The following is a guest post from Rev. Todd Owen Watson, a United Methodist minister. We thank Rev. Watson for sharing his personal perspective as a member of the clergy and a person of faith.
In the past several months I have listened and watched with great interest to all the conversation about and around proposed Amendment 26 to the Mississippi Constitution, also known as the Personhood Amendment, which will appear on the November 8 ballot. In addition to the emotional manipulation, the simplistic sound bites, and the out right lying by persons trying to persuade us to vote either YES or NO on the November ballot, there have also been significant and meaningful thoughts by persons on both sides of this issue published in the newspapers or online, and spoken over radio and television media. Though some might claim otherwise, the conversation about life, its origins, its value, its meaning, and its scope cannot be addressed by a simple YES or NO vote on any ballot, in any state, at any time.
I am a minister of the gospel, the good news about and from Jesus Christ, and I try to proclaim every day in words and actions that Jesus came and proclaimed so that we “might have life, and that [we] might have it more abundantly.” (John 10:10 KJV). According to Jesus, life is God’s hope for God’s creation, and the Creator desires that life to be full, rich, and abundant. The very fact that in the Christian tradition our God is also known as the Creator of Life, shows the value of life in our understanding of the universe.
However, if one is going to stand in the stream of God’s valuing of life, one must recognize that ALL life has value. Young, old, rich, poor, male, female, black, white, faithful, faithless, sinner, saint, healthy, ill, child and mother–ALL stand equally before God. No one life has more value than any other. Our society, our laws, our culture, and our values may not fully recognize the equal standing of everyone’s life, but the Creator does. And that is my opposition to proposed Amendment 26– it values life at conception at the expense of all other life, and makes no allowances for anyone else, under any circumstance, at any time–conceived life is given primacy in every circumstance. It would be nice if the changing of one or two words in a state constitution would solve all of our concerns about life, its sanctity, and its meaning, but this ill written and ill advised amendment might destroy more life than it saves because of its lack of focus and heavy handed impact across all aspects of our daily existence.
Proponents say that this Amendment is about abortion, and there is a kernel of truth in that statement, but only a kernel. This Amendment would affect the one abortion clinic operating in the state of Mississippi. However, it would also affect 1. all families who struggle to have biological children (such as those on fertility drugs, who often experience miscarriages of conceived life, and those using in vitro fertilization that often results in the implantation and loss of many scientifically fertilized eggs before pregnancy actually occurs), 2. all mothers whose health and very life might be threatened or damaged by pregnancy (such those who experience ectopic pregnancies, or those who have an Rh factor incompatibility with their unborn child that threatens both lives) and 3. all women of any age (teen and up) who are raped and because of this law, might be required to endure the mental anguish of carrying a child conceived through that criminal act, to full term. And these three scenarios are just the “tip of the iceberg.” There are literally hundreds, if not thousands of situations that this amendment would affect. If we pass this amendment, we may devastate and destroy many more lives than we might ever save. Is this really what we want as citizens of this state? Using the ultimate question of my faith tradition, “Is this really loving our neighbor as we love ourselves?”
In a world where our medical science has the capability to begin, prolong, and end life with remarkable ease, there are no easy answers. If we delude ourselves into thinking that our concerns about the involvement of medical science at the beginning of life (or at any other time of life, for that matter) will be answered by voting YES on proposed Amendment 26, we could not be more mistaken. This Amendment will not only fail to assuage our concerns, but it will worsen the lives of all of Mississippi’s citizens. As a person of faith I know that the call upon my life is to vote with wisdom and an informed conscience so that all life may be valued. Thus, I can do nothing but vote NO on proposed Amendment 26.
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With all due respect, I believe you have been misinformed. This bill will not make IVF illegal. It will however, Make disposing of fertilized illegal. God is the creator of Life, I think he is the only one that has a right to take it away.
Actually, Neely, I think it’s you who have been misinformed. While 26 may not technically make IVF illegal, it will regulate it out of existence in Mississippi. In the words of Dr. Eric Webb of Yes on 26, personhood will prohibit freezing embryos and limit doctors to attempting to fertilize no more than two eggs for most women.
The medical realities of IVF make this a de facto ban, even if nobody ever says that “IVF is illegal”. It’s like saying that driving is legal, but that you can only buy one gallon of gas per month.. technically true, but you’re still not going to get very far.
