It is Human to Err on the Side of Life

In 1973, Supreme Court Justice Harry Blackmun, author of Roe v. Wade, wrote: “We need not resolve the difficult question of when life begins. When those trained in the respective disciplines of medicine, philosophy, and theology are unable to arrive at any consensus, the judiciary, at this point in the development of man’s knowledge, is not in a position to speculate.”

Basically, Justice Blackmun was saying that it had not been proven when life begins – thus making it impossible to say whether abortion kills a living human baby or just prevents one from eventually developing. This statement indicates that the justices who voted to legalize abortion – even the justice who personally wrote Roe v. Wade – were still open to the possibility that life begins at conception. Whey, then, did they not err on the side of life?

It is built into the very foundation of human nature to side with life if there is the least glimmer of hope. It is our basic instinct to preserve, prolong, and protect our own lives and lives of those around us if there is even just a possibility of existence.

Imagine a parent whose daughter or son ran out into the street, was immediately hit by a car, and then left lying unconscious and bleeding in the middle of the road. Would the parent walk away, assuming that the child is dead? Of course not! Without a second thought, the parent would do everything possible to give that child a chance to live. After all, until there is positive proof that the child is not living, there is still a chance, still a hope… Even if medical professionals counseled that the odds of survival were next to none, and warned that the risks and trauma involved in operating were astronomically high both to the parent and the child, none of that would matter. The parent would still err on the side of the possibility of life – the life of their son or daughter.

That is strikingly similar to abortion.

Whether or not it is legal, whether or not the woman’s pregnancy is the ideal circumstance, does abortion not violate our very instinct as human beings to preserve, prolong, and protect life?

Some people are not convinced by the medical and scientific findings and current embryological teachings that a new life is formed the moment the sperm and ovum form a single cell, but despite the skepticism, does the possibility of existing life not prod the heartfelt protection of an unborn child until there is absolute, infallible proof that he or she is not a living, separate human being?