Texas victories, pro-abort absurdities

In a small victory for the pro-life movement today:
http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2013/07/13/texas-senate-poised-to-vote-on-abortion-measure/

I'm thrilled with this victory, which although it does not achieve our final goal of banning abortions altogether, is a step in the right direction. I particularly like that it places large financial burdens (hopefully financially crippling) on current and future abortion centers. Given what the Gosnell trial and many other cases have brought to light recently, I don't think anyone with a shred of regard for the health and life of women should be able to protest something that obviously protects their health like this. But, then, maybe some activists are so in favor of abortion that they don't care how it's done- they just want people to be able to kill babies when convenient.

Interacting with the information in the link:

1. "House Bill 2 would require doctors to have admitting privileges at nearby hospitals, allow abortions only in surgical centers, limit where and when women may take abortion-inducing pills and ban abortions after 20 weeks. Only five out of 42 existing abortion clinics meet the requirements to be a surgical center, and clinic owners say they can't afford to upgrade or relocate."

This all sounds quite reasonable to me. Being able to admit patients to a nearby hospital? Having a high standard for health protection in places where abortions do happen? Making sure women aren't just sent home to take abortion pills and left to deliver the dying baby into a toilet? Seems pretty downright reasonable. Makes you wonder why the "pro-women's rights" side is all in a huff. Probably because of the last sentence, but like I said earlier- you would THINK they'd be all for laws that protect women's health given how many rich opportunistic "doctors" have been running these operations to make easy cash while employing, for instance (in the case of Gosnell), a 15-year-old to apply anesthesia.

2. They introduced amendments to add exceptions for cases of rape and incest and to remove some of the more restrictive clauses, but Republicans dismissed all of the proposed changes.

Well, given that most of the bill has to do with the health standards in the facility performing the abortion, I really don't think it would matter what the source of the pregnancy is. Of course, logically it doesn't matter the source of the pregnancy in terms of the value of the human life growing in the womb either.

In the end, this is only a small victory. It does represent a trend in the right direction, though, and drawing the line back 4 weeks will mean that more babies will survive because more women will not have decided by the 20th week. Further, it brings important information to light, such as that babies feel pain at 20 weeks. One can hope and pray that this information will enter the minds of many pro-aborts and change their minds. (As a side note, I think it could be considered ironic that vegetarians are primarily liberal and argue that it's wrong to cause pain to animals- consider that some semi-vegetarians will eat fish because they don't feel pain- but many of them are completely fine with killing the pain-capable child within their bodies).

Further, I think this demonstrates a powerful new option for pro-lifers (though I'm sure it's not entirely new) - that is, that we can and should attack the economic foundation of abortion centers in very reasonable and important ways. Defunding Planned Parenthood is one way. Another way is to continue to raise and enforce the health standards and restrictions on clinics so that evil pseudo-doctors don't set these clinics up to make tons of money. After all, many pro-aborts have argued that by legalizing abortion they were just saving the health of women who were getting back-alley abortions before. You would THINK they'd want high standards of cleanliness and licensed people doing the work.
Maybe by hitting them in the wallet the clinics will fall one by one, making it so difficult to get an abortion that more women will choose to carry the baby and then offer him/her for adoption- an excellent option in all cases. 

In the end this is God's battle, and our job as Christians is to be His tools on earth to save every child we can, and preach to the hearts and minds of the lost and pray that He will redeem them soon.

