The Government overturned a ban on abortion aid funding.

Two questions about this.

Will my hard-earned dollars now go to pay for abortions?

And - How do religious Labor and Greens voters support a party that thinks aborting a fetus is the right thing to do?

There are a couple of points,

from a taxpayers point of view is the money better spent supporting new mouths? Indefinately?

Presumably abortions will be available to those who don't actually want more children! Some of the same christian groups oppose contraception, which gets the people to this position in the first place.

One wonders how strong the religious vote is in our society, and by how much it dwindles each year.

Last time I checked the poll in The Australian, 62% of people supported the move, 33% were opposed with the remainder being neutral. And the Australian is usually perceived, at least, as being more on the conservative side.

So it seems most people do think it's sensible to not discriminate in our aid dollars. TruthNow's no stranger to trolling, I sincerely doubt he or she will return to back up the initial post, but it's easy to tear apart anyway.

The reality of the decision is that aid dollars can support organisations who perform abortions. It's not specifically about that - many, indeed, most practical organisations realise that there will be occasions when abortions are necessary. These organisations were barred from receiving aid dollars in the past.

Also, there is the fact that in third world countries, women have very little power. Rape is more common and the women often have no decision over contraception. Thus, an impoverished family is made larger as the mother sometimes has no choice.

Thankfully, that's been changed. Of course, individuals like TruthNow rarely like to look at the bigger picture.

Luckily, most Australians don't agree with him/her.

Dear TRUTHNOW78,

It is possible to be religious and support the right of a woman to have an abortion. You seem to have the ethnocentric idea that all religious people have to agree on the question of abortion. All religious people do not oppose abortion, and all non-religious people do not support abortion. Life is not that simple.

Well good on Stephen Smith of the ALP for bringing about these
changes! They are years overdue and the religious lobby
within the Libs clearly did not care too much about the
68'000 women a year in the third world, who die from unsafe
abortions.

Not that the 4 million $ a year will change the world, but
at least it is a start.

Shame on the libs for denying third world women rights
which Australian women take for granted.

Australia supports the death of our native unborn to about 80,000 to 100,000 so it no strange thing that they will now support the death of the unborn overseas. We have now justified murder as legitimate while we condemn the ancients for sacrificing their chilren to the fertility cults as primitive.

The influence of Green politics with their undercurrent political stance on population reduction is behind this current view. Australia has to import workers from the third world to maintain our young population of workers.

That's right, Philo. They sacrificed children, not clusters of cells.

Why is it that the religious can't accept that their views are primitive and out of step with modern Australia, and instead have to invent conspiracy theories to explain it?

The "influence of Green politics"? Two-thirds of Australians don't vote green. Try again.

SORRY!
Do you know anything about Col Rouge?
In a thread he wrote "I full expect to expire in a massive heart attack"
I hope he is well.
Antonios Symeonakis
Adelaide

Philo,
Can you tell me if you believe in contraception or birth control in any form.

There is no right for women or men for that matter to kill their unborn babies. Women in the third world nations do not need to be patronised by immoral arguments from any of us in Australia because women in these countries would sooner choose life over abortion if we be consistent by helping them materially to support them having their babies at birth and beyond.

I am Michael Webb, and a member of the DLP. The DLP is pro life all the way with no exceptions at all; we are also against privitisation of electricity and opposed to privatisations in virtually all sectors of the economy. ( the ALP once was a great Party for the first 60 years of its existence until the ferals and pragmatists- read unprincipled ones took over. )We in the DLP are running in Federal and various State election ballots and believe that no one whatsoever should murder unborn Australians. Pople who hold to the opposite view have no rights simply because injustice and stupidity( which is always the position of the abortionists) have no rights. Or to break that down further: "stupidity has no rights" in the words of my parish priest Fr John O'Neill, God bless him.
Always give birth to children because those who bring up alleged exceptions do not really care about the exceptions at all but are wedging to make it a part of general 'culture'.

webby, I find it difficult that anyone in good conscience would vote for a party that had a "no exceptions at all" policy.
Who would wish to be forced to carry through a pregnancy that has no hope of a normal life as a result of say genetic defects . No disrespect meant to those who have or choose to bear these children, but to be forced to courtesy of the DLP. I should hope not!

Maybe you could make an exception for this 9 year old, surely:

http://www.time.com/time/world/article/0,8599,1883598,00.html
"But the Church takes these positions that are so rigid that it ends up weakened. It is very intolerant, and that intolerance is going to scare off more and more followers."

Insert DLP for church if you like. No exceptions.

No one in good conscience could vote for politicians who support and vote for abortion, lowering the age of sexual consent so as to satisfy the lsuts and perversions of adults, same sex adoptions, allowing totalitarians governments' sovereign funds to buy into Australian businesses and even government assets like water and electricity. One is free in good conscience to vote for those politicians who support life and support Australian jobs regardless of party. Sadly there aren't too many courageous politicians who are prepared to break with the precious Party ie the Libs/Nats/ ALP.

All babies have a right to be born regardless of their personal condition or the condition of their parents ie economic situation.

I should hope so ! No one has a right to murder unborn children. That 'right' simply does not exist. Stupidity has no rights.

You don't care about that 9 year old. You are only using that as your excuse for the real agenda of allowing abortion generally. Pull the other one.
The DLP has members both Catholic and non Catholic alike. The principles are aligned very well with Catholic social teaching and that is terrific I think. The bishops though involve themselves at th altar which is their function and have taught the Catholic laity to join the political party of their choice that most faithfully aligns itself with both Catholic social teachings and also Catholic moral teachings but also allows Catholics to join Parties that are not DLP such as the Libs and ALP so as to change and improve them.
Many good politicians in all the main Parties but sadly not enough as the relativists and feral type views are gainign the upper hand with their false pretend compassion wihc is not compassion at all but rather the snake in the grass pretext to change society to the relativist and pro death and anti natural law ways of living.

Webby wrote about rojo: You don't care about that 9 year old. You are only using that as your excuse for the real agenda of allowing abortion generally. Pull the other one.

Dear Webby: You don't know what rojo cares about not. You cannot read rojo's mind. It is quite possible that one might care more about a person who is born than an embryo inside that person.

One of the signs of a rigid and bigoted mind is that a person with such a mind cannot see that a person who differs acts in good faith.

From your post I think you have a rigid and bigoted mind. Nevertheless I think you are acting in good faith. Give others the same credit.

All who oppose your ideas are not wrong. They merely differ.

My wife was asked by a Muslim to tell him what she found wrong with his religion. He was obviously ready to defend himself even though he had not been attacked. She said, "What is wrong with your religion is the same thing that is wrong with all religions. You think you have the truth."

Actually some religions accept that other people may have a different thing that they think is truth and are tolerant of that difference. Although I agree with rojo I don't think you are a bad person you merely have a different opinion. Your truth is merely opinion which you mistake for truth.

Actually David, 'tolerance' has got nothing to do with truth or virtue. Whislt different religions think they are right , they all cannot be right; either one of them is right or all of them are wrong; there is no in-between. The Catholic Church teaches this very issue as a matter of doctrine. People like you mean well David but essentially what you are inferring about religion is this: that all religions are either as good as each other and usually all religions may be as bad as one another. This thinking is wrong. It is the heresy of religious indifferentism. All our rights and natural tolerances spring from the true religion of Christ and His Catholic Church ( his Spouse as taught by St Paul and others). The 'tolerance' you speak of may have some good elements but is essentially formed in the non-religious and politically correct ( anti Catholic) 'modern' Western world. It doesn't hold water but gains its 'believers' from peer non religious group think which doesn't 'tolerate' the very heritage that is undermined and rejected by degrees through 'law reform' ( legal positivism) whereby non-religious secualr humanists get satisfaction and revenge through legal changes to suit their whims.

Dear Webby,

I think you mean well also, but I think you are terribly wrong. Your 'truth' is probably due to the fact that your parents were or are Catholic.

Your truth is merely the opinion of a powerful institution which you choose to accept. In a democratic state if the opinion of a powerful institution is that of the majority of the people it becomes law. However, that does not mean that it is true or right.

I believe that there is no divorce in Italy because Italy is democratic, and a majority of the people accept a law that does not allow for divorce. A law that does not allow for divorce promotes adultery. A law that does not allow abortion condemns nine year old girls who have been forced into sex by their stepfather and are medically judged to be physically incapable of bearing a child to have that child. In effect not having an abortion is probably condemning the girl to death.

In Saudi Arabia people have limbs hacked off and are beheaded for offenses which would not attract similar penalties in Italy.

Unfortunately it is the religious mindset in both Saudi Arabia and Italy that promotes immorality by my definition of immorality.

Islamists have a different truth from you. Some day both Islam and Catholicism will vanish, and people will find new 'truths'.

Not that this has much to do with abortion, but (surprise, surprise) the Catholic Church has been brought into the discussion again. I wish I could find the source, but I can't, so I'm afraid what follows will be on a "take it or leave it" basis without cold hard evidence.

I remember reading a justification of ecumenism from the Vatican. Essentially, it contradicted what Webby has presented here. It acknowledged (in a huge step for the Catholic Church) that there is more than one path to salvation. That is, people who do not belong to the Catholic Church are not automatically damned to hell or even to limbo. My understanding of the document was that you don't even have to profess your love for God to get there. Instead, one can achieve salvation purely by living a virtuous life. As most religions have very similar guidelines for what a "virtuous" life is, there is nothing preventing a Muslim or a Hindu or any other religious person from entering heaven. Similarly, many people with no religious connections at all, who are governed solely by their own consciences, can lead perfectly virtuous lives and reap the rewards at a later date.

While the Catholic path is seen as preferable, I think the Church has recognised that people like Gandhi and many other non-Catholics have proved their worth and the fact that they haven't "seen the light" should surely be no impediment to their eternal salvation. I would hazard a guess that "not seeing the light" (my words, not the Church's) could include seeing the teachings of the Church but not understanding them to the point of acceptance. Sounds patronising, but remember that these ideas stem from people who see understanding as acceptance.

I think the document was Lumen Gentium.

Like I said, this has nothing to do with abortion but when I see posts like Webby's I can understand why many people don't like Catholics or members of any other religion, for that matter.

Fortunately Webby, your DLP party will suffer the same fate as any other group of zealots who can't accept that theirs is just one teaching within the multitude.

They'll crash and burn... actually, that's being generous. They won't get enough traction to warrant crashing and burning, they'll just be ignored.

Simply because, people want an MP who listens. Not one who preaches and refuses to see that people may have different ideas about right and wrong, as davidf states.

You believe a fetus is a baby. Others think a fetus is a fetus and there are notable differences.

I respect pro-lifers who respect that others at least are coming from a place of compassion, even if they disagree with them.

I dislike however, religious nuts who refuse to even consider the possibility that people with different ideas about abortions, still have good intentions. Do you really think we're all about convenient murders? Do you honestly refuse to believe that some people are concerned about issues like rape as well as children (actual children as opposed to bundles of cells) being born into abject poverty? What about women with no choices about contraception? The thousands who die from illegal abortions?

But no. You won't even deign to consider that. It's not the right-to-life arguments that annoy me. It's the way that most of the fervent followers disregard the opinions of the other side.

I'm glad you told me about the DLP, so I can inform others as to the dogmatic nature of this group. Odds are however, you'll never get an MP within a stone's throw of government.

Some of these members of the god squad, seem to live in their
own little dream land, far away from any kind of reality.

I was listening to such a debate on US tv, about the present
Obama change of laws, when it comes to IVF embryos.

There are something like 600'000 eight cell embryos, frozen
in storage. One religious Congress member suggested that
they should be adopted. It turns out that something like
70 were adopted last year, so clearly Catholics are not
running to their rescue!

Reality prevails. If not used for research, those cells
will be dumped. Minus perhaps another 100 adopted ones.

Webby, would you like a few hundred thousand spare embryos
for your party members to adopt?

David and Yabby,
First to you David.It is NOT possible to be religious and support abortion. The Church, in line with the commandments and Divine words from the Scriptures speaks of the sacredness of human life from the beginning. Many non religious people also support the pro life position becuase the natural law can be known by everyone because God has crated our very natures. Go and tell the police after clocking 140km in a 100 km zone or having run a red light that "life isn't so simple". The police officer will nod and smile and still write you your ticket. Same with the 10 commandments.

