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The Sanctity of Unborn Life

Submitted by Lutek on Thu, 02/29/2024 - 16:39

Recently. the Supreme Court of Alabama found itself contemplating the 'sanctity of unborn life'. Unfortunately, it allowed itself to be distracted by theological dogma and the much-misunderstood Biblical concept of the 'image of God'. There is a much simpler and clearer approach that the court could have taken: The sanctity of unborn life is exactly the same as the sanctity of life that has been  born - or hatched, or cloned. All life is sacred.
If you're having trouble reconciling that with your theology, consider that life itself is the 'image of God'.  Life is 'God'. Whatever your theological beliefs may be, I challenge you to deny that assertion - logically though, not just through mindless repetition of mostly misinterpreted scriptures.
Life itself is holiness; it is the only 'thing' worthy of that adjective. If we pay attention, it is easy to see that divinity all around us - not just in ourselves and each other, but in the animals, plants, insects, microbes, stars and galaxies; all of which are indeed alive in their own fashion.
That assertion doesn't resolve the philosophical issues concerning our relationships to other living beings - be they other people (born or not-yet-born), animals, plants or micro-organisms .We have to eat. We need to protect and defend ourselves. But seeing and always knowing that life is sacred helps put those relationships into proper perspective. In those situations in which we have to assign relative values to individual lives - for example hunting and gathering, or military or police actions, or as in the Alabama case about the value of a human foetus as compared to that of a "born" human - we should begin from the conscious awareness that each of those lives is just as sacred as our own, no matter the specific circumstances. The value judgments we make in individual circumstances are relative and temporary, but the ultimate value of those lives, and of all life, is absolute.
 The next step in the evolution of the human race will be for each person to attain a constant, conscious awareness of the nature of the Life that is within us and in every other living being. Under all of those piles of psychological baggage and material possessions with which we bury ourselves, and behind the memories, opinions and biases we have collected and formed along our individual paths through life, the spirit of life within each living being is exactly the same. I am you, and you are me, just from different viewpoints.
The movers and shakers of  the world would do well to keep that in mind.

 

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