OPINION: 40 years too many for abortion
January 21, 2013 at 6:42 pm in The Daily Republic
An abortionist acts out the violence in the womb to end the baby’s life.
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OPINION: 40 years too many for abortion
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Today, as a woman and as a mother, I celebrate Roe v Wade. Keeping abortions safe and legal is important in the lives of women. Making them illegal will only push them into the back alleys forcing women to seek terminations in unsafe and dangerous ways and if one does not believe this will happen, one is simply ignorant of the past and what could become the future.
Moreover, the generalization in believing all women suffer emotionally after having an abortion is additionally ill-informed as there are many who respect their own integrity and knowledge knowing they made the best decision for all involved.
And finally, I become tired of hearing those who do not have experience in this area pretending to speak so knowledgeably regarding it. In this case, true knowledge and understanding comes when one “becomes” the person in said place rather than placing one’s self in one’s place. Until you find yourself a woman discerning continuation of a pregnancy or not, please be respectful of how you engage in the conversation.
PS. and none of this even begins to question the underlying issue: why are women being placed in positions having to make said decision? 1 in 6 women do not have access to prenatal healthcare due to poverty, which leads to a higher infant mortality rate. Should we maybe be seeking to make changes here? Moreover, America is one of the worst Nations in supporting women once they have babies. We receive 12 weeks of unpaid leave after birth compared to Norway which receives 52 weeks and 80% of her wages or Denmark where one receives 28 weeks and 60%..Maybe its time to act like we truly support the family rather than trying to make abortions illegal. Maybe just maybe, if women had more support such as the above countries, which by the way have legal abortions but many less than America, women would feel there are other options.
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Are you seriously quoting a woman from 1932??? Irrelevant….
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Claiming to be a pastor, have you ever quoted anyone from 2000 years ago?
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Oh Red……how I envy you. To live in a world where debate is dismissed because people close their minds to “facts” and yet your response is pretty much all all misinformation and misquotes (as an example)
http://babel.hathitrust.org/cgi/imgsrv/image?id=inu.30000041607486;seq=334;width=680;height=680;orient=0 and is based on a negative attack about a woman that was AGAINST abortion, which is your position! . To what point? To get on a soap box about “evil” Planned Parenthood?
Why is this discussion about ” those who oppose the taking of innocent life and those who try to justify it” and not about rights? Could it be that you and others like you have “minds are made up and would not be persuaded by any facts”.
Hot debate. What do you think?
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If you claim the organization is based on eugenics i’m sorry but that’s incorrect also. The woman agreed with the philosophy but did not practice it and the organization was not built on it.
How are the rights of an unborn child different than a prisoner on death row?
Hot debate. What do you think?
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Would you rather go back to the time when BOTH the mother and the fetus died? Abortion has been with us since pre-history. At least now we have a law that allows women to stay alive.
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I would like to address some of the columnist’s comments:
“Where is the outrage and disgust of the violence”- in some polls up to 70% of the country agree with a woman’s right to choose.
“Hypocrisy best describes our government that calls it double homicide if someone murders a pregnant woman but it’s legal to have abortions”-I have to admit I was going to agree with this statement so I had to look it up. Couple of things. A person is charged with double homicide if the pregnancy has progressed to the point that the fetus is able to live outside the womb. That’s an important point because by the legal definition a fetus is not a person and has no rights…..that’s why an abortion is not murder. That and the fact that a woman has a legal right to end a pregnancy. This also answers the “None of these children had the right to choose. Where is the outrage?” This is not the Christian point of view but it is of other religion and the Constitution does say that no religion shall be put above others. That also answers the question of “Where are our rights to religious freedom guaranteed under the Constitution.”You do have religious freedom. If your religion forbids you to have an abortion, then don’t but you can’t put your religious rules on everyone.
Hot debate. What do you think?
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I fully agree with you Don. There are many places where religious views do not belong. It’s all part of Freedom of Choice.
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If religious views are just for show, and we need to discard our principles when a supposed majority supports evil, I want no part of that scenario.
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I am a christian, but when it comes to my religion, I will never push others to go by it since I have my own views on it. It is their freedom if they want to follow religion it or not. Religions should not tell people what to do or not to do. Religious views have no place in government laws, if it comes to religion pushing into government, religions should be taxed.
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We can then surmise that evil has as much value as good?
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Wow Eldreton that is nice to see. A Christian who actually sounds like he knows what Christ was about! American Christianity could use more like you. Ironic to see the thumbs down for this particular comment of yours. Reflective of the sad state of American Christianity.
