1. - The abortion has always existed, although not with the easiness and diffusion it has now. In ancient
2. - Let us see the biological data. At the beginning of human life different phases are observed. In first place, the ovum fecundation by the spermatozoon (Oskar Hetwing, 1875), that takes place in the fallopian tubes and constitute the new biological reality, other than the mother. This initial cell, called zygote, contains in itself the genetic code, and the determination of all the hereditary biological and psychic process. It is also called germen, pre-embryo or pre-implanted embryo. In itself, embryo means germen.
3. - Juan Ramón Lacadena, a Genetics teacher in the Madrid's Complutense University Faculty of Biology comments as follows: “The fecunded egg initiates its way towards the uterus, dividing itself in this way, reaching the uterus at the third or fourth day. It is to say, it is in a week from the fecundation when the embryo, already like blastoderm, starts to stick in the uterus walls, taking another week to end its fixation (nesting)”. (Faith and biology, PPC,
4. - The zygote is characterized by the all powerfulness, id est, by the possibility of subdividing itself into autonomous parts, with the same genetic code, like it happens in the case of monozygotic twins. The zygote goes from the form known like morula (16 cells forming a compact group) to the form known like blastula or blastocyst, connected embryonary cells that, through proliferation, grow to form the different organs. Growth in volume begins. The Greek word blastós means germen, outbreak, stem, son.
5. - Fourteen days after fecundation the implantation or nesting in the uterus wall phase ends, required condition for the following feeding and development. It is also called the embryo phase. It goes from the third to the fourth week. At the beginning of this phase appears the shape known like gastrula (from the fifteenth to the eighteenth week) being different the three primitive germinal layers (ectoderm, mesoderm, endoderm) of those from which the diverse tissues and organs will derive. Between the seventh and eighth week, the skull, eyes outline, arms, legs and feet fingers, ears, can be identified.
6. - Growing and matureness take place during the fetus phase. It goes from the eighth week to the end of the gestation. The fetus is the conception fruit from the end of the embryo period to the birth. Between these phases a series of vital process take place, determined by that genetic code constituted in the fecundation.
7. - Some juridical data. In the ancient society, in
8. - In general, in the Christian society abortion is considered an assassinate and it is punished like a crime. Up to the tenth century, the penitence applied is limited to ten years, although the penitential books change. That of Theodore,
9. - Civil code follows the steps of the canonical code. During the fourth century, in the Visigoth world, that who delivers an abortive product is punished to death. The woman is lashed, if she is a slave, and degraded, if she is noble. During the seventh century, the Chindasvinto´s code punish to death, or at least to blindness, to whom provokes abortion, or to the husband, if he orders or allows it. In
10. - In the modern society large changes come out.
11. – At present, the so named Law of Terms intends to change
12. - Some theological data. The Bible scarcely talks about abortion, since it is not practiced by the Jewish society. An abortion caused by a strike delivered to a pregnant woman is punished with a fine, according to what is imposed by the husband and through arbitration. (Ex 21,22). Life is a God's gift (Ps 127), lord of life and death (Dt 32,39). The parents participate in God´s creative work. The mother of the Maccabees brothers says: I wonder how you were born of me; it was not I who gave you breath an life, nor I who ordered the matter of your body.(2 Mc 7,22). And the sick Job: You wrapped me up in skin and flesh, knit me together with bones and sinews (Jb 10,11). An psalm 139: You deeply knew my soul and even my bones were known to you when I was formed in secret, fashioned in the depths of the earth. (Ps 139, 15).
13. - Prophets Jeremy and Isaiah, like Paul, feel themselves called by God from their mother womb (Jr1, 5; Is 49, 5; Ga 1, 15). They really recognize that their first relation came from God to them. In the name of God, Jeremy carries out the symbolic action of breaking a china jar in the Topheth valley, where children sacrifices are made. That is what I will do to this people and this city (Jr 19, 11). In the Gospel, when
14. - From the beginning, the Christians defend human life in its mother's womb. Talking about the two ways frame (life-death, light-obscurity) we find the following precept in the Didaje and in the so-called Barnabas´ letter: “You shall not kill the son in his mother womb” (II,2; XIX,5). In the letter to Diogneto it is affirmed that the Christians “breed children, but they do not throw away foetus” (V.6) Athenagoras, a Christian philosopher from Athens, about 177 writes: “We affirm that those who practice the abortion commit homicide”, “what the woman carries in her womb is a living being” (Petition in favour of the Christians, 35). At the end of the second century, Clement of Alexandria affirms that the Christians “we do not kill with perverse instruments what the
15. - In the councils of Elvira (about 305) and Ancira (about 314) those practicing abortion are excommunicated. In the Eastern Church, Basil writes in the year
16. - About the human soul origin (if it is transmitted by generation or if it is immediately created by a new God's blowing) Agustin manifests his doubts and prefers “not to affirm what he cannot understand within the human reason nor to demonstrate with the divine authority” and he counsels “to imitate the Maccabees´ mother, who, even knowing that she had bred from her husband, and that the Supreme Creator had formed them in body and soul, nevertheless, she tells them: I don´t know how you appeared in my womb”(From the soul and its origin, I, 13,16 and 15,25).