We’ve written extensively about the medical complexities involved, in the above-linked post, in another post about similar comments from Dr. Webb made in a different forum, and in our IVF/Personhood FAQ. I suggest you read these and familiarize yourself with the issues involved. It’s a whole lot more complicated than the Yes On 26 flyers want you to think.
With all due respect, a man of God SHOULD live by faith in Him. If you have FAITH, why do you debate and reject the consequences of obeying His Word???
Possibly because we all have different understandings of what that Word means, Michelle.
I’m Episcopalian, myself. I don’t believe that God requires me to wear skirts and grow my hair long, as Pentecostals do. I don’t believe that God requires me to cover my head, as the Mennonites do, or live out of the world as the Amish do. I don’t believe that God requires me to abjure ALL birth control, as devout Catholics and some Evangelicals do, and have as many children as the Lord sends me. I don’t believe that blood transfusions are evil, as the Jehovah’s Witnesses do, or reject medicine as the Christian Scientists do.
None of that makes any of them better Christians than me, or me a better Christian than them.
The God I believe in can see what’s in our hearts. I don’t think He’s fooled by the difference between methotrexate and tubal removal surgery. He knows the intentions of parents who work to bring life into the world with the help of medicine. He knows the fear and the pain of the woman who has been violated, or the woman who is ill, or the family with the child who is destined to die. He sees, and knows, and forgives.
“As you do not know the path of the wind, or how the body is formed in a mother’s womb, so you cannot understand the work of God, the Maker of all things.” (Ecclesiastes 11:5)
From your post it seems you’ve found the connection between abortion and IVF. I see from your posts below that you seem to think that abortion in the case of rape is acceptable. A couple of questions: 1) when does life begin? 2)How many failed embryos does it take to make a “viable” embryo that one could then implant, meaning what are the odds that in forming an embryo you create a viable embryo that will survive long enough to be “fit” to implant? 3)why does any horror (rape) justify another (taking the life of the baby)? 4)Where do you find that people have the “right,” in a Christian sense, to children?
@Jacob, the question of life begins isn’t something that can be settled out by popular vote, legislation, or judicial opinion. What 26 does isn’t to declare the embryo is alive — it declares that the embryo has constitutional rights, which is not the same thing at all. It’s perfectly possible to have great respect for embryos and not feel that they are deserving of constitutional rights.
To answer your concrete question, about 5% of eggs retrieved in IVF will fertilize, begin to divide, survive 2-7 days in the lab, be transferred, implant, and survive pregnancy. Depending on the fertilization technique, up to 50% of them will fail to fertilize correctly. Over 50% of the ones which do fertilize will not continue to develop. Even when you have two viable embryos to transfer, there is about a 60% chance that the woman won’t become pregnant.
I’ve said nothing about a Biblical right to children — the “right” to which I am referring is my legal right to determine the appropriate medical treatment for my disease. Anything beyond that is an individual question to be resolved between a couple and their doctor, and informed by the couple’s faith.
Since you seem to consider that IVF is immoral, my question for you is this: do you believe that Yes On 26 is wrong in saying on their FAQ that IVF will not/should not be illegal under personhood? Supporters of the Yes side simultaneously promise that IVF will remain legal, promote draconian restrictions which will constitute an effective ban, and tell us that it’s the moral equivalent of abortion. These things cannot logically all be true at the same time.
Either someone is explicitly being deceptive, or there is wide disagreement about how personhood should affect IVF. In neither case can parents like me trust the assertions of the Yes flyers.
I agree. My Bible is the word of God and his word says that to take someone’s life is murder. I will vote yes on this amendment becausei disagree with abortion and the dre who perform it. The reason they are against it is simply a financial. Decision.if you have not researched abortion …please do so and inform yourself on how horrible it really is.
Mary, my family has nothing whatsoever to do with abortion, or the performance thereof. It’s not acceptable to threaten my ability to build a family as collateral damage to end abortion.
I agree wholeheartedly with Rev. Watson. I am pro-life, I always have been. BUT, this law does nothing but cause potential harm to all if it is allowed to go through. I am RH negative, I do have to have the shots and yet, I still had a miscarriage earlier this year. Amendment 26 will not allow infertility treatments in the state of MS because of how it will be regulated. No family will be able to afford 15 to 20 thousand dollars per try for only 2 eggs at a time! And no, any woman or teenager who has been raped by stranger or worse, by FAMILY, should have to look at themselves everyday, knowing what caused the pregnancy. Yes, a baby does have rights~ Yes, I agree that abortion used as a method of birth control is wrong… BUT what happens to the mother’s rights? I am voting NO and I will continue to talk to all family and friends for them to vote NO. This is wrong and so far, every state these people have tried to force it upon has turned it DOWN. There is a reason why people. We don’t need this type of control over us, not now… not ever.