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If you want no part of society, that’s cool. You can start up your own colony and live like the Hutterites, Mennonites etc. Be self-sufficient. Nobody will bother you. But when you live among the rest of us, the majority gets to rule.
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So you are willing to quell your dissent when the republicans are in the majority next time, unlike last time, and go along. What a breath of fresh air that will be.
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Wrong again. The law which is controlling is the Federal “Unborn Victims of Violence Act”. It makes no such distiction that you cite. It protects any child “in utero” and says nothing about whether it might live outyside the womb. It has been challenged numerous times as conflicting with Roe v Wade but has always been upheld as not being a conflict.
Here’s section d: d) As used in this section, the term “unborn child” means a child in utero, and the term “child in utero” or “child, who is in utero” means a member of the species homo sapiens, at any stage of development, who is carried in the womb.
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It’s not a conflict because abortion was written in as the exception to the law.
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Sorry, not wrong. The law doesn’t “protect” anything. It states in the case of a violent crime if a fetus us injured of killed it can be listed as a victim. It is also not recognized by all the states…because the law says a fetus has no legal rights….nor does this law give it any.
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Red: God won’t have to judge me or women like me for you already have.
Be at peace.
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I am no ones Judge. I do make judgements however, every day. We all make judgements between what we believe to be right and wrong. Your statement is ridiculous, immature and unbecoming for someone who presumes to be a pastor.
Hot debate. What do you think?
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Can I ask why you always choose to “attack” Mrs. McLaughlin? Other people are posting comments disagreeing with your opinion yet you only attack her? Do you feel most threatened by her? Do your insults make you feel “right”? You clearly have a defensive personality that very much shows your own insecurities. You voice your opinion, yet attack people who oppose it. Is there a higher form of hypocrite? Are only people who are as close minded as you and agree with your views allowed to post comments? If so definitely let us all know so we aren’t disturbing your way of life. I mean that is what we are doing correct? By disagreeing with you we are disturbing the way you live and the views you have? Enough for you to resort to insults? What you aren’t understanding about Kristi’s first post is that she is not promoting abortion. She is not saying that abortion is good or that women should have abortions. However, she is saying that making abortions illegal is not going to solve the problem. I do not AGREE abortion should be used as a type of birth control, but I do believe birth control is not as easily available as it should be. Which obviously causes abortion numbers to increase. I also believe that, even though I do not agree with abortions as a type of birth control, it is not my place to keep a woman from having one. See Red, there are many variables that I don’t think you fully understand. Rape being one that is brought up most commonly. A lot of people only agree with abortions if they are victim of rape. Understandable, however it wouldn’t solve anything. You would then have women lying about how they got pregnant. Women claiming to be raped to get out of the pregnancy. Now I don’t think I need to get into the details of the messes that would create. So do you ban abortion for all? And say tough luck to the people that truly were hurt? Another variable is medical. Is the pregnancy putting the woman’s life in danger? I’m sure your argument is..is one life more important than another? Which to you I ask, is it? Are the lives of people on death row less valuable than the embryos? Even without these variables it still comes down to choice. The choice of the person who owns the body. Red we all can debate this forever but the truth is abortion is going to happen. Whether it is in a back ally that puts the pregnant woman’s life in danger or safely with a doctor. The question we need to be asking is how we keep as many young women as possible from feeling like they need to make that choice. Keeping them safe, giving them the necessary birth control, and making sure they don’t feel trapped to the point where they feel as if they need to hurt themselves to get out of a situation. Voice your opinion Red and we will keep voicing ours, but enough with the insults. We are all tired of hearing them. Have a good day.
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Not many assumptions were made. I simply asked questions which you avoided answering. As for the “we” portion, I will stick behind that and say once again “we” do not enjoy the insults. You clearly thrive on the attention given when you post your comments. (Now that’s an assumption and a very good one I believe.)
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Smartimus, I know a large number of pastors that are pro-choice. It’s the catholic church that pushes the anti-abortion propoganda.
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I find it very interesting that the mindset of people are so different. Recently 26 people died in a school shooting in which 20 of them were young children. Since then I have heard multiple people make comments that “no one is taking my guns”. Really, 20 children died and you are worried only about losing your guns. This is interesting because I have heard these same people make statements about baby killers, murderers, etc… They believe their rights are more important than the rights of others and they are willing to fight for their rights while voting to take away the rights of others. Now we have a debate on whether abortion is right or wrong and both sides feel very strongly about their positions. In South Dakota making abortions illegal has been voted down twice by the majority of the people. But, the other side refuses to give up because they believe that they are right, they quote the bible, they quote people from nearly a century ago, and they use insults to weaken the opposition. It is difficult to accept that their views are not part of the majority. I voted for the right to choose and I believe in the right to bear arms that don’t include assault rifles.