It is not a question of "your" truth or mine. Truth is truth and is discoverable. Christ made those claims and His Mystical Spouse the Catholic Church teaches these truths of afith. Opinion doesn;t come into it nor the background of our parents.A law that does not allow abortion condemns nine year old girls who have been forced into sex by their stepfather and are medically judged to be physically incapable of bearing a child to have that child. In effect not having an abortion is probably condemning the girl to death.

Adultery wouild happen reargless because divorice is forbidden by Christ anyway. Having a secular law to do away with Divine law and allow divorce doesn't dissolve the issue of unfaithfulness.

Why speak of Saudi Arabia? You are comparing oranges with apples. Both religions cannot be true. Or both are false. Take your pick based on truth.

Yabby- re: embryos in storage. Utilitarian arguments are facile.

Dear Webby, Many religious people support abortion. They just don’t happen to share your religious beliefs.

There is no reason for anyone else to accept your definition of religion or to accept your scriptures. You quote Jesus. You don’t even follow his religion. He was not a Christian. He lived and died a Jew. To follow his religion consult your local rabbi.

What is the New Testament heritage?

RELIGIOUS BIGOTRY: "No one comes to the Father but by me" (John 14:6);This text has helped to create a world where adherents of one religion feel compelled to kill adherents of another. A veritable renaissance of religious terror now confronts us and is making against us the claims we have long made against religious traditions different from our own.

ANTI-SEMITISM: And the people answered, 'His blood be on us and on our children'" (Matt. 27:25); No other verse of Holy Scripture has been responsible for so much violence and so much bloodshed. People convinced that these words conferred legitimacy and even holiness on their hostility have killed millions of Jewish people over history. Far more than Christians today seem to understand, to call the Bible "Word of God" in any sense is to legitimize this hatred reflected in its pages.

SEXISM: For man was not made from woman, but woman from man. Neither was man created for woman, but woman for man." (1Cor. 8-9)The message of the Christian church was once that women are evil to their core and it was built on the story of Eve. She was taken out of man and was not his equal, but his helpmeet. Evil entered human history through the weakness of the woman. She was made to bear the blame and the guilt. She was the source of death.

The above is garbage.

Your truth is not even your opinion but the opinion of your church. Truths of faith is rubbish. Truth requires proof not faith.

Islam and Catholicism are both man made structures claiming divine sanction. I take my pick of neither because there is no reason to think either is true.

Webby, you sound exactly the same as every other fanatic throughout history claiming "truth."

There have been millions.

They're all just like you. They all have that fundamentalist extremism that is convinced its right, and has been responsible for more death and suffering throughout history than any other mindset.

Your "truth" is bulldust to me and many others, who are disgusted by its arrogance.

Deal with it.

*and Divine words from the Scriptures speaks of the sacredness of human life from the beginning.*

Err Webby, I have the so called Divine words of the Scriptures
right here, in front of me.

Exodus 35: 1 and 2 is also quite clear. Moses was told by the
Lord that anybody who does any work on the Sabbath, shall be
put to death.

Now I really like my neighbour, top bloke, and I refuse to obey
your so called holy scriptures and put my neighbour to death.

If you really want to know a bit about the history of your
church, read a book called "The Sex Lives of the Popes"

Hehe, what a kinky bunch they were :)

But this is your so called divine truth, rather you then me lol.

Mr no exceptions, whether or not I care for the 9 year old is quite irrelevant. It just so happens I do. Perhaps not so much for her eternal salvation as you concern yourself with, but for the life and reality she has now. She finds herself in a despicable position. One no child should ever face.
The fact is she has faced this situation. And regardless of the circumstances the DLP would ensure that this girl continues the pregnancy, no exceptions. Thus I say to you that you give no indication of caring for this child.

I have nothing against abortion generally, I need not deny it. I trust the decision to abort is not taken lightly, but that is really up to the woman and her beliefs regarding when her fetus becomes a person.
The pro-life lobby really aren't all that persuasive in their arguments, they have to focus on changing laws and picketing abortion clinics rather than on persuading the woman she actually wants the baby. Perhaps thats something the DLP could work on.

The statistics are staggering.

According to the ABC radio online link,
and I quote:

"42 million abortions are performed around
the world each year... More than half are
medically unsafe, and around 68, 000 women
die annually. Some 220 thousand children
lose their mother this way..."

And some of us are questioning the validity
of our Government's Community Aid reversal
decision to lift the 12 year long ban - and
once again support the funding for abortion
services in countries like Vietnam, PNG, and
so on...?

The mind boggles ...

I was raised as a Catholic. I have two children -
and I firmly believe that just like divorce,
to have an abortion -would have to be one of
the most difficult decisions that anyone would
have to make. I could never judge anyone for that
decision.

And I certainly would never bring religion into it.
I do have a question ... this is to those against
abortion ... and my question is this:

If a mother accidentally miscarries, the 'fetus'
is not given a funeral, but is simply disposed of
as any other tissue.

Why do you suppose that is?

For those interested in my position on contraception.
I have two natural children then a vacetomy.
I have five step children.
Between my wife and I we have fostered 64 infants and school age children children over the previous 40 years.
We have supported several children in Rawanda and India through Compassion International Aid throught their infancy and their education to age 18. All children deserve a life worthy of whatever we can give them. They do not deserve our intention to destroy them so it places less responsibility on us. Giving money to destroy them is not a worthy human response. No sane mother desires the death of her unborn, it is the selfish response of the calious western mind.

Philo

If what you claim about your care for children is true, then you are to be commended.

Given your responsible aid to minors, I ask what would you have done for a pregnant, sexually abused nine year old?

Forced her to term?

Or arranged an abortion?

Especially bearing in mind that opposing an abortion in this case condemns them both to death.

That's not principles. Even if you think that abortion is murder, you're still choosing two deaths over one.

That's just callous idiocy. Moralising arrogance that results in the death of another.

I'm going to offer my thoughts here, and judging by some of the other posts I have read in this and other threads relating to abortion over the years, I think there might be many who agree with me here.

The old line that "abortion is murder" is a bit of a distortion. Yes, abortion involves killing, and perhaps abortion simply because the child is unwanted is murder. But not all killing is murder. The term "murder" has legal implications; it also has a heavy base in our values. When a police officer kills a gunman to save a hostage, he is a killer but not a murderer. When a soldier shoots an enemy combatant, the only people who call him a murderer are those who do not like what he does. Nobody denies that he is a killer, but few call him a murderer.

How does this link to abortion? Well, in both situations the act of killing was a necessity. In the first, the killer saved a third party; in the second, he saved himself. We can justify these actions, so I guess we can justify abortion if it is necessary. I don't know that a 9 year-old can safely have a child, and I would hazard a guess that many rape victims would suffer terribly should they carry their attacker's baby to term. So much so, that they could be psychologically damaged to the point of self-harm or harm to the child.

Thus I would suggest that, while carrying a baby to term is preferable, there are times when it simply isn't an option. I am against abortion in principle, but that is easy for me to say from my sheltered, happy and safe (relatively) wealthy Australian male perspective. If a baby is aborted despite posing no physical or mental harm, I would be tempted to call that murder (from an emotive, not a legal perspective). If it is aborted for the common good, it is a sad but necessary act.

Our current Government has shown how morally bankrupt it is by approving aid money to be used for killing unborn children. It is no wonder that God's hand of protection appears to be lifting from this country. Ignorant people ask how God can allow bush fires or floods to kill innocent people and then nod their heads in the name of 'rights' to kill the most vulnerable in society. We now call evil good and good evil. Humanistic religion has again shown itself to be equal or even more evil than the catholic church at its worst.

TruthNow asked: "Will my hard-earned dollars now go to pay for abortions?"

A: they do already, but now that proportion of your taxes which was previously used to feed starving black people will be partly siphoned away to killing some of the very small black people so that we can all feel better that there are fewer starving black people in the world. See?

"How do religious Labor and Greens voters support a party that thinks aborting a fetus is the right thing to do?"

With a heavy conscience, hopefully, which is why they should look to parties such as the DLP to better represent their views.

Now to address some of the hideous initial responses:

"from a taxpayers point of view is the money better spent supporting new mouths? Indefinately?"

Presumably taxpayers can stop feeding new mouths down the track, if desired. A better use of tapayers money is, wherever possible, to help people to feed themselves, so there should be no problem for the taxpayer here. I see some taxpayers are more than happy to support the killing of small black people if it means saving taxes down the track.

"Presumably abortions will be available to those who don't actually want more children!"

Indeed, but the pro-life position - the humane position - is that you cn't kill people to solve your problems.

"Some of the same christian groups oppose contraception, which gets the people to this position in the first place."

This lie keeps popping up all over the place. Given that most pregnancies do not arise from rape and incest, it is the case that most abortions arise from people having sex who do not wish to have babies. Contraception availability has always increased the number of abortions, not decreased it. This is because contraception propagates the idea that some children are "unwanted."

Should we believe that someone's right to live is determined by his/her "wantedness"?

Yes I agree with you Runner.
Our current Government is cold and merciless. One day God will judge us on whether we decided through 'pro choice' to keep our hearts of stone or to allow them to be transformed to hearts of flesh after the manner of His own Divine life when God became man in Christ Jesus.

Let's also look at the propoganda copout of the Victorian State Government and their mates in the media, those journalists, who bought the line that 'no one should be blamed' ( ie no one is responsible for the hundred of Aussies who perished in the bushfires.
What rubbish ! The Greens policies and the preferences the ALP and the Coalition take off the Greens to win power thus influences reckless policy changes that do not permit satisfactory cleanups of debris and trees close to farming properties; and also the loss of systematic cool season yearly back-burning. They are responsible for this and we need laws to make them, retrospectively criminally liable.
Fancy blaming God for trqagedy ( or in this case the bogeyman of allged 'global warming'/'climate change' for the bushfires !).
Blame man and his bad negligent choices in political policy changes that any park ranger would tell you will never work but only satisfy the pantheists who are in the politicla system and who hate the Truine God and the true believers ( traditional Catholics).

"One wonders how strong the religious vote is in our society, and by how much it dwindles each year."

This is completely irrelevant to the issue of whether or not abortion is ethical, for it is not a religious question.

The original question posed by TruthNow was to ask religious people why they would vote for Labor and the Greens, not to make threats to the poor little secularists who live in terror of a dreaded "theocracy"!

"Last time I checked the poll in The Australian, 62% of people supported the move, 33% were opposed with the remainder being neutral."

Because, of course, online polls are so meaningful. I suppose if the numbers had been reversed, you would have condemned your fellow Australians for being so backward and seen it as necessary to "educate" them.

"many, indeed, most practical organisations realise that there will be occasions when abortions are necessary."

Only because they believe it's acceptable to kill people to solve your problems. Which it isn't.

"These organisations were barred from receiving aid dollars in the past."

Because it is wrong to kill people to solve your problems.

"Also, there is the fact that in third world countries, women have very little power."

Then address the issue of power, but don't kill babies.

"Rape is more common..."

Then address the issue of rape, but don't kill babies.

"Thus, an impoverished family is made larger as the mother sometimes has no choice."

So find a way to help them feed themselves, but don't kill babies.

"Thankfully, that's been changed. Of course, individuals like TruthNow rarely like to look at the bigger picture."

The bigger picture in this case means killing babies. And we all know that's wrong, which is why most people talk around the main point.

Otokonoko wrote: I would be tempted to call that [abortion] murder (from an emotive, not a legal perspective).

Dear Otokonoko,

English versions of the Decalogue may translate one of the commandment as "Thou shalt not kill."

A more accurate translation from the Hebrew is, "Thou shalt not murder." You make the distinction that the original makes.

Murder is a matter of legal definition. It would seem reasonable to me to define as murderers those who would make a nine year old child carry a baby to term if giving birth resulted in her death.

Dear Runner,

There are no unborn children. One has to be born to become a child. The nine year old girl pregnant by her stepfather was a child. By the abortion she has a chance to be a child a while longer. I favour the rights of born children. Born children are the only real children.

Sorry Runner, no children involved at all. So you remain confused.

I saw an interview recently with David Attenborough, where they
asked him about god etc. He mentioned a worm in Africa, which
burrows its way through childrens eyeballs and wondered what
kind of god that would be, who created it. Interesting question.

Calling abortion murder is not emotive. It is the taking of innocent human life. The 'emotes' may or may not come into it but upon reflection and as part of being a human person why wouldn't one get upset and distressed byt he murder of innocent human babies? It is great being a Catholic because I feel comfortable in experiencing feelings of pain and distress at hearing about abortion. It is proof of being alive. No shame in that. Thankyou God for the wonderful Catholic Faith I say.
Murder is a matter of religious teaching which was and still should be taken up by the secular law making authorities. What is made law is not always moral; and thsi is the fault of human lawmakers and not the God who created our very natures after which we need to have laws that are derived therefrom.