As a Methodist, I stand up and applaud Rev. Watson for putting his neck out here and supporting Mississippi families! Thank you so much. Voting with WISDOM…an amazing concept!
Hello, Atlee. Thank you for posting this well written article. I appreciate Mr. Watson’s view on the issue, and I would wholeheartedly agree with him if he had proven a single, particular statement made in the third paragraph. Mr. Watson wrote that Amendment 26 “values life at conception at the expense of all other life.” If that statement were true, then I would be adamantly opposed to Amendment 26 as well. Unfortunately, I believe that Mr. Watson has been misled.
The actual text of Amendment 26 is: “The term ‘person’ or ‘persons’ shall include every human being from the moment of fertiliation, cloning or the functional equivalent thereof.” I do not find anything in this amendment that elevates life at conception above all other life. Instead I find it to state that life at conception is equal to all other life. In fact, I find that this amendment is in perfect agreement with Mr. Watson’s statement that “if one is going to stand in the stream of God’s valuing of life, one must recognize that ALL life has value … child and mother–ALL stand equally before God. No one life has more value than any other.”
Currently, Mississippi law does not recognize that all life has value. Section 97-3-37 of the Mississippi Code provides protection from homicide for all human life at any stage of development EXCEPT for those human lives that are killed through abortion. Amendment 26 simply removes that exception by placing all human lives INCLUDING the victims of abortion under the protection of the Fifth and Fourteenth Amendments of the US Constitution. It seems to me that one who recognizes that ALL life has equal value before God and that “no one life has more value than any other” would be in favor of a law that echoes that belief.
Mr. Watson implies that Amendment 26 may not be consistent with the biblical command that we love our neighbor as ourselves, but I would ask Mr. Watson the same question that was asked of the Savior: “Who is my neighbor?” If I were placed into the parable of the Good Samaritan, would my neighbor be the priest and the Levite that walked by on the other side or the Samaritan? Which of these three would be my neighbor if I were in that story? Of course, the answer is all three of them, but if in this story I were to minister only to the needs of these three, then I would be a very wicked neighbor indeed, for I would have neglected the one neighbor who was dying.
Mr. Watson gave a very passionate plea for us to love our neighbors, but I submit that he is only asking us to love the three while ignoring the neighbor dying at his doorstep. I challenge you to truly apply this lesson from our Savior and love the neighbor that others reject. Vote yes on Amendment 26.
If you truly believe that one life cannot be more valuable than another, you cannot justify a life-of-the-mother exception. You must attempt to save both lives as long as the fetus has a heartbeat, even if doing so means the death of the mother, even if the fetus is ultimately doomed in any case.
From reading your booklet, I see that this is indeed your position, so I will note for the record that you are philosophically consistent.
That said, I think it’s repellent to let women die when it’s possible to save their lives, and I think most people on both sides agree.
Thank you for the reply, Atlee. I agree that it is wrong to let women die when it is possible to save their lives. However, let me ask you to consider a similar situation in order to better understand my position. Suppose for a moment that a doctor discovers that one member of a set of conjoined twins has lethal defect that will most likely claim the lives of both twins. Let’s suppose also that one member of this particular set is capable of surviving a separation while the other is not, and that the one suffering from the lethal defect is the one which is not capable of surviving a separation. Now, from this scenario, I would like for you to think of an answer to different questions:
1) Should the doctor kill the “weaker” twin in order to save the stronger?
2) Should we amend our law against murder to allow the doctor to do so without fear of prosecution?
Now let me change the scenario just slightly and ask you two additional question. In this scenario, let’s suppose that it is the stronger of the two that has the lethal disease. Let’s also consider that a treatment for his disease has been found, but that the application of that treatment would necessarily kill the weaker member of the set. Now let me ask you the next two questions.
3) Should the doctor kill the weaker twin in order to extend the life of the stronger?
4) Should we amend our law against homicide to allow him to do so without fear of prosecution?
I’m looking forward to reading your answers.
