[1639] THE SOCIAL STUFF- During the recent debates about the budget the whole issue of funding for abortion came up. Some said it should have been dealt with others said put it off for now. I was in the camp that said let’s not try and add it on right now- our military people were facing the loss of their checks and I felt like we really needed to just pass something without getting into the whole abortion debate. Now- having said this- I am without a doubt ‘Pro-life’. Whenever we have these types of debates everyone seems to get really pissed- almost as in if the Pro Lifers want to strip women of their ‘reproductive rights’. Last night one of the news shows presented it as the pro lifers were just as dangerous as Al Qaeda. While it is true that there have been extreme groups who advocated for the justifiable killing of abortion doctors- the majority of Christians [like in the upper 99 %] do not hold to this view. One time while having a discussion with a liberal pro abortion person- the person argued for their position- as they became heated they began using language about disabled people that went like this ‘how dare those conservatives force women to have mentally retarded children- the mom has to put up with the crap of dealing with that person their whole life- the mom has no life- just taking care of this mentally retarded person..’ the person went on describing the ‘mentally retarded’ person as a ‘non human’. I said just listen to the way you are speaking about the person- I’m sure the mother of that child loves that child- does not view the child as some type of animal that they are forever condemned of taking care of because of the conservatives. When these debates are held in our country we need to understand that we are always talking about human life- if people want to debate when that life starts- fine. Or if they feel the quality of the life of the person might be less than a fully healthy child- fine. But understand that no one should have the right to take another human life- even if that life seems less valuable then what you deem worthy of life. I heard a story a few weeks ago about a famous French scientist- I believe he was the one who discovered the gene that causes Down Syndrome- either way he was a leader in the field. He was a personal friend of Pope John Paul the 2nd and it was a time in the world where many nations were dealing with the whole issue of legalizing abortion. Because of the doctors work in the field- he had lots of patients who suffered from the disability. At one point there was a video put out advising doctors to let their patients know whether or not they want to take the test to see if their child [unborn] has the disease. The video advised strongly for doing the test so the woman could abort the less than desirable child. Somehow one of his child patients saw the video. On his next visit to the doctor he jumped into the doctors arms [young boy] and said ‘please help us- they want to kill us’. The doctor made it his goal to defend the rights of these innocent victims- people who do have value- who understood what the real issues were. The child pleaded for this adult to protect him and all others who shared his disability. As this debate will continue to rage in our country- I hope we can all at least view people as human beings- people who do have value- even if we deem their value less than a fully healthy person [which I do not agree with!] These are not things we are talking about- a simple ‘reproductive right’ of a woman. While I’m glad that there are free clinics and other outlets for women to find health care- and yes- reproductive health care does matter. It’s just not right to categorize another human life as a simple matter of a woman’s reproductive right- that child [in many cases a young girl] has rights too. www.corpuschristioutreachministries.blogspot.com