?? I don’t think I want to do that. Spent 10 minutes there. That was enough.
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I wasn’t there, and I understand what she said was very upsetting to you. But for what it’s worth, I think that the GC executive meant that Mary consented to “bring forth a Son” (“Let it be to me according to your word,” she says to Gabriel). The executive read Luke 1 as saying that God wouldn’t have forced Mary to bear a child unless she consented.
There is no question of Mary making a choice regarding abortion, since Gabriel’s announcement is about the future: Mary is told she will become pregnant, not that she already is.
I don’t see Gabriel asking for Mary’s consent, but Mary does indeed give it (and so presumably could have withheld it).
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Hey Bill, haven’t seen you for a while here. Welcome back.
Bill, don’t recommend people to visit hell… Fulcrum7 has absolutely no credibility, it’s a toxic site. 
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[quote=“elmer_cupino, post:20, topic:18996, full:true”]
But you might want to enlightened me on what the Bible teaches specifically and categorically about abortion.
My response: Thank you for the question.
Revelation 21:8 lists those who will be thrown into the lake which “burneth forever…”
Interestingly and purposefully, directly after the mention of murderers and sexually promiscuous, the word “pharmakeus” is placed. This word is most often translated as sorcerers. But the Greek word “pharmakeus,” used in the first and second century, was primarily referring to potions that prevented pregnancy and aborted pregnancy.
If you wish I can find the primary sources that prove this. I have several contemporary usages during that time that will make it clear, I will have to dig for them.
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That is interesting that the committee was not balanced which raises questions. Though the Larson article says there are rare instances when abortion might be necessary, these weren’t listed.
There are times when the mother’s life is at stake (a rare incidence) and the fetus has severe abnormalities. I say the latter because my aunt used to care for such infants for parents who couldn’t. I remember little Susan and Martha. These little girls just laid in bed 24 hrs a day and were fed with tubes. They were coma states and didn’t know they lived.
As for rape and incest that is up to the mother, doctor and counselors and if she can physically and mentally handle a birth. Her mental life could be at stake.
Obviously abortion should never be used for birth control or convenience. Adoption is an alternative and there are not enough infants for all the requests. The woman’s body is not her own but is shared by another human being. When a woman has a late-term abortion of a baby that can live outside the womb, it is no different than one who purposely commits infanticide. That goes for the doctor doing the procedure and clinics like Planned Parenthood.
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Arthur,
I would suggest that you read Numbers 5, the whole chapter. It talks about a pregnant woman whom her husband suspects was impregnated by someone other than himself. He then brings her to the temple and pays an offering of jealousy. Then the Priest takes the woman, makes a concoction of several things including holy water and the dust from the temple floor (this is also where all the blood sacrifices for the year have been splattered) and makes her drink it. If she was an adulterous, then the fetus is dried up inside her and she is made baron, supposedly by God. Although the concoction would probably induce a great deal of intestinal trauma all on its own thus causing a miscarriage. But if she is innocent, she (supposedly) will suffer no ill effects. Remember, all of this starts with an overly suspicious husband.
You only have a couple of options: Either God kills the fetus, because the woman is an adulteress, or the Priest kills the fetus because he has given a pregnant woman a very contaminated drink that has caused her to abort the fetus. Either way, if she aborts, the “baby” or “fetus” (your choice) is dead. And, basically, the fetus/baby is destroyed even though it had nothing to do with any of this. The outcome is exactly the same as an abortion. So either God or the Priest aborts the baby…you don’t get any other choices. It’s a sick story and it is also a valuable story.
You might want to throw in Exodus 21:22-25 as well. It definitely places a different value on a fetus before birth, and a baby after birth. One is murder, the other, the perpetrator has to pay the husband a fee.
I could point out other places where God had the captives of Israel after a battle, God had them slaughter all of the innocent women and children. Running swards through the stomach of pregnant women. What a lovely picture this paints. But this same God doesn’t want you to lay a finger on two cells that have just combined in a woman’s uterus or you’re a murderer. No heartbeat, and certainly no breathe, which defines life in several verses in the Old Testament.
I ask you this. How is this any different than a 13 year old who is impregnated by a relative, or a woman who is violently raped, in which the act that has caused a pregnancy? And for the love of (insert your own word here), don’t tell me that a woman raped can never get pregnant. I have a sister-in-law that is a living testimony to that fallacy. That was one of the stupidest things I think I have ever heard in my life.
This is not a black and white issue, and it is not for the government to decide either. They are so stupid, they can’t even figure out that guns are dangerous or that pumping millions of tons of pollutants into the air every single day is destroying our planet. Yet you want them to decide moral issues as complex as this?
I am a man, so I will never have to make this decision, but there is no way I will ever tell a woman what she has to do with her own body. If you don’t want to have an abortion then don’t, but don’t tell someone else what they have to do. And, thank God, you were a minority on that committee.
