Tioga Herald

If we are looking towards the Supreme Court to make a decision on Roe v. Wade and pro-life, what, then is this about?  Writing the book of Judges for the scriptures?  Those scriptures were not written for a secular society as we know society today.  The American society is made up of many denominations, whether Roman Catholic ones who follow the right wing LeFevre (are they around today) or other Roman Catholics.  It is a society of Jews, both orthodox and “liberal.”  It is a society of mainline Protestant and evangelical puritanical fundies of the Protestant type.  Also the various sects of the Islamic, Hindu, and other religions.  That is America today.
Do we think that because someone is Roman Catholic or Protestant, there is only ONE belief and only ONE way to think, as if this is a Hitler, Mussolini, or Stalinist society?  We are not, so it is not up to a Supreme Court to decide to rid us of abortions, but to judge in an overall humanistic way, not catering to ANY religious belief. 

In 2007, I heard Roman Catholic Bobby Kennedy, Jr., speak.  He brought up the topic of abortion.  As with most Roman Catholics, he did not discuss the aspect of life beginning at conception or at some other time in a trimester of pregnancy.  He expressed his values, though, against abortions.  For this Protestant sitting in the audience, there was agreement.  At all costs, one should avoid abortion.  However, Kennedy brought up the idea about the actions of a secular society which can best limit abortions.  He had statistics about how states like Massachusetts where abortion is legal but regulated, abortions had declined.  He then compared statistics of abortions in a Southern state like Mississippi and how, with opposition and working to keep it illegal, abortions had NOT declined.  He asked the question.  Do we wish to reduce the number of abortions or do we think we can make it illegal and eliminate abortions entirely?  Tha answer to this question is based on past practices when, even with the illegality of abortions, there has never been an elimination of it. 

Aded to this concept are several other aspects regarding abortions.  How many Roman Catholics (and Protestants, too) who have followed church doctrines against contraception, but quietly and silently do it anyway?  How many have I heard say, “we do it, but don’t say anything,”  To quote scripture from the Gospels, how many times did Jesus Christ call the chief priests and other leaders “hypocrites?”  Perhaps it was not over the issue of contraception, but the concept of being a hypocrite is the same. 

Another aspect to this issue which should be considered through the lenses of justice in a secular society.  Many people discuss this, but take it lightly.  Rape.  Some girl is raped.  What happened in days gone by?  Embarrassment by parents who then became hypocrites in order to hide the fact that there was a baby born to a teenager.  Mother and baby are shipped off to a relative to have the baby and then the child comes back home as a “sister” to the one who gave birth.  Hypocrisy, once again.  Why? 

In days gone by, too, there were the instances of “shotgun weddings.”  Real pretty picture.

Then there is the “unexpected” results of pregnancy when two teenagers fall in love.  During these times of abortion and the parents of the girl carrying child are so embarrassed they FORCE the girl (and boy, too) into a position of abortion, just to “save face.”  In this case, pro-choice is a pertinent expression to apply, in case the mother and father DO wish to keep the child and NOT have an abortion.  Do they get to override the vanity of the parents who don’t want a child with a child, at too young an age?
If a Supreme Court needs to consider this question in a secular society, it also needs to consider the fact that so many outside the womb also have no choices in life in an America which is one of the wealthiest on earth but treats the lower classes with such disdain it figures it gives them so much with an option to go to war and die.  There are many who are just as helpless as a babe in the womb and no one gives no damn about this aspect in America.  I witnessed homeless folks in Palm Beach County where there are the wealthy like Donald Trump and many who have nothing, watching as they starved on the streets because they had no options.  If the Supreme Court determines there is “justice” for a fetus, then what about justice for these young folks or for those who are given a choice to go die for country, as being the ONLY choice.  And Republican jackasses like Trump and other wealthy can go to hell thinking that it is the fault of these people, lacking any understanding or consideration by putting themselves in the feet of such people.  I am sure there are other examples similar to what I describe in Palm Beach.  Thank God that I have helped some homeless who DID serve their nation, but came back to nothing, in tutoring them to get through college and save their lives.  Does anyone care?  Nah! 

Then there is my great-grandmother whom my family was never able to meet because she died in childbirth in 1903.  Both baby and mother died at the same time. Had my great-grandmother had the option to abort the child, she could have survived and given the world OTHER children, only because there was a problem with the development of the child in the womb which killed both mother and child.  Makes no sense to make abortion illegal when it is such a circumstance.  Thank God my mother, who went through nine months carrying a baby and the baby died, survived after the stillbirth.  That was a time before abortions were legal, but what would have happened if my mother’s life had been threatened? 

Stop the BS bull manure of this crap within a secular society and simply regulate abortions in a rational and reasonable way.  Yes, I am opposed to abortions, but I am also reasonable when there are circumstances in which more than just the fetus is hurt.  I do not think it is necessary to get into some kind of argument about “when life begins” because the result is a very nebulous answer not worth pursuing.  Just let us all live life with peace and justice, especially stopping those with guns who shoot up abortion clinics.  They murder people who are OUT of the womb and that is just as bad, with their GD guns, rifles, and auotmatic weapons.