The Idealized Conservative on Church & State

After hearing more and more conservatives openly promoting the unity of Church and State (only their Church, or course) I found this quote from one of their favs ironic.

An Abortion of a Post

A Catholic apologist I follow recently said that “religion isn’t required to show that an unborn child is a human being.” The particular phrasing of this statement makes it obvious. A child of a human is a human. No need for debate there. The less clear question is this: is an unborn zygote or fetus a child? For the sake of argument, let’s say yes, but that still isn’t entirely the point. After all, the corpse of a human is still a human. The morality of abortion must take into account more than black and white definitions.

Killing cells isn’t a morally wrong act by anyone’s standard. If it was, everything from sun tans to common medical procedures would be stigmatized or illegal. A fertilized egg is a very active collection of cells. In my opinion, the main distinction between human cells and human people is consciousness. While the moral argument of aborting a mind cannot be made until the brain develops, the moral argument for aborting a soul can be made at conception...providing one accepts that the spiritual enters the material during orgasmic climax or shortly thereafter. I know breeders tend to say “on my God” in bed, but I’m not sure that’s exactly what they mean. It’s magical thinking, and it’s the foundation for religious pro-life reasoning.

This post is probably painting me as a bleeding heart pro-choice advocate. I don’t consider myself as such--my view is more nuanced. Unlike religious pro-life reasoning, there is valid secular pro-life reasoning that takes into account the terms of the pregnancy as well as other factors. When the brain and nervous system develop and the unborn child begins to think and feel, I am far less comfortable with abortion. Watching the ultrasounds of my twins, I learned that this development happens surprisingly early. It’s hard to say exactly when my feelings on the subject change. As a rule, I am pro-choice for the first trimester and pro-life for the third, with my opinion during the second trimester contingent largely on the situation--but still leaning pro-life. I think this is a common take on the moral dilemma of the issue. The religious pro-lifers tend to defend their position with images of near-fully developed kids cut out of women’s bodies. This is always gruesome and, at least in my case, a straw man pictorial. In a way, it’s also misrepresenting their own position, considering Catholics focus the lion’s share of their propaganda  on late term abortions while they feel the exact same way about morning after pills.*

*This may be a generalization, but it’s a well informed one. I’m representing the Catholic Church’s position and very few Catholics defect from the Church’s position on anything much less a hallmark like abortion.

The Hypothetical Progressive Pope

I’ve been trying out hypothetical as a way to show believers where their beliefs originate. The best example I’ve worked out is directed specifically toward Catholics. I ask:

If a future Pope reversed the Church’s position on gay marriage, would you also reverse your position on gay marriage?

The word Pope could be substituted for “religious leader” to make this less Catholicism-centric, but the Catholic Church is fairly unique in that it’s doctrine trumps even the Bible in the eyes of its congregation. Seeing how the Pope is the infallible spokesperson for the Church, his word matters immensely.

Now, let’s look at what the possible answers mean. If a believer who opposes gay marriage answers in the affirmative, they show that their assessment of morality and their opinions of what is or isn’t discriminatory are based solely on authority. Whatever the Church thinks is how they think. The Pope is the Borg Queen in this scenario. If the believer instead says they would maintain their opposition of gay marriage against the Church, then we can know for sure that their belief is in fact a product of their own reasoning--at the cost of being a "bad Catholic."

Neither option is at all palatable to the believer, so if you pose the question, expect a refusal to answer. Most often I get, “the Church would never change their position so the question is moot.” That may be, but claiming certain knowledge of the future is a childish dodge for people with a distaste for hypothetical. Nevertheless we can’t force an answer out of them. This isn’t the Inquisition. (Speaking of which, poor Galileo would say that the Church sometimes, eventually, changes their position.) Simply posing the question is enough for the believer to formulate an answer, even if they see the trap set for verbalization. Consider the point made.

Gay Marriage Opponents are Bigots

It’s no secret that the religion fueled, hot button issue of the day is gay marriage. Like it's religion-fueled issue of abortion, gay marriage one of those nasty debates where generalized accusations fly based solely on one’s stance. Gay marriage supporters are endorsing immoral behavior. Gay marriage opponents are bigots on the wrong side of history. Both sides not only deny the accusations, but frame them in such a way that they no longer makes sense. I’ll argue that only one side of the issue has internally consistency.