Who am I? Reflections on commanded comfort

"Awake, awake, put on strength, O arm of the Lord; Awake as in the days of old, the generations of long ago. Was it not You who cut Rahab in pieces, who pierced the dragon? Was it not you who dried up the sea, the waters of the great deep; Who made the depths of the sea a pathway for the redeemed to cross over? So the ransomed of the Lord will return and come with joyful shouting to Zion, and everlasting joy will be on their heads. They will obtain gladness and joy, and sorrow and sighing will flee away.
I, even I, am He who comforts you. 
Who are you that you are afraid of man who dies and of the son of man who is made like grass. 
That you have forgotten the Lord your Maker who stretched out the heavens and laid the foundations of the earth. 
That you fear continually all day long because of the fury of the oppressor, as he makes ready to destroy? But where is the fury of the oppressor? 
The exile will soon be set free, and will not die in the dungeon, nor will his bread be lacking.
For I am the Lord your God, who stirs up the sea and its waves roar (the Lord of hosts is His name). 
I have put My words in your mouth and have covered you with the shadow of My hand, to establish the heavens, to found the earth, and to say in Zion, 'You are my people'"

I, even I, am He who comforts you. 
Who are you that you are afraid of man who dies and of the son of man who is made like grass. 


I, even I, am He who comforts you.
We go through many long, hard, terrible difficulties in our lifetime. We lose friends, we lose family, we hurt them and are hurt by them, and from our first breath until our last in this life we are perpetrators and victims of the sin that has warped us in this very broken world. It is tragically undeniable that our lives cannot be entirely perfect happiness. 
When I was younger, if I was injured I went to my parents for comfort. If I was scared, or sad, or just had a bad day overall, my parents, my friends, my family were usually able to provide some sort of comfort. But there are events in our lives in which the comfort of others falls very far short- life-altering, foundation-shaking events, like the loss of those parents who were that comfort, or the loss of the spouse who was half of your whole, or the great tragedies that are etched forever in our minds that happen around the world and close to home. 
Who do we turn to in those times? An "I'm sorry" and "anything we can do to help" are good comfort, and are welcome from those we know and even those we don't. Yet, on the battlefield amid ten thousand flying possibilities of death, where the ground erupts death and the wind screams death and there is death on the faces of those around us, what is our comfort? 
What is our only comfort in life and death?
Not that I am my own. Not that my gun, my hands, my brain, my emotions, my can-do attitude, my sales ability, or my instincts will save me. Those are all here today and gone tomorrow, grass in a furnace ready to be consumed and destroyed to make room for a new wave of ephemeral things, droplets in an ocean, significant and yet minute. 
My muscles can only lift a couple hundred pounds. My mind can only process so many thoughts, invent so many reactions. My hands can only type so fast and work so hard.
No, our only comfort in life and death is that we are not our own, but belong both body and soul, in life and in death, to our faithful Savior Jesus Christ. That not a hair can fall from our head apart from His will. That ten thousand can fall at our side and yet we are preserved. 
If a bomb went off in this very apartment right now, I *could* survive it unscathed. Men have walked out of hotter furnaces. If a hungry bear were to find me while I'm out in the woods, I could escape alive. Hungrier beasts have had their appetite quieted while the main course mocks from above. (Assuming, of course, no preceding insults toward passing prophets on my part)
There is NOTHING that can possibly happen between Heaven and Sheol apart from the knowledge of our Creator, the Lord God. He stretched out that expanse. He knows it intimately. He knows waterfalls and mountains and galaxies beyond all our knowing as well as He knows the depths of our hearts, our  thoughts (hidden and unhidden), and the state of our souls. He knows His plans, who He will graft and who He will prune. 
We KNOW that Christ is our great high priest, the perfect mediator who is without sin and yet *KNOWS* exactly what we go through when we are tempted. He *KNOWS* what it is to be tempted, and indeed has BEEN tempted far worse than any of us ever have. 
He knows the tragedy of death and the grief of loss, and has shed tears when a loved one has moved on. He's even raised that loved one back to life.
We have every reason in the world, literally, to cast all our cares upon the Lord. We have *every* reason to rely on Him for everything, from each daily breath to the fact that our cities will not be covered in molten lava or a world-ending flood anytime soon. We must know, given the evidence, that those loved ones that pass on while believing in Him are only passing through the stable to travel further up and further in, onward flying joyously toward that endless summer holiday. 

