardly developed the baby growing in the womb is the beginning of a human life, and another human being should not end any life created by God at any stage of its development. All life is precious as the psalm quote above states that.
It is important to know when life begins as it is vital to know when life should be protected which helps to decide on moral issues such as Abortion, contraception, Euthanasia and responsibility for others.
The various Christian churches have different views on contraception. The Roman Catholic Church says that the use of contraception is against natural law. It is natural that conception may happen with sexual intercourse and therefore this should be prevented.
We have the responsibility to look after life as God as stated in Genesis. We are put in charge so we have to look after life, even at most vulnerable times which are at the beginning and the end.
“Yahweh gives death and life, brings down to Sheol and draws up” 1 Samuel 2: 6
Christian Church’s encourage the support of hospices. Hospices are places for terminally ill people to be cared for and allowed to die in comfort and dignity without employing euthanasia. The first hospices were founded by Christians who were at the forefront in looking for compassionate alternatives to euthanasia.
Roman Catholic Christians believe that medical knowledge and understanding are inspired by God and therefore they should be used to prolong life whenever possible. In the end Christians believe only God can decide when a persons life will end.
An example of responsibility for the sake of The Sanctity Of Life is when Jesus helped the person that was possessed by many devils and turned into a demon by putting the devils into a herd of pigs and making them drown after rushing off a cliff.
“For Jesus had been telling the unclean spirit to come out of the man…So he gave them leave. The devils came out of the man and went into the pigs, the herd charged down the cliff into the lake and was drowned” Luke 8:26-33
This shows that one human life is more important then pigs or animal life and those we have a certain responsibility towards helping others at times of need.
Although there have been great examples of human responsibility in the past, despite that we have not set the right standard of life and our responsibility at times of the past in addition. For example when both the Romans and the ancient Greeks killed weak or deformed babies by exposing them to the elements (leaving them outside to die, eaten by viscous animals, dying of hunger). Pluto and Aristotle thought that the state should enforce this type of killing since death was better then living a stunted life, even though it is so gruesome and unjust.
In conclusion I think that the Christian views/beliefs are of the sanctity of life are very similar and do not have a substantial difference, as some views may be more lenient then others as others may be more strict (Roman Catholics). Although their views on the responsibility of those at the beginning and the end of there lives may be slightly different, they once again have the same basic beliefs, and I think that all Christians know their responsibility for others by the previous teachings of the bible and that we should follow some of those teachings to this day so we do not further mistakes with our responsibility for others as the Romans and ancient Greeks did.