"One has to be born to become a child." you say David. What unphilosphical nonsense you speak. That is logically impossible. I am glad I believe in a God who has us put on our thinking caps which He gave all of us before we open our mouths.
"born children are the only real children" says David. Mate, I really fear potential totalitarian little gods like you. I really do and that is why I left the ALP to become a true Labor man in the DLP. SO watch out for me, OK. I come to end your dangerous hateful
and cold hearted opinions on a political level in NSW.

Sorry for you Yabby rather than for Runner.
You and some other pro culture of death people are denying the truth that stares you in the face ie the existence of human life within a mothers's womb which you illogically say only becomes human and worthy to be granted a right to life upon coming out of the womb and into the hands of the obstetrician or the midwife. Sorry Yabby but being Catholic is emminently more normal than your irrational opinion. You are the one confused and one doesn't even have to be a religious person to see that.

We all will die and worms will eat us up but so what! Our bodies arise
at the final judgment just as Christ and His Blessed Mother are both body AND soul in Heaven.

At the particular judgement ( our personal individual death) our individual soul is judged to Heaven( or purgatory for most of us before going to Heaven) or Hell. The worm eaten body will be restored to perfection better than we ever have here on earth at the general judgment to Eternal Heaven or eternal Hell. So don't worry about the worms too much.It is transitory.

Webby wrote: “It is great being a Catholic because I feel comfortable in experiencing feelings of pain and distress at hearing about abortion. It is proof of being alive.”

Apparently you felt great about condemning those who considered the pregnant nine year old child’s life and future and saw that she had an abortion.

In March 1095, Pope Urban II gave a sermon including:
“I, or rather the Lord, beseech you as Christ's heralds to publish this everywhere and to persuade all people of whatever rank, foot-soldiers and knights, poor and rich, to carry aid promptly to those Christians and to destroy that vile race from the lands of our friends. I say this to those who are present, it meant also for those who are absent. Moreover, Christ commands it.”

The Crusaders rampaged their way across Europe massacring Jews and even Orthodox Christians when they sacked Constantinople. They drowned Jerusalem in a sea of blood.

I feel great pain and distress reading about it.

On October 16, 1943 a mass huntdown of Rome's Jews was carried out by German forces, who under Kappler and Dannecker's orders made house-to-house searches on every street, and arrested all the Jews - men, women, and children. The Pope was requested publicly to denounce the hunt for Jews, but he did not respond.

I feel great pain and distress reading about it.

Among the many other instances of the Catholic Church’s complicity in murder and silence in the face of evil there is the torture and burning people alive in the Inquisition.

It is sheer hypocrisy for a Catholic to complain about a culture of death when their church is a prominent part of that culture.

I don’t attack you as an individual as you have attacked me. I realise that you have been brainwashed by an evil church but also recognize that you are a fellow human being.

Being a Catholic is normal and rational if one’s reason considers other humans as worthless and excuses the crimes of the Catholic Church.

It's good of Webby to demonstrate that the Democratic Labor Party is actually the Theocratic Catholic Party. Now we know who to put behind the shooting and fishing parties on the ballot.

We've had abortion in Australia for over 30 years. God seems to be a bit behind in his punishing. I suppose he has to get to all the masturbators and unwed mothers first.

And Belloc's Daughter, if you believe "that you can't kill people to solve your problems", I assume you're fully opposed to the Iraq war?

Whether you call yourself catholic, protestant, agnostic, happy clappy or god hater murder is still murder, divorce is still divorce, formication is still fornication. Their is no doubt the Catholic church along with other churches have murdered people. The very fact that atheist, god haters, god deniers, earth worshipers sprout their own dogmas and mantras shows they believe in absolutes. Davidf's selective recall of history (albiet true) ignores the fact that more children have been murdered in the name of 'rights' than by all the religous wars put together. He is unable to acknowledge the moral bankruptcy of his own arguement. His only comfort seems to be that the Catholic church along with others have done despicable things even by earth worshipers standards or non standards.

Quiet please! For convenience, will everyone please slot themselves into the categories created by runner.

If you're unsure whether you're a god hater or a god denier, please take a pamphlet from the rack and fill out the questionnaire. Earth worshippers will need to wash their hands first, unless you are sprouting dogmas, in which case you'll need more potting mix.

*Our bodies arise at the final judgment*

Not so Webby, what we can show is that bodies land
up being recycled, earth to earth, dust to dust, new
plants grow etc. We have evidence for that. For the
rest there is no evidence, just speculation and hope.

Your church will of course sell you a ticket to heaven,
any other organisation who sold what they cannot
prove, would be in front of the courts for defrauding
consumers. But as my old uncle used to say "for every
fool that dies, another ten are born" Very true.

No babies or children are involved in abortion, just
some fetuses.

But then as we know from evolution theory, the number
of potential beings of any species is near limitless
and only some can survive.

Sperms are beings, they are human too. How many have
you flushed down the toilet in your lifetime Webby?

Well put Sancho.

There is no such thing as a God hater. From the atheist viewpoint,
how can you hate something that does not exist?

As for earth worshippers - if there is indeed a God as described by mainstream Christians - I would imagine that he/she would be an earth worshipper. If you create something I would imagine you would not want it ruined by human greed and excesses.

Sancho, I need a more specific pamphlet. I'm getting confused.

Maybe I'm an earth worshipper, but I don't recall worshipping soil lately.
A god hater? If there is a god, he, she, it or Version 2.11 evidently has bigger problems than worrying about whether I believe in it. I certainly don't hate it, it's just been lax about returning unsent mail.
Maybe I'm a secularist, though I dunno if that fits given that I'm a 'live and let live' kinda guy, which means I'm fine with religions practicing their beliefs provided they don't foist themselves on others, like this idiotic DLP party which seems to be a front for Catholic preachers rather than a party who will listen.

Evidently somebody's sounded their bugle and the rest have come-a-runnin' to save the crying cell-bundles.

Well the latest poll in The Australian, a decidedly conservative paper, has approval of Rudd's decision to supply foreign aid for groups that perform abortions running at 62% approval to 34% opposed (the remainder being apathetic).

I guess Australia is a secular country, as opposed to a theocracy. Given that without exception throughout history, theocracies everywhere have been dictatorial incompetent corrupt bugger-ups, that's a relief.

Guys, given that both the baby and the nine-year-old will die in this recent furore, how can you justify letting both die when you have the power to save one via an abortion?

For all your sanctimonious babbling, can you answer me that simple question?

Although Otokonoko comes from a pro-life position, I am sympathetic to his stance. I respect those stances when they have the courage to consider the deeper aspects of this issue and understand that things are never so black and white as the hysterical 'murder' arguments presented here.

I've no respect however, for those who just sign their principles on a dotted line and are too cowardly to consider that in the simplest terms, even if they do regard abortion as murder, they're still choosing two murders over one.
I suppose such reflection might reveal the shaky foundation upon which they have based such simplistic principles anyway.

Sancho,
I suggest you talk to any pregnant mother and ask are you carrying a baby or a call growth (not clusters of cells).
The ancients had no skills in abortion that would not also damage the mother (They sacrificed children).

(The "influence of Green politics"? Two-thirds of Australians don't vote green.) Green politics is not the domain of one party as you seem to imagine.

Fractelle,

(you asked, "I ask what would you have done for a pregnant, sexually abused nine year old?") Such a decision is not mine, it would be up to her doctors and counsel. I know several women who have fallen pregnant from rape who have happy and healthy children, and they would not have it any other way. As foe me. Certainly not "Forced her to term or to abort". As it seems you have made up your mind to have her abort since you raise a specific case; otherwise you would not have posed the question you have answered in your own mind.

Dear Philo,

We find an adult guilty of rape if the adult has sex with a nine year old since we assume that a nine year is not capable of giving informed consent to sexual relations. I think it is reasonable to assume a pregnant nine year old is not capable of understanding the implications of giving birth and motherhood. There may be women who have carried the product of rape to term and had joy in their child. However, a nine year old girl is not a woman.

Oh, you mean "green", Philo, without the capital "G". Same thing. Well, it's not, actually, but the link between fundamentalism and poor education is legendary, so I won't press the point.

Fundies have been railing against abortion for three decades, but population control as a political issue has only emerged in the last couple of years. If it wasn't environmentalism, you'd be blaming feminism, secularism, homosexuals, immigration, atheism, Jews, blacks, rock & roll, or Harry Potter.

Your argument regarding child sacrifice is nonsensical, and the rest is just the predictable cookie-cutter religious argument we've had since the Enlightenment: "Society is crumbling because of [insert thing I disapprove of]. It's all the fault of [insert thing I disapprove of]".

Philo

"(you asked, "I ask what would you have done for a pregnant, sexually abused nine year old?") Such a decision is not mine, it would be up to her doctors and counsel."

Nice try at not answering a straight forward question. I did not ask what doctors and counsellors would decide, I asked YOU.

How very cowardly of you that you would try to evade this question.

Do you approve of women seeking abortions after rape? Or (as in the case of the nine year old) if her life is endangered by continuing a pregnancy? I do not want a lecture on how some women manage to bring to term children of rapists. I want to know if you can possibly understand that a woman is the final decision maker on how her body is used - not you, not doctors, not counsellors. That a living breathing female has veto over a bunch of cells in her body.

The very idea of personal autonomy in decision making overriding the right of a child who exists to be born, even in situations as tragic as rape, still can never override the right to exist for the baby; the baby is the innocent party. The women are also innocent; the rapist is guilty and deserves the death penalty.
The baby can be adopted by the many Aussies married couples who currently are having to go overseas due to dopey Australian governments who have not got their act together and have made local adoptions nearly impossible.

You mean, Webby, that the nine-year-old girl isn't innocent? Little tart was just asking for it, was she?

Fractelle uses the deceitful arguement of the one in a thousand women who are raped and end up pregnant as justification to murder the other 999 unborn babies largely due to convenience. Unfortunately that is the way sick hearts justify their abhorrent behaviour. Renaming unborn children as a cluster of cells is typical of those that make up pseudo science to justify their pitiful view.

Sancho,

You need to read ALL of my post, particuarly the part of my post that said:
"The women are also innocent".
Duuuurrrr.

Sorry Runner, no babies or children involved in abortion, it
is you who are trying to reinvent language, to suit your dogma.

Unlike you Christians, I don't think that suffering is noble,
I'd prefer a world of less suffering.

If every child born was loved and wanted, the world would
be a better place.

But that goes over your head, your dogma dominates.

Last night I actually thought of you religious lot. They
screened the movie "Helter Skelter" about Charles Manson
and his cult. Those followers were as fanatical about
Manson, as are many Christian cults, about their religion.

It is sad really, that any kind of rational thought can
be thrown out the window, in the name of fanaticism.

It just seems to be, that this is how the mind works for
some. Fair enough, but still sad.

Australia has to import workers from the third world to maintain our young population of workers.
What a load of crap. Young people of yesteryear finnished school and entered the workforce. The selected few went on to uni.

Now they finnish school, go to tafe wasting more time and money,(that is if they don't excersize thier percived right to travel the world first), then enter a trainee ship only to find out they have to work in the real world, they then go to another job and another and eventually they drop out of the workforce and go back to tafe to be re-trained. Meanwhile we have a skill shortage and no compitent workers.

As for abortion. When a child is born and is recognised as being 9 months old, then I will consider it has been murdered when aborted, not before hand.

Sorry Yabby, everything you are saying about Christians and even rational and good natured non-Christians who cherish the natural law ( ie knowing right from wrong as imprinted in all our natures and which they are co=operating with)is the opposite of truth. Yabby you are in denial about the very basics and so your philosophy flounders immediately. You are projecting all your own problem beleif issues onto Runner and Christians and even rational non-Christians for that matter. You have your own dogmas. Now dogma isn't a dirty word Yabby and we all live by them; problem is though- you live by the wrong dogmas. Now for two two quotes if I may from the master of common-sense:( the first one is especially for you Yabby as you are being described):

"We call a man a bigot or a slave of dogma because he is a thinker who has thought thoroughly and to a definite end."
Gilbert K. Chesterton

"A teacher who is not dogmatic is simply a teacher who is not teaching. " Gilbert K. Chesterto

You're right, Webby, I missed that line. Luckily you took the opportunity to:

a) argue that every rapist deserves to see his child borne by his victim, and...

b) reinforce that you are completely unelectable to anyone not living under Sharia law.