Yet, we would more often than not prefer to cast our cares upon...ourselves. To worry about tomorrow in spite of today's cares. To be clear, I am not saying that we should not store up our harvest in storehouses for the coming winter, nor that we should not be careful and stewardly and use the tools given us by God for the purpose of affecting the care of ourselves and those around us to do their God-given task. But I am saying that our every breath, our every effort, our every exertion and plan and thought and intent and deed, should be done in the knowledge that it is begun and carried through and finished by the God who made us able to do what we did. We must know that the cause of each action and its result is already known, a story written by the Author which we often only see after the words are written, while we're dithering about somewhere in the epilogue. 
We MUST...be comforted.
“Who are you that you are afraid”
The imperative nature of this phrase strikes me because it runs very counter to the inclination of our natural instinct. We prefer to do it ourselves. We want to conquer the mountain on our own, win the medal, receive the accolades. Fix the problem. Heal the person. We prefer fruit over following.
I think that in Isaiah 51:17 God is reminding us that we MUST...be comforted. Taking comfort is not solely the action of a child, nor our very last resort after we’ve tried everything else. We MUST be comforted in the power and the majesty and the glory and the grace and the goodness of the Lord our God, He who is “I AM,” a name that requires no further explanation because He IS. 
In this context while it is absolutely tragic and horrible when one’s children are all slain, one’s goods and servants all stolen, and one’s health degrades near to the point of the death, it is nevertheless absolutely critical that we are COMFORTED by the power of our God, and TRUST in Him. No amount of scraping and debate can change the facts of our utter downfall and loss. Only the Lord who formed our every cell and organ, who breathed into our lungs so that they beat, only He can return what is gone. Only he can heal what is diseased. 
Only He can take us from the black despair of loss into the bright springtime sunlight of life renewed. 
To be sure, it is no small thing to have that trust, to give up the ultimate end of the game knowing your dice simply cannot land on the right numbers. In the depths of our despair, in the midst of our great crises, we are akin to a child at the worst of his fever, when the whole world has gone dark and the sun cannot possibly rise again. 
Yet it does rise. The winter breaks and flowers come again. Our lungs clear up and our heads cool down and life is renewed. 
The tombstone rolls away and the dead once more live.
Our God is unimaginably great and powerful. Every single thing in the world is here as a result of His intent, His constant will that His words retain their form. And He loves us. He died for us, and has performed every single impossible thing we can possibly think of. Not one thing that we accomplish can ever compare to the weight of His glory and majesty. He does not need to give to us- we have given nothing so that He might owe us- and yet He DOES GIVE. He who did not spare His own Son but gave Him up for us all will surely with Him yet give us all things. 
This is not prosperity gospel. This is not faith for funds. God is not our servant, and yet God *is* able to give His people all that He desires to give them, and He wants us to pray to Him, to seek first His kingdom and His righteousness. He WILL add all the things we need unto us if we do so. As our works are committed to the Lord our thoughts ARE established. 
We MUST trust Him.
We MUST serve Him.
We MUST be comforted by Him.
Oh what a comfort that the reason for our being is here, now, requiring our trust. Take His hand - He knows the way, and you will not stumble. 
Have faith.

Romans 8. 
But in all these things we overwhelmingly conquer through Him who loved us. For I am convinced that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor things present, nor things to come, nor powers, nor height, nor depth, nor any other created thing, will be able to separate us from the Love of God, which is in Christ Jesus our Lord. 

Excerpts of Job
"Have you ever in your life commanded the morning, and caused the dawn to know its place, that it might take hold of the ends of the earth, and the wicked be shaken out of it?"
"Who has cleft a channel for the flood, or a way for the thunderbolt, to bring rain on a land without people, on a desert without a man in it, to satisfy the waste and desolate land and to make the seeds of grass to sprout?"
"Do you know the ordinances of the heavens, or fix their rule over the earth?"
"Will you really annul My judgment? Will you condemn me that you may be justified? Or do you have an arm like God, and can you thunder with a voice like His?"
"Who has given to me that I should repay him? Whatever is under the whole heaven is Mine."
Then Job answered the Lord and said, "I know that You can do all things, and that no purpose of Yours can be thwarted."

