Aren't the Unborn Boys or Girls!

The unborn are not a part of their mother's bodies. The unborn are individuals. The life of the unborn can be started outside their mother's bodies. Frozen embryos are sometimes fought over in child custody cases. The unborn can survive both birth and abortion in the second-trimester and third-trimester of gestation. Surgeries and medical treatments can be done on the unborn.

"Doctors can almost always prevent transmission of H.I.V. from infected mothers to their babies by testing the mothers during pregnancy, treating those found infected with antiretroviral drugs, and giving their babies a six-week course of one or two drugs to prevent them from becoming infected. That works in the vast majority of cases, but when it does not, doctors provide stronger drug regiments to treat the infection in the baby," says The New York Times editorial staff in the March 5, 2013, article "The Intriguing Case of a Baby Cured of H.I.V."

Yet babies in their mother's wombs of the same age as those treated with antiretroviral drugs can be killed for virtually any reason by legal abortion except for some late-term abortions in fewer than 11 American states. Read my article "Abortion Hurts."

Science has forced some pro-choice people to now admit that abortion ends human life. Frances Kissling, a long-time pro-choice advocate and former president of Catholics for Choice, told Time Magazine in the January 14, 2013, article "What Choice? Abortion-rights activists won an epic victory in Roe v. Wade. They've been losing ever since," "When people hear us say abortion is just another medical procedure, they react with shock . . . Abortion is not like having your tooth pulled or having your appendix out. It involves the termination of an early form of human life. That deserves some gravitas."

The women's movement started out pro-life. Elizabeth Cady Stanton, passionately-in-love wife married 47 years, mother of seven, women's-rights activist and abolitionist, was both pro-woman and pro-life. In a 1873 letter to Julia Ward Howe, the originator of Mother's Day, Stanton writes, "When we consider that women are treated as property, it is degrading to women that we should treat our children as property to be disposed of as we see fit."  Read my article "Pro-Woman, Pro-life."

Preacher, Abolitionist and Women's Rights Activist Sojourner Truth said, "You say women need to be helped into carriages and lifted over ditches. Nobody's ever helped me into a carriage or over a mud puddle. And ain't I a woman?" Truth said, "I have plowed, and I have planted. I have gathered into barns. No man could head me. And ain't I a woman?" Truth also said, "Jesus came from God and a woman. Man had nothing to do with him."

Science has now demonstrated that human life begins when sperm and egg unite. Aren't the unborn boys or girls!

God loves all people even His enemies. Matthew 5:43-48 the Message Bible says, "“You’re familiar with the old written law, ‘Love your friend,’ and its unwritten companion, ‘Hate your enemy.’ I’m challenging that. I’m telling you to love your enemies. Let them bring out the best in you, not the worst. When someone gives you a hard time, respond with the energies of prayer, for then you are working out of your true selves, your God-created selves. This is what God does. He gives his best—the sun to warm and the rain to nourish—to everyone, regardless: the good and bad, the nice and nasty. If all you do is love the lovable, do you expect a bonus? Anybody can do that. If you simply say hello to those who greet you, do you expect a medal? Any run-of-the-mill sinner does that.

“In a word, what I’m saying is, Grow up. You’re kingdom subjects. Now live like it. Live out your God-created identity. Live generously and graciously toward others, the way God lives toward you.”"

God even loves rapists, the women and men raped and the babies conceived of rape. None of these people should be killed. Instead God desires that people be changed into the goodness of His likeness. 2 Corinthians 3:17-18 Amplified Bible says, "Now the Lord is the Spirit, and where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is liberty (emancipation from bondage, freedom). And all of us, as with unveiled face, [because we] continued to behold [in the Word of God] as in a mirror the glory of the Lord, are constantly being transfigured into His very own image in ever increasing splendor and from one degree of glory to another; [for this comes] from the Lord [Who is] the Spirit."

Isn't it past time to outlaw all abortions except those that science is not yet sophisticated enough to save the physical life of both the mother and the unborn? Read my article "Thoughts About Abortion."

The loss of a child hurts. "I have borne thirteen children and seen them almost all sold off into slavery, and when I cried out with my mother's grief none but Jesus heard," said Sojourner Truth. Japanese American and other Asian American parents couldn't do much to protect their children when former President Franklin Delano Roosevelt ordered that Asian Americans be thrust from their homes into internment camps. Read my article "Faith, Fear and Japanese Americans." Rock star Steven Tyler of the band Aerosmith writes in his autobiography, Walk This Way, about his abortion experience, “It was a big crisis. It’s a major thing when you’re growing something with a woman, but they convinced us that it would never work out and would ruin our lives. … You go to the doctor and they put the needle in her belly and they squeeze the stuff in and you watch. And it comes out dead. I was pretty devastated. In my mind, I’m going, Jesus, what have I done?” 