Go you!

Philo,
"I suggest you talk to any pregnant mother and ask are you carrying a baby or a call growth (not clusters of cells)."

Wouldn't the answer depend on whether the woman wanted a child? I think we often look at the fetus with the finished product in mind. To some that eventual baby will be the most cherished thing on earth and to others the most resented. I wouldn't impose a resented childhood on anyone.

"The ancients had no skills in abortion that would not also damage the mother..."

So does that mean they didn't try? There are plenty of botched cases in the modern era from backyard abortions, do we really want a return to that?

A question I do pose(not necessarily to Philo) is, if your particular deity granted the ability to perform abortions who are you to question that deity? Can you really be certain of their intent?
An omniscient deity would surely have known the future, and if it wasn't to their pleasing could easily shape that future. I doubt they would leave it up to the DLP.

David wrote: "All who oppose your ideas are not wrong. They merely differ."

Wrong David. To differ as to say on what is your favourite colour, or favorite make of car is OK and doesn't involve blurring truths.

I right like blue, you might like green. Ce la vie !
I might like Fords, you might like Holdens. Once again, ce la vie my friend.

But when dealing with issues of religion and of the actual official teachings that spring from them we are not dealing in favourite cars or colours.

In other words, one religion and its tenets is either absolutely right or wrong. All religions cannot be either equal as far as their truth claims. Only one can be right.
You are cherishing a false respect, a false peace if you will of people's comfort levels rather than seeking and finding truth. God in Christ made definite claims about Himself and passed this on directly to Apostles whose successors are with us today. Therefore, it is a sentimental,fuzzy worldview too commonly said like a mantra by many including yourself to say to put superficial resepct ahead of these truth claims rather than subordinate in all humility human thought to the claims made for examining and accepting truths.
The great man, whom sadly enough never got to meet Richard Gere and other Hollywooders, once said:
"Buddhism is not a creed, it is a doubt. "

G K Chesterton

Dear Webby,

Better intelligent doubt than stupid faith. Faith in the ridiculous promotes atrocity. There is no reason to accept what it says in your fairy tale book. In creating a humanoid God as Christianity did it merely reduced the pagan pantheon to one. If I worship anything it is the sanctity of doubt. Doubt and questioning is the beginning of knowledge. Blind faith is a continuation of stupidity.

Buddha said that one should question all that one is told even to his sayings. He recognised that he was living in a particular time and place and what he said might not be relevant for another time and place.

He made a lot more sense than belief in a virgin birth, salvation by accepting mumbo jumbo and all the other nonsense I think you believe in.

RELIGION, n. A daughter of Hope and Fear, explaining to Ignorance the nature of the Unknowable - Ambrose Bierce who I prefer to G. K. Chesterton

*You have your own dogmas.*

Not so Webby, because for me, all information is tentative and
I am free to change my mind, if the evidence changes. Unlike you,
who is kind of stuck with whatever pope is elected, even if the
man is a scoundrel and a deviant, or simply not the brightest. That is dogma for you!

So just to show you how unbiased I am, where I live, the moon is
fairly clear to see on most nights. If the 10 commandments appear
on its surface, for all to read and its mentioned that the old boy
thinks that the pope is a good fellow, I will take notice immediately!

On the other hand, if the writing is all in Arabic and mentions the
72 virgins, I will have to face my duty to keep so many girls
happy :)

So there is nothing dogmatic about my opinions Webby, just good
old reason and the ability to spot snake oil merchants like the
many churches, from a long way off.

Even-thou I have the power or thought to destroy religion, plus many others that has the insights we have grown to love and expect. We still have baby boots on. Smile. Religion will still be needed for a time too come, but not in todays political times.

I have been watching you all! and you all still cant work together! What a shame.

This makes EVO sad.

EVO2

The above will conclude you have a mind of your own!

What A mind you must have!

We need to get off this planet, or 6.5 has its gamely, as your bid, not no certainly with the forward minds that makes you think so.

And we go around and around we go. ( very pleased )

SO! Whats the problem that I see?

EVO

Abortion was introduced into medical practice about the 60's to do away with unwanted children, which in my day of large families was rare. This should have meant that today there would be no need of DOCS and Child Welfare agencies. Yet statistically there are more abused and neglected children per head of population than in the large families of the War years.

Another factor has entered the family dynamics. Unnmarried mothers in poverty and on drugs with several neglected children. The selfcentered middle and upper classes who find having children inconvenient, ruining their social life and demanding of their time. These are the ones more likley to abort a pregnancy. They rationalise that the unborn is not human. However there is enough evidence to show that it never evolves into any other species. They do not abort a child because it is deformed or has evolved into another species. They can well afford to raise it. They abort it because it will interfere with their social life.

This indicates they actualy hate what is natural - motherhood. Abortion has become the safe method of having unprotected sex. These women will actually suffer deep down hatred of themselves. In later life they are plagued by depression, guilt, breast cancer etc.

A mother who surgically aborts her child is 15 times more likley to develop breast cancer. Breast cancer in women is a major problem in todays society, and costs far greater than money spent on abortions. When the mammary of the breast are forming following conception if the child is surgically aborted causes malfunction in the breast cells, which does not happen in a natural abortion. Breast feeding reduces the incidents of breast cancer. Many in the Medical profession will not speak of this because it keeps them in work

Dear Webby,

You objected when I wrote: "All who oppose your ideas are not wrong. They merely differ."

You insisted that you had the truth, and it was not a matter of opinion. The truth is that I was trying to be polite, but you wouldn't have it so. The truth is that I consider your beliefs ridiculous nonsense.

Some time back. We were dinner guests at the house of a Muslim. We were guests because my wife was her wife's teacher of English. He was very belligerent about his religion and was all set to argue. He asked my wife, "What is wrong with Islam?"She answered, "What is wrong with Islam is the same thing that is wrong with all religions. You think you have the truth." You have the same sort of aggressive belligerence with your garbage as our Muslim host had with his garbage.

It is not false respect to call your beliefs a matter of opinion. It is true respect. I realise you are a human being, and I really don't like to hurt human beings by criticising their beliefs which they may cherish.

Yabby wrote: "...all information is tentative and I am free to change my mind, if the evidence changes."

I think that's a reasonable attitude. I am free to challenge his beliefs because they are not cherished, and he can change them with new evidence. Normally I don't feel free to challenge outlandish beliefs such as that of the virgin birth. However, you are so belligerent in defending your ridiculous nonsense that I have lost my attitude of respect toward your nonsense. In a civil society we make polite noises of respect to avoid hurting other people. Somehow you don't seem to understand that.

"The truth is that I was trying to be polite, but you wouldn't have it so. The truth is that I consider your beliefs ridiculous nonsense."

Which seems pretty dogmatic to me.

I love how all the comments from the anti-religionists are the *least* rational!

Philo

After refusing to give a straight forward answer to my relevant question concerning a raped and pregnant nine year old child. You dig further into your lack of credibility with a post that is little more than a web of lies.

You claim: A mother who surgically aborts her child is 15 times more likley to develop breast cancer.

Fact:
A woman is no more likely to develop breast cancer after abortion than she is after miscarriage or full term pregnancy or not procreating at all. Breast cancer is caused by genetic predisposition or age or a combination of both.

See: http://www.betterhealth.vic.gov.au/bhcv2/bhcArticles.nsf/pages/Cancer_and_heredity?OpenDocument

There is no more evidence for a link betweem abortion and cancer than there is between miscarriage and cancer. Please note that miscarriages are far more frequent than abortions and posit no threat of breast cancer.

Philo claims
Abortion was introduced into medical practice about the 60's to do away with unwanted children.

Fact:

Women have sought abortions for as long as there have been unwanted pregancies. This is not something that started in the 60's, women have been trying to control their fertility – hence their bodies since prehistory.

“The practice of abortion dates back to ancient times. Pregnancies were terminated through a number of methods, including the administration of abortifacient herbs, the use of sharpened implements, the application of abdominal pressure, and other techniques.”

“The first recorded evidence of induced abortion, is from the Egyptian Ebers Papyrus in 1550 BC. A Chinese record documents the number of royal concubines who had abortions in China between the years 500 and 515 BC.[According to Chinese folklore, the legendary Emperor Shennong prescribed the use of mercury to induce abortions nearly 5000 years ago.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_abortion

Cont'd

Cont'd

Until the 19th century abortion was not criminalised:

“In 1803, Britain first passed antiabortion laws, which then became stricter throughout the century. The U.S. followed as individual states began to outlaw abortion. By 1880, most abortions were illegal in the U.S., except those ``necessary to save the life of the woman.'' But the tradition of women's right to early abortion was rooted in U.S. society by then; abortionists continued to practice openly with public support, and juries refused to convict them.
Abortion became a crime and a sin for several reasons. A trend of humanitarian reform in the mid-19th century broadened liberal support for criminalization, because at that time abortion was a dangerous procedure done with crude methods, few antiseptics, and high mortality rates. But this alone cannot explain the attack on abortion. For instance, other risky surgical techniques were considered necessary for people's health and welfare and were not prohibited.”

Women choose and will continue to choose abortion for as many reasons as there are women.

The appalling treatment of a little girl began with the attitude of her stepfather that her body was for his use. That there should be any kind of furore over the question of this child obtaining an abortion outlines that many people still believe that a female's body is not her own.

However, attitudes like Philo's still persist and women must be constantly vigilant to keep our hard won control over our bodies and our lives.

The antiquity of abortion from historical records doesn't make it morally right. It merely shows the history of sinful behaviours.
Quoting ancient Egyptian and Chinese manuscripts doesn't validate abortion just as Chairman Mao's admiration for and even his boast in outdoing some of the ancient Chinese Emperors in terms of their evil behaviours doesn't prove anything other than his depravity and failure to show kindness and failure to learn from history.

Quoting Wikipedia entries about history without a purpose of moral betterment in mind is just banal.

Yabby,

You actually DO have your own dogmas. From what I've seen of the content of your posts you are obviously hostile to the Christiand heritage of the West. When you say you are free to change your mind, you are meaning that you value the altest fads and opinions over any set principles. This is how dictators and madmen work. They wake up in the morning and depending on their mood, they will decide who to kill or let live. Behaving like little gods. Nero,Hitler and Stalin and other dictators operated like that.
In any case, no amount of evidence that contradicts your undeclared( ashamed??) non-Christian and hence secular humanist principles/dogma woule cause you to change your mind. You are not as 'free' to 'change your mind' as you pretend. ( well in actual fact you are but you have a stubborn will that refuses to change)

Webby

You actually DO have your own dogmas. From what I've seen of your posts you are obviously hostile to the secular traditions that have made the west greater than theocracies. When you say you have the truth, you are saying you have subscribed to a set of supersitions and no amount of reason will ever sway you.
This is how dictators and madmen work. They wake up in the morning and depending on the content of their superstitious ideology, they decide how to interpret who their god wants them to kill.
Behaving like little gods, those behind the butchery of the crusades and 9-11 operated like that.
In any case, no amount of evidence* that contradicts your (ignorant?) fundamentalist Christian dogma would cause you to change your mind. You aren't even pretending you're free to change your mind. (Actually, you can, but you have a stubborn will that refuses to change).

See Webby? Ain't hypocrisy grand?

*Funny how the bible doesn't mention dinosaurs and is jam-packed full of miracles which don't seem to happen anymore. Could it be that it was written by superstitious primitives? No?
Could it be that these people didn't have access to science or evolutionary concepts? Still no?

What is it that makes your ravings different to those of muslims, hindus, jews or scientologists?
Even if we did accept Christianity... is it the Anglican, Presbyterian, Catholic, Uniting Church, Jehovah's Witnesses, Mormons, Protestants or Pentecostals?

In small doses I can see religion having something to offer, but no intelligent rational person can take fundamentalist religion seriously, except in the sense of the threat it poses to the peaceful pursuit of rational principles in society.

Fractelle,
There are many factors that trigger abnormal cell growth in the breast. Heredity is a large factor in abnormal cell growth. Having been a dairyman for 39 yrears of my life and seen many cancerous growths in lactating cows. I recognise genetics is a factor. However a surgically induced abortion predisposes natural cell growth to the posibility of cancer.
Fact: Women in third world countries do not have as high incidence of breast cancer as women in developed countries because they breast feed their children. In a natural abortion the body naturally shuts down and adjusts to the lack of intake by the dead foetus.