Romans 11: Oh the depth of the riches both of the wisdom and knowledge of God! How unsearchable are His judgments and unfathomable His ways! For who has known the mind of the Lord, or who became His counselor? Or who has first given to him that it might be paid back to Him again? For from Him and through Him and to Him are all things. To Him be the glory forever. Amen. 

Stories Pt. 2

I have a fascination with reading stories, but I am not much of a storyteller. Or, to be more specific, I am a very prolific and hard-working storyteller, but I'm afraid I don't put a lot of time and effort into the details of my own story.

Perhaps because I know the ending of the story I'm telling, I'm less motivated to put work into the plot and the character development. On most days I spend a fair amount of time hoping for a plot device to enter the narrative, whisking away some defining struggle. At those critical moments, those great crises that really grab at the heart and define the future of my story, I have to admit I'd often rather jump to the last page. How does this story end?

We are all storytellers, of course. Each of us crafts an epic novel over a period of minutes, days and years. Our stories are constantly read by others, critiqued by others, and face that dreaded reread at the end of the day. Some days I just close the book and throw away the editing pen. On other days, this rough draft carries some heavy red ink.

What does the main character in your story sound like? We all write with the intent of building a protagonist, or at least a sympathetic character. You may be a victim or you may be an oppressor (justified, of course, by the faulty narratives of others). At some point your story will include comedy, tragedy, drama, action, romance, and perhaps even horror. How will your main character react? How will his reactions be read by others?

One inescapable fact of our stories is that they will be read by others. We can attempt to limit the types of readers who will interact with and give input to our plot, but in the end both the cultured and the uncultured, the wise and the foolish, and the Godly and ungodly will encounter our story and interact with it. What will their reactions be? How do they see my story?

I certainly don't always want them to read my story, and there are bits here and there, elements of my character's development and events which they need not all be privy to. However, it cannot be denied that when my story unfolds in the public eye at times, its impact must be understood. A bold-labeled Christian story left open before the eyes of the unbelieving ought not therefore to read as though it had fallen off the pop fiction shelf and been dragged through a sea of profanity on the way to the reading desk. Words have an impact, and the story of my life makes changes both grand and minute in the sentences and paragraphs of authors around me every day. A jovial mood may inspire many stories to lighten up, whereas my character's anger may sour and make bitter or angry the stories around me.

I hope soon that my story will have a co-author, but just to be clear, I'm not shopping for a ghostwriter. A good few editors have made their mark on my story along the way, and it has surely benefitted from their input, but I'd be foolish to throw away my pen. Any man who would dictate a story through the pen of another writer cannot deserve credit for the outcome of his life.

We live in a perpetual rough draft, a compendium of ten million short stories that form the saga of our whole life. To be sure, some of our early writings are our worst, and we're thankful that we have a couple much more experienced editors along for that ride. They let us know when the main character needs to develop, and their guidance helps make a masterpiece out of a children's book. Someday I look forward to editing and helping to write a few new books myself.

It's something of a terrifying thought, though, bringing new stories into the world. Those first words, that beginning sentence, initiate what will, Author willing, be another lengthy novel. There are so many considerations, so many chances to make a mistake. Too much red ink might drown out the narrative, and too much control of the story might make the characters uncreative. Perhaps more terrifying is the fact that those stories aren't entirely in my hands, or even theirs.

Through all this, however, there is one reason why I do not fear setting my pen down at the end of each day; one reason why I do not fear even sometimes setting it aside in the middle of an important plot twist. That reason is the Author, who knows and has seen the beginning and the end of mine and every other story in the world. What greater comfort can there be than to know that no matter how great the conflict, no matter what climactic event may cast my character about and threaten his strength, even so the conclusion has already been reached. It has even been promised.

