And Other Thoughts: Living Sacrifice

Today I found myself tangled in a messy debate over abortion on facebook. What triggered the conversation was someone’s post regarding how great the weather has been correlating to global warming. A “friend” commented and said:

“I bet you won't be saying this when all the polar bears are extinct. But I bet you don't care about the polar bears.”

I immediately found myself responding:

"I wish more people were concerned about the holocaust of unborn babies in our country than they are about polar bears in Antarctica.”

To which she responded:

“Use the word "holocaust" in its correct context. Holocaust means sacrificed by fire. Abortion is not a "sacrifice," it is a choice. A choice that is no one's business.

However, I did have to correct her, because although the word “holocaust” does indeed mean “sacrifice by fire,” it also means:

“Any mass slaughter or reckless destruction of life” (dictionary.com).

I followed it with a link to the movie, 180, which absolutely correlates abortion with the Holocaust. (The 30 minute movie is provided below. It is well worth the time, and you’ll be amazed as some of the answers that are given to random people on the street. Some knew nothing about Adolph Hitler, and others said they’d choose to bury Jews alive if given a choice to do that or be killed themselves. But what was incredibly fascinating as you continue to watch the movie connect abortion with the Holocaust, is the absolute transformation—right before your very eyes—of some of the people interviewed. You will see the shock and horror in their eyes, and their revelation of what abortion truly means in our society. Thus the name, 180.)

Pro-choice. Is the choice of abortion a “sacrifice”? When we think of ancient times, are we not horrified by the human sacrifices of babies? How does abortion differ?

I think the real sacrifice comes when we decide to be Pro-Life. When we choose life instead of murder. The real sacrifice is putting ourselves aside and taking responsibility for our actions, behaviors, and “choices.”

Abortion is quite literally a living sacrifice to selfishness and foolishness. It’s not a choice by any means. Not when we consider how many people are fooled into the notion that abortion is especially okay within the first trimester. According to Pregnancy Period:

“The first trimester is the stage of pregnancy that begins on the first day of your last menstrual period and ends at 13 weeks. During the first trimester, the basis for all of your baby’s organs will form.”

So let’s consider what happens during those first 13 weeks that everyone is so convinced is not life:

Day of conception: baby’s features, including sex, hair and eye color are determined (Before You Decide resource booklet).

Week 4: the babies heart is PUMPING and his/her movement is easily seen on ultrasound.

Week 6: the baby has fingers and has begun to move.

Week 10: fingernails and toenails start to form.

During training to become a post-abortion counselor, we are shown a video of an actual abortion. As the doctor inserts the instrument to grind the so-called “tissue,” the baby STRUGGLES to keep away from it. It squirms and fights for its life.

So let’s go back to the idea that the choice of abortion is “no one’s business.”

“Alberto Giubilini and Francesca Minerva claim if a fetus can be aborted, a newborn can also be ‘terminated.’

‘Merely being human is not in itself a reason for ascribing someone a right to life,’ the authors write in an article published in the online edition of the Journal of Medical Ethics.” (Click here for the source.)

Once we say that an abortion during the first trimester is “legal” and ethical, we begin to push the boundaries concerning what life means. Is it no one’s business when we take a life because we may or may not think a child has a right to a life? When have we been given that right to decide?

When will we MAKE this our business? If we were burning newborn babies in a calf or throwing them in poisonous showers would we still insist, “It’s no one’s business”?

Hitler did…