Abortion is the expulsion of an embryo or foetus from the uterus, resulting in death. There are two different types of abortion, induced abortion which is when the abortion had been caused deliberately by human action and spontaneous abortion which is when the pregnancy is ended through natural causes, or by an accidental trauma. Spontaneous abortion is commonly known as a miscarriage.
Women have abortions for several different reasons, due to their lifestyle, financial circumstances or simply their age. Many women feel that bringing a child into this world in what they think are inappropriate circumstances, may be bad for the child, there are many reasons why women have abortions such as the women is not in a serious or long term relationship and feels that she will not be able to cope with having a child on her own. Another may be if the woman's or the baby's health is at risk if she continues the pregnancy. In some cases the pregnancy may be a result of rape.
Many people believe that a woman should have that to choose if she wants to continue with the pregnancy or not whatever her reason and shouldn't have to persuade any one why she should have one because it is her own body. But others believe that the decision should not be taken lightly, and should have to talk to doctors and the father of the unborn child.
Over the last 3 centuries, the British parliament has debated over the abortion issue several times. Following the 1990 act, a woman cannot have an abortion without a good reason; she should persuade two doctors that her health would be at risk if she continued with the pregnancy, or that any child she already might have would suffer if she had another baby. It is legal to have an abortion up to the 24th week of pregnancy, after this time the baby would be able to survive being called a premature birth.
Some early Church fathers thought that until the 40th day after conception, abortion was allowed, because they believe this was the time the unborn child would receive their soul, but this is not generally accepted now.
The Roman Catholic Church believes that abortion in any case is considered a sin, even if it is the result of a rape. They encourage women not to have an abortion, but to adopt the child if she feels that she will not be able to manage looking after a baby. The Roman Catholic Church have made several statements about abortion, ...
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Some early Church fathers thought that until the 40th day after conception, abortion was allowed, because they believe this was the time the unborn child would receive their soul, but this is not generally accepted now.
The Roman Catholic Church believes that abortion in any case is considered a sin, even if it is the result of a rape. They encourage women not to have an abortion, but to adopt the child if she feels that she will not be able to manage looking after a baby. The Roman Catholic Church have made several statements about abortion, for example Humanæ Vitæ in 1968 emphasised that 'human life is sacred'.
The 'Life' organisation believes that the 'destruction' of a foetus is always wrong, whether or not the unborn child is handicapped or unwanted. They also believe that all human life she be protected by the law and that a life begins at the moment of conception.
Humanists believe that abortion is better than bringing an unborn child into the world. But they are not in favour of abortion, the understand there will always be a number of unplanned pregnancy, and that mothers should have the choice of abortion, or to keep the baby.
The bible does not say anything about abortion, since when the bible was written, abortion wasn't a common occurrence as it is now. The bible does not use the word abortion, or does it deal with it directly, but there are Christians that use the bible to support their views. They may point out that the bible stress the impotence of human life, and how it is wrong to kill another human.
'So created man in his own image, in the image of god he created man; male female he created them' this tell Christians that God created man in the image of himself, and that everyone has a little bit of god inside of them, so having abortion would killing about of God.
The bible also says that people are commanded not to kill; this commandment means that it is wrong to take any human life except in capital punishment or in war.
'You are to take life for life, eye for eye, tooth for tooth, hand for hand, foot for foot, burn for burn, wound for wound, bruise for bruise.' This quote tells Christians that no one has the right to kill, whether or not the human is born or unborn, and if someone should kill or hurt another, there should be a punishment equally to the damage they have caused.
'Rescue the weak and needy; and deliver from the hand of the wicked.' Christians might believe this has an important message about abortion because a foetus is weak and needy, and need protected from those who want to hurt it and from the people who believe that abortion is a freedom of choice.
'Your eyes saw my unformed body. All the days ordained for me were written in your book before one of them came t be.' This quotation suggests that before you are born, your life has been written out like a book, and everything has been planned out for you and by the mother aborting the child, she ruins the life planned out for this unborn child.
Christians put their beliefs into actions in many different ways; the Christians who are against abortion do similar things to those who are for abortion, but obviously for different reasons. For example:
* A Christian might join an organisation which supports abortion, or join a 'pro-life' organisation which campaigns against abortion, such as SPUC or Life.
* They may take part in protests to make abortion illegal or to keep it legal, for example taking part in marches and other demonstrations.
* Their beliefs may effect their votes in elections, such as someone who disagrees with abortion, may vote for someone who promises to make abortion harder to obtain.
* For the people who in favour of abortion, they may offer counselling for women who have had abortions. Also for those who are against abortion, they may not believe that it is enough to discourage women from having abortions, and they may become foster parents and help looking after the children on a more long term basis than just babysitting.
* Whatever they believe about abortion, Christians are still likely to believe that it is important to give people a proper sex education, in order to reduce the amount of unplanned pregnancies.
* They may also pray to God to help with the problem of abortion.
Abortion is never justified.
I don't agree with this because I believe that a woman has a right to choose whether she becomes a mother or not. I don't agree that all abortions are justified, in some cultures they abort a child because it's a girl, and won't continue the pregnancy unless they are having a boy.
If a girl is having a child under the age of 16, I believe that she has the right to abortion whatever her reasons are, even though she should have used the correct precautions before hand. I don't believe that some one who can still be classified as a child still, would be able to cope with having a child of their own.
If a child is proven to be mental or physically disabled before they are born, i believe that the mother and anyone else involved should be properly informed about how handicapped the child would be before being asked to make the choice of keeping the child or not. In some cases where they chose not to abort the child, the child hasn't been nearly has handicapped as the doctors believed it to be.
In some religions, I believe they are to harsh with abortion issues, such as Roman Catholics believing that even if the child is the result of a rape, the woman is encourage to continue the pregnancy. Also in some religions such as Christianity, they believe from the moment of conception, a life as a become and believe that the foetus is a real person before even stating to look like one, therefore having an abortion is murder. I don't believe this, I think until the 20th week of pregnancy, the foetus is a foetus, and not yet a person, and that abortion is not murder, but merely stopping a life from forming.
