A Catholic Knight

A Catholic Knight

25 August, 2012

In our society ...

you cannot be executed because a relative of yours committed a capital crime in which you had no participation ...

you cannot be executed because a relative of yours did something horrible which causes his victim to remember and emotionally relive the crime every time she sees you ...

you cannot be executed simply because your presence causes someone to change her plans or is
otherwise an inconvenience to her …

you cannot be executed without due process – a trial in court in which you are found guilty of a capital crime …

unless you are an unborn child.

All arguments that abortion should be allowed in cases of rape or incest amount to the above.

As far as I'm concerned, rape and incest are capital crimes. They attack the very foundation of all society and those who commit these crimes have, by committing them, forfeited their right to life. However, in those cases where a child is conceived as a result, the child is a completely innocent victim of the crime.

Instead of lying to women and society, telling them that abortion is the most merciful way of dealing with this terrible situation, we should be dedicating resources to counseling and maternity assistance for the women, and placement in foster care and adoption for the children if the mother is not able to raise her child.

What about allowing abortion when the life of the mother is in jeopardy from the pregnancy? In those cases, both mother and child should be closely monitored to allow the child to develop as much as possible in the womb. When the threat to the mother's life become immanent, the child should be delivered and all reasonable efforts to preserve his life should be made. If saving the life of the child is not possible, then palliative care should be given so that the child does not suffer while dying a natural death. In this case, death is not caused or desired, it is merely accepted as inevitable.

In no case is the deliberate killing of the child justifiable. There is a name in the law for deliberately killing an innocent person – murder.