My response to the article Why you shouldn’t blame the clergy that a majority of Catholics support abortion on LifeSiteNews.com.

I personally blame the culture and the many Nancy Pelosi Catholics who define Catholicism in terms of their own ideologies. However, I do agree with you on the general point that we must examine our consciences. And by "we" I mean all Christians or pro-lifers, especially those of us who live in the United States. Many of us are in fact guilty of letting the popular culture govern our daily lives rather than our consciences. Our side stood by idly as the forces of evil transformed our society. Often we assumed that we could wish or pray it away without taking action. Now that the evil around us is unavoidable, we are finally starting to say something. Thankfully we're winning on the sanctity of life, but we may have lost in other important areas—noticeably the sanctity of sex, the family, the God-created distinction between male and female, etc. It's easy to blame "liberals," Obama, the political parties, voters who stay home, whoever. The fact is that change must start with us humbling ourselves before God and society, admitting our faults, and then taking action.

Any country that accepts abortion is not teaching its people to love, but to use any violence to get what they want.

"The government should not be involved in such a personal decision as abortion." Our response: The government got "too involved" in abortion when it claimed to have the authority to deprive some human beings of their right to life. The Declaration of Independence asserts that government exists to secure the rights already bestowed by the Creator. Moreover, when somebody's "choice" destroys somebody else's life, that choice is no longer merely a personal, private matter.

Thugs murder people even though it's illegal. Should we legalize murder? If abortion is OK, why stop at birth?

claim: 'Abortion is an inherent human right.'
response: "A small exercise of logic destroys this notion. Starting with this notion, it follows that the same claim also applies to the mother of the woman. However, if the mother of the woman who claims the right to an abortion had aborted that woman, she would not be able to exercise the right that she is claiming. Therefore, there are two possible logical conclusions: A woman does not have the right to abort her unborn child, or the right to abortion must be explicitly granted to a woman by her mother.\n\nThose who do not live cannot exercise any rights. But abortion is the termination of a human life. That is a fact of biology. Thus abortion is the willing denial of human rights—all human rights—by one human to another. How can abortion be a human right when it denies human rights to humans?"

“We have a sliding scale of rights. People get more rights as they become older over time. We don’t allow children to do certain kinds of things and so I think that that is part of that continuum.” Being born and living isn't one of those things we prevent children from doing. This argument ignores the fact that we restrict the rights of children for their own long-term welfare.

Almost half (48%) of all abortions are performed in the United States on women who have had a previous abortion.
6 in 10 women who have abortions are already mothers.

42% of women abort their children because of financial stress. The second most popular reason for having an elective abortion comes from women who would rather not feel forced to abandon their education and career pursuits.

78% of abortion-determined women who see their unborn child’s ultrasound and hear its heartbeat will forgo the abortion.

claim: 'Abortion is justifiable if the abortee has no brain activity.'
response: 'This argument limits the timeframe of legitimacy to a matter of a few weeks, but is a tantalizing and tempting argument. However, it fails in light of the fact that we speak of human rights, not "person rights." Human beings are entitled to equal treatment because they are human beings. The attempt to classify some human beings as less deserving of rights has led to numerous atrocities in human history.'

claim: 'Pro-lifers support war and the death penalty and thus are hypocrites.'
response: "This claim results from the following facts: Pro-lifers tend to support the Republican Party. The Republican Party supports the death penalty and drove the war in Iraq. This argument fails for a number of reasons. Pro-lifers support the Republican Party because the Democratic Party has aggressively supported the \"right\" to abortion on demand for decades. The argument ignores the fact that many pro-lifers generally oppose war and the death penalty on religious grounds. \n\nFurthermore, those who do support the death penalty and certain wars do so on the grounds of law enforcement and national security. There is a clear difference between the aborted child and the convicted criminal: The former is completely innocent, whereas the latter has been tried by law and found to be guilty of a crime. One could argue that there is no hypocricy in this. In fact, the pro-lifer should always remember that the pro-abort's position is more hypocritical—he opposes the killing of a convicted criminal but supports the killing of an absolutely-innocent baby—and he is attempting to project his own hypocrisy onto his opponents."

claim: 'The right to abortion is necessary for the equality of women. Equality for women mandates the right to abortion.'
response: "This argument originates from the notion in women's liberalism (also called \"feminism\") that men impregnate women for the purpose of controlling them. Even if this claim held water in our modern society, it still fails in the fact that abortion discriminates against females by age and stage of development. \n\nThis argument also often carries a degree of hypocrisy. Many of the women who claim this argument reserve for women the right to decide to abort a child. But the child is the product of a mother and a father. These people seek to deny the father the right to let the child be born."

