If you have 15–20 minutes to sit down and read a thoughtful article, “Attention and the Screen-Sick Soul” is excellent. Screens can turn us into a pathetic type of human being. Don’t let’s screens master you; master them. Handle with care.
Roe vs Wade was overturned this last Friday with a vote of 6–3. Honestly, I never thought that I would see the day. From a biblical viewpoint, a human person exists from the moment of conception. Jeremiah 1:5 gives a clear picture that even before conception, a person and purpose exists in the mind of God. It has always been hard for me to understand how a Christian theologian/philosopher can defend a woman’s right to do what she wants with her body over and against a fetus. In my view, the only way to do this is to assign less-than-human-person status to the fetus. If a fetus is not yet a human person, then a woman can do what she desires since the fetus is more like a clump of cells (hair, fingernails, etc.) than a person. In this view, the fetus is a part of the woman’s body, not an actual human person with moral and legal rights. On the other hand, if the fetus is not just part of her body, but an actual human being (e.g., the fetus possesses its own DNA, etc.), then it seems immoral (in religious terms, “sinful”) to “delete” the human life. Granted, there are very complicated, heartbreaking, and difficult circumstances (e.g., a pregnancy due to rape, a case where a woman will certainly lose her life if she carries the fetus to term, etc.) that might deserve special treatment, but on the whole, whether or not the fetus is considered a human person is the most important issue before anything else should be discussed. This is the point upon which the entire debate hinges.
Regarding the ruling itself, it DOES NOT MEAN that abortion is no longer legal in the United States. All it means is that the issue can be completely and totally decided at the State level. While Roe vs Wade was in place, it made it extremely difficult if not impossible for states to forbid or restrict abortion. With the ruling struck down after almost 50 years, now states have full authority to decide for themselves. So, some states will forbid it, some will severely restrict it, while others will parade themselves as the champion of women’s rights and continue to allow abortion.
BJ Condrey, Ph.D. 