I am still thinking about Greg Cunningham's presentation, about which I have already blogged here and here.
The fact that I am still pondering says something both about the impact of his presentation, and also the complexity of the issues it raises.
I have to say that what particularly haunts me is the graphic footage shown of an abortion being carried out.
It reinforced for me that fact that the forgotten victims of abortion are the doctors. What a man must have done to himself to be able to kill, dismember and then extract a baby identifiable piece by identifiable piece from its mother is almost unimaginable.
These people need our prayers.
Of course the unborn children are the primary victims; of course the desperate mothers need our compassion and support; but the medics... surely they too are victims; and their very humanity, quite possibly their eternal destiny, is at stake. We owe it to them, too, to do everything we legitimately may to end this barbarism.
4 hours ago
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2 comments:
I am not, I think, a particularly squeamish person but I struggled at watching the abortion footage. I think that the use of such visual material ought to be governed by caveats not unlike those determining a just war- proportionality, likelihood of success and so on. In short some thought needs to be given to the judicious exploitation of visual imagery. There is a range of potential approaches- from the "softly softly" tactic of raising awareness of the actual nature of foetal life to the "nuclear option" of the gory real abortion pictures/ film footage.
Patricius
I agree - I found the abortion footage almost unmatchable -but I was also struck by the effect it had on me.
It is certainly very powerful in bringing home the true evil of abortion.
The question is, may that power legitimately be used, and if so, what are the prudential considerations surrounding such use.
I do not think the questions as straight forward as some commentators on either side seem to (cf for example the Catholic Herald articles and comments).
Just War theory is an interesting set of criteria to apply. I will continue to ponder - but do hope to reach some conclusions soon.
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