Abortion Is Never A Humane Choice
News articles such as these are frequently making the rounds into our media feeds. In this article, I want to call particular attention to the instances being used by secular media to promote abortion as healthcare, usually citing cases of fatal prenatal abnormalities.
Riding on the waves of sentimentality, mainstream media is promoting abortion as the best available choice for women. But the fabric of humanity is not made entirely of emotions alone. It is a tapestry of physical, emotional, psychological, moral and spiritual components weaving together, every part as important as the other.
Medical science is greatly helpful in diagnosing the condition of a baby in utero. It is a shame when medical professionals presume to use this knowledge to tell parents they can now decide to actively “terminate” their baby. To offer parents the sole choice of suffocating or dismembering their non-viable baby, in order to alleviate the temporary emotional distress they might be experiencing is exposing them to long lasting psychological and emotional trauma.
Death of a child is extremely traumatic for parents. Counting down the days, knowing that your baby won’t make it can be understandably agonizing. Grieving is a necessary part of dealing with that trauma. But to be responsible for inducing an early death by cruel and painful methods is a burden that parents should not be forced to carry.
With Planned Parenthood and pro-abortionists selling the lie that it is a quick in and out procedure with no details of what the procedure really is, I truly believe that most parents given a limited time to make a life or death decision are choosing abortions ignorant of what it entails.
I hold no judgement towards parents who choose abortion in a period of great vulnerability. But to those who provide this as the optimal solution, what do we say? Isn’t there anything to be said for the morality of the act or the humanity of the child? To put parents in the position of having to kill their own babies, babies they had dreams and hopes for? And to journalists and media personalities who uphold abortion as “the ultimate savior of women”, what do we say? Of course, these emotionally charged stories strike a note with readers (because who among us haven’t experienced loss and suffering?) but they are also what drive mobs beyond the realms of rationality! They can be a powerful tool to evoke empathy but they must never be used to dull consciences and sway us away from reason.
For the sake of simplicity, I refer to this article, where two arguments are made: first, carrying the baby to term put (mother’s) life at risk because of preexisting conditions. I expect this would have been a concern even if the baby was completely healthy. Isn’t this a risk that was taken into consideration early on in the pregnancy? Wouldn’t appropriate medical attention and care be extended to her if her baby didn’t have the diagnosis? So why is that choice withheld from her in this situation?
Some other articles mentioned doctors not fearful of treating at-risk women due to abortion laws. Unfortunately, medical professionals have been trained and empowered to take the lives of the unborn in such cases. Abortion law does not prevent a mother whose life is in danger from receiving the treatments she needs even if it results in the loss of the baby’s life. This is done by inducing labor or delivering the baby alive through medical interventions. The difference may seem subtle but has enormous weight in the decision making. Perhaps this is an invitation for those in the medical field to grow in their competency and discretion by reviewing case by case. Abortion has been the norm for far too long.
The second reason cited was, “to prevent (the baby) suffering”. Studies show that babies in the womb as young as 15 weeks can feel pain. If the baby could speak for himself, I’m certain that the comfort of their mother’s womb in their suffering would be greatly preferred to the methods used for abortion. But of course, “fetuses” can’t speak and hence we assume that they would choose death for themselves if they could.
I reckon it is far easier living with the natural death of a child than having to live with deliberately choosing to end your child’s life.
Most of us are capable of rational, moral decision-making no matter how deep our emotions may run. (It’s probably the only thing keeping many of us from prisons!) This is precisely why when parents are faced with the discovery of their child’s fatality, we as a community including family and friends, medical professionals, media persons, spiritual leaders, and everyone involved, must rally to support them emotionally and rationally in the midst of a crisis instead of pushing them to make choices they may come to regret with time. And there are other choices! I contend that a truly compassionate approach would be to give the choice of living out their parenthood in the brief time they have with their baby than to rip that privilege away from them.
It is still their baby, viable or not. If non-viability is what determines the choice for abortion, perhaps it is because we have told them that the child is of better value to them dead than suffering – physically, financially and emotionally. Would we take this approach with babies outside of the womb? Would we kill a child who was dying just to spare parents emotional anguish?
Currently, 80% of parents with fatal prenatal diagnosis abort their babies. When offered the right kind of perinatal hospice care, 75-85% of parents are likely to carry their babies to term despite the circumstances.
Parents have a right to be allowed to grieve while also acting humanely towards their unborn. I would argue that those in the medical field have a duty to expend all options of real healthcare for women in difficult pregnancies without offering abortion first. To not do so is to unnecessarily make their non-viable baby a threat to the parent’s well-being.
When the fatal instruments have been put away, when the news story has run its course and all is silent, will their grief echo consolation or despair at what was chosen?
Remember I said there are other options? Be Not Afraid (BNA) offers support to parents carrying to term following a prenatal diagnosis. BNA along with Heartbeat Int’l, Charlotte Lozier Institute and Her Plan is working on a national initiative to create a prolife network of service providers who can offer case management support to parents carrying to term following a prenatal diagnosis. They offer training to organizations in developing their own BNA-modeled service. Find more information on www.prenataldiagnosis.org.