So I write, not for myself, and not solely for the reading of other writers. Rather, I write primarily for the Author, seeking to mirror with my pencil the fine calligraphy of His masterful strokes. I seek to write my story in ways  that please the Author, and trust and have peace in the knowledge that he will perfect my character through his editing. I write each story with all the emotions and much of the uncertainty that all this world's authors do, but I know the ending. It's a really uplifting, inspiring one. I won't be the hero though, and the victory certainly won't be achieved by my means - there has been, is, and will be serious divine intervention involved in my plot. I have no problem with this, though, because at the end of the day I know that I cannot write a perfect story.

That is for my Author and Lord to accomplish.

Stories Pt. 1

Note: This was stylistically inspired by the book "Notes from the Tilt-A-Whirl" by N.D. Wilson (which everyone should go out and read and then watch the DVD)

I have a fascination with stories. I like anecdotes, and I like epic sagas. I'm interested in happy stories, sad stories, scary stories, stories with meaning, and most of all stories that can play out on a little film reel in my head.

Sometimes as I drive, or sit in the food court at the mall, or fly above the earth at 38000 feet across a country of millions, I try to imagine stories occurring around me. When a frowning middle-aged man with a gut walks past, is he just a man in mid-life crisis? An angry boyfriend of an unhappy woman? Perhaps he's a man with a troubled teenage daughter who he loves, but who has made some bad decisions. Perhaps he's normally a cheerful, witty man, but today he spilled his coffee on his shirt or stubbed his toe. Maybe the series of events that led up to his coffee spill were the sort that will read well in a book he writes, or lift spirits at his next party. Maybe there was a near-death experience, or a life saved (his or that of a child- this story could be inspiring or involve frivolous lawsuits). 

I doubt I'd do well to ask him the story now. His disposition promises more rain than sunshine, his words more likely to be foul than fair. But I still wonder.

My grandfather cut off his finger (at least) three times during his decades as a carpenter/woodworking genius. I think it was the same finger. Guys find this sort of thing amusing, ironic. I once had my thumb shut in a sliding minivan door for a good minute before the door was unlocked and my purplish thumb released. Now it's a war story to compete with others among a group of friends who have suffered broken limbs, dangerous allergies, concussions, and any number of other painful events in their past. We laugh, we wince, we try to paint greater tales with each passing minute. This scar came from an unfortunate tumble down the stairs. That bruise came from fighting off a pack of lions.

Enter a comedy on the food court stage - young suburban kids bedecked in gear that is supposed to represent the poor and underprivileged. 

What are their stories?

Are they fools acting tough and distant from the world, looking to score drugs or pick up women? Are these dissonant notes in the middle of a symphony? Ink spatters on a Davinci masterpiece?

Are they young men carrying a fashionable image (one sort of fashion anyway) that they like, but whose cultural associations they do not identify with? Are they just trying to fit in? Perhaps they listen to 50 Cent and Eminem in the car with their friends, but turn on the classical music when no one's around, and dream of performing solos of Bach and Handel's great choral works.

One guy has his pants hanging low. I think I know his story. I sneer at the fiction I've just written. It is a story unfit for the pages being written all around him. It belongs in the "pop" section at best, or perhaps it ought not to have been published at all. Will these pages do anything but steal ink from the rest of us? 

 Maybe he helped lift groceries into the car for an elderly lady and his well-worn belt snapped from the effort.

What is your story? What stories play into your life? What was your worst injury, your funniest joke, your first kiss, taste of candy, or ride at the amusement park? 

 What is the story you tell with your walk, with your emotions, with your expressions, with your actions? Does it fit with the first draft you composed this morning? Are you producing and directing a box office hit, an artistic masterpiece, or will this one go straight to DVD? What will the critics say? What will the Critic say?