Interconnect

Raizy Glauber and Nathan Glauber were 21-years-old, Orthodox Jews of the Satmar Hasidic sect who had been paired by a matchmaker before marrying about a year ago reports The New York Times. The Glauber's were also killed in a car accident Monday, but doctors were able to perform an emergency Caesarean section to save the life of their son who was born at 24 weeks gestation, according to The New York Times's March 4, 2013, article "Emergency-Room Crisis: When Pregnant Woman Is Dying."

The Glauber baby boy is the age of babies now protected from some second-trimester and third trimester abortions in some American states. Read my article "Abortion Hurts."

Because of the age and place of residence of the unborn they are being discriminated against. The unborn have few legal rights.

Issues are interconnected. Christian minister and Civil Rights Activist Martin Luther King, Jr., said, "An individual has not started living until he can rise above the narrow confines of his individualistic concerns to the broader concerns of all humanity." King also said, "Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere."

The injustice of discrimination is widespread. During segregation African Americans and other people of color were compelled to sit in the back of buses and to go to colored only public places. The Voting Rights Act got rid of things like poll taxes, literacy tests and other administrative barriers erected to block African Americans and other people of color from voting. Are today's citizen tests, English tests, long waiting periods to become citizens like the past discriminatory poll taxes and literacy tests?

All Rafael and I had to do to become American citizens was be born. We thank God that we are not slaves, undocumented or living in countries where much of the population is living in circumstances comparable to segregation and even slavery.

Is anyone advocating for making American citizenship for immigrants almost as easy as it is for those born citizens?

A proverb from Zaire says, "A kind person is the one who is kind to strangers." Matthew 7:12 New Living Translation Bible says, "Do to others whatever you would like them to do to you. This is the essence of all that is taught in the law and the prophets." It does not matter if people want to stay in a country permanently or temporarily, God encourages us to treat them like ourselves. Deuteronomio 10:17-18 Palabra de Dios para Todos dice, "porque el SEÑOR tu Dios es el Dios de todos los dioses y el Señor de todos los señores. Él es grande, poderoso y terrible. Él no tiene favoritismos ni acepta sobornos. Él se encarga de hacer justicia a las viudas y a los huérfanos. Él ama al inmigrante que habita contigo y le da comida y ropa." Deuteronomy 10:17-18 Complete Jewish Bible says, "For Adonai your God is God of gods and Lord of lords, the great, mighty and awesome God, who has no favorites and accepts no bribes. He secures justice for the orphan and the widow; he loves the foreigner, giving him food and clothing."

Of course, we would not want to offer citizenship to drug lords, terrorists and other real criminals, but many foreign people will add great value to our American society by becoming citizens. Ruth, who was from Moab, was also in the human heritage of  King David and Jesus Christ. Ruth said to her Jewish mother-in-law Naomi, in the book of Ruth 1:16-17 English Standard Version, ". . .“Do not urge me to leave you or to return from following you. For where you go I will go, and where you lodge I will lodge. Your people shall be my people, and your God my God. Where you die I will die, and there will I be buried. May the Lord do so to me and more also if anything but death parts me from you.”"

Ruth was brave enough to escape the paganism of Moab. For other escapes, read my article "Audacious Escapes" and "Only One is All Good."

Ruth married the Jewish Boaz and lived the rest of her life in Israel. The women of Israel said to Naomi about Ruth in the book of Ruth 4:15 New Living Translation, " . . . your daughter-in-law who loves you and has been better to you than seven sons."

How much value and goodness are we missing through discriminatory practices like abortion and the process for foreigners to become citizens?

Embrace Disability. Reject Abortion.

Jennifer McKenna Morbelli, a 29-year-old woman 33 weeks pregnant entered the Germantown Reproductive Health Center in Germantown, Maryland, on February 3, 2013. LeRoy Carhart peformed a multi-day abortion procedure where the goal was to induce labor and deliver a dead baby. Instead by February 7 both Jennifer Morbelli and her daughter, Madison Leigh, were dead.

Morbelli, a full-time substitute teacher at the Church Street School in White Plains, New York, may have sought the late-term abortion due to a medical condition of her daughter. Dan Morse in his February 11, 2013, Washington Post article, "Antiabortion activists blame Germantown clinic for woman’s death," writes, "The family of the dead woman, preparing to bury her this week, could not be reached for comment.  An online gift registry linked to her and her husband indicated that her pregnancy had been wanted.

In Maryland, late-term abortions — those that occur when the fetus is developed enough to survive — are legal when the life or the health of the mother is at stake or when the baby develops a fetal abnormality."

The Apostle Paul writes in 2 Corinthians 1:9 Amplified Bible, "Indeed, we felt within ourselves that we had received the [very] sentence of death, but that was to keep us from trusting in and depending on ourselves instead of on God Who raises the dead."

Learning that we have a disabled child to raise may feel like a sentence of death to some.