Bill, unfortunately the twin argument isn’t applicable here because there’s a difference between an already born person and a fetus. Believing that a fetus is a life form doesn’t make it equal to an already formed human life. And if the already formed human hosting the fetus needs to terminate it to protect their life, that should absolutely take precedence.
Life is valuable, and I’d venture to say that you make decisions every day that place yours above others. Do you eat hamburgers or wear leather shoes? At some point, you decided that your nourishment or comfort was more important than the life of a cow. Scrambled an egg this morning? You unconsciously decided that satisfying your hunger was more important than the life of a baby. Sure, it’s of a different species, but it’s still a life. And I don’t judge you for that. Maybe your breakfast and lunch gave you the strength to go out and do something good. Even if it just let you do something very ordinary, your life will probably mean more to the world than the life of the cows or baby chicks you’ve eaten.
Accidentally hit a deer or run over a squirrel? Ever set a mousetrap?The fact that you weren’t charged with manslaughter or animal cruelty is in recognition of the fact that your life is more important than those you ended. It doesn’t mean you didn’t feel bad about it, or that the loss of that life was insignificant, but we decide every day that one life has more value than another.
If you get to make those decisions without legal penalty or harassment, why shouldn’t women (who are the only ones capable of being killed by a fetus)?
And what about a Jewish or non-religious mother facing a life threatening pregnancy? Why should she legally be required to endure a life threatening pregnancy because of what you believe in, which seems to be rooted in your personal interpretation of Christianity? You are free to have your own beliefs, but the difference between America and a place like Iran is that you don’t get to legislate them onto others who don’t interpret things exactly the same way that you do.
I strongly believe infertile couples should be given extensive information about adoption. My grandfather wasn’t able to have biological children, but adopted my grandmother’s children from a previous marriage, and cared for them like they were. I don’t share his DNA, but he’s more my family than some blood relatives. I think that sometimes infertility is God’s way of saying that a couple’s child just came into the world through someone else. But guess what – I don’t get to force that belief on someone else, and I’d reject any law that tried to.
This is a fantastic piece. Rev. Watson lays out the troubles he finds with this Amendment and why he will vote against it. I stand with Rev. Watson, Atlee, and Samantha in asking my friends in Mississippi to vote no. This amendment is such a reach that i cannot fathom why a person with any common sense would support this. The first defense that any supporter, as evidenced above, is they are against abortion. Most people are against abortion. Being pro-choice does not mean that I am for abortion but that I am for my wife and nieces right to choose. I do not condone abortion as birth control. I think that abortion has place in the medical field to limit or prevent death during pregnancy, and to remedy the effects of unwanted pregnancy due to sexual assault. No person should be forced to give their own to give birth or to give birth to child that comes from being horrifically sexually assaulted. If you are female, I cannot understand why you would support something that limits your rights to this point. If you are male, I want you to imagine your wife, sister, niece, aunt, daughter is raped; Would you want those females closest to you in life to be shackled with the reminder of the most horrific moment in their life for the rest of their life or a have remedy to that situation? I support my wife’s right to choose. You should support a woman’s right to choose, especially if you could be affected by this. One other point I would like to make is the science of life at conception. If life begins at conception, then there would be no need for a woman’s body. We could take an egg and sperm, then fertilize the egg in a petri dish and the zygote should form into a baby without the need for a uterus inside a mother. Sounds absurd right? It is. Women provide life for fetuses by protecting and nursing them while they develop. A fetus cannot breathe on its own until about 24 weeks into pregnancy. That tells me that it cannot live until then. It is definitely not alive at conception. Mississippi needs to worry about other things particularly where it stands in education, teen pregnancy, and obesity. Vote NO and encourage other to vote NO.
I only regret that I no longer live in MS. We now live “next door” in AL. I would wholeheartedly vote YES on the amendment! I was born as the result of an abortion back in 1952, when they were done by c-Section. My mother was dying and at the time the only way to treat uremic poisoning was to take the baby. My best friend became pregnant after a rape and that is the only child she will ever have. If she’d had an abortion, then she’d have NONE! Misty kept her baby since her body had already been violated by a man of another race, she didn’t want to violate it again with an abortion. The child looks just like a mirror of her, with her dad’s black eyes. God knits a child together in the womb and WE as humans do not have the right to play God. Life begins at conception, why is it so hard for us to accept that? The only thing I an possibly see in reading and rereading the bill is that it should be modified to allow for invitro. I know it says that it’s not making that illegal, but it is paving the way for that. I would like to see that one part modified; but other than that I’d VOTE YES!!!!! Of course, I realize we all have our own opinions, if we didn’t then we’d be living in a socialistic society not a republic – ’nuff said about that!
