The Value of Life

When is life not a life?  Well, apparently when it’s inconvenient, unplanned or doesn’t provide a useful purpose.  

In Rome, during Octavian’s rule, unwanted children were dumped on the steps of the Columna Lactara; some would be fed by wet-nurses but most would be left to die.  The patricians didn’t want a child that was of slave blood, but the slaves couldn’t afford to feed another mouth (nor the herbs used by many of the more elite to end pregnancies).  However, in other countries (Egypt for example) unwanted children were adopted by childless couples, raised in homes until they could be used as helpers in temples, etc.  

We have become a society that has no use for beings that do not constantly prove their value.  A life isn’t a life until it can exist on its own (which is a strange irony in a country that provides welfare and assistance for illegal immigrants and peoples who could work but don’t).  

We have doctors performing “acts of service” to the poor and downtrodden masses of women who couldn’t afford an abortion – killing their babies; and sometimes them.  There have been couples who take a public vote, via website, on whether they should abort or keep their baby.  Society is in an uproar over a woman and her husband who are pregnant with their 20^th child – how many children should someone be allowed to have?  We’re over-populated, and how dare they have more children!

Some woman in my hometown allegedly leaves her two year old in a car while she takes the 4 year old with her to find help for their broken-down car.  This family has already been cited for child neglect and required to take parenting classes.  

4,000 babies are aborted EVERY DAY.  (National Review).  We’re in an uproar over the birth of the 7 billionth child because we can’t possibly care for that many children in our world.  

It is unfortunate that women never learned the self-control and integrity of their bodies as they were growing up.  Self-control should have been considered far before abortion (or even birth control) was needed.  Whether you are religious or not, it should be a given that just because you can doesn’t mean you should.  

Abortion is the ultimate in birth control (unless you consider that controlling the likelihood of birth is best provided through the act of abstinence).  Technically, it’s murder in one of its most uncivilized forms; although medically it’s not considered murder at all as the “baby” is considered a fetus until it is able to live outside of the womb (viability).  It is interesting that the terms “baby/ies”, “fetus” and “embryo” are used interchangeably throughout the media until the aspect of murder/death/abortion comes up and then it’s not a baby, it’s a fetus. 

Life and death is not just an issue of sex and birth and value; what about Murder, Euthanasia, Value of life, maternal health, Infant health, Economics, Eugenics, Genetic selection?  What is the difference between ending a life because it’s inconvenient and ending a life because it’s not valuable?  Who determines convenience?  Value?  Worth?   

It has been said that the mother should be in control of the decisions over her; but the decisions over her body begin before she has something else – another growing life – inside of her.  PRIOR to that point, she made several choices regarding the use of her body.  But the life of the baby is not the only one to consider here.  What about the lives of the father, grandparents, siblings and other family members?  Do these people have no say; no value in the calculation of this child’s worth?  What about couples that cannot conceive or couples that want to adopt?  What value to them is the life of an “unwanted” child?

How many pregnant women thought about what they were doing BEFORE they had sex?  “I wasn’t planning on getting pregnant” is a lot like going to a restaurant but not eating (or paying for the meal you ordered).     The baby didn’t ask to be conceived; the individuals who decided to have sex decided to roll the scientific wheel of procreation and take their chances.  Birth control is not a guarantee; only abstinence guarantees that pregnancy will be avoided.  I personally know people who have conceived (or were conceived) through so-called guaranteed birth control methods like vasectomy, diaphragm/birth control and condoms.  News Flash:  Sex creates babies.  

Biblically, killing another human unless in the defense of your family or your person is murder.  Each child is “fearfully and wonderfully made”; even if in human eyes the child is deformed, retarded, or otherwise ‘imperfect’.  I wonder how many children that weren’t planned for are living across this country/world and have made it a better place.  I wonder how many parents would have the guts to tell their child “you weren’t planned for, but we struggled along anyways and we’re glad we did”.

When we begin to place the value of human life above the worth of our homes, our cars, our rights and our possessions, this world will be a better place.  Until then, not one person on this planet is safe.