Did Morbelli have people around her telling her regularly that anything can be overcome?

No matter who we are we need to regularly hear words of encouragement and edification. Proverbs 18:21 the Message Bible says, "Words kill, words give life; they’re either poison or fruit—you choose." What we say and do comes from what we think which is influenced by what we are hearing.

We need to hear that God still does miracles, and He wants us to ask Him for them. Miracles come in different manners.

Sometimes God can work through fetal surgery to fix a problem. Most ectopic pregnancies occur when new human life grows in mom's too-small fallopian tubes instead of her uterus/womb creating a life-threatening situation for mom and child. Two percent of ectopic pregnancies occur outside the fallopian tubes. Jayne Jones could have had a life-of-the-mother abortion since, her son, Billy, was growing outside her uterus threatening both his and her lives, but she choose to continue her pregnancy. At this time science is not usually sophisticated enough to preserve both the life of the mother and child when an ectopic pregnancy occurs. But Jayne and Billy's story has a happy outcome. Billy was born through a special surgery called a laparotomy on April 19, 2008, weighing 2lb 2oz and breathing on his own at 28 weeks gestation.

We also need to hear that sometimes people make mistakes, and we need to ask God for knowledge, understanding and wisdom. A child diagnosed inside the womb with a medical problem can be born without a medical problem due to a wrong diagnosis.

We also need to hear that a child diagnosed in the womb with a medical problem can be prayed for, and God will supernaturally heal the child.

We also need to hear that sometimes it is God's will for a child to live with a disability.

God meant for us to have an enjoyable life with or without having a disability. In John 10:10 Amplified Bible Jesus Christ says, "The thief comes only in order to steal and kill and destroy. I came that they may have and enjoy life, and have it in abundance (to the full, till it overflows)."

A Chinese proverb says, "To plug the ears while stealing the bell;" it means "to deceive oneself." We are deceived if we think we can have an enjoyable life without the energy of the Holy Spirit. God's idea of joy does not mean that we will not experience pain. Abolitionist Frederick Douglass said, "If there is no struggle, there is no progress." Romans 5:3-5 Amplified Bible says, "Moreover [let us also be full of joy now!] let us exult and triumph in our troubles and rejoice in our sufferings, knowing that pressure and affliction and hardship produce patient and unswerving endurance. And endurance (fortitude) develops maturity of character (approved faith and tried integrity). And character [of this sort] produces [the habit of] [joyful and confident hope of eternal salvation. Such hope never disappoints or deludes or shames us, for God’s love has been poured out in our hearts through the Holy Spirit Who has been given to us."

With a disability and without a disability there are some days and even some years where we just rather not deal with them and/or are not sure where it all is going to end up. But the good thing about being one of God's people is that nothing that happens is without purpose. The Apostle Paul writes about God the Son Jesus Christ in Colossians 1:16-17 Amplified Bible, "For it was in Him that all things were created, in heaven and on earth, things seen and things unseen, whether thrones, dominions, rulers, or authorities; all things were created and exist through Him [by His service, intervention] and in and for Him. And He Himself existed before all things, and in Him all things consist (cohere, are held together)."

God created people with disabilities and abilities to live and not to be killed by abortion, infanticide, suicide or any other deadly scheme to handle problems. 

God wants to spend now and eternity with us. John 17:3 Amplified Bible says, "And this is eternal life: [it means] to know (to perceive, recognize, become acquainted with, and understand) You, the only true and real God, and [likewise] to know Him, Jesus [as the] Christ (the Anointed One, the Messiah), Whom You have sent."

God want us to ask to receive a now and eternal relationship with Him. John 1:12 Amplified Bible says, "But to as many as did receive and welcome Him, He gave the authority (power, privilege, right) to become the children of God, that is, to those who believe in (adhere to, trust in, and rely on) His name."

"I like you very much just as you are," says Mark Darcy (Colin Firth) to Bridget Jones (Renee Zellweger) when she lists her faults to him in the romantic comedy Bridget Jones's Diary. God would like for us to do like Bridget, and He'll respond like Mark. We don't have to get ourselves together before seeking a relationship with God. God considers all our faults (sins) forgiven and forgotten because of the crucifixion, death and resurrection of Jesus Christ.

God accepts us as we are, and He wants us to keep on getting better empowered by His Spirit. God is God the Father, God the Son Jesus Christ and God the Holy Spirit (1 X 1 X 1 = 1). The Apostle Paul writes in 2 Corinthians 3:17-18 Amplified Bible, "Now the Lord is the Spirit, and where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is liberty (emancipation from bondage, freedom). And all of us, as with unveiled face, [because we] continued to behold [in the Word of God] as in a mirror the glory of the Lord, are constantly being transfigured into His very own image in ever increasing splendor and from one degree of glory to another; [for this comes] from the Lord [Who is] the Spirit."