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Abortion and Unnatural Selection

from the May 30, 2006 eNews issue
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Modern technology has given us the awesome ability to gaze into the womb and spy on growing unborn children. We can see them suck their thumbs and smile, cry and kick. We can count every delicate rib and make sure their developing hearts have all four chambers. We can count the toes of tiny feet that are not yet even 1 inch long.

The blessings of ultrasound and modern 3-D imaging have enabled us to see that human embryos are not just blobs of flesh, but are miniature human beings just months away from life in the outside world. They have enabled doctors to see potential birth defects and problems in advance, and have given parents the chance to have surgeons operate on their unborn children before the tots have even blinked in the light of day. These technologies have greatly helped those who fight on behalf of the unborn, to protect them from those who would rather have them killed.

Sadly, these technologies have also opened the way for one of the worst forms of discrimination – one that ends with the murder of a child simply because she or he is considered less desirable.

Sex Discrimination

In some villages in northwestern India, little boys far out number little girls because parents have used sonograms to check the sex of their unborn children so that they can abort unwanted female babies. It’s an illegal practice under India’s 1994 Prenatal Determination Act, but people tend to ignore the law. This March, a doctor in India’s northern state of Haryana was convicted and jailed under the law, but after 12 years, he was the very first. A study published in the British medical journal Lancet in January showed that at least 500,000 female fetuses were aborted in 1997 – an estimated 10 million since 1985.

In villages where there is hardly any stigma against girl children – for instance, villages where potential grooms do not expect a dowry for their new brides – the male–to–female ratio is much more even.

Disability Discrimination

Sonograms also enable parents to find out when their unborn children have a disability or deformity. This can be helpful in preparing for potential complications with a child’s birth or for any immediate surgeries a child might need. However, early discovery of deformities have also allowed parents to choose to abort their handicapped children.

It has recently been revealed that 20 babies in Britain have been aborted simply because they had club feet. Others have been aborted because they had webbed fingers or extra digits or a cleft palate. Every single one of these problems is easily corrected by surgery, and not one is life threatening, and yet parents and doctors have been willing to abort children simply for not being “perfect”.

The Value of Life

Human life is not valuable simply when somebody is pretty, or smart, or physically healthy. Its value is not dependent on gender or perceived perfection. Human life is valuable because humans were created in the image of God. God gave His Son, His Only Son, to die – the highest payment possible – in order to redeem humankind. Humans are extremely valuable to God – to God, who knows all things. If God looks on the little deformed child as valuable, as precious, then we must do so as well.

“But God hath chosen the foolish things of the world to confound the wise; and God hath chosen the weak things of the world to confound the things which are mighty.” - 1 Corinthians 1:27