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Teresa,
Thank you for addressing me. I have not been previously been told that the GC Committee was so unbalanced. Neither have I heard about these unhelpful presentations. I wonder if the woman who spoke about Mary and Jesus wasn’t in a backhand way making the point that because she didn’t abort him other women shouldn’t abort their embryos/fetuses either. I don’t know because I wasn’t there. In any case, I wouldn’t take the Guidelines very seriously because very few have. I imagine that your last child is by now well and truly an adult and that perhaps you are a grandmother. Splendid! I have been told by others that your spiritual journey has taken you in a direction that I did not anticipate. Although I think I understand why and respect you for it, please know that you took a piece of my heart with you. Dave
For whatever it’s worth……There is a real mental disconnect with the process of procreation that many seem to be missing. I have an analogy that probably will not work for many of you but it make the point for me. When the sperm and egg unite, it is similar to a small nut and bolt coming together. No one would think that a nut and bolt are a Buick, yet when the process of construction is complete you have a Buick. Likewise, no one should think that a small clump of undifferentiated cells is a baby, it could just as easily be an artichoke. The two components that come together at conception are essentially T cells which can differentiate into virtually every body part, just as the nut and bolt, along with the many other components coming together will ultimately become a Buick. But even when the Buick is fully assembles, such as in the case of a fully developed fetus, it still is non-functional until it comes into the world and takes its first breathe. Just like the Buick, which will not become a vehicle until you put gas into it. The very definition of a vehicle is something that transports something else. That process cannot take place without fuel. The process of supplying fuel to the Buick makes it into a vehicle, and the process of taking air into the lungs of a fetus makes it a baby. A human is a self-sustaining entity, and without oxygen supplied to the cells of that entity, it would not be able to sustain life. Another vehicle pushing the Buick, does not make the Buick a vehicle. And the oxygen supplied to the fetus from the mother does not make the fetus a human being. Therefore, the fuel for the Buick and the oxygen for the fetus are what sustain its intended purpose and at the same time makes it into what we know as a vehicle and a baby.
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As someone who experienced a miscarriage, I can assure you that to this mother, the pregnancy was a real person. True, not fully developed and not viable outside the womb, but very real. Unfortunately, there is no one to blame for early pregnancy losses; except perhaps one’s own body or the viability of the child.
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I assume that, after a hunt for Teresa Beem online, she is the author of the book that one does not have to be an Adventist to be “saved.” She also converted to Catholicism, and now writes fiction, if her bios are correct.
It is a new thought to me that Mary the mother of Jesus was given the choice of becoming His mother. That the Godhead would consult with Mary first and seek her response, is a beautiful thought. She was unmarried, became an immigrant to Egypt, and welcomed strangers from strange lands into the most intimate of settings, the birth site of her child. She chose to be His mother and to take the societal and cultural risks of being outside the bounds of spiritual correctness and cultural accepted behavior. It took another angel to convince Joseph. God intervened to affirm His plan for His family and its destiny during a dangerous and difficult time. He honored Mary in many ways; first with a choice and the honor of being the mother of God.
This is something I was never taught in Church or school. I didn’t know what the Annunciation was until I was an adult. One continues to grow.
Thank you, Spectrum, for facilitating these discussions.
How beautiful that God has given us new birth into a living hope through the birth and resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead. I Peter 1:3
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Alice,
I am sorry for your loss. I don’t think I have stated anywhere, ever, that you must abort an unborn. I think that is why everyone who is pro choice is exactly that, or should be, in favor of the mother making a decision, and yes, that should be an informed decision. I, also think that abortion should not be a means of birth control, that should be dealt with much earlier down the road.
I had a sister in law many years ago that was forced by the state to carry a child to term, even though she was violently raped. This same woman married a few years later and was again forced by the state to carry another child, who’s head never formed and was confirmed by the doctors to be unviable, yet the state again made her carry it to term, and a few hours later the baby died. She had been a church going Christian. She never stepped into a church again until she died many years later. This story is a story of loss
. Loss of a year of her life from living in an unwed mothers home, postponing her college education, and ultimately a woman who turned on God, because of hateful Christians.
This simply isn’t a black and white issue and I wish everyone would stop treating it that way.
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Thank-you. I agree that it’s not a black and white issue, which is why I think the choice must be left up to the mother, hopefully in consultation with trusted, and trustworthy, people. I do think abortion should be legal, so that women can seek care in a relatively safe setting, whether or not I agree with their choice. I also have issues with young women being expected to give up a year of their life, usually outside their home communities, to bear a child for someone else. That, too, should be a choice, not an expectation. I’ve been friends with some of those women. No matter their choice, it’s a difficult one.
I was only taking issue with the nuts and bolts analogy. It seemed too mechanical to me. I did not think you meant that unborn children should be aborted. On the contrary. And I agree that abortion is a terrible method of birth control. But, working in prenatal clinics for Medicaid clients, I was often struck by how chaotic their lives were. That made it difficult to take the pill every day at approximately the same time. Other methods have been developed, but it helps if lives are more predictable day to day and if illness does not interfere with the effects of hormonal methods. For example, antibiotics interfere with the hormonal action.
Loss takes so many forms and most families have multiple stories of situations that were handled badly, sometimes by government, sometimes by medical professionals, sometimes by friends and/or family, and too often by church members. We all need to be more caring with and about each other. I’m sorry for the pain your family has experienced.
Anyway, it’s bedtime here, but I wanted to respond and assure you I wasn’t misinterpreting your intent. It can be hard to express exactly what I mean in print media.
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