Partial-Birth Abortion

Partial-Birth Abortion
By Allan E. McNabb

Last week, the Supreme Court upheld the Partial-Birth Abortion Ban Act that congress passed and President Bush signed into law in 2003.

Partial-Birth Abortion Ban Act
The Partial-Birth Abortion Ban Act of 2003 prohibits the procedure commonly known as partial-birth abortion. In the act, partial-birth abortion is described as, “an abortion in which a physician delivers an unborn child's body until only the head remains inside the womb, punctures the back of the child's skull with a sharp instrument, and sucks the child's brains out before completing delivery of the dead infant.” The act states that this procedure “is a gruesome and inhumane procedure that is never medically necessary and should be prohibited.”

In the act, the case is set forth that partial-birth abortion is illegal based on Roe v. Wade and Planned Parenthood v. Casey. The Partial-Birth Abortion Ban Act states:
Partial-birth abortions involve the killing of a child that is in the process, in fact mere inches away from, becoming a “person”. Thus, the government has a heightened interest in protecting the life of the partially-born child.

Later the Partial-Birth Abortion Ban Act notes that the fetus is killed outside the womb during a partial-birth abortion:
. . . partial-birth abortions are “ethically different from other destructive abortion techniques because the fetus, normally twenty weeks or longer in gestation, is killed outside of the womb”. According to this medical association, the “‘partial birth’ gives the fetus an autonomy which separates it from the right of the woman to choose treatments for her own body”.

The Partial-Birth Abortion Ban Act also notes that partial-birth abortion seeks to kill the child, and destroys a partially-born child:
Thus, by aborting a child in the manner that purposefully seeks to kill the child after he or she has begun the process of birth, partial-birth abortion undermines the public's perception of the appropriate role of a physician during the delivery process, and perverts a process during which life is brought into the world, in order to destroy a partially-born child.

To the inhumane brutality of partial-birth abortion, congress found that:
Implicitly approving such a brutal and inhumane procedure by choosing not to prohibit it will further coarsen society to the humanity of not only newborns, but all vulnerable and innocent human life, making it increasingly difficult to protect such life. Thus, Congress has a compelling interest in acting — indeed it must act — to prohibit this inhumane procedure.

Congress concluded that partial-birth abortion is never necessary to save a mother’s life and blurs the line between abortion and infanticide in the killing of a partially-born child:
For these reasons, Congress finds that partial-birth abortion is never medically indicated to preserve the health of the mother; is in fact unrecognized as a valid abortion procedure by the mainstream medical community; poses additional health risks to the mother; blurs the line between abortion and infanticide in the killing of a partially-born child just inches from birth; and confuses the role of the physician in childbirth and should, therefore, be banned.

Statistics on Abortion
Abortion is more common than many of us may realize.

The Guttmacher Institute is a research group with which I disagree in some respects. But they provide some very enlightening statistics.

Nearly half of pregnancies among American women are unintended, and four in 10 of these are terminated by abortion. Twenty-four percent of all pregnancies (excluding miscarriages) end in abortion.
In 2002, 1.29 million abortions took place, down from 1.36 million in 1996. From 1973 through 2002, more than 42 million legal abortions occurred.
Each year, two out of every 100 women aged 15-44 have an abortion; 48% of them have had at least one previous abortion.

About half of American women have experienced an unintended pregnancy, and at current rates more than one-third will have had an abortion by age 45. (Facts on Induced Abortion In the United States, Guttmacher Institute, 120 Wall Street, 21st floor New York, NY 10005)

God’s Word and Abortion
In past articles, we’ve explored God’s word and found that a fetus is a living human being. Some of the Scriptures we looked at were:

Luke 1:15 John the Baptist was filled with the Holy Spirit while in the womb; therefore, John was a living person while in the womb. A mass of tissue could not be filled with the Holy Spirit.
Luke 1:41, 44 The babe leaped in her womb for joy. A baby in the womb can leap for joy — a mass of tissue cannot leap. If a mass of tissue could leap in the womb, it could leap outside of the womb. Have you seen a mass of tissue leap?
Matt. 1:23 Mary, while pregnant with Jesus, is said to have a child before birth.
Matt. 2:1 "Now after Jesus was born" considers that Jesus was Jesus before birth, while still in Mary's womb.

What can we do?
Woman who had abortions, and doctors who perform abortions can be forgiven and go to heaven — we’ve all sinned and need forgiveness (Rom. 6:23). But what can we do to help?

We can teach, encourage, and support women with unwanted pregnancies. We can show them God’s love by the way we reach out to them and help, showing them God’s will regarding their unborn child.

We can pray:

We can pray that people will realize abortion is wrong, and that law will be enacted prohibiting abortion.
We can pray for pregnant women, that they’ll not choose abortion.
We can pray for unborn children, their health, and safe delivery.
We can be pray that infants about to be aborted will be spared.
We can pray that infants experiencing abortion won’t feel pain during the procedure.

We can educate ourselves and discuss the topic with others:

We need to be familiar with Scriptures that teach abortion is a sin.
We need to be familiar with abortion procedures and alternatives, so we can help mothers make good decisions.

We can love women who had an abortion, and help them. Many of them regret their decision and seek forgiveness from a loving Savior. As Christians, we can show them Jesus’ love and lead them to forgiveness through His word.