Fact: laws were passed in Australia to allow consultation by two doctors to determine if the continuation of a pregnancy would cause harm to the mother, or that the baby would be deformed. That law still remains however abortion is currently used as a birth control method and does great harm to the mother, and costs the taxpayers millions. It reflects badly on the iresponsible attitudes of those engaging in selfish sex. To avoid a pregnancy altogether by responsible behaviour especially toward the woman saves her from having to face surgery, and the moral decision to terminate a human life

*You actually DO have your own dogmas. From what I've seen of the content of your posts you are obviously hostile to the Christiand heritage of the West. When you say you are free to change your mind, you are meaning that you value the altest fads and opinions over any set principles.*

Err not so Webby. Perhaps you should pick up a dictionary and look
up the word "dogma".

My view of Christianity is much as the same as it is for the thousands of religions that have so far be invented. Check your
anthropology. Any isolated human tribe ever found, believes in
some kind of deity, from moon gods, sun gods, all sorts of gods.
It makes perfect evolutionary and psychological sense, but that
does not mean that its all true.

I certainly do not follow any latest fads. If you want to understand
the world, just learn a bit about biology. Suddenly it all makes
sense.

Even fanatics like yourself, make sense from a biological and
neuro science perspective

Err don't need a dictionary to know that you are an anti religious dogmatist Yabby. Evolution, which is totally discredited and which 'evolved' from the philosophical outlook of Darwina nd then on-sold to help out angry atheists ( many of whom actually believe in God but hate Him), has nothing to do with the issue at hand.

Christianity was never invented. God Himself came to us historically as Jesus and well, err/durr Yabby, the rest, they say, is history.

You and David and your othe little mates may cheer on anti discrimiantion laws and if part fo the socialist Left may decry prejudice agaisnt people on religious grounds but in both cases it is all atheist hypocrisy because you guys really hare religion , especially the Catholic Christian Faith. You just have no courage to admit it openly like soem of your other mates. So come on. Admit it now, in the open, and be done with your hypocrisy.

Philo

1. You don't believe in evolution yet bring in genetic predisposition among lactating cows. Quite ironic and not a little funny.

As far as I know there is no correlation between milking cows and women breast feeding their children. Please elucidate. And some more evidence than claiming to be a milkman would help greatly assist your credibility.

Abortion causes no more physical harm to women than does miscarriage. As for emotionally, a woman greatly desiring her baby who miscarries experiences far more hurt, than a woman who is prepared for and has chosen an abortion. I have experienced both in my lifetime, the abortion was a relief at a time I could not have cared adequately for a baby and as I don't live in a world where women are regarded as cows, I was not expected to bring the child to term for adoption which would have brought me far more trauma than the half hour spent having an abortion.

Really, Philo you are deliberately drawing away from the topic here, which is about a little helpless nine year old raped repeatedly by her stepfather then saved from his abuse and thankfully treated with compassion and received an abortion thus saving her life.

In conclusion it is not for you to judge women (any women) how they live their lives - especially someone who never has and never will experience pregnancy.

Ah Webby, your problem here of course is that your very own Catholic
Church has accepted evolution theory. So has every university of
any merit, on this planet. So perhaps you are in the wrong church!

Love and hate are very close and its you who are emotional about
religion and need it to cope with life. Fair enough. To me
its a question of indifference. Religion should be a lifestyle
choice and no more. Yup, certain individuals, to quell their
anxiety, need things like religion to cope with life. A bit like
some people are drug addicts.

Where I have a problem with religion, is when organisations like
the Catholic Church intrude on peoples human rights and want to
enforce their dogma by political mandate.

Lets have freedom of religion but also freedom from religion.

IMHO the Vatican is responsible for much suffering and misery on
this planet and they should be held accountable and be ashamed
of themselves.

They should be free to preach to their flocks, but should not be
free to try and force their dogma on the rest of us. For they
still cannot produce a single piece of substantiated evidence to
show that what they claim is true.

Webby, you really need to back what you're saying with some kind of evidence.

Evolution, which is totally discredited and which 'evolved' from the philosophical outlook of Darwina nd then on-sold to help out angry atheists ( many of whom actually believe in God but hate Him), has nothing to do with the issue at hand..

1) Actually, it hasn't been discredited.
2) Atheists can't hate something they don't believe in. Simple logic.

Christianity was never invented. God Himself came to us historically as Jesus and well, err/durr Yabby, the rest, they say, is history.

I see. Well, seeing as nobody alive today was there are the time I don't see how you can possibly back this up.

Why not go with the Qu'ran? You're basing everything on the bible. Why not go with the Talmud, Qu'ran, or one of the ancient Hindu texts?

Webby, I don't hate god or religion.

I just think any god worth believing in wouldn't take this ridiculous dogmatic ritualism seriously.

I do dislike people who can't grasp basic logic and become dogmatic.

The difference between us Webby, is that you can't identify with any belief system that isn't your own.
I'm not asking you to adopt them, I'm asking you to step outside your box for just a moment and consider that other people have different beliefs to you and they have good reasons for doing so.

However, you persist in telling everyone else they are wrong.

Who's the more 'hating' person?

If a party like your DLP ever got in place, I firmly believe they would be horrifically discriminatory against other religions, given what you've demonstrated. It's a huge worry.

The rest of us can all get along, which is what the world needs. Then there's the fundamentalist nutbags in each religion who need to preach and bring us all to war. Those people, I hate, and their script is just like yours.

Actually evolution has always reamined a theory and not a law of science. Species cannot 'evolve' into a different species. There is neither an incremental gestational alteration nor the wildly crazy 'evolution' of huge leaps and bounds that evolution demands. It is simply unscientific. The fundamentalist creation science and the young earth theory is almost as crazy as evolution.
2) Atheists do actually hate something they don't believe in. Simple logic. The whole secular humanist and Left agenda within the Western world on a legal 'reform' basis that is comprehensive in its scope soas to alter culture is evidence of that.

You don't see and more to the point do NOT want to see. Going upon your own 'logic' all of history is to be treated with suspicion. Why stop at treating a historically continuous body like the Church as suspicious and something not to be believed then?

Sacred texts argument? Catholics do not use that as the Catholic Church precedes the New Testament; and the New Testament is part of that same Church. The Church is living and not a dead letter.
Webby, I don't hate god or religion.

Dogmatic beliefs are not ritualism. Rituals come with the liturgy ( ie the way we worship)eg the Mass, Novenas and other prayer forms.

"I do dislike people who can't grasp basic logic and become dogmatic."
I don't but rather hope you grasp the basics first before your assumptions about alleged illogicality in religious believers is assumed.

"The difference between us Webby, is that you can't identify with any belief system that isn't your own. "

Why would I identify with error?

Webby asked: Why would I identify with error?

Since I don’t know you personally I would assume that you have identified with error because you were born to parents who identified with the same error. Presumably you identified with that error as an expression of your love for them. If you were not born a Catholic you probably had an emotional experience that caused you to accept Catholicism. I doubt it was a rational choice.

Of course Christianity, like all other religions, was a human invention as is God. The Christians copied the pagan religions and invented a humanoid God in Jesus. The invisible God of the Jews did not have great appeal to the pagans. However, Christians incorporated the Jewish tribal legends along with the fairy tales of the New Testament to compose their Bible.

Due to an unfortunate event in history a Roman Emperor adopted Christianity. Although the Roman Empire disappeared as a political entity it has been preserved as a religious entity with the dioceses and bureaucracy of the Catholic Church that copies the administrative structure of the Roman Empire. Had Constantine not adopted Christianity the religion would either have disappeared or remained a minor sect.

The adoption of Christianity by the Roman Empire was the beginning of the Dark Ages and the end of the spirit of free inquiry in the western world. Charles Freeman in "The Closing of the Western Mind" tells the story.

Constantine’s Sword by James Carroll, Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 2001, tells how the adoption of Christianity as the official religion of the Roman Empire changed Christianity to a religion of war. James Carroll was a Catholic chaplain in the US army and started to question during the Vietnamese War. He is a friend of Jim Noonan, a Catholic peace activist, who introduced me to his writings.

The Conversion of Europe from Paganism to Christianity: 371-1386 by Richard Fletcher, London: Fontana (HarperCollins), 1998, is a tale of great violence. Ireland is the only country during that period which became Christian peacefully. Christians could freely murder to correct the sin of not being Christian.

The secular state with separation of religion and state curbed the Christian propensity for violence. Since the Catholic Church can no longer use the tools of its bloody Inquisition such as the thumb screw, the rack and the other instruments of torture there is no way it can force others to accept its nonsense.

The idea that sin is transferable and that Jesus or any other entity can take one's sins upon himself is nonsense. One is simply responsible for one's sins. No one else can relieve you of it.

Buddhism, Judaism and Islam are all superior to and more reasonable than Christianity. They all emphasize the relationship of humans with each other more than a mystical concept of an entity which can take on someone else's sins. Mithra was born of a virgin on December 25. Osiris was born on the 361st day of the year. According to Plutarch his body was placed in a box but came again to life. Several other deities such as Adonis, Tammuz and Attis had life stories similar to Jesus. The Indian Krishna was born of a virgin (Davaki), and his birth was announced by a star. The Christian Eucharist corresponds to totemic sacraments in paganism. The Saviour God and the myth of the Golden Age before the Fall are pagan concepts. Paganism still lives on being found within Christianity. Manichaeism was a religion that once spread from Spain to China. Although it lasted 1,500 years to the eighteenth century it is all but forgotten. Perhaps by the year 2,100 Christianity will be a forgotten curiosity like Manichaeism. There might not be a year 2,100 AD as the calendar might date from a more significant event than the birth of the mythical Jesus. It might be superseded by the year 195 AE, 195 years after Einstein came out with the scientific papers that revolutionized physics.

Don't forget them thar witches david f.

Another weird anomaly that the superstitious haven't corrected.

Webby, I'm going to make this the last post because I can see I'm banging my head against a wall, but I should make the point that all the sciences are made up of theories. The nature of gravity is a theory. Intra-Molecular science is a theory.

I'm glad you added 'almost' to the creation science theories. We're both agreed then that that stuff is insane.

But the bible makes no mention of dinosaurs, yet we find their bones. Strange huh? Wouldn't the bible have mentioned at some point, that god made these massive creatures that walked the earth? Hmm?

You also say why shouldn't I believe the church exists because history etc etc etc.

It still exists today. I can see it. Therefore, it exists. You are typing to me, Webby, therefore you exist. It doesn't make you right.

As history develops it becomes less reliable. What happened a few days ago is pretty reliable. Recorded history 10 years ago is pretty reliable. 100 years ago is less reliable. 2000 years ago is damn difficult to pin down.

Historians rely on multiple texts to confirm authenticity. They also don't rely on whacky 'god' theories. My point all along has been that there are other texts and histories just as authentic as your biblical one. In fact, the Chinese for example, were bopping along quite happily, unaffected by all this religious bloodshed in the Roman empire that marked the birth of Christianity. They had their own religion and didn't give two hoots about your superstitions.

Nevertheless, I rather suspect that given your 'error' comment you're not open to evaluating the flaws in your belief system, so I'll bid you adieu and move on to something more productive.

I should have guessed that with boaz and gibo gone that another would step forward to fill the gap... partly my fault for feeding it.

Evolution is unproven and becomes more suspect by the day.No point in bringing up gravity and molecular science because evolution just doesn't rate along side them.

Disavow yourself of the thinking that says you must somehow find dinosaurs in the Bible. That is somehting that many Protestant fundamentalists reach for. It doesn't count because the Catholic Church doesn't use the Bible that way. The Bible, through Catholic Church teaching tells us how to get to Heaven ; not how the Heavens go. The Bibel is not a Science book nor a proff text for science. The Bible is the story of the history of salvation; from the spiritual yearnings and the nature of mankind leading up to the fulfilment in Christ. If you wish to abuse yourself then go to the 'Reformation' theologies. But if you prefer the truth go to the Catholic Church; and directly to her magisterial teachings. Try and stay clear of Geraldine Doogue's Compass and the old ABC Religion Report as you will only learn dissent from those sources.

