[Pastor Warren] At what point does a baby get human rights in your view?
[Barack Obama] Well, you know, I think that whether you are looking at it from a theological perspective or a scientific perspective, answering that question with specificity, you know, is above my pay grade.
Human life begins at conception. The DNA of the unborn child, at all stages of development, is distinct from the DNA of his or her mother. Obama is unclear about what he means by the "scientific perspective" of when a baby gets human rights; clearly it's not conception, because that is quite specific. Possibly he means the point at which the baby has a functional brain, heart, and nervous system, or the quickening (i.e., when the mother feels the baby move), or or the point that the baby can exist outside the mother with additional technology, or the moment of birth itself. What is clear, however, is that where to draw the line would be arbitrary in the sense that the baby, even after birth, is dependent on his or her mother (or caregiver) for ongoing development, and having or raising a baby limits the mother's freedom to do other things.
Obama's position is as intellectually dishonest and evasive as the original muddled Roe v. Wade decision, which invented a Constitutional de novo right for a woman to abort her child for any or no reason.
Obama is a Christian, so we need to speculate what Obama is making reference to in terms of a theological perspective. Some in the "pro-choice" movement have sought to use Exodus 21:22-25, by inferring from a lesser imposition of a fine for an incident resulting in premature child delivery. However, the scenario is not one of elective abortion, and a more critical reading of the original text suggests more severe penalties if the prematurely delivered child was injured or died as a consequence.
One should also remember that abortion and infanticide were known options of population control elsewhere during Biblical times. The sex revolution from the 1960's, which reflected the ready availability of natural and artificial contraceptives and "liberated" young men and women from the traditional Christian ideal of responsible sex within marriage, has been a pale imitation of the hedonism under ancient Greece and Rome, where couples, including extramarital partners, used a variety of techniques and natural contraceptives to limit the risk of pregnancy. Abortion and infanticide served as a backstop for families growing beyond their means, for an unfaithful spouse to hide evidence of her indiscretion from a returning soldier, or for a suspicious husband to refuse parental responsibility for an infant.
However, abortion and infanticide were not practiced in the Judaic-Christian communities. First-century Jewish historian Flavius Josephus said that the Pentateuch “forbids women from either to cause abortion or to make away with the fetus.” The early Christians, stemming from the Apostles and St. Paul as practicing Jews, carried forward the general prohibition against abortion and infanticide. The Didache (dated 50-120 AD), a code of Christian morality, specifically noted: ''Thou shalt not murder a child by abortion.'' (Did. 2:2), as did the Epistle of Barnabas (80-120 AD), a more theological tract (Bar. 19:5).
There has been consistent condemnation of abortion, throughout pregnancy, as morally reprehensible throughout the history of the Catholic Church, stemming back to the days of Jesus. The reason for this requires an understanding of natural law; that is, the reproductive process is designed to produce a child; our response should be to preserve and perfect, but not to interrupt the designed process. (That is, if the unborn child becomes ill, we may treat him or her back to health, but we cannot introduce elements which adversely affect the prospects for a healthy child at birth.)
There is some variance on how serious a sin it was considered, based on obsolete Aristotelian concepts regarding the nature of pregnancy, i.e., delayed hominization/ensoulment/human personhood. In essence, the ancient Greek philosopher held that there must be enough bodily development, e.g., development of the brain and nervous system, to support animation. Hence, St. Thomas Aquinas and certain other theologians, influenced by the widely-accepted view of Aristotle, held that abortion is murder after the point of animation and a lesser sin beforehand. (However, we now know that the zygote has everything it needs, assuming a safe, nourishing environment, from the start to develop as a sentient human being.)
There is no doubt that some Christian politicians have attempted to justify their expedient support of unrestricted abortion rights with logically incoherent justifications like "although I personally oppose abortion, I respect a woman's [euphemistic] right to choose." How many Democrats argue "although I personally support a living wage, I respect an employer's right to choose (i.e., compensate as he sees fit)"? How many times do they argue "although I personally oppose incidents of racism, I don't have the right to impose my personal racial justice views on other people?" "Pro-choice" Catholic Democrats like Joseph Biden, John Kerry, Ted Kennedy, Chris Dodd, and Barbara Mikulski (among others) have sold their souls for political treasure. For all the liberal Democratic intellectual posturing that conservative Christians are hypocritical by fixating on the right to life and refusing to rubberstamp their inefficient, impersonal, costly, counterproductive, bureaucratic social justice agenda, liberal Democrats have lost sight of Christ's admonishment to love the little children and to remember the least of our brethren. As Jesus duly prayed: "I praise you, Father, Lord of heaven and earth, because you have hidden these things from wise and intelligent people and have revealed them to infants." (Matthew 11:25).
