Evangelical Switch from Pro-choice to Anti-abortion

the Bible treats human life as beginning at conception, but yes the unborn child doesn't have the legal status of a born human being. However, it IS a human being as you should be able to judge from the untrasound images as I've pointed out, it is not a fish and it is not a blob. And the loss of the unborn child IS treated as a loss to be recompensed, so don't give me this about how abortion is just fine and dandy with the Bible.Edited by Faith, : No reason given.

Here's something by Jonathan Dudley that I quoted in Message 1 (Broken Words: The Abuse of Science and Faith in American Politics):

quote:

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God does not regard the fetus as a soul, no matter how far gestation has progressed. The Law plainly exacts: 'If a man kills any human life he will be put to death' (Lev. 24:17). But according to Exodus 21:22—24, the destruction of the fetus is not a capital offense. Clearly, then, in contrast to the mother, the fetus is not reckoned as a soul.

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Genesis 2:7 says:

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Gen 2:7 Then the Lord God formed a man from the dust of the ground and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life, and the man became a living being.

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This implies that life begins at the first breath, not at conception.--PercyEdited by Percy, : Clean up.

All this attempt to make the unborn child into something unhuman is self-delusion, since you know very well that if it is left to grow and develop it will become a person and if you kill it you are killing a human being. You know that. And again I point out that the ultrasound at twelve weeks shows a living baby with all its parts intact, even sometimes sucking its thumb. To use sophistry to pretend it isn't ought to eat at your conscience.And the point at which God made Adam a living being says nothing about the point at which we are living human beings in the womb since Adam was never in the womb.Edited by Faith, : No reason given.Edited by Faith, : No reason given.Edited by Faith, : No reason given.Edited by Faith, : No reason given.

I don't really plan on taking part in the debate, but I want to add that it was the Medieval European belief that "quickening", the time when the fetus acquires its soul, occurs when the mother first feels the fetus "kick".I see that Faith already has already quoted Luke 1:41 in post before mine.

No it doesn't. As I said, it treats the unborn fetus as the father's property, the same as an ox. In Exodus 21:22, note the phrasing, "... so that her fruit depart from her, and yet no mischief follow...." The loss of the fetus is not considered "mischief". As I've pointed out, abortion is not fine and dandy with the bible. It is destruction of property, which is subject to compensation. It is not, by any stretch of the imagination, murder.

Not unhuman, just not yet a living human being. In other words, you have no counterargument, just name calling. Why not just deal with the arguments and leave the derogatory comments aside? No one would dispute that. You can't kill something not yet alive, and until born a fetus is not yet a living human being. No one's pretending what can be seen on ultrasounds at twelve weeks doesn't exist.The only one exhibiting sophistry here is you, since to argue against straw men is sophistry. Why can you never engage in discussion without casting accusations against the other side? Next you'll be telling us all how poorly you've been treated when the personal charges began with you.--Percy

It's a living human being and it is self-delusion to deny it.

Yet as always you provide no evidence to support your assertions.

It's not a living human being and it is self-delusion to deny it.Now what? Could I suggest a fact based discussion at far remove from your personal animosities?--Percy

The Bible denies it.

I gave a couple of quotes showing that the Bible recognizes us as persons even in the womb.

And I showed that it doesn't. Either the Bible contradicts itself (it does) or you're misinterpreting your quotes (you are).

You provided a couple quotes about Jesus and about while Mary was pregnant with Jesus, who evangelicals believe existed even before conception. Those quotes are not about non-godhead people.--Percy

What ARE you talking about? Nobody says John the Baptist existed before conception and he's the one who leapt in the womb. And Jesus pre-existed conception as God but not as man: he had to be formed in the womb like any other human being. And if God says He knew Jeremiah in the womb then He also knows us in the womb, rather than right after we are born, that certainly shows that we are living human beings before birth. And while twelve weeks isn't conception it's awfully young and awfully tiny and it's clearly a living baby that has all the parts of a baby and acts like a baby.Edited by Faith, : No reason given.

Didn't he leap in reaction to Jesus in the womb? Luke isn't specific about when the holy spirit came over Mary, and it always seemed to me that it must have been sometime during the journey to visit Elizabeth, who when she arrives seems very certain that Mary will bear a child, something you wouldn't normally say to someone not pregnant. Actually he says the same thing about Jeremiah that he does about Jesus, that he knew him before conception: "Before I formed thee in the belly I knew thee." I don't think you can reach any conclusions about normal conceptions by quoting scripture about people God knew even before they were conceived.At best the Bible is equivocal about when a fetus is a human being, saying different things in different places. But the earliest reference, and therefore certainly the most reliable, is where Genesis says taking a breath defines life.--Percy