Catholic Answers Staff - Straight Talk About Abortion

Abortions are performed at all stages of pregnancy, but they use different means to bring about the childs death depending on when they are performed.

At the very beginning of pregnancy, drugs are sometimes used to make the inside of the mothers womb inhospitable to the child so that he cannot implant. Denied the nutrients he needs, the child then dies. So-called emergency contraception or the morning-after pill can have this effect. In fact, so can regular contraceptive pills and intrauterine devices (IUDs).

Sometimes in the early weeks of pregnancy, drugs (such as RU-482 and Methotrexate) are given to a mother to cause the lining of her uterus to break down so that the already implanted child dies from lack of nutrients. Other drugs are then given to cause the child to be expelled from her womb.

Surgical abortions are often performed in the weeks after implantation. One of the most common methods is suction-aspiration abortion, in which a tube with a sharp edge is inserted into the womb. A pump is turned on, and the sharp-edged suction tube is used to dismember the child and vacuum out the womb.

When this isnt possible, another procedureknown as dilation and curettage (D & C)is often done. In this case, a loop-shaped knife is inserted into the womb and its walls are scraped clean, destroying the child.

As the child grows larger, different techniques are used. One used for children up to 24 weeks of age is dilation and evacuation (D & E), in which the child is dismembered by using forceps to grasp and twist off his head and limbs.

One of the most barbaric methodswhich is usually illegal in the United Statesis known as partial-birth abortion. It involves pulling the childs body, except for the head, through the birth canal so the child is now partially born. The abortionist then punctures the babys head and vacuums the brains out through a tube so that the head can be crushed and more easily pulled through the birth canal.

Another method used late in pregnancy is the saline abortion, in which concentrated salt water is injected into the amniotic sac so that the fluid which the child swallows and breathes is poisoned, and he dies of salt poisoning. This technique also corrodes and burns the childs skin.

Bear in mind that for abortions committed in the second and third trimesters (after 13 weeks) the baby is conscious and able to feel pain as his body begins to be torn apart or is poisoned and corroded. Children are not provided painkillers as they are destroyed.

Children in these stages of pregnancy often can survive outside the womb. Babies have survived when born as young as 21 weeks, and medical technology is making it possible for them to survive outside the womb earlier and earlier.

The logic of the pro-life position is straightforward and undeniable:

1. Deliberately killing an innocent human being is always wrong.

2. Abortion deliberately kills an innocent human being.

3. Therefore, abortion is always wrong.

The argument is so simple that even a child can understand it. If the two premises are true then the conclusion that follows from them is also true.

As we will see, the premises are rock solid, and the argument is sound.