Hot debate. What do you think?
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I apologize for mixing two different issues but I normally don’t post so I thought I would get it all out.
I would also like to state that I am an admirer of Mrs. McLaughlin, her courage to stand up for her beliefs (no matter what side of the argument she stands for) is amazing. She doesn’t hide behind the obscurity of using an alias as most do.
“Well Behaved Woman Rarely Make History”
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If the pastor of a supposed Christian church supports abortion it should be no surprise they are going to encounter harsh criticism. The premise that being in the alleged majority should absolve one from criticism is ludicrous at best.
Hot debate. What do you think?
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Smartimus, I know a large number of pastors that are pro-choice. It’s the catholic church that pushes the anti-abortion propoganda.
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While it may be true that the Catholic Church is staunchly anti-abortion there are a tremendous number of protestants, including clergy that defend life in an equal manner.
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Have you noticed that protestant clergy often refuses to speak about it, mainly since their divided over it. They prefer to let the members do as they wish on this matter, not rule over them because if they did, they would most likely be getting into some hot water. I’ve read my religion’s list on abortions, it pretty much avoids the matter, no decision either way leaving it open as pro choice. pastors are willing to their own beliefs.
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No I haven’t noticed that. There have been several that have written letters and editorials in our local paper against abortion.
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Smartimus,
I must have missed the part where the pastor or the church said they should be absolved of criticism due to majority. In fact, I believe those were my words speaking on the legality of abortion. You make statements like “claiming to be a pastor” and “supposed Christian church” maybe you would like to share your guidelines on what one has to believe to be a Christian. Just in case I ever choose to become one.
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Red, which would you choose, abortions to be legal or for women that want an abortion to do them illegally and risk their health, lives or the suicide route. Issues like this should keep religion out of it. Furthermore, christianity was not meant to be religion. Some think sins still exist, but forget one critical item, ALL sins are forgiven. So, do as one feels they should do, be free, choose freely among yourself. Nobody should let others tell you what to do when it comes to one’s personal health. If a woman chooses to have an abortion, so be it, there shall never be any wrong said about her for doing so. It’s her life, leave it at that.
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You can twist the voting process however you would like to satisfy your own needs to feel right, but the bottom line is abortion is legal and will most likely stay legal. You say majority of people that show up to vote. Are you implying that abortion would be illegal if everyone registered to vote, voted? That’s a stretch..
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Good morning: You are correct, I do not “believe” in the bible because it is a book. I believe in a divine love that I choose to call God and I follow a Jewish sage named Jesus. (Jesus was not a “Christian” and I wonder how he would feel being called one.) I am ordained and affirmed by my denomination which put me through an ecclesiastical council and then voted to affirm my call. I preach love and accountability to one another, teach spiritual disciplines and biblical literacy without being literal, and sometimes have to say that the manner in which we are being community together is hurtful calling people to a higher level of behavior. I am among many pastors who believe in reproductive choice: http://www.rcrc.org/news/Pastorsphoto.cfm
Men and women who stood side by side knowing that sometimes the most loving action, while being a tough decision and one not taken lightly, is discontinuation of a pregnancy. I would then direct you to Joseph Fletcher, an Episcopalian priest and “father” if you will of situation ethics.
Finally, and this will be the last post on this thread from me:
For one to say that rape and incest is a smoking screen for women is one of the more terrible things said in this conversation. In my profession, I have heard many 5th steps and the amount of women who have been raped by family members is overwhelming. They do not seek help because of attitudes such as this. They are afraid, wounded and a piece of their soul is damaged in their innocence. Some of them have become pregnant and some have not. Some overcome their wounds and some do not. Some have babies and some do not. All are loved by God.
It has been said there needs to “be a voice.” I choose to speak for them and for the thousands like them.
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Sorry, I made a mistake thinking you claimed to be a Christian pastor.
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Kristi is what we call a compassionate christian, one that knows all have rights, freedoms. Smartimus, I suggest you go running back to your pope, he wants more of your money. I do consider the pope a poor symbol of christianity. I see more catholic church worship the pope or mary much more than Jesus or god. Mine focuses on Jesus, our rights as a people and God.