But Obama is not a mere foot soldier in this neo-Roman revolution of hedonism and abortion and infanticide rights. Jill Stanek, who was a nurse for Christ Hospital, which is affiliated with a "pro-choice" Christian denomination, discovered the hospital's doctors practiced elective induced-labor ("live-birth") abortions, where any surviving baby is left to die without medical assistance (taking up to 2 hours) in the arms of a parent or (if they refuse) a staff member. Jill movingly describes her experience with a surviving aborted Down syndrome boy; the parents had passed on their right to comfort their baby, and the designated staff member did not have time so she left the boy to die alone in the Soiled Utility room. Jill had observed the abandonment, and took the initiative to go and comforted the second-trimester baby struggling to breathe during the final 45 minutes of his life.
Jill Stanek was bothered by the larger issue of the infanticide of surviving aborted babies and basically lobbied both the Congress and the Illinois State legislature to mandate hospitals [even those bearing Christ's name!] to exercise their professional responsibilities to save the lives of babies on their premises! [These attempts took place in the first half of this decade while Barack Obama was a state senator in Illinois.] In July 2002, the U.S. Senate unanimously passed the Born-Alive Infants Protection Act (H.R. 2175), which also cleared the House by voice vote. This bill ensures that live-born babies have full legal rights under federal law. Language was added to the bill to placate those concerned that the bill might be used to undermine a woman's right to abort her child. The pro-abortion group NARAL took no position on the amended bill.
What's particularly telling is Obama's prominent role in fending off related legislation in the Illinois legislature until he was elected to the US Senate in 2004. The Born Alive Infant Protection Act, which requires hospitals to treat born alive babies, finally passed in 2005. Obama votes against and/or "present" in 2001 and 2002 and defeated the bill in committee (even after voting to add abortion-rights-neutral language similar to the federal bill) when the Democrats regained control of the state senate in 2003. Obama's objections included questioning the bill's constitutionality (i.e., Roe v. Wade), undue burdens on mothers and their doctors, and its imposing Judaic-Christian values on other Illinois citizens (no doubt neo-Roman pagans!)
What's particularly notable about Obama here is that his position on this issue was hardly mainstream, post-partisan, or unifying, on one or 2 occasions alone in speaking out against the bill on the Senate floor. He used every sham argument and every legislative trick he could think of to derail this bill and to protect the status quo, which was infanticide of surviving aborted babies.
Jill Stanek and a colleague (Allison Baker) in discussions before committees in Congress and the Illinois legislature had discussed other incidents (besides the abandoned child), including seeing a hospital staffer fish one of the surviving babies from the trash, only to watch the baby slip from his blanket and drop to the floor. At some point after Jill's initial testimonies, Christ Hospital provided alternative arrangements from the original Soiled Utility room, a "comfort room". The Comfort Room included such features as cameras, foot printing equipment, and baptismal supplies, so parents could bring home mementos of their dying babies for whom they were refusing medical treatment. (I personally find this concept rather macabre.)
This led to this statement from Obama: ""Ms. Stanek, your initial testimony last year showed your dismay at the lack of regard for human life. I agreed with you last year, and we suggested that there be a Comfort Room or something of that nature be done. The hospital acknowledged that and changes were made and you are still unimpressed. It sounds to me like you are really not interested in how these fetuses are treated, but rather not providing absolutely any medical care or life to them."
In fact, Jill Stanek had the prior year briefed Obama on the Comfort Room where "[t]here is even a nice wooden rocker in the room to rock live aborted babies to death." Barack Obama attempted to take credit for a preexisting Comfort Room, accused her of backing out of a fictitious compromise agreement, suggested that she should be satisfied with the improved quality of life now provided to dying babies, and questioned her motives, implying she was grandstanding for the sake of publicity.
In closing, I would leave fellow voters with Biblical verses serving as Ms. Stanek's inspiration to help save dying babies:
"Rescue those who are unjustly sentenced to death;
don’t stand back and let them die.
Don’t try to disclaim responsibility by saying you didn’t know about it.
For God, who knows all hearts, knows yours, and he knows you knew!
And he will reward everyone according to his deeds."
Proverbs 24:11-12
don’t stand back and let them die.
Don’t try to disclaim responsibility by saying you didn’t know about it.
For God, who knows all hearts, knows yours, and he knows you knew!
And he will reward everyone according to his deeds."
Proverbs 24:11-12
