Michael Bresciani
A childs eye view of abortion and the Pledge to America
By Michael Bresciani
The GOP has issued their "Pledge to America" not a moment too soon as we approach the midterm elections of 2010. Pro-life activists are glad to see that the Republicans have not ignored their plight.
Although nothing would take the place of a solid promise to enact legislation that would stop abortion cold, at the very least it can be seen that the GOP has promised to take baby steps in the right direction. (No pun intended)
On page 28 of the downloadable PDF version of "The Pledge to America" is this paragraph, "We will establish a government-wide prohibition on taxpayer funding of abortion and subsidies for
insurance coverage that includes abortion. This prohibition would go further and enact into law what is known as the Hyde Amendment as well as ban other instances of federal subsidies for abortion services. We will also enact into law conscience protections for health care providers, including doctors, nurses, and hospitals."
The language of lawmakers, scientists and politicians presents a natural barrier to common wisdom but we can applaud the GOP for this step forward.
Most of the measures called for since the inception of the Supreme Court ruling of Roe v. Wade in 1973 have been complicated by language. In total almost all measures are just more sweeping out the cobwebs but never killing the spider.
Lawmakers approach the question of how it is funded and not the end of abortion. Politicians weigh the opinions of those they represent (perhaps) and are swayed by public outcries, groundswells and demographics. Scientists never address morality, but rather, simply replace all allusion to a moral position by replacing terms like "human being" with sterile or clinical terms such as "fetus."
The moral question of abortion is not swept away but rather it is buried beneath a heap of endless complications, legal language and semantic pugilism. Now, the problem of abortion is neither here to stay, nor on its way out, it is just in that static nowhere land we call, "complicated."
Perhaps we are asking a very simple question to the wrong crowd. Those far into adulthood are enamored if not totally saturated with complications about life. Maybe we should ask those who are not that far from their "fetushood" what their views are about abortion.
We don't ask children where the best investments are in the stock market but who hasn't stopped in their tracks from time to time at a child's view of a very complicated matter. Who hasn't learned from their unencumbered retorts and perhaps felt a little foolish that we chose such a complicated path to answer a simple question.
Jesus Christ knew that children had answers we were bound to miss because of our proclivity to sink into controversy, language problems and social pressures. He stated this clearly in Matthew 11:25, "I thank thee, O Father, Lord of heaven and earth, because thou hast hid these things from the wise and prudent, and hast revealed them unto babes."
A child can turn fear into nothing and reverse complications in an instant, and in a way that might shock us into what might be called; higher wisdom. A child's eye view of things can jolt us and bring us to sudden comprehension rather than our usual condescension. Nothing conveys this idea better than a story I read recently about a child caught in a thunderstorm.
The little girl had to walk home from where the school bus let her off and seeing that a severe thunderstorm was brewing her mother rushed out to pick up the child. With fearful visions of her child cringing in mortal fear or worse, her mom rushed to the bus stop at breakneck speed. As she approached the child, a spectacular display of lightning burst across the darkened skies followed by the loud clap of thunder.
The little girl was smiling and adjusting her dress when mom arrived. Her mother asked, "Honey, what are you doing?" The girl replied with, "I'm fixing my dress and smiling because God keeps snapping my picture!"
A child's view of things often produces this kind of humor but at other times it serves to convict us of our own refusal to see something because we have allowed it to be buried in impediments, debate and perhaps even self deceit.
Scott Klusendorf, author of "The Case for Life" and president of Life Training Institute, who travels across the nation encouraging people to make simple but confident arguments in the defense of the unborn, tells such a story during his interview with Dr. Richard Land on the For Faith and Family broadcast.
Speaking to a group of school children, Scott asked them if the phrase contained in the Declaration of Independence about all men being created equal by the Creator and having unalienable rights to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness applied to unborn babies, they all replied with a loud, yes.
When asked why they had the rights to life liberty and the pursuit of happiness they replied with a unanimous and resounding, "Because they are human beings."
Perhaps it takes a bunch of children to remind us just why the founding fathers chose to begin this most famous part of our Declaration of Independence with "We hold these truths to be self evident."
Why are these truths that were once held as "self evident" now smothered and stifled under layers of complications? Could it be that after a generation long attack against the idea of there being a creator, how can we believe he has endowed us with anything?
Oh, that we could see again as we did before the layers of social pressures, political correctness and complications of modern life came between us and our vision of higher matters.
Why can't nine members of the most august body of educated judicial experts see what children see? Why can't we see it? We could if we started here, "And Jesus saith unto them, Yea; have ye never read, Out of the mouth of babes and sucklings thou hast perfected praise?" (Mt.21:16)
Yes it is just that simple. Why don't we want the unborn to be aborted?
Because they are human beings.
