In Canada the law is that the fetus isn’t a person until the moment is it born. A competent person being defined as someone who has rights and the ability to make stable choices. This is and always has been a touchy topic, from abortions to birth control. “Politicians are to scared to go there”- An incredibly smart man once said. How do we decide when a person becomes a person? “We” don’t, the government decides, making the laws around personhood as broad as they can go.
We as a society react so heavily to these conflicts, but we don’t often touch on Christian Science; a religious practice following a book written by Mary Baker Eddy made in 1879(http://christianscience.com/what-is-christian-science). This practice includes the healing of Jesus “proven” through its medical exercise. This basically means that parents/guardians, through Christian Science can withhold their child from “un-needed” medical attention. Allowing them to legally make decisions to consciously end their child’s life. That child will never get a say in the life it was about to live, because of the choices his parents made for him. “to commemorate the word and works of our Master, which should reinstate primitive Christianity and its lost element of healing” (Church Manual, p.17). This blog isn’t to shun Christian Science, I simply believe that a living person shouldn’t be denied health care because of their parents beliefs. If the child had cancer, do you think its right to just pray that the cancer goes away and not get the medical help?
Interesting train of thought, and certainly important topics in today's conversation.
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