Into the Wardrobe

A thought.

Sally conceives and calls the fertilized egg Frank. A few days later, the ball of cells split into two. Both are viable. She now carries identical twins, Frank and George. She realizes that she is carrying dozens of potential people, and uses some clever technique to split Frank and George into two again. Bill and Boris. Then again. Frank, George, Bill, Boris, Harry, Bert, Mark and Tim.

If she had chosen otherwise, she would be denying life to six people. Don't they have as much right to life as Frank and George?

Common sense of the ages would see how foolish it is to try to play God (such as in the way you describe, Allan). Of course, there's precious little of that these days.

Also, all this talk about our own "rights", for an orthodox (small 'o') Christian is foolish. To go back to Lewis in TGD, we don't want "our rights". We want the Bleeding Mercy. People who here talk about "their right to..." are not in connection with that faith.

In dealing with those who DO insist upon "their" rights, should we accept their language and terminology if those terms contradict our faith? It means accepting a lie as the basis of an argument.

And again, Chesterton: "We have learned to do a great many clever things. The next great thing is to learn not to do them."

If legal prohibition and punishment ever stopped what men strongly desire, then I might concur. I am committed to doing what I can against abortion. But punishment after the fact never restored any loss. Abortion is a dreadful sin. Killing in war is a dreadful sin [iirc, you would be canonically barred from communion for twenty years for either]. Pride is a dreadful sin; so is adultery, so is heresy. There's a lot of adultery; we could make it a crime with the death penalty. It's a direct sin against the image of God, and thus in some ways worse than murder.
Then, we could have a police force dedicated to catching erring spouses. illicit office trysts could end in bloody gun battles. dirty underwear could be snatched and sent to DNA testing. Doctors would become spies, or confederates - and pay for it if they got nailed. sleazy hoteliers and smirking cab drivers might face years in jail. call girls could do hard time. We could impose real and severe consequences. And, adultery would go on, as it always has.

We could try the methods used for drug enforcement, do you think? that has been good for the integrity of police departments, the lives of poor young men, ghettos, jails, courts, air travel, tax revenue, etc etc. - and of course has not ended drugs.

Consider the 15- minute menstrual period, as it was called back in the day. A few women got together with vaccuums, tubes, jars, and whatnot, and -well, they used them every 29 days. Whatever the doings in between, no one turned up pregnant. I don't know if that was actually abortion, but it may well be. Now imagine a society where abortion is prosecuted as murder. Are you ready to charge any circle of friends who meet too regularly behind closed doors?? If not, and presuming doctors, nurses, midwives etc are forbidden to perform abortions, are you going to go through the bucket after every miscarriage, looking for evidence?

It gets worse. What if one in ten women have had abortions, as of now? There is no statute of limitations for murder. With all the accessories before and after, perhaps a third of the population can be convicted of severe felonies. Are you ready to punish them all? or choose among them? you might burn a few doctors along the way, and terrorize the rest. In fact, the real purpose of all this would not be conviction. Lynchings would be inevitable - will you stand in their path? Fear and control, the separation of the imagined pure from the defiled, the ascendancy of the proud, the wrathful, the hateful - there would not be money enough to carry out all the evils.

I use strong and possibly upsetting language, because we are talking about real and brutal arrangements - no less, no gentler will be used - enacted by passionate men who set no limit to their cruelty, because they think they are pleasing God and stamping out evil. I speak against it, and I want no part of it. there is precedent enough among the Orthodox, the fathers and monastic writers, to say nothing of the Gospels, to guarantee than my position is within the Orthodox tradition.

Control of names is significant; I meant that, on this common ground, we allow proponents of postions to name their own positions. Of course there are positions inimical to Orthodoxy, and always have been.

I agree that rights language cannot cope with deep issues of justice - it can only apportion properties and privileges among men, and settle disputes where goods conflict.

the view from Canada is more placid than that from the moonlit garret, but your question about what good abortion legislation would be is consonant with mine.

The problem can be framed like this: the more serious a crime we define abortion as, the more severe, pervasive, obligatory, and unyielding must be the pursuit, prosecution, and punishment. If it is capital murder, we ought to turn society into a prison, almost half of us guards, half prisoners. the rest police and judges, to adequately address the scope and seriousness of the crime. Of course that is impossible - isn't it? - and halfway measures are all that could be done; to fill the gap, there are those who will take the law into their own hands. Between sporadic prosecution and vigilante killings, a climate of fear, desperation [a dreadful sin itself] and therefore complaisance with tyranny will necessarily prevail. God forbid we live to see that.

Rus, you are too ready to tell me I have left the Church, and that is not appropriate, so help me St Athanasius [who famously stood against all the Church, but from within].

If you want to legislate shame and shunning, best of luck with that. We would devolve into the congregational principle of the pure and the reprobate, the lost, with whom we have no commonality and to whom we have no obligation.

The rightwing actually appears to want this state of affairs. I do not; charity and justice will not stand for it. Again, you must understand, none of us are innocent, and none of us will gain innocence by any law or condemnation of others.

*two of a trade never agree*

[quote="rusmeister If we can, we MUST make abortion illegal. We MUST condemn it. [/quote]

Perhaps here we can see a way forward. To make abortion illegal will require popular support. To get popular support we need to get the majority to have a view taht abortion is not the way to go; if we do that then the demand for abortion will die away. So the way forward would be to influence those seeking it to take another way.

I am certainly not confusing sinner and sin - I am directly talking about how we treat the person.

You may be thinking about RC episcopal authority; OC bishops' authority does not extend to the domain of lay people's politics. bishops do not have that dimension of authority. On matters of this sort, we do not owe obedience. On whether abortion is sinful, I am in full agreement with my bishop.

Insisting on making abortion illegal, then falling back on shame and shunning is no position at all.

I am not in any position to shame or shun anyone, whatever their sins, and I defy you to show that any Orthodox is in such a position, whatever may be the view of the RC, P, or other faiths.

Neither could any law force or oblige me to shame anyone, though it might bar me from hiring [do you really want that], marrying [were i single - and do you want that?], renting to, paying support to [the alternative being steal or starve], providing medical care to, etc etc. this class of sinners/criminals.

Scarlet letter A covers about the same territory. I find it ugly, mean, unforgiving, and unChristian. I won't do it, and I wont ask for it.