Conspiracies And Catholicism: Life Science

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Foxfier

“Quit forcing your religion on me! Your Pope might think that a fertilized egg is alive, that it’s human, but that’s your opinion. I believe in science! It’s no more a person than a skin cell is, and you just think it has a soul. If abortion upsets you, you should get people to use birth control.”

If you’ve been in abortion discussions, you’re probably familiar with this kind of assertion. I’ll admit that I’ve taken some slight liberty with the paraphrase. I combined several variations into one claim. Other than that…

It’s Alive!

A ‘fertilized egg’ is a somewhat improper way to describe what happens when a sperm and egg (gamete) join. It’s a zygote, the first stage of development in all animals. It is a single celled organism of whatever species the parents are. In cloning the egg is emptied, the insides of a cell from whatever is being cloned are put in, and the result is induced to start growing as if fertilization had just occurred. (Nuclear transfer: I mentioned this in the Frankenstein installment.) Sometimes the phrase is used to mean “pre-embryo” or “pre-fetus,” although in non-abortion situations (such as IVF) a three-day-old organism is called an “embryo.”

While a skin cell can be said to be alive—because it is part of a living organism—a zygote is an individual constituted to carry on the activities of life by means of organs separate in function but mutually dependent, a living being. If uninterrupted, a zygote will develop into a recognizable adult member of the species. A skin cell will remain an skin cell.

When a human egg is fertilized, the organism that results is a member of the human species, distinct from both parents. That is a scientific fact. The Catholic Church teaches that being a living human being means the individual has inherent dignity which we must respect. The question of ensoulment doesn’t arise. (You can find a much more in depth explanation of when human life begins in this PDF of the same name, from the Westchester Institute.)

Are some humans not people?

nonperson

We have established that, scientifically speaking, the unborn human is both alive and of our species.

This is where things get confusing, because science does not say who is a “person.” The question of personhood is (in this context) a moral question. As Catholics, we are required to recognize all living humans as people. Ironically enough, it is those claiming to be defenders of science who are making a moral judgment, and one that is sadly not that uncommon in the history of humanity. More recently the word “person” has come to be synonymous with “human being,” and is preferred by some to “man” to apply to an individual homo sapiens. It is then easily understandable that most people defending abortion would not want to recognize that their stance means that they are explicitly denying that all humans are “people.” Especially if someone is not carefully choosing his words it is understandable that he would try to claim that a member of our species below a set point of development is not a “human being.”

Pointing out that they are declaring a group of humans to be non-people can be effective, sometimes even on the person arguing for abortion. Please try to be as gentle as possible about it, the shock can be pretty nasty. The author John C. Wright wrote about his instinctive recognition of his son as a person, and laid out the logic rather bluntly. It is worth noting that at the time he was an atheist, though a very classically influenced one.

If you don’t like abortions, support birth control!

This sounds like it should make sense. The logic of “women have abortions because they have an unwanted pregnancy, birth control reduces pregnancy, more birth control would result in less pregnancy.”

For a Catholic, this is roughly on par with saying, “If you don’t like murder, you need to support assault!”

Chemical “birth control” results in death for the small human, in some cases as a primary means, some physical methods (IUDs) also cause death, and even something as basic as a condom inherently deforms the essence of sex. This is religion, or at least philosophy.

Birth control does not necessarily reduce the number of pregnancies. It lowers the chance of a pregnancy as a result of intercourse. Failure is usually measured in terms of the percent of female users who have an unintended pregnancy in the first year of typical use. Not listed, of course, is abstinence, i.e. not having sex unless you recognize that the reproductive act may result in a new life. Thus, contraception—and the “contraceptive mentality”— is a root cause of the heat in the abortion debate. Contraception promises that you will have sex without a chance of needing to be responsible for your resulting children. So, if pregnancy results anyways, it’s very tempting to believe that there’s not really your offspring involved.

People you can’t see are so much easier to dehumanize.

Conspiracies and Catholicism is a series of posts about things like albino assassin monks, hidden Bible books, pagan Santas and secret councils— popular culture related to Catholicism, sometimes in unexpected ways. If you have a suggestion for a future article, please leave a message in the comments or email me.  Prior posts available in the author’s profile.

© 2014. Foxfier. All rights reserved.

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8 thoughts on “Conspiracies And Catholicism: Life Science”

  1. Pingback: Basic Life Science and Catholicism | The American Catholic

  2. Foxfier thanks for this article. I appreciate how you bring clarity to definitions, and the way you bring out the concern for human life that the Catholic Church has. God bless.

    1. Thank you. I hope that it will help folks show people who have been lied to the truth– and I pray that the folks who haven’t been lied to, but believe it anyways, have a change of heart.

  3. Pingback: Calling Men to Be Icons of God the Father - BigPulpit.com

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