Stony Hearts Value Vanity More Than Life

Written by Mark Kelly

April 6, 2004 – If anyone needed proof that pro-abortion extremists have the heart of a stone-cold killer, the appalling case of Melissa Ann Rowland fills the bill.

On April 5, in a Salt Lake City courtroom, Rowland waived her right to a preliminary hearing on a murder charge stemming from the death of her unborn child in January. She delayed having a Caesarean section that doctors said was necessary to save his life. Her twins eventually were delivered by C-section. One, a girl, was alive, but the boy was stillborn.

Extreme feminist groups have rallied to her cause, defending her right to refuse the surgery, even if it meant the baby's death.

Rowland's reason for delaying? The procedure would leave a scar.

Her justification for waiting even though it would cost the baby his life? "It's your body. It's your right to do what you want with it."

In saying that, she parroted one of the primary excuses cited in the late 1960s and early '70s for creating a right to abortion on demand – the right of a woman to make decisions about her body. The Supreme Court's Roe v. Wade decision meant that a woman's "right to privacy" included a pregnant woman's right to define herself as a woman who isn't pregnant.

"Abortion rights" advocates told all of us that the "lump of tissue" (the fetus) is part of a woman's body.

The problem: It simply isn't true.

An unborn child is not a part of the mother's body, not even as a freshly implanted embryo. From the moment of conception, the child's DNA contains all the genetic information it will ever possess. And the child's DNA is not the same as the mother's. It is unique and individual. The "woman's control over her own body" argument ignores the fact that the bodies of two genetically unique individuals are affected by an abortion decision.

For extreme elements of the "abortion rights" crowd, aborting a first- or even second-trimester unborn child is minor surgery, like removing a cyst. Abortion was promoted as simply a method of birth control, not much different than applying a condom. The goal of their campaign was the sexual "liberation" of women, the ability to engage in recreational sex without concern for the consequences. They ignored the horrible effects of such promiscuity on women. They wanted to avoid, at all costs, any discussion of the horrendous consequences for unborn children.

In the Rowland case, you'll notice an absence of discussion of the four ways in which the unborn differ from the newborn, often referred to with the acronym SLED.

Size: The fact that an unborn child is smaller than a newborn is as irrelevant to its personhood as the difference between the size of a newborn and an adult.

Level of development: An unborn child is less developed than the newborn, but that doesn't mean the unborn are less deserving of protection – no more than a newborn would be less deserving than an adult.

Environment: Is a 24-week unborn child less of a person because it lives in the womb instead of a nursery? What about the 24-week premature infant growing strong in neonatal intensive care?

Dependency: Most often used to excuse abortion before the fetus is "viable." But why are the unborn less worthy because they depend on the mother for sustenance? Is an adult less worthy of protection because she depends on a kidney dialysis machine?

You'll also notice that the "abortion rights" advocates defending Rowland aren't talking about the health of the mother, the one issue that usually governs decisions about late-term abortion. Protecting the "health of the mother" was President Clinton's excuse for twice vetoing federal legislation outlawing the gruesome and barbaric procedure known as "partial-birth abortion."

Ms. Rowland's health was never an issue for her doctor; the issue was the health of her ready-to-be-born son. Her rationale for not allowing the delivery was utterly shallow and self-centered. Justifying her decision means that the life or death of an unborn child is no more significant than electing to have cosmetic surgery.

In Rowland's case, in fact, the willingness to risk her child's life was precisely because of a cosmetic issue. How callous can someone be? And we won't even factor in her attempt to raise bail money by offering a couple her "newborn" son for adoption – the son who died because she delayed having the C-section.

The sad case of Melissa Ann Rowland – and the tragedy of her son's needless death – proves that extreme elements of the pro-abortion crowd value convenience – even vanity – more than the life of a full-term unborn child.

And it demonstrates the depths of depravity to which people sink when they reject the God who creates human life in His own image.

Mark Kelly is the author of "Proof Beyond Reasonable Doubt: The End of Christian Apologetics," an e-book available at http://kainospress.com

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