Should Abortion Be Allowed?
"Should
abortion be allowed at least in cases of incest or rape?"
Imagine that after a brutal attack and rape by a relative, a woman ends up in coma and becomes pregnant.
Imagine also that she remains in her coma for several years, during which the baby
growing in her reaches
full term and is delivered by caesarean section.
When the woman finally wakes up from her coma, learns that the child near her is hers
from the ince
stuous rape and requests the child be killed, would
you kill that child?
(Inc
estuous) rape is a despicable crime for which the
perpetrator deserves the full punishment allowed by law. But the child in such a
case is another victim of the crime, not its perpetrator.
Justice for a crime requires the punishment of the guilty, not the
murder of an innocent (see
Justice of God for the exception), whether inside or outside the womb.
In the Bible, God also explicitly forbade punishing a child for the sin of his father
-
"The son shall not bear the guilt of the father, ... the wickedness of the
wicked shall be upon himself" (Ezekiel 18:20) - so a child fathered
by a rapist cannot be killed for the rape.