 My stories are all bestsellers you know. They're all 100% original. They're very dramatic, very artistic. My tragedies call forth rivers of tears, my dramas gain sympathy and understanding, and my comedies produce the best laughs.

That is, if anyone actually took the time to read them.

I frown as I walk through the mall. I'm remembering a mistake I made last week at work. Before I know it the audience knows me as an angry character. No doubt I'd be the guy picking the fight, the example made by the hero. 

 Who made the casting decisions? I was supposed to play the conflicted hero with a complex past. My performance is nuanced. Everyone will love me as soon as I reach Starbucks.

The world has 7 billion novels, each of them with somewhere between one and a million chapters. Do you like reading? I'm usually more of a picture book guy, but I'm getting a lot more interested in words.

Who is the person next to you in the elevator? Why is she wearing mismatched socks? Who's helping take care of her baby now that her husband died serving in the military?

Who are you? 

Tell me a story.

Senses and senseless

First a few verses that inspired the poem:

Psalm8

OLord, our Lord, how majestic is Your name in all the earth, who have displayedYour splendor above the heavens! From the mouth of infants and nursing babesYou have established strength because of Your adversaries, to make the enemyand the revengeful cease. When I consider Your heavens, the work of Yourfingers, the moon and the stars which you have ordained; What is man that Youtake thought of him, and the son of man that You care for him? Yet you havemade him a little lower than God, and You crown him with glory and majesty! Youmake him to rule over the works of Your hands; You have put all things underhis feet, all sheep and oxen, and also the beasts of the field, the birds ofthe heavens and the fish of the sea, whatever passes through the paths of theseas. O Lord, our Lord, how majestic is Your name in all the earth!  

Job10:8-12 

Yourhands fashioned and made me altogether, and would You destroy me? Remember now,that You have made me as clay, and would You turn me into dust again? Did you notpour me out like milk, and curdle me like cheese; Clothe me with skin andflesh, and knit me together with bones and sinews? You have granted me life andloving kindness; and Your care has preserved my spirit.

Psalm139: 13-16

ForYou formed my inward parts; You wove me in my mother’s womb. I will give thanksto You, for I am fearfully and wonderfully made; wonderful are your works, andmy soul knows it very well. My frame was not hidden from You, when I was madein secret, and skillfully wrought in the depths of the earth; Your eyes haveseen my unformed substance; and in Your book were all written the days thatwere ordained for me, when as yet there was not one of them. 

Before I saw, or was yet seen

By any creature here

You saw me Lord, and knew my ways

And saw my life so clear

And cell by cell each hour and day

From nearly nothing I

Was woven Lord, by Master hands

Whose craft none can deny

You gave me eyes, O Lord, to see

The stars and sunset’s flame

Such beauty Lord, as can’t be called

By any fitting name

You gave me touch, to know the feel

Of bark and stone and steel

To feel the cool of ice and wind,

And know my breath is real

You gave me ears, to capture Lord

The sounds of songs and words

And filled the world with music, Lord

Of symphonies and birds

You gave me taste to make my meals

Delicious,wondrous, grand

You filled the world with flavors Lord

So many tastes at hand!

You gave me smell, to better know

The joy of growth and heat

In foods and flowers overwhelmed

My senses are complete.

Oh Lord how great the life you wove-

This intricate design!

How glad I am that this whole life

Is blessedly now mine

We thank you Lord that each of us

Is full of life to live

That you, Lord, wove us each in love

A blessed life to give

I pray each day you will O Lord,

With care our children make

And break O Lord the will of those

Who your creations break

For fearfully you build O Lord

And wonderfully we’re planned

Plant fear O Lord, in those who break

With terror stay their hand

Convict, O Lord, the hearts of those

So blinded in their sin

To know that you’re at work to grow

That precious life within

For every sense that in them dwells

Is mirrored in their womb

O Lord protect the helpless ones

Whom senselessness has doomed

The beautiful story

Picnics, fires, food and sunsets

Ice cream, chocolate, grass and swings

Running fast and laughing loudly

My life’s full of blessed things

  