So you think it’s acceptable to sacrifice families like mine, which were built through infertility treatment, in order to end abortion? Because I don’t.
I am a Pro-Life Christian, and I plan to vote against the personhood amendment. As a woman, I do not want the state of Mississippi to tell me I cannot make the decision with my husband and doctor to end a pregnancy that endangers my life or that was the result of the unspeakable crime of rape. Amendment 26 makes no room for these situations. I will vote against it because of this. I believe that the intentions behind this amendment are noble, but the unforeseen implications are not worth it. Thank you Rev. Watson for bringing a Christian voice to the Vote No on 26 movement.
Couldn’t have said it better myself! Wonderful article! Well written Rev. Watson, well done.
And thank you.
I have participated in many abortions as an operating room nurse. Each and everyone had a reason. When there are no foster children left in the world, all adoptees are adopted, I see you on the road protesting war, and the death penalty, all schools and churches fully integrated, and I get invited to your home out of love, I will be against abortion. Put your money where your mouth is. You are against abortion because you want more non colored babies born, fodder for your private and public jails, and the world is still maintained by the 5% who owns 95% of the worlds wealth.
If you think God intends all, what makes you think he does not intend abortion?
Awesome! Free will was bestowed upon us for a reason!
MS is going backward. All issues should not be put on the ballot. Consider the rebel flag issue. That flag is offensive to all good people no matter their skin tone.
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I am a NON-denominational Christian. My knowledge of God is based on the entire Holy Bible, and my personal instruction from the Holy Spirit as I read and study the Word. My knowledge of God does not require comparisons of theological differences among the Church.
It is written:
“Thou Shall Not Murder”
Thank you for a well written article that explains your position with confidence. I am still not sure where I stand in this debate, but I understand the important ramifications that it entails. Which is what brought me here today.
However, I am confused as to your specific arguments against the amendment. You are choosing a NO vote because, “No one life has more value than any other.”, and “it [the amendment] values life at conception at the expense of all other life, and makes no allowances for anyone else, under any circumstance, at any time–conceived life is given primacy in every circumstance.” It also does not appear that you are arguing against life beginning at conception. Am I right in summarizing your argument in this way? If I am wrong, please correct me.
If that is the true, you are seriously contradicting yourself. In any of those 3 situations you mentioned, are you not then choosing to place a higher value of life on the existing person? This is easily illustrated by your third example; a woman who has been raped having to “endure the mental anguish of carrying a child conceived through that criminal act, to full term.” This is simply choosing which life you will value. You are supposing that this woman’s life is of higher value than the child that has been conceived. This is not maintaining equality of life to everyone. It is choosing which life is more valuable.
On it’s face, this is a weak argument against amendment 26.
Don’t value his opinion more than another. Read the Bible and gain your own understanding or you will go astray. My understanding of the Bible is that life is sacred from the beginning. There is no justification for murder. Not one. We are to turn from the ways of the world and man. If our belief in when life begins affects other areas of the world so be it. If you don’t like the way it affects IVF, adopt. And yes, I have dealt with infertility and went to a fertility clinic for assistant. But I relied on God through my experience and he saw me through. Not modern day medicine or man.
Do you have a child of your own as a result of your infertility treatments?
Mary – But what of those who don’t worship your God or read your Bible? They are citizens of Mississippi, too, and they shouldn’t have your religion legislated onto their lives, their bodies, and their private medical decisions. If a religious justification is all we have for a piece of legislation, that seems at odds with the ideals our country was founded on.
I want to express disagreement with Christi’s statement that amendment 26 would stop fertility treatments in MS. there are many types of fertility treatments, and most would not come under the purvey of 26 . The part of IVF that allows fertilizing multiple eggs and then freezing the “extras” needs regulating out of existence. Frozen embryos do not need to be in limbo in a freezer until someone decides to “use” them. Embryonic stem cell research is wrong and unnecessary, since the same “cures” can soon be accomplished with cord blood or adult stem cells. Give God a chance to guide us to accomplish things the right way! (Please see the research of Dr. Derrick Rossi.) The practice of implanting multiple embryos and then selectively aborting the extras that you or your doctor don’t think your body can handle is abhorrent to me. This is being done because it is “too expensive” to only create one or two embryos at a time! All that is expedient is not necessarily moral. With all that said, I am probably not voting in favor of 26 because it has too many unintended consequences and is too general to be good law.
