Pia de Solenni
‘The topic continues to be a hot button issue in the US as recently evidenced by the response to Sen. Obama’s comments to Pastor Rick Warren on August 16 and House Speaker Pelosi’s comments to Tom Brokaw on August 24. The fact that abortion continues to be an issue reflects the amazing grass roots work of the pro-life movement.’,’
You can watch the statements of both politicians here on YouTube.
Of particular interest is Pelosi’s misstep, which a friend pointed out to me, when she uses the term “child” to refer to the discussion of Roe v. Wade. Watch and listen carefully – you’ll hear it around 1’37”: “Roe v. Wade talked about very clear definitions of when the chil… [stumble, fumble]… first trimester…certain considerations second trimester…not so third trimester, etc.”
[Aside – presumably, she meant to use the term “fetus” which is a Latin word used to signify “offspring”, “progeny”, and even “child” when referring to humans. It is used to describe the offspring both before birth and after birth. Within the abortion debate, it is a term that has been limited to the unborn child, presumably in an attempt to dehumanize her.]
Roe, contrary to popular conception, including the Speaker’s, did not limit abortion according to trimester. It legalized abortion for any reason. Its companion case, Doe v. Bolton, released the same day, allowed abortion at any time.
If you want the science, consult one of the top embryology books in th US, The Developing Human (tip to Kathleen Parker’s article):
“Human development begins at fertilization when a male gamete or sperm (spermatozoon) unites with a female gamete or oocyte (ovum) to produce a single cell — a zygote. This highly specialized, totipotent cell marked the beginning of each of us as a unique individual.”
But the best part is when the Speaker invokes St. Augustine as a defender of abortion based on his theories of ensoulment. Let’s be clear on one thing, while questions of ensoulment may have persisted, there was never any doubt that the Church taught that abortion was wrong. Here’s a great resource for quotes from the various Fathers of the Church on the topic of abortion. If you’re interested in what St. Augustine has to say, here are a few samples:
And therefore the following question may be very carefully inquired into and discussed by learned men, though I do not know whether it is in man’s power to resolve it: At what time the infant begins to live in the womb: whether life exists in a latent form before it manifests itself in the motions of the living being. To deny that the young who are cut out limb by limb from the womb, lest if they were left there dead the mother should die too, have never been alive, seems too audacious. Now, from the time that a man begins to live, from that time it is possible for him to die. And if he die, wheresoever death may overtake him, I cannot discover on what principle he can be denied an interest in the resurrection of the dead.
-Enchiridion 23.86.
Therefore brothers, you see how perverse they are and hastening wickedness, who are immature, they seek abortion of the conception before the birth; they are those who tell us, “I do not see that which you say must be believed.”
– Sermon 126, line 12.
[I did most, if not all, of the research on this project; so I can vouch for its authenticity.]
The Speaker’s assertions have generated responses from many members of the Catholic hierarchy in the US. Here are the first few –
This is a great teaching moment. We need to do as much as possible to talk about the issues and to make clear the teaching of the Catholic Church. At the end of the day, it’s not just about the unborn child. It’s also about the mother. And it’s about everyone else, too. As Mother Theresa famously commented,
[I] feel that the greatest destroyer of peace today is abortion, because it is a war against the child, a direct killing of the innocent child, murder by the mother herself. And if we accept that a mother can kill even her own child, how can we tell other people not to kill one another?
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