There are propoganda reports of governments and corporations over the alst few days and weeks that are false. So to compare the recent and the new with truth; then to treat older histories with les reliability is a false analogy. In BOTH cases whether history be old or recent we go to sources and source methodologies and primary sources.
The Catholic Church relies not on "whacky 'god' theories" or myths. It relies on multiple witnesses along with written records not just Scriptures. In fact its Scriptures were verified by the early Church throughout the various Catholic communities before deciding on the Canon or list of Scriptures.
The Chinese were not as you say " bopping along quite happily, unaffected by all this religious bloodshed in the Roman empire". The average Chinese were subjected to much hardship and worse under many dynasties of Emperors.
Your closing lines of "moving on to somehting more productive" is a poor attempt at snobbery and condescension typical of many secularised vain Australians. You are not unique in that regard.

Dear Turn Right Then Left,

Why on earth would you feign confusion as to which religion to choose? Why would you pick Scientology? You did list it? Why the JW's? etc? Stop playing dumb mate. Why choose any that have broken off from the Catholic Church? Why call Catholic Faith "fundamentalist" and lump it in with all the others who are very different in many cases? The sources of authority of the Catholic Church are totally different fro mthat of the other non Catholic and non Orthodox churches of the East.
As a "rational person" and secualr Leftist you are on the backfoor my friend because like all your mates eg the Brumby Leftie govt of Victoria they defied science by refusing to backburn. As a result hundreds of Aussies died. Also the athiest Lefties on the ABC and SBS were self absorbed straight after the tregedy of the Victorian bushfires by blaming 'cliamte change' for it or trying to flog their architectural firms on how to build fire proof homes to defy raging bushfires infuture. What narcissism and vanity !! For starters the dead do NOT deserve fellow arrogant and vain Australian yuppies lecturing to them in the unrealistic Left-wing twit-city way.
You and your crowd of atheist Lefties, along with the neo liberal corporate 'right' are both irrational; the Left on ideological terms and the Corporate Right on feigned humanitarian terms with an agenda to simply see dollar signs even in tragedy.
Bring on the DLP and good Catholic everywhere; who would never treat fellow Aussies in rural Victorai like you Lefties and Corporate Rightists do.
The DLP has principles and is really the ALP of old( ie in the first 60 yars of its existence arguably the best political Party in the Western World for Christian values and trade union gains for families). The ALP today is 'labor ' in name only, not in NATURE.
You Lefties do not even rate.

Possibly a bit about the founder of the DLP might be of interest.

Bartholomew Augustine "B. A." Santamaria, otherwise 'Bob', (14 August 1915 - 25 February 1998), Australian political activist and journalist, was one of the most influential political figures in 20th century Australian history, though he never held public office or joined a political party. A highly divisive figure, he inspired great devotion from his followers and intense hatred from his enemies. He regarded his own career as a failure, but on his death was widely praised for his lifelong opposition to Communism. Santamaria was the unofficial leader and guiding influence of the Democratic Labor Party and led its split from the Australia Labor Party.

Santamaria went to Melbourne University where he graduated in Arts/Law. His MA thesis was titled "Italy changes shirts: the origins of Italian fascism." He was a political activist from an early age, becoming a leading Catholic student activist and speaking in support of Franco's forces in the Spanish Civil War. He also was a strong supporter and wrote about Mussolini's regime in Italy, but denied that he had ever been a supporter of fascism.

He supported Mussolini and Franco but denied he supported fascism!

Dear Webby,

There’s a saying in law. If the law supports your case, appeal to the law. If the facts support your case, appeal to the facts. If neither supports your case, pound on the table. Calling names like atheistic Lefty because others don’t support your primitive superstitions is pounding on the table.

By splitting the Labor Party Santamaria who claimed to be for the workers kept the Libs in power.

The DLP has a preoccupation with what goes on below the waist opposing abortion and same-sex marriage.

Same-sex marriage can encourage stable relationships among homosexuals and thereby reduce homosexual promiscuity and the spread of disease. It is a public health measure.

Access to abortion is also a public health measure. Women do not have to resort to the coat hangar or unsafe back alley abortionists. It supports the rights of women who are already born.

as ever in abortion debates I'm between two rocks. There is no question that abortion is a brutal form of contraception, and bloody.

Can those who have bred argue about the non-validity of the foetus as a lifeform tell me that they did not experience the joy of expectant parenthood when finding out that they or their partners were carrying a few extra cells?

Not a cut and dried argument, and definitely not a religious question for most of us. More often its an economic or (yuk) a lifestle question.

Webby, in the words of Marge Simpson "one person can make a difference, but most of the time they shouldn't".

palimpsest, doesn't "expectant" say it all? It's about what could be, not about the fetus. We don't tell people about pregnancy until week 12 or so because things can and do go wrong.
Prior to the birth of our two children my partner had a miscarriage. The grief wasn't about the actual fetus, but about what could have been. The expectation of a bouncing baby, the excitement of first time parenting, realising how life would change.

Now if you happen not to want a child that expectation could well be different, however the view on the fetus essentially is the same. It is a potential life. No more, no less. We all want whats best for that potential life when it arrives, for some it's best it simply doesn't arrive.

Davidf writes 'Buddhism, Judaism and Islam are all superior to and more reasonable than Christianity'

Yea sure David that is why the likes of you and the vast majority want to live in countries freed by Christian principles. You do make some pretty dumb statements. Can't you just see people lining up to immigrate to Islamic countries.

Runner wrote: "Can't you just see people lining up to immigrate to Islamic countries."

Dear Runner,

It has already happened. When Christianity reigned supreme in Europe Jews and other non-Christians fleeing the Inquisition and other expressions of Christian love found a welcome in the Islamic countries. The medieval Christian universities were open only to Christians. In the Muslim universities Christians, Jews, Buddhists and other non-Muslim scholars were welcome. The evil of Christianity has been moderated by the secular state and the democratic ideal of the separation of church and state.

Considering such expressions of Christianity as the Inquisition, the Crusades. the Wars of the Reformation, the Holocaust carried out by a Nazi Germany backed by and large by Christian churches and other Christian horrors Islam has been relatively tolerant. Islam is now in its own Dark Ages, but there are signs that it is coming out of it.

Please look at http://www.resetdoc.org/EN/Arab-civil-society.php which contains "Arab civil society? It is already in the future (and waiting for politics)"

The Holocaust was a nationalist act, not a Christian one. Have a look at the 'state religion' set up by Hitler, which was more pagan than anything else.

I took a look at the DLP policies webb, they’re draconian, there are absolutely no rights for women, but plenty for the unborn, why is that? I can’t see many people backpedaling away from current rights and then buying into this, there is no possible way your regime could come into power in this day and age, thankfully!

Democratic Labour Party Polices:
http://203.10.72.20/~delapa//~policies.htm

*A permanent embargo on all tax funding for procured abortions, destructive human embryo experiments and the artificial reproduction of human life for any utilitarian end.

*Enforcement of the criminal law with respect to procured abortions and euthanasia through the prosecution of medical professionals who violate human life.

*Establishment at Federal State and Territory levels of an office of Advocate for the Unborn Child with all the functions, powers and duties necessary to promote and protect the life of the unborn, to afford legal voice or representation in all pertinent forums, to investigate impending medical and other threats to the child's natural right to be born and to instigate prosecutions for offences under relevant laws.

Furthermore, the crusades weren't entirely Christian, either. As far as I was aware, there were Muslims fighting as well?

Hey guys,
The topic is about abortion aid to third world countries. It is not about religion, the DLP, evolution, or a raped 9 year old. These are diversions.

It is about abortion is it our responsibility to fund? Will it improve womens health in third world conditions? I would have thought better food and sanitation would do more for womens health than aborting their pregnancies.

Take China with their one child policy is doing more damage to women's mental health because their Government enforce abortion. Do these women want abortion? Similarly will Governments in third world enforce abortions. Do we aid Governments that violate human rights. Abortionists around the World believe we are overpopulated and it will be up to Governments to enforce abortions.

Abortion also is not a safe sex solution- it is a health hazard.

Dear Otonoko,

Muslims fought back against the invading Crusaders who also massacred Orthodox Christians, pagans and Jews in Europe far away from Palestine.

Many Christians try to deny the Christianity of the Holocaust and make Hitler a pagan. Hitler’s anti-Semitism comes from his Christian background.

Hitler became an altar boy, and was confirmed as a "soldier of Christ" in the Catholic Church. He was steeped in its liturgy, which contained the words, "perfidious Jew" which was not removed until 1961.

Hatred of Jews was the norm of the two major religions of Germany, Catholicism and Lutheranism. Hitler greatly admired Martin Luther, who openly hated the Jews. Luther condemned the Catholic Church for its pretensions and corruption, but he supported the centuries of papal pogroms against the Jews. Luther said, "The Jews deserve to be hanged on gallows seven times higher than ordinary thieves," and "We ought to take revenge on the Jews and kill them." "Ungodly wretches" he calls the Jews in his widely read Table Talk.

Hitler seeking power, wrote in Mein Kampf. "... I am convinced that I am acting as the agent of our Creator. By fighting off the Jews. I am doing the Lord's work.”

Hitler informed General Gerhart Engel: "I am now as before a Catholic and will always remain so." The Catholic church banned great literature, but Mein Kampf never appeared on the Index of Forbidden Books.

The church neither excommunicated nor even condemned him. Popes, in fact, gave Hitler and his fascist friends Franco and Mussolini, power over whom the pope could appoint as a bishop in Germany, Spain and Italy.

Some Christians admit Christian responsibility. Lutheran Mother Basilea Schlink founded the Evangelical Sisterhood of Mary in 1947 in repentance for Christian acts.

From their website on http://www.kanaan.org/international/israel/israel7.htm

Time and again the Jewish people have suffered at the hands of Christians. They have been humiliated, deprived of their rights, accused of murdering God and blamed for every imaginable calamity. During the Crusades, the Inquisition, the pogroms and, most horrific of all, the Holocaust, millions of Jews have suffered flagrant injustice.

Philo wrote: I would have thought better food and sanitation would do more for womens health than aborting their pregnancies.

Dear Philo,

I doesn't have one or the other. Women get worn out through having many children. Having reasonable size families along with adequate food and housing both contribute to health.

Philo wrote: Take China with their one child policy is doing more damage to women's mental health because their Government enforce abortion.

Dear Philo,

I support a woman's right to choose whether she will bear a child or not. The Chinese policy does not concern itself with a woman's right to choose. Abortion is a crude tool to control overpopulation. Better ways are free access to contraception, woman's education and adequate medical care so a woman doesn't have many children hoping one will survive.

Philo wrote: Abortion also is not a safe sex solution- it is a health hazard.

Dear Philo,

I think giving birth is a greater danger to woman's health then an abortion under adequate medical supervision.

*Abortionists around the World believe we are overpopulated and it will be up to Governments to enforce abortions. *

Nonsense Philo. What most pro choice people believe is much what
I believe, ie that women should be given a choice as to how many
kids they want to have. If all kids were loved and wanted, there
would be alot less suffering.

Abortion is only one small part of the story. Its about improving
family planning overall, for third world women, so that they have
choices, like Western women do.

China is a whole different story once again. The Chinese realised
that they had gotten to the point where they simply had too many
people, which if it went on, was just not sustainable.

Now if you think its a good idea to keep popping out babies until
the whole thing crashes and you land up with genocide, like in Rwanda,
well then you will learn the hard way.

So the question arises, why force women to have children that they
don't want, due to lack of proper family planning services. Its
pointless sending ever more boatloads of food, which results
in ever more babies that need feeding and even more boatloads of
food.

Even you would have to concede that the days of everyone having
8 kids, generation after generation, at some point have to end.

david f,
You speak nonsense. I come from a family of seven siblings, and my parents came from large families. I have 12 families of cousins one with 12 children. My mother had good health all her life and died suddenly at 82. My auntie who had 12 children died at 96 and had good health all her life. They worked hard to provide for their children and had purpose to live to see their great grandchildre. Small families do in not in any way enhance a womans long term health prospects. Healthy food, exercise, hope and a happy disposition goes a long way to good long term health.

Philo wrote: David F, you speak nonsense….. Small families do in not in any way enhance a womans long term health prospects. Healthy food, exercise, hope and a happy disposition goes a long way to good long term health.

Dear Philo,

I don't speak nonsense. You come from a large family, and your relatives come from large families where the women were apparently content to have such families. That does not mean some women don't get worn out from child-bearing. My wife was a visiting nurse 50 years ago. Women worn out from child-bearing begged her for contraceptive advice. She gave such advice on request and was fired because of it.

You have provided what is called anecdotal evidence. You have cited a case where a large family did not harm a woman's health and then generalised about all large families. It is not a reasonable generalisation.