Actually, this is not medically correct at all.
One of the important reasons to do IVF instead of other types of infertility treatments is to AVOID the need for selective reduction. With IVF, the maximum number of babies is determined by the number of embryos you transfer; if you don’t want more than one baby, you can choose to transfer only one embryo. With other treatments such as IUI, the risk of multiples, especially high-order multiples, is much higher, because you can’t control the number of eggs which will fertilize. The vast majority of selective reduction comes from those other non-IVF treatments.
Creating one or two embryos isn’t just a simple problem of finances. If you can’t attempt to fertilize more than two, most women will have no embryos to transfer, and pregnancy rates will be almost zero. If you read Ann’s story, you will see that her doctors attempted to fertilize 21 eggs, and that 19 of those eggs either didn’t fertilize successfully or stopped dividing in the next 48 hours.
Thank you Rev. Watson for your words of wisdom! If a woman has cancer and is pregnant, she may have to deny chemotherapy for risk of her unborn child. What happens to the two other children she already has at home and needs a mother. This is NOT just about abortion and this is why it is so important to be informed…and VOTE!!!!
Great point! She is not choosing herself. She is choosing the children she already has.
I hate to say this, but because of your argument, I have to ask: Why doesn’t she kill one of the other children instead of the one in her womb? What’s the difference? You acknowledge that they are all “children.” Your argument is illogical. All children should be protected; the killing of any child is wrong.
No, your argument is illogical, because killing one of those children won’t cure her cancer.
In Laurie’s hypothetical situation, the mother must undergo chemotherapy to recover from her illness, even though the chemotherapy may kill or seriously injure the unborn baby. It’s a side effect of a necessary medical treatment, not a deliberate action.
Call me confused, but I thought Yes On 26 says this argument is just a “scare tactic”, and that doctors would be permitted to save the life of the mother over the baby in such cases. Now you’re saying that this is not true, and that even livesaving abortions won’t be permitted? Please make up your mind, and be honest with voters accordingly.
If there is a God, he/she is a loving God who doesn’t believe women to be murderers and has granted us the free will and cognitive reasoning to create our own path, whether it’s the creation of life through IVF or the saving of a life through emergency abortion. If you are against abortion, don’t have one. If you don’t need IVF, don’t seek it. Jesus would certainly not condone the self-righteous attempts at oppression set forth by Prop 26. This is a tremendous website filled with nothing but love to give and knowledge to share. Stop attacking and read with an open mind and heart.
I am a pro-life Christian woman and I have lived in Mississippi all my life. Initiative 26 is pro-woman, pro-child, pro-life. There is no middle ground, no 99% to that. All persons should have equal protection by love and by law. Vote “Yes” because the unborn baby is a person, too.
No. Just no. Until the unborn “baby” is born, it is a fetus. An acorn is not a tree, a silkworm is not a dress, an egg is not a chicken. These things all have the potential to develop into something else, the way a fetus has the potential to develop into a baby, but it is not a baby at conception. Fertilized eggs, the kind used in in vitro, are not a baby. Ask any couple going through the painful procedure to have them become babies – ask them about the heartbreak of the eggs not developing into babies – and they will be able to tell you that as much as they’d wish that a fertilized egg could be a baby, it is not.
And out of curiosity, since you’re so concerned about the well being of fetuses, what initiatives are you supporting that would address the infant mortality rates in Mississippi – one of the highest rates in the country? Where is the legislation that would put protections in place for pregnant women to have access to food and pre-natal care, since low birth weight is the leading cause of infant death?
Last I checked, and I check often. We live in the United States of America the supposed land of the “Free”, this includes both freedom of and freedom from religion. Since when do a group of people on their religious ideals get to tell others what to do with their bodies?
So many people freak out about Muslims in the USA claiming they are going to force Sharia Law on them, but they fail to see that they are forcing their religious law on others. Law of this land should be balanced for all; free of religious bias, free from persecution, and free of stupidity.
Do any of you really think this will be found Constitutional? After all … our supreme court found that a corporation is a person… but I can’t figure out where the egg came from or the fertilization…