Gay marriage supporters deny the claims by refuting the authoritative worth and/or truth of the bible, which is the only possible reason homosexual behavior can be seen as immoral. This makes me happy on a few levels. Since the America is pretty evenly divided on the morality of homosexuality, that means roughly half the population refute the authoritative worth and/or truth of the bible. Considering how many people belong to Bible-centric religions in the US, this means that most of them aren’t nearly as sold on their faith as survey data shows. They are my favorite kind of Christians--those that are Christian in name only. The most secular gay marriage supports make the accusations against them nonsensical in their warranted rejection of “sin” as a concept.

The opponents of gay marriage originally pushed that homosexuality was a choice, but this argument didn't hold up. First, there was a problem calling the majority of those who are an authority on homosexuality, gays themselves, liars. Second, there was a problem that if homosexuality is a choice, then so should heterosexuality be a choice. The straight opponents refused to accept this. Now, opponents deny claims of bigotry with their “hate the sin, not the sinner” rhetoric. Denying a person rights and branding them immoral for who they fundamentally are is the definition of bigotry, but focusing their intolerance on the one action that separates the gays from the breeders (that is, homosexual sex) is a loophole in the bigotry label--at least in their eyes.

This loophole is many things, but internally consistent isn’t one of them. Since the only way to see gay sex as immoral is by appealing to Abrahamic religious traditions, then we should measure their entire argument by the same standard. The bible repeatedly states that sins of the heart and mind are just as damning as sinful actions. Hell, it’s even in the commandments. Thou shalt not covet is an entirely separate command from thou shalt not steal. When using the bible as their guide, the unavoidable and internal homosexual attraction is just as sinful as the active and external homosexual sex act. Therefore, it is safe to conclude that gay marriage opponents are, in fact, bigots.

Politics Shmolitics

In an effort to expand my topic base, I’m considering branching out into related areas. I figure a good way to make a religion themed blog even more heated and controversial is by adding politics. My only hang-up is that politics ain't my thing...mostly because I enjoy being right.

Religion is pretty cut and dry. There either is a God or there’s not. If I was a believer, many more debates could be had about the nature, powers, disposition, mouthpiece, etc. of God, but I'm not. This makes it simple. I have very little doubt that am wrong on this single issue which, so far, has been the driving force of Deity Shmeity. Hell, it's in the name.

If I started writing about politics, I’d be far to wishy washy to make a compelling argument. Being skeptical is not conducive with punditry. There is so much spin that the over arching narrative of both sides of fiscal policy seems to lead to the same place--fairness. Is it fair that the rich pay more taxes without any extra incentive while the poor pay nothing and receive handouts? Is it fair that our system makes it easy for the rich to become richer and the poor become poorer? No on both counts. Fairness isn’t a marketable trait for either party.

I’m socially liberal, but that’s about all I have to say. I’ve done a gay post. I support feminism as much as a next guy (key word being guy.) My only passion politically is keeping church and state separate, but this is only periodically a problem. While there are plenty who want more bible in the constitution, I don’t see that happening anytime soon.

So politics are out. There are enough political opinion sites out there and most of them do the public a disservice. If this blog morphes into something else, it won’t be the O’Reilly Factor. You’re welcome.

Soul Abortion

Politics and religion, the two subjects that should not be discussed at the dinner table. Each have their share of hot button topics, none more so than those that overlap between the two. Today I’m talking about one such topic, the morning after pill.

You may wonder why I don’t cover the broader issue of abortion. It’s because I have no clear stance on the matter. I’m pro-choice for first trimester abortions and pro-life for third trimester abortions. Any demarcation as to when exactly my stance changes is largely arbitrary, so I vaguely point to the second trimester. My feeling is that there are valid, secular reasons not to abort an unwanted fetus, but only religious reasons to oppose aborting an unwanted embryo. Plan B provides the perfect example of religion fueled opposition and is the safest for me to discuss without hesitation.

Emergency contraceptive pills (ECPs), such as Plan B, are intended to disrupt ovulation and/or fertilization. They are basically just a higher dose of standard birth control and likely don’t abort anything. Even so, the rivals of the pills claim that they could be an abortion, and any chance of this is a chance of killing another person.

When they say "person" or "baby" or "human-being," remember whatever terminology a theist uses for that thing in mamma's belly, they really mean a “soul.” In their eyes, a person begins at fertilization because a divine entity has delivered a soul to a collection of cells. I don’t buy the angelic stork hypothesis. It won’t be some immortal essence that brings conciousness to the unborn child. It will be it’s brain...and it doesn’t have one yet.

So if you are opposed to abortion and you are opposed to the morning after pill, I’m going to write off your opinions as magical thinking. If you are opposed to abortion and you support ECPs, then we can talk. My opinion remains flaky until the theoretical question of “would you have an abortion?” becomes practical...and seeing how I’m not a woman, I doubt it ever will.