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what is the term used for a large group of people focusing their attention to one person that tells all his followers to do go by all his rules, do everything he says?? anyone want to take a guess?
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The living pro-abortion people are making the”compassionate” decision to kill the unborn babies that, unlike them, are not given the chance at life. Why is it “compassionate” for someone to arbitrarily snuff out life when they themselves recieved real compassion and escaped the fate of 55 million of their brothers and sisters.
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Smartimus, Nearly all pro choice people know that all anti abortionists are truly only pro birth, You have no care at all what happens to the baby once it is born or what living situation it is in or what the health condition of it is. You have no jurisdiction when it comes to issues if the baby has health impairments that will make it suffer for the rest of it’s life, along with that the hardships, stresses on the parents only to have the child turned over to the state because the parents can’t afford to care or deal with it. In such cases making taxpayers pay for this is wrong. Abortions should always exist for cases where fetus has impairments that will cause significant problems for the rest of it’s life and to prevent parent hardship which often leads to divorce. You have no Idea how much the ability to an abortion can save the woman, her partner and the taxpayer. All anti abortionists care about is themselves, not how the public or how the woman as well as her partner wanting a choice wants. If you don’t like abortion, keep your mouth shut, don’t force others into your religious beliefs, dreamworld. Some religions do have a strong belief in pro-choice, so your anti abortion ranting is very against freedom of religion.
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Eldredton from your comment I can surmise that the aborters are thinking only of themselves. I’d say it’s about time they start thinking about the innocent unborn baby and less about their selfish selves and personal convenience. How do you claim to know what pro-life people think when you make statements that are so oblivious to the truth? “Compassion” for the unborn is snuffing out their life? There are hundreds of thousands of people that would give all they have for what the aborters are so cavalierly willing to throw away.
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If that is so smartimus, then explain why so many thousands of kids are stuck in foster homes, boarding homes across the country?
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Are you saying that those kids would be better off dead? Adopting a child is unnecessarily costly and otherwise difficult in our society.
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So, IF a woman can’t raise a child then what?? Especially since you just said that about adoption? You put down adoption like a dirty rag. So that just proved that you are only Pro Birth, forcing someone to take care of a baby even if the woman can’t even care for the baby. If it has severe health issues, then what?? those issues would have been found early in a pregnancy. Abortion is needed as an option. You can’t have a baby, raise it properly if don’t have the money, resources for it. much more so in cases of health problems. One example that’ll be tough for you: Although Illegal, wrong in human society, do hear if it being done if a women couldn’t get an abortion, but do you know that if any other animal does not want it’s young it will merely leave it to starve.
You can’t force someone to go through a pregnancy to attempt to raise a kid they don’t even want in the first place, a kid constantly rejected by it’s own parent it’s whole life. That is what I call morally wrong, the wrong way to have a kid. In regards to anything, abortion is needed in certain cases. but some could also call it late miscarriage. nothing is certain anyways till pass the 28th week. I have a friend that had a miscarriage at 22 weeks.
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Smartimus
As it has been pointed out that the issue has been defeated twice so the majority is not alleged, it’s a fact’
The points of your criticism are not constructive and have little foundation in fact. I will admit that the question on quoting someone from 2000 yrs ago was pretty good.
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That making abortion illegal was voted down in no way means that the majority of people support abortions.
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Nobody supports abortions. Abortion is always a last resort and isn’t easy for anyone. It should be rare, but legal. I have many pro-choice friends and nobody is a cheerleader for abortion. What I am a cheerleader for is allowing women to decide for themselves when they are willing to give birth to a child. The government has absolutely no business in these decisions.
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Abortion isn’t only about cases of the health of the woman since I explained earlier, but also that of the fetus. In some cases there is a deformity or some genetic or other problem found during tests which does warrant the need for an abortion. For ones wanting a baby it is better and less stressful later knowing it would be a healthy baby than one with physical or genetic problems which parents or others can’t handle. For ones that say abortion is always wrong are blind to the full picture.
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Since we apparently agree that abortion should be rare, why is it that rather than remedy that situation, there is an effort to eliminate it entirely? You would think that all efforts to improve sex education, contraceptive services, and family planning services would be seen as efforts to reduce abortion. In fact, all of the above are under attack. Do you see the inherent contradiction in your viewpoint? Since we can not eliminate abortion because it will just go underground and kill many women, we should be doing everything we can to help women who don’t want to get pregnant. You can not just wish away the facts about sexuality and hope that people stop having sex if they don’t want a pregnancy.