17. - When does the human life begin? When initiated human life is already a human being?. As far as the first question is concerned, the teacher Lacadena says: “no scientific would doubt to answer that in the moment of the fecundation; id est, when from two different realities – the ovule and the spermatozoid – a new reality comes out – the zygote – with a potentiality of its own and a genetic autonomy, since, although he depends on his mother to subsist, his development takes place mainly according to his own genetic program. Since this genetic program is specifically human and not that of a mouse or a carrot, the new life is, evidently, human”. And about the second question “the range of opinions is ample and curious: from those considering that human life is a human being from the very moment of the conception, to those who base their opinion in relational criteria like being accepted by their parents, being recognized by the society, be intentionally procreated, be intended to live, ect. In the biological context in which we move, such relational criteria cannot be taken into account”, “from the genetic point of view, there is not to day a doubtless scientific answer
18. - Two hypotheses exist in the Christian tradition. The successive animation, also called delayed, is defended by Thomas of Aquinas (1225-1274), who follows it from Aristotle (384-322): each shape requires a matter apt to receive it. The human soul (shape of the body) would be infused after the initial matter development: “rational soul is created by God when human generation is completed”, “this soul is sensitive and vegetative at the same time, corrupting in themselves the previous forms”, “the man engenders what is similar to him as far as due to the virtue of his seminal substance the matter for the reception of the rational soul is prepared” (Suma theological, I, c.
19. - Most recent Church's teaching is unanimous: “Human life must be taken like sacred, since from its beginning it presupposes Creator's action” (John the XXIII, Mater et magistra. 1961), “life must be protected with most care from the conception; te abortion like the infanticide are abominable crimes” (Vatican II, GS 51), “that who procures abortion, if it takes place, will be excommunicated” (CIC, c. 1398), “human life must be respected and protected in an absolute way from the moment of conception” (Catholic Church Catechism, p. 2270), “a human being who initiates life is what is eliminated (with the abortion)”, “fecundation initiates human life adventure” (John Paul the II, EV 58).
20. - It is not the same to deliver a moral judgement over the abortion than to deliver it over its unpenalization or legalization. Besides, “legalization it is not the same that unpenalization. Legalized behaviour becomes a right; that who desires to carry it out, may count on the State protection. On its side, unpenalization does not mean that the behaviour is not legal, nor that the State should protect it”, says Jose-Roman Flecha, a teacher on moral theology in the
21. - It is also necessary to recall: the Church establishes a new relationship with the world, when she leaves the old identification between Cristianisme and society, she comes out of the situation of Christianity, opts to live like a community in the middle of the society, respects the autonomy of the temporal questions, acknowledges the legitimate social pluralism, renounces to impose the Gospel by force, offers it in the weakness of the freedom. We take into account Jesus attitude, who does not yield to the pressure to ask the penalization for the woman who commits adultery (or abortion), but who calls her to conversion: Neither do I condemn you; go away and don't do it again (Jn 8,11).
* Dialogue on diverse positions:
- First phase is considered human life (or not)
- It is only a cellular life, biological material
- It is a human life in his way
- When human life is at the stake, benefit of doubt is due
- The abortion like the infanticide are abominable crimes
- Abortion penalization is requested
- Unpenalization is accepted
- Christian society has imposed brutal and criminal penalizations
- Unpenalization and legalization is mixed
- Conscience objection of the health professionals is respected
- Legalization is accepted
- Legalization is denounced
- Abortion is denounced
- A call to conversion is delivered
- Our society will be in due time ashamed of the abortion it provokes
- Present problems: day's after pill,