Dear OzSpen,

In relation to baptism, allow me to tell you a story:

It occurred during the Middle Ages, when everyone was forced to convert to Christianity, including Jews. Also at the time, meat was forbidden on Fridays.

So one Friday evening, our friend, a converted Jew, had his Sabbath meal which included meat when knock-knock, there came the priest to inspect.

Our friend quickly dipped his finger in water and sprinkled it over his dish mumbling something, this he repeated three times. The priest was astonished: "what are you doing?".

"I just did as you did", replied our friend: you splashed water on me three times, saying "You were a Jew, now you are a Christian; You were a Jew, now you are a Christian; You were a Jew, now you are a Christian", so I did the same over my plate saying: "You were meat, now you are fish; You were meat, now you are fish; You were meat, now you are fish".

Banjo

give up your lies. Changing the name of an unborn baby does not change what it is. You employ the same tactics as the nazis did with the Jews. By all means defend mudering unborn human beings but try being a little honest instead of using pseudo science and pseudo language to justify the unjustifiable. There is no honesty or science to back you.

Dear NNS,

No species can increase without limit. There are two basic reproductive strategies. One is characteristic of spiders, many insects and most fish. Social insects are an exception. They care for the young in the hive or nest and limit births when the honey season is ending as bees do. One reproductive strategy produces many young with little or no parental care. The other strategy involves producing fewer young but with parental care as in the case of mammals. In the case of humans until recently women would produce young with the expectation that even with care all would not survive.

Not long ago there was both a decrease in infant mortality and longer life spans due to better sanitation and medical care, but people kept on having children at a rate which ignored the fact that the world had changed. One of my two grandmothers had six children. Five survived to adulthood. The other grandmother had seven children who survived to adulthood. It is obvious that all women of childbearing age cannot keep producing at such a rate. My mother produced two children, and only one survived to adulthood. My wife’s mother did the same.

My wife and I were in effect only children. We both had more than one child as we wanted our children to have sibling(s). Unlike the bees we do not produce fewer children by instinct when the situation calls for it.

The Chinese realised that reproduction unchecked would lead to disaster. They initiated the one child policy and enforced it in a brutal manner with coerced abortions which both of us find unacceptable. Many of the only children grew up to be spoiled brats. The Chinese policy led to a sexual imbalance. Many Chinese couples faced with the fact they could only have one child opted to have a boy. A society with many more males than females leads to both frustrated males and oppressed females. It is not a healthy society. It is not good to follow the Chinese example.

continued

continued

For a happy home life for children while controlling population growth some couples could have many children while most have none. For childless couples that is not a good solution either.

We are seeing the effects of uncontrolled population growth in today’s world. People are fleeing countries which no longer can support their people. They seek entry to more stable, prosperous countries which cannot admit them all without unfortunate social changes. Fertile land which could grow crops is used for housing the teeming hordes. Fewer countries can export food. One million species are on the verge of extinction due to humans encroaching on their habitat and causing climate change they cannot live with. To save the world it might be better for humans to disappear. However, I don’t want to go yet.

The 1994 population conference in Cairo had several recommendations:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/International_Conference_on_Population_and_Development

1. Universal education: Universal primary education in all countries by 2015. Urge countries to provide wider access to women for secondary and higher level education as well as vocational and technical training.

2. Reduction of infant and child mortality: Countries should strive to reduce infant and under-5 child mortality rates by one-third or to 50–70 deaths per 1000 by the year 2000. By 2015 all countries should aim to achieve a rate below 35 per 1,000 live births and under-five mortality rate below 45 per 1,000.

3. Reduction of maternal mortality: A reduction by 1/2 the 1990 levels by 2000 and 1/2 of that by 2015. Disparities in maternal mortality within countries and between geographical regions, socio-economic and ethnic groups should be narrowed.

4. Access to reproductive and sexual health services including family planning: Family-planning counseling, pre-natal care, safe delivery and post-natal care, prevention and appropriate treatment of infertility, prevention of abortion and the management of the consequences of abortion, treatment of reproductive tract infections, sexually transmitted diseases and other reproductive health conditions; and education, counseling, as appropriate, on human sexuality, reproductive health and responsible parenthood. Services regarding HIV/AIDS, breast cancer, infertility, and delivery should be made available. Active discouragement of female genital mutilation (FGM).

Continued

Continued

It is important that there is a planet in which future generations of humans and other species can live. To secure that, we must control our rate of reproduction. No species can increase indefinitely, and there are already too many humans. I certainly don’t have all of the answers but am just telling you my concern. There has also been a long struggle for women to have equal rights. That makes for a better world. Part of that struggle has been for women to have access to medically safe and legal abortion. It will be a tragedy in my view if women are stripped of that right, coerced to listen to arguments for or against abortion or harassed in any way after having decided to avail themselves of an abortion. They know what they are doing.

There are other concerns which we should address, but controlling our reproduction is near the top.

There is an unfortunate tendency in this thread to use emotive language and to charge somebody with a different view of being a liar or of bad character in some other way. I think it is better to assume good faith on both sides and to use accurate language. A fetus is not a baby. Abortion is not infanticide.

Dear OzSpen,

In an optional question on the 2016 Census, 52.1% of the Australian population declared some variety of Christianity. The government accepted that those who said they were Christian were Christian. That is the criterion I use

david f,

<<In an optional question on the 2016 Census, 52.1% of the Australian population declared some variety of Christianity. The government accepted that those who said they were Christian were Christian. That is the criterion I use>>

That's a say-so view of Christianity. Would you go to a Dr who was a say-so Dr without proven credentials?

That is your choice to regard Christian that way, but it is not how Jesus defined what it means to be a Christian: "For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life" (John 3:16).