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So lets pretend that it wasn’t the majority of the voters that defeated the law. It must not have been important enough to pro-life supporters to get out and vote. I don’t know Mrs McLaughlin personally but I highly doubt she would condone killing millions of unborn babies. Call it what you want, but it really is about rights.
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Of course to hold that view one has to ignore the unborn baby and dredge up the baser instincts toward lack of humanity to innocent unborn babies. If we are nothing but rabble on a level with an amoeba abortion makes sense.
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The unborn child has no rights.
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Red, on the other hand if you truly believe that a fetus in the earliest stages of pregnancy is not yet a human being (which I do) then you are not murdering anyone. It comes down to perception. And yes, I would expect you to act accordingly to your beliefs as you should expect I would as well. As far as condoning one, would you say that all people that support any war (a system that kills millions) is basically the same situation. War kills people including the innocent. If one supports the public owning assault rifles and someone uses one to kill children are they condoning the killing As the “intelligent” form of life it is possible to support woman’s rights without condoning “the killing of millions”. That is just another ridiculous dig at Mrs. McLaughlin.
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Technically a baby has no rights unless it can fully live outside the womb, but once again, it’s the woman’s decision. I do know of late term abortion, I do support it if the baby is found to have congenital, physical, genetic defects which will put the baby in poor health the rest of it’s life. You must also think of quality of life situations as well for both baby, parents. There are situations where Abortions are needed whether early or late. How many of those millions would have been in poverty, on gov. aid, welfare… A majority of abortions are from ones that can not afford to have kids. rape victims should always have full right to abortion. Plus government should not pay welfare cases additional money if they have kids, but should give them free, required Birth control to recieve welfare. Includes men on welfare.
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This video speaks the truth. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1IAhDGYlpqY
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The pro-abortion forces need to be mindfull of Isaiah 5:20, “Woe to those who call evil good and good evil, who put darkness for light and light for darkness, who put bitter for sweet and sweet for bitter.”
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Abortion has no meaning or word in that line since a fetus can not survive outside the womb.
The true meaning of that line is meant for the kings, rulers of nations that do what they can to twist the minds of it’s people to do wrong by the masses. Hitler is a prime example of this. Enslaving people by the masses applies as well. As well as any case where a king, queen or leader tells all it’s people to bow before him.
If you bow before any leader with exception of God or Jesus you have gone against the meaning of christianity.
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Go ahead, think what you like, but the word kings isn’t mentioned in this poassage nor does it specifically refer to kings, though kings need to heed this warning as well.
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It didn’t specifically say kings due to the fact that many nations at the time were ruled by kings, was left it out to prevent persecution, but as a whole was meant for any leader. Those that study history, science know that fact.
Those that thumbs down on the previous comment i assume admit to bowing down to someone else. There is a verse that does say “Thou shall not bow to anyone but your one true god”.
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“The true meaning of that line is meant for the kings” and “I didn’t specifically say kings” these are two consecutive quotes from eldredton.
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Once again, nobody is “pro-abortion”. Also, using your own sacred texts to apply to behavior of all individuals including those not subscribing to your specific religious superstitions is cavalier at best. I won’t force what I think is true down your throat if you promise to do the same.
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I exercised my free speech rights in quoting it. You weren’t forced to read it.
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That is true Smartimus but the thrust of your argument is if anyone disagrees with your religious beliefs, they are wrong whereas the rest of us are leaving religion out of it.
Morals and ethics are based on social mores, not religious, therefore if society deems something to be moral, so be it.
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And you are trying to cram that philosophy down everyone’s throat. Sorry, not buying.
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All i see this as is the modern day religious war. Overall, I see it is better to follow christianity than a specific religion. You get a much better perspective on things that way. I’ve visited many churches, a relative is a retired pastor. I can tell your catholic by your view smartimus.
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Please explain what difference your speculation on my specific denominational adherence has to do with this discussion?
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If you want to know, I remember being in H.S. and this abortion topic pops up, it was forget about that class because it was 2 against the rest of the students in the room and the teacher laughing about it. Protestants vs the catholics. My class was 90% pro choice, class below me was 95%
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When you want to come into the 21st century, let me know
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I have no desire to be included in your view of the 21st century. I’ve seen all I need to see of your version of morals and ethics and the carnage to the innocent it brings. No thanks, don’t include me in your schemes, that’s fine with me.
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That’s fine
Enjoy the 16th
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