© Michael Bresciani
September 25, 2010
The GOP has issued their "Pledge to America" not a moment too soon as we approach the midterm elections of 2010. Pro-life activists are glad to see that the Republicans have not ignored their plight.
Although nothing would take the place of a solid promise to enact legislation that would stop abortion cold, at the very least it can be seen that the GOP has promised to take baby steps in the right direction. (No pun intended)
On page 28 of the downloadable PDF version of "The Pledge to America" is this paragraph, "We will establish a government-wide prohibition on taxpayer funding of abortion and subsidies for
insurance coverage that includes abortion. This prohibition would go further and enact into law what is known as the Hyde Amendment as well as ban other instances of federal subsidies for abortion services. We will also enact into law conscience protections for health care providers, including doctors, nurses, and hospitals."
The language of lawmakers, scientists and politicians presents a natural barrier to common wisdom but we can applaud the GOP for this step forward.
Most of the measures called for since the inception of the Supreme Court ruling of Roe v. Wade in 1973 have been complicated by language. In total almost all measures are just more sweeping out the cobwebs but never killing the spider.
Lawmakers approach the question of how it is funded and not the end of abortion. Politicians weigh the opinions of those they represent (perhaps) and are swayed by public outcries, groundswells and demographics. Scientists never address morality, but rather, simply replace all allusion to a moral position by replacing terms like "human being" with sterile or clinical terms such as "fetus."
The moral question of abortion is not swept away but rather it is buried beneath a heap of endless complications, legal language and semantic pugilism. Now, the problem of abortion is neither here to stay, nor on its way out, it is just in that static nowhere land we call, "complicated."
Perhaps we are asking a very simple question to the wrong crowd. Those far into adulthood are enamored if not totally saturated with complications about life. Maybe we should ask those who are not that far from their "fetushood" what their views are about abortion.
We don't ask children where the best investments are in the stock market but who hasn't stopped in their tracks from time to time at a child's view of a very complicated matter. Who hasn't learned from their unencumbered retorts and perhaps felt a little foolish that we chose such a complicated path to answer a simple question.
Jesus Christ knew that children had answers we were bound to miss because of our proclivity to sink into controversy, language problems and social pressures. He stated this clearly in Matthew 11:25, "I thank thee, O Father, Lord of heaven and earth, because thou hast hid these things from the wise and prudent, and hast revealed them unto babes."
A child can turn fear into nothing and reverse complications in an instant, and in a way that might shock us into what might be called; higher wisdom. A child's eye view of things can jolt us and bring us to sudden comprehension rather than our usual condescension. Nothing conveys this idea better than a story I read recently about a child caught in a thunderstorm.
The little girl had to walk home from where the school bus let her off and seeing that a severe thunderstorm was brewing her mother rushed out to pick up the child. With fearful visions of her child cringing in mortal fear or worse, her mom rushed to the bus stop at breakneck speed. As she approached the child, a spectacular display of lightning burst across the darkened skies followed by the loud clap of thunder.
The little girl was smiling and adjusting her dress when mom arrived. Her mother asked, "Honey, what are you doing?" The girl replied with, "I'm fixing my dress and smiling because God keeps snapping my picture!"
A child's view of things often produces this kind of humor but at other times it serves to convict us of our own refusal to see something because we have allowed it to be buried in impediments, debate and perhaps even self deceit.
Scott Klusendorf, author of "The Case for Life" and president of Life Training Institute, who travels across the nation encouraging people to make simple but confident arguments in the defense of the unborn, tells such a story during his interview with Dr. Richard Land on the For Faith and Family broadcast.
Speaking to a group of school children, Scott asked them if the phrase contained in the Declaration of Independence about all men being created equal by the Creator and having unalienable rights to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness applied to unborn babies, they all replied with a loud, yes.
When asked why they had the rights to life liberty and the pursuit of happiness they replied with a unanimous and resounding, "Because they are human beings."
Perhaps it takes a bunch of children to remind us just why the founding fathers chose to begin this most famous part of our Declaration of Independence with "We hold these truths to be self evident."
Why are these truths that were once held as "self evident" now smothered and stifled under layers of complications? Could it be that after a generation long attack against the idea of there being a creator, how can we believe he has endowed us with anything?
Oh, that we could see again as we did before the layers of social pressures, political correctness and complications of modern life came between us and our vision of higher matters.
Why can't nine members of the most august body of educated judicial experts see what children see? Why can't we see it? We could if we started here, "And Jesus saith unto them, Yea; have ye never read, Out of the mouth of babes and sucklings thou hast perfected praise?" (Mt.21:16)
Yes it is just that simple. Why don't we want the unborn to be aborted?
Because they are human beings.
© Michael Bresciani
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(See RenewAmerica's publishing standards.)
