I would like to make some comments in response to Julie McDonald’s commentary in the Nov. 18 edition of The Reflector.
The letter is divided into four sections. I’m going to comment on the section titled “pro-life.” My primary source of information will be from a book entitled “What to say When” by Sean Carney and Steve Karlen.
The book is very articulate and well researched. I would highly recommend reading it. I quote from the book: “The Guttmacher report estimates that mothers who conceived while on the birth control pill in 2014 accounted for more than 116,000 abortions, making abortion following contraceptive-pill failure the sixth leading cause of death in America. Condoms fared even worse, with condom failure associated with more than 224,000 lives lost to abortion, the nation’s third leading cause of death in 2014.”
So much for birth control preventing unwanted pregnancies. Abstinence and sexual purity are not mentioned in the column. If you practice these, you will not become pregnant.
McDonald’s column states that “abortion should be rare, at most used only in extreme causes, such as rape, incest and protecting the life of the mother.” Rape involves a serious crime and the rapist should be punished to the full extent of the law. But why should a baby conceived in rape be punished with the death penalty? In no other scenario do we punish a baby for the crimes of his or her father.
So what about saving the life of the mother? As far back as 1967 Alan Guttmacher, MD, wrote: “Today it is possible for almost any patient to be brought through pregnancy alive, unless she suffers from a fatal illness such as cancer or leukemia, and if so, abortion would be unlikely to prolong, much less save, life.”
The bottom line, even in rare cases where pregnancy involves life threatening complications, the direct killing of a pre-born child is never necessary to save the life of the mother.
God bless you Julie. You are heading in the right direction but you have a ways to go before you can claim to be truly pro-life. What you said at the end of your column is definitely true. You reap what you sow. To God be the glory. Jesus is Lord.
Patrick Brown,
Battle Ground