In 2011, 565 children were killed by guns. In that same year, 1.2 million children were killed by abortion.

"I respect your views, but I have to represent all the people." Our response: That's what we're trying to say to you. If you neglect the unborn, you are not representing all the people. Roe vs. Wade excludes them from protection; we demand that they be included. A public servant cannot legitimately ignore an entire segment of the public that is being destroyed.

"Those who oppose abortion do not have the right to deny it to those who do not oppose it." OK, if you don't like slavery then don't own slaves. If you don't like murder then don't commit it. Pretty much any action that someone believes to be wrong or sinful can be dismissed with this reasoning.

The society that tolerates abortion on demand tells its members, "You do not have intrinsic rights as a human being. You have rights because people allow you to live and thus give you those rights."

claim: 'Pro-life organizations generally oppose contraception. This will cause dissention in the movement between those organizations and individuals who support contraception, and thus break up the movement.'
response: 'Interestingly, many pro-aborts did not discover this fact until the mid-2000s and gleefully turned this notion into a short-lived Internet meme. This shows how desperate they are. The most ardent proponents of the pro-life position tend to be devout Catholics, and the Catholic Church ardently upholds and defends its opposition to artificial contraception. But even considering that the pro-life movement contains many people who support contraception, it is laughable to think that this is a wedge issue in the movement. Actually, the sheer number of abortions and importance of life issues in the current political scene makes the debate over contraception quite petty in comparison. Furthermore, this is not a new development. Pro-life organizations, particularly those with Catholic roots, have opposed contraception since their inception. Some of these organizations predate the Roe vs. Wade decision. If this were an issue that would divide the movement, it would have done so already.'

"I'm personally opposed to abortion, but can't impose my views on others." I'm pretty sure you oppose murder, slavery, child labor and lots of other actions that are illegal. So where's your crusade to have those laws repealed?

"I''m personally opposed to abortion, but can''t impose my views on others." Our response: This is not a matter of views, but of violence. The law is supposed to protect human life despite the views of those who would destroy it.

claim: 'Pro-lifers are only pro-fetus and refuse to take care of babies once they are born. Pro-lifers are unwilling to adopt the unwanted children that would not be aborted.'
response: "This is an easy strawman for the pro-aborts to set up and knock down. Many pro-lifers do not have the means to take care of the world's unwanted children, but would gladly do so if they did. Furthermore, respect for life is a societal problem. In making this argument, the pro-abort reveals a deeper problem: his general contempt for humanity. When confronted with the humanity of the unborn, he demands that someone else take responsibility for them after birth. This is part of what the Catholic Church calls \"the culture of death,\" and must be addressed as a cultural problem.\n"

A pro-life consensus among self-described libertarians shouldn’t be complicated: "Just government protects the rights of individual people, and unborn babies are individual people; therefore, just government protects the rights of unborn babies." In practice, however, a significant percentage of libertarians don’t apply their principles to unborn humans, most likely because their exalted talk of freedom and individual rights is really only meant to protect the freedom to pursue their own interests.

Claim: The unborn baby occupies their mother's body against the will of the mother. Thus the mother has the right to remove the unwanted "parasite" from her body.

This is one of the most self-centered attitudes that one can have about pregnancy and the unborn.

Parasites, by definition, aren't supposed to be in the organisms they inhabit. Parasites, by definition, harm their hosts, taking resources from their carriers without giving anything in return.

Parasites come from without. Hosts do not produce their own parasites.

Research has shown that cells from the unborn child can actually help heal the mother from illnesses. Parasites usually don't provide any sort of benefit to the host.

Pregnancy is not a disease.

The unborn child did not choose to be conceived. Just because someone's presence is not wanted does not give the affected party the right to kill them.

Some argue that abortion is more like eviction. That logic gives a parent the right to abandon a child or refuse to provide for a child on any ground the parent maintains.

It is hypocritical for a woman to use this argument if she is the result of an unwanted pregnancy. See the "human right" argument.

“We don’t know if abortion is murder, therefore let’s proceed as if it isn’t.” This is the exact opposite of how responsible ethics works. If we don’t know for sure whether abortion is murder, and there are serious-but-not-definitive reasons why it may be, then decency dictates we err on the side of caution and avoid abortion’s potential harm.

"I support women''s rights and health." Our response: That is precisely why you should examine the evidence, which is more plentiful than ever, that abortion is destructive of women''s health, and listen to the growing voices of those who have been harmed by abortion. That is also why you should examine how the abortion industry, through unregulated and dangerous clinics, continues to deceive and exploit women.