From http://www.guttmacher.org/pubs/ib_3-02.html

“The risks associated with adolescent childbearing are apparent when the maternal mortality ratios (which represent the number of women who die from pregnancy-related causes for every 100,000 live births) of different age-groups are compared. In Nepal, for example, the maternal mortality ratio among teenage mothers is almost double that of women giving birth in their early 20s.

Childbearing is even more dangerous for women in their late 30s and 40s, many of whom suffer from obstetric problems associated with earlier births or from having had several children at closely spaced intervals. In Nepal, the maternal mortality ratio among 35-39-year-old women is about three times that for women in their 20s and early 30s. In Malawi and Zimbabwe, the ratio for women 30-39 is about twice as high as the ratio among women under 30.

As these statistics make clear, maternal mortality would drop substantially if women in developing countries were able to limit childbearing to their 20s and early 30s.”

Having a large family means that a woman’s child-bearing years are extended and her risk of obstetric problems and maternal mortality is greater.

*Small families do in not in any way enhance a womans long term health prospects.*

Hang on Philo, 12 kids could send any sane woman nuts :)

What has changed is that today women have choice when it
comes to family planning, unlike those days.

Clearly not too many women choose to have twelve children,
when given that choice.

Back in the days when the pill was banned in Ireland, they
used to smuggle it in by the boatload. Its simple, woman want
choice and not be treated as mere broodmares. Fair enough
and I doubt if you can give a good reason why they should
be denied that choice.

Pro life people believe in a real choice that doesn't involve the committing of an immoral act and of a crime according to law. Pro life is the true pro choice position to hold. No unborn baby is killed. Natural family planning according to Catholic teaching involves no pills ( abortafacients) and no onanism. Most married couples at the Catholic parish of St Hohn Vianney's in the Diocese of Parramatta swear by it. Some have two or three children; other have more with many having four of five ( most) and some having eight, nine and one happy couple have thirteen. All are happy and my wife and I along with our children have family BBQ's and after Mass have a cuppa and a laugh as Catholics do.
Most of us, including our parish priest Fr John O'Neill, are seeking a real labor party to represent us all again. Currently poor Australia has a rich man's party the Libs; but sadly an ALP that is very close to big business and is against working class Aussies like us who are doing the right thing by having kids.( more than Costello's plea to have one more for the country).
Where killing is concerned ( abortion) no one has the right to stupidity. Stupidity has no rights at all and so there is no choice possible to kill unborn children. End of story folks.

Dear David
Thanks for your more than a little rant against the Catholic Church which you neatly borrowed from anti Catholic religious bigots and not a few secular ones besides.
One problem with your story of the Jews. The initially gave support to the de-former ( not re-former) Martin Luther. They soon found out that he was a frothing at the mouth hater of them. Like the early days of the Spanish Inquisition ( which persecuted Catholics) both Catholics form Spain- including priests and bishops, and Jews from the German States- sought future assistance from the Pope against the small group of fanatics in Spain and the Jew hating Luther.
A little more on Spain as an interesting aside. Much early Protestant English government propaganda was directed against Catholic Spain. Truth is William Cecil, Cromwell and other newly invented Anglicans wreaked torture and murder upon the UK.
Pope Pius XII wrote an encyclical letter condeming Nazism andhuman rights abuses in German held territories; and did so in German ! a break with Latin to get the message out. Golda Meir and World Jewry after WWII congratulated him. The Chief Rabbi of Rome was so impressed he became a Catholic. NA took as his baptisimal name Eugenio. He did so in honour of Eugenio Pacelli a.k.a. Pope Pius XII.
Jews that were saved from the Nazis were mostly protected by religious Catholics and Lutherans and Evangelicals, not by Johnny come lately Commo/liberal secularists even back then in the thick of things in WWII.

Thankyou David for your bigoted rank. Thought I get you to reflect upon my humble offering.

*Natural family planning according to Catholic teaching involves no pills *

Ah, I just love that catholic method, where they tell you how great
it is, then have 6-8 children :) Webby, you use it if it works for
you lol, but don't expect others to take it too seriously. Others
should be free to choose, like about anything else.

You might love your Catholic sing songs and after church barbecues
with all the kids, but clearly the majority of Catholics are baling
out, for despite all those kids, the Catholics Church pews are
largely empty.

I was one of the many many kids, whom the nuns tried to brainwash,
but at a young age already told the church to get stuffed, for
I could see through their hogwash.

Once again, no babies or children are involved in most abortions,
for a fetus is not yet a person, it does not yet have a human
brain. No human brain = no person, all quite simple really.

You flush your sperms and ova down the toilet without a problem,
they are beings and they are human, you murderer you :)

Morality is of course subjective and is little more then somebody's
opinion. If you want to take your moral guidance from a few old
farts in Rome, well that should be your choice, as it is mine, if
I want to play golf or not.

But don't expect me to take those old farts in Rome seriously, in
any way, shape or form.

After all, they live in pomp and splendour, whilst kids are dying
of starvation, so much for them caring about the suffering.

Webby wrote: Thanks for your more than a little rant against the Catholic Church which you neatly borrowed from anti Catholic religious bigots and not a few secular ones besides.

Dear Webby,

I would like to tell you of some of my sources:

Gordon Zahn, a Catholic sociologist wrote “In Solitary Witness” about a heroic Catholic, Franz Jaegerstatter, who refused to fight for the Nazis and was eventually beheaded. His priest and other members of the Catholic clergy persuaded him to go. He refused and was beheaded. Zahn also wrote "German Catholics and Hitler's Wars: A Study in Social Control" which told how the German Catholics by and large supported Hitler. Zahn was cofounder of Pax Christi USA, a Catholic peace organisation.

"Constantine’s Sword" by James Carroll, Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 2001, tells how the adoption of Christianity as the official religion of the Roman Empire changed Christianity to a religion of war. James Carroll was a Catholic chaplain in the US army and started to question during the Vietnamese War.

Edward H. Flannery (1912 – October 19, 1998) was a priest in the Roman Catholic Diocese of Providence, and the author of “The Anguish of the Jews: Twenty-Three Centuries of Antisemitism”, first published in 1965. He did not shut his eyes to what his church has done.

Fr. Flannery was the first director of Catholic-Jewish Relations for the U.S. Bishops' Committee for Ecumenical and Interreligious Affairs, a position he held from 1967 to 1976.

Most of my information about Pius XII comes from "A Cross too Heavy: Eugenio Pacelli." By Paul O’Shea, a Catholic.

For the life of Luther I read "Luther: a Biography" by H. G. Haile, a Lutheran.

I also read “The Roots of Anti-Semitism: In the Age of Renaissance and Reformation" by Heiko Obermann. It was translated from German and published by Fortress Press, a Lutheran publishing house.

Most of my sources are Christians of good will who try to deal with the past of their churches unlike you who deny and call names. You might benefit by reading some of the above.

Yabby, you have some serious anger management issues not to mention generalisations and downright spaced out rants to deal with.
Wow, I really leeerrvvvv the serial denials done with barely disguised passive aggression ( are your teeth ground down whilst feigning sanity)concerning babies not really being babies before birth and now you add they have no brains.
Wow. What tablets are you taking Yabster?
At least Diamond Jim McLelland who became an atheist makes more sense than you do and still joined with the ALP Groupers as did many non-Catholics to remove Communists fro the trade unions in days gone by.
Diamond Jim was a more productive and rational atheist than you are advertising tonight about the Kingdom of Nothingness.
Diamond Jim might be praying for you now ( if he is at the right diestination). Who knows? He may have repented during his last moments. Who knows? Jim, if you are in the right place, pray for Yabby please !

David,
You obviously haven't read the historian Daniel Henri-Rops on Church history.
And haven't read Rabbi Dallin's defence of Pope Pius XII who has been defamed by many Communist sources funded by the former Commo governments of the USSR and Eastern Bloc.
You also need to read former Chief Rabbi of Rome's story, Israel Zolli: http://www.secondexodus.com/html/more/zolli.htm

this site is written by Jews who are all now Catholics.

Also David why did the Dutch Catholic bishops get thrown in concentration camps? Answer: they all spoke out against Nazism and the deportation and murder of Dutch Jews.
David, you are trying to convince yourself from slanted sources that are either religiously anti Catholic in outlook or secular liberal or socialist left.

Ah Webby, no anger at all, just a very low tolerance, for stupid,
ill informed people :)

As it happens, one of my hobbies is neuroscience. So I have a reasonable understanding of development, when it comes to the
human brain.

Now you would have to agree with me that an 8 cell embyro does
not have a human brain. Or do you deny this?

The first time that anything resembling a human brain is finally
assembled, is around week 23-24.

Most abortions happen before week 12.

So no children, no babies, no emotive crap as you claim, but fact.
Embryos are not people, people have human brains.

So sorry, its game, set, match :)

Now you go off to pray a bit, it keeps you off the streets lol.

Dear Webby,
A little information on the split between the DLP and the ALP might be of interest.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/B.A._Santamaria

“Labor Split and National Civic Council

In 1954 Evatt publicly blamed "the Groupers" for Labor's defeat in that year's federal election, and after a tumultuous National Conference in Hobart in 1955, Santamaria's parliamentary followers were expelled from the Labor Party. The resulting split (now usually called "The Split", although there have been several other "splits" in Labor history) brought down the Labor governments in Victoria and Queensland.

In Victoria, Mannix threw the resources of the Church behind Santamaria, but in New South Wales, Norman Cardinal Gilroy opposed him, favouring the traditional alliance between the Church and Labor. Gilroy's influence in Rome ended official Church support for the Movement as well as, reportedly, Mannix's chances to be elevated to the Cardinalate.

Santamaria founded a new organisation no longer an organ of Catholic Action, the National Civic Council (NCC), and edited its newspaper, News Weekly, for many years. His followers, known as Groupers, continued to control a number of important unions. Those expelled from the Labor Party formed a new party, the Democratic Labor Party (DLP), dedicated to opposing both Communism and the Labor Party, which they said was controlled by Communist sympathisers. Santamaria never joined the DLP but was its unofficial leader and guiding influence.”

Webby wrote: “David, you are trying to convince yourself from slanted sources that are either religiously anti Catholic in outlook or secular liberal or socialist left.”

The above is nonsense. Catholics I am friendly with do not spit the dummy at every mildly progressive act. The DLP is a paranoid group that sees reds under the bed. Communist sympathisers do not control the ALP. Even the Catholic Church hierarchy does not back the DLP. Norman Cardinal Gilroy ended Catholic support for the DLP. Mannix’s support for Santamaria put paid to the chance of his becoming a cardinal. The DLP will remain an unimportant rump group that most Catholics have too much sense to support.

Santamaria supported Franco and Mussolini. Most Catholics do not support fascists.

Dear Webby,

It's very interesting that some Jews became Catholic. One Jew who was never a Christian is Jesus Christ. If you were really a follower of his you would follow his religion not a religion set up by other people. I wrote a song on the subject which I sang on the radio to the tune of the old jazz standard.

The Imitation of Christ (consult your local rabbi!)

6 ft 2
Eyes of blue
Jesus Christ, he was a Jew
Has anybody seen my Lord?

Big hooked nose
There he goes
Preaching so that everyone knows.
Has anybody seen my Lord?

Speared in the abdomen
By a Roman,
Blood gushing out.

Rose from the dead,
So it is said.
People believe without a doubt.

Jesus died,
Still a Jew.
Still a Jew so why aren't you?
Has anybody seen my Lord?

Should be backed up by a moldy fig jazz band with a lead wahwah cornet ala Muggsy Spanier

It is easy to dismiss anything that disagrees with you as left wing, secular etc. That's a good way to avoid listening to anybody else.

I don't believe there is such a thing as religious truth. I wish you well.

Good night,

David

Examinator appointed me as Minister for the Artz and Having a Good Time.

And now is the time for a li'l entertainment break.

Reflect on this, my good people, as the Kinkster performs his epiphanic epic live from Dublin:

"They ain't makin' Jews like Jesus anymore"

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z0ZMj5RksbE

Thanks Fractelle! I've been a Kinky Friedman fan since the 70s. Other pertinent songs include:

* "Get Your Biscuits in the Oven and Your Buns in the Bed"
* "High on Jesus"

and of course

* "Ride 'Em Jewboy"

While I'm here, I'll just note that TRUTHNOW78 has once again elicited a large number of responses to his/her intitial troll, without participating at all in the discussion.

Pretty successful, I'd say.

david f,
If you imagine a woman's choice will improve their health, then I see no evidence. I have worked amoung youth and find most teenagers engage in sex and use the pill. They suffer all types of VD as they choose to sleep around. These diseases were rare in my youth.

Philo wrote: david f,
If you imagine a woman's choice will improve their health, then I see no evidence. I have worked amoung youth and find most teenagers engage in sex and use the pill. They suffer all types of VD as they choose to sleep around. These diseases were rare in my youth.

Dear Philo,

Please cite your statistics to show those diseases were rare in your youth. I assume that in your youth you were not working with sexually active teenagers.

You aren’t looking in the right place for evidence. The pill has given women control of their reproductive capacities and freed women from the burden of being worn out from bearing too many children. That is what I wrote about. Your experience with teenagers does not negate that.

I have no doubt that the freedom the pill gives has been abused. However, I think of my beautiful cousin who was seventeen years in 1943. Apparently she said an emotional goodbye to her boyfriend as he went off to war. Two months later he was killed in action. Finding herself with a dead boyfriend and a family she apparently didn’t feel she could tell of her pregnancy she committed suicide. I still think of her. I wish she had the pill then. Diseases can be cured. Death can’t.

No doubt society will adjust to the social changes due to the pill. Samuel Noah Kramer translated ancient Sumerian cuneiform tablets. One of them said something to the effect that children no longer listen to their teachers or obey their parents. People no longer respect the gods, and everybody wants to write a book.

Older people have been concerned with the improper behaviour of younger people since the beginning of recorded history.

Yabby is angry and angry. GK Chesterton wisely observed this as the result of moods. Moodyness isn't a reasoned rejection. It leads to a spiral of invective against reason and the elephant in the room ie the Catholic Church. Yabby moved on to something unreasoned and one manifestation of the rejection of the Church is the rejection of natural law and of denying the obvious about the existence of personhood for unborn human babies. Here are some quotes for a reality check:

"To accept the fact that after fertilization has taken place a new human has come into being is no longer a matter of taste or opinion . . . it is plain experimental evidence" (Dr. Jerome Lejeune, "Father of Modern Genetics" and discoverer of the cause of Down's Syndrome). "By all the criteria of modern molecular biology, life is present from the moment of conception" (Dr. Hymie Gordon, Chairman, Department of Genetics at Mayo Clinic).

The widely used medical textbook The Developing Human, Clinically Oriented Embryology, 6th Edition, Moore, Persaud, Saunders, 1998, states at page 2 that "The intricate processes by which a baby develops from a single cell are miraculous.... This cell [the zygote] results from the union of an oocyte [egg] and sperm. A zygote is the beginning of a new human being...." At page 18 this theme is repeated: "Human development begins at fertilization [emphasis in original]...."

Judge Michael J. Noonan ruled as follows in a New Jersey case based on a man's efforts to save his unborn child from being aborted: "?based upon the undisputed medical testimony by arguably the foremost authority in genetics in the world, I found that human life begins as conception; and that Roe vs. Wade permits a legal execution of that human being." (Municipal Court of New Jersey -- Law division, Morris County criminal action docket no. C1771, et seq. State of New Jersey v. Alexander Loce, et als., Defendants, April 29, 1991, Honorable Michael J. Noonan).

A few more good ones for a reality check on a priori rights for anti life poseurs out there who act out their moods via angry activism for a plethora of alleged other 'rights on the agenda today. Here, chew over these also:
Even the "pro-choice" feminist author Naomi Wolf has criticized the efforts of abortion-supporters to obscure the humanity of the unborn child. She asks, "So, what will it be: Wanted fetuses are charming, complex REM-dreaming little beings whose profile on the sonogram looks just like Daddy, but unwanted ones are mere 'uterine material'?" (Our Bodies, Our Souls, The New Republic, October 16,1995)

These people are not speaking about the Bible or some religious belief. They are speaking from the basis of scientific proof. Every medical text in the world, in fact, will confirm that a unique human life begins at fertilization. If science did not know that, how could it have produced test-tube babies?

http://www.priestsforlife.org/brochures/amatter.html

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/03/20/AR2009032002415.html?hpid=sec-religion
“Vatican Official Defends Child's Abortion
By Francis X. Rocca
Religion News Service
Saturday, March 21, 2009; Page B07

VATICAN CITY -- The Vatican's top bioethics official said the two Brazilian doctors who performed an abortion on a 9-year-old rape victim do not merit excommunication, because they acted to save her life.

The statement, by Archbishop Rino Fisichella, president of the Pontifical Academy for Life, appeared as the lead article in last Sunday's issue of the official Vatican newspaper, L'Osservatore Romano.

"There are others who deserve excommunication and our forgiveness," Fisichella wrote, addressing the unidentified rape victim, "not those who permitted you to live and who will help you to regain hope and faith."

The case drew international attention earlier this month after the local Catholic archbishop excommunicated the doctors who aborted the girl's twin fetuses, as well as the girl's mother.

The child was 15 weeks pregnant, allegedly after being raped by her stepfather. Weighing only 80 pounds, she might have died if forced to carry the pregnancy to term, the doctors said.

While reiterating Catholic teaching that abortion is an "intrinsically wicked act," Fisichella suggested that under the circumstances, it might have been the lesser evil.”

"Her life was in serious danger because of the pregnancy in progress," Fisichella wrote. "How to act in these cases? An arduous decision for the physician and for the moral law itself."

In contrast with church authorities' typically uncompromising statements on abortion, Fisichella stressed the degree of moral discretion that the doctors were forced to exercise.
"The conscience of the physician finds itself alone when forced to decide the best thing to do," he wrote. "A choice like that of having to save a life, knowing that one puts a second at serious risk, never comes easily."

The above action by a Vatican official shows compassion, wisdom and more good sense than many Catholics show who automatically defend whatever their church does.

Fisichella sees abortion as evil but also sees not having an abortion in the case concerned as a greater evil. I can only approve of his reasoning.

Yabby is angry*

Hehe, is that so? I could have fooled me lol, for I knew nothing
about it. If I feel anything then it is sympathy for people like
you Webby, who are clearly such gullible suckers.

I remind you that human life does not begin, it simply continues.
The sperm and ova which you happily flush down the toilet, are
very much alive. That same dna is contained in the fetus, a copy
of each.

A child is a person, for it has a human brain. A fetus does
not have a human brain, so it is a being, as is an ova or a sperm.

Now either you have the intelligence to understand all that or
you don'

Nobody in the Church rushed to put out a media statement proclaiming excommunication. The media asked Abp Cardoso Sobrinho for the Church’s view on the matter. What would Abp Fisichella have him say? – “No comment, the Church has no view on it”? Or should he have lied and said that the automatic excommunication for all abortionists does not apply in this case? He pointed out the fact amid no doubt a great deal of comment to the effect that he and the Church “above all defended, embraced, treated the girl with sweetness to make her feel that we were all on her side, all of us, without distinction”, which the media of course ignored, as it would have given the lie to its attempt to create a scandal and discredit the Church.

If any abortionist deserves excommunication (and they all do), a man who forcibly aborts a minor who is unable to consent is doubly deserving of excommunication. And Abp Fisichella does not have the power to revoke or annul the excommunication

Dear Webby,
Thanks. You have my life easier. Every federal election we get a ballot for the senate. If we put ‘1’ next to a party the party will allocate preferences for all candidates. I don’t like to do that so I find out about the senate candidates and look up all the parties and those who are running on the different slates.

It takes time and effort. Many of the parties and candidates have information about themselves on the net. I divide the candidates and parties into those I think would be good for Australia and the world and those who would not be good. The good ones get numbers starting from one. The bad ones get high numbers. Those I can find nothing about go in between. I try to order them in order of preference with what information I have. However, I rarely meet someone who is a member of the minor parties. In general talking to a member gives me a better picture of what the party is for than reading what the party writes about itself on the website.

Thanks to you I have a better feel for what the DLP is about and can now put it last.

Dear David,

It is allright that you put the DLP last because the DLP message of being pro life all the way and of also being pro trade union and against casino capitalism is what appeals to most ordinary families out there.
David, you and the odd few contributors to online forums have views that are in the minority and so we in the DLP do not need your vote anyway mate. You have all of the typical left/liberala nd libertine attitudes and philosophy that traditional Catholics as well as many people in the community who are in touch with what human nature and the natural law is basically all about. It is these good people who are and who will be delighted to learn of the traditional Laborite message of the DLP.

You are in the minority David.
Have a great day buddy.

Dear Webby,

The chances are that I will not have a chance to put DLP last since it will not have enough supporters to be on the ballot.

The DLP pro union, anti casino capitalism and pro life? That’s a great, big laugh! Union Catholics like Paul Keating have no part of it. Catholic leaders like Norman Cardinal Gilroy would have no part of it. Anti-union supporters of Casino capitalism such as even Malcolm Fraser, John Howard and Robert Menzies greatly admired Santamaria who founded the DLP.

Real pro lifers would be concerned with the life of a pregnant 9 year old raped by her stepfather. You are just concerned with seeing that those who helped her are punished for it because abortion is always wrong even if when it is more wrong not to perform one.

You label the great majority of Australians who want nothing to do with the DLP as left/liberal and libertine. That’s also a big laugh.

Dear David,

The DLP was on the last Senate ballot paper and was 'above the line' as the DLP is registered fro Federal elections. In NSW alone with 95% of the Senate papers counted the DLP had approx 53,000 voters. That is without any advertising at all.

David, I'm afraid the laugh right now is upon you. In hindsight Cardinal Gilroy, Bishop Carroll abd co have been proven wrong. Right now we are being told our banks are 'safe'. Guess what David, the model of post ALP Split pragmatism and it's alliance with big business and privatisations have now been proven to have comprehensively failed. The banks owe more than $400 billion compared to about $142 billion in deposits etc. Within the next nine months we will go the way of the USA and the UK. Then further down the track inflation will hit honest Aussie savers big time sadly enough because all 'safe' money in cash or cash deposits will have lost much of its value.There is nothing wrong with some of the Liberals claiming to have admired Bob Santamaria. It only proves the bankruptcy of the Liberal Party policies. Menzies stopped voting Liberal in his latter years. Howard was only trying to get in Santamaria's limelight but remains a hopeless supporter of failed neo liberal economic policies. He is anti union and hence no friend of mine.
Re; the Brazilian girl, the Catholic way is sound. Try and deliver the babies but if inteh process the young lady's life is in danger then all attempts are make to save her. If the babies come out prematurely then that is not a sin and no grounds for excommunication. It is only when deliberate attempts to abort regardless, as in this case, that sin occurs.
You live in cloud cuckoo land David if you ascribe your own label upon the majority. Not every one lives as an inner city alternate view/lifestyle greenie or simialr as you do. Get outside your fishbowl.

In some backward Muslim countries once a girl is menstrating she is considered of marriageable age. As Mohamet had a 6 year old wife whom he consumated at nine. The fact is in some countries if a girl is cabable of giving birth there is no questions asked. I suggest you lobby in those countries to change their customs. The fact that the child was not a wife would raise the death penalty to them both in those countries.

The fact it was rape raises the disgust of mature Westerners. Not the fact of her pregnancy, as it is not news that a 9 year is pregnant. It is the fact that rape is not acceptable. That she is pregnant is natural.

The fact of nine year olds falling pregnant is not a reason for abortion. The criminal act there was rape of a minor.

The excommunications for those involved in the nine-year-old Brazilian girl’s abortion have been overruled.

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/03/28/world/americas/28brazil.html?ref=world

“The doctors’ actions set off a swirl of controversy. A Brazilian archbishop summarily excommunicated everyone involved — the doctors for performing the abortion and the girl’s mother for allowing it — except for the stepfather, who stands accused of raping the girl over a number of years.

“The law of God is above any human law,” said José Cardoso Sobrinho, the archbishop, who argued that while rape was bad, abortion was even worse.

The storm intensified when a high-ranking Vatican official supported the excommunications. But then a conference of Brazilian bishops overruled Archbishop Sobrinho, saying that the child’s mother had acted “under pressure” from doctors who said the girl would die if she carried the babies to term, and that only doctors who “systematically” performed abortions should be thrown out of the church.

Finally, the Vatican’s top bioethics official, Archbishop Rino Fisichella, also criticized the initial stance, saying the “credibility of our teaching took a blow as it appeared, in the eyes of many, to be insensitive, incomprehensible and lacking mercy.””