Struggles for what’s right and decent

Arguments and making up

Fights for good and flight from evil

With maturing fill my cup

  

Day by day the story lengthens

Working, playing, word by word

All our stories interwoven

Joys and battles uninsured

  

Now a crisis, hearts now broken

Then new hope through something small

Here your story darkens, deepens

Soon though good will reign o’er all

 Each day’s fullness, darker, lighter

Fills your memories, builds your life

Praise the Author for this story

Pray you’ll see more joy than strife

  

Thank Him that He planned beginnings

And foresaw beyond the end

Thankful be for birth and parents

And the love with which they tend

 Oh the sorrow for those others

Stories shortened tragically

They were faces we’d remember

If they were but here to see

But the millions, lost to hatred

But for most through lack of care

Lost their stories at the prologue

Such a sorrow ours to bear

  

EVERY story has its struggles

EVERY story has its joy

WHY play god and burn the story

Of that brand new girl or boy

Send them to a different writer

One who edits with more love

Bear them, bear that awesome burden

Pray for help from up above

  

Nothing happens in this Story

Just so bad there is no hope

You‘re ALIVE, don’t end their stories

Just because you couldn’t cope

  

You can NOT say it is better

That their life would be all pain

FIND a story that’s that broken

In this life of sun and rain

 Oh that sunrise would rise, glorious

Bright in eyes of millions more

Oh that wind would soft, surround these

Children of the moral poor

  

God above we pray and battle

For these vulnerable lives

Keep them safe and end the killing

Break the needles, blunt the knives

  

Prosecute and end the villains

Comfort those who are afraid

May we every day as Christians

Save the children you have made.

Fill your world, and soon Lord bring us

Further in and higher up

Bring us to that endless table

Where with you we’ll raise our cup

Abortion law, consistency, and morality

So today I was curious as to whether there are cases (as I'm sure there are plenty across the country) wherein the murder of a child previous to 20 weeks has been charged against someone in light of the mother's desiring to not abort that child. I wasn't disappointed. Read the following, it's not too long and very interesting to see how someone will attempt to bend and twist to charge murder for the death of something they do not see as human in other situations.http://writ.news.findlaw.com/colb/20040128.html 

Following here are interactions with the more maddening parts of the article:

1. "Many students agree, moreover, that a fetus has moral worth that requires that as long as the mother is prepared to sustain the physical and emotional burdens of pregnancy, others must refrain from harming her fetus. In response to the ruling in Keeler, the California legislature amended its murder statute to add "fetus" to the class of victims whose malicious killing would qualify as murder, coupled with an exception for consensual abortions."

Here they introduce the idea, which is commonly held, that the fetus maintains a moral value only as long as the mother deems it to. The full responsibility for the definition of the value and life of the child is given to the mother as the carrier of the child, in effect conferring upon her the position of God. A 10-day-old fetus is valuable, and in fact has human rights (see more later) when the mother determines it does. Should she determine otherwise, it is no longer human and may be killed immediately.

 2. "A truer analogy, then, is not to the man who slips on a subway platform but rather to the man who shoots at a woman who is lying in her bed but whose bullet kills not only the woman but also a child concealed underneath the woman's blanket. Though the shooter did not know about the child when he aimed his gun, his actions were nonetheless intentional, and he specifically meant for those actions to result in a person's death."

I agree with this completely. In fact I think the analogy could be expanded and applied to all abortions in one way or another.

3. "Because the right to choose abortion is a right on the part of the woman to physical integrity and not a per se right to kill an unwanted fetus, the moment that physical integrity becomes compatible with fetal life, the right to maintain one no longer includes the right to terminate the other. (For similar reasons, a genetic mother has no right to terminate a surrogate mother's pregnancy, no matter how much the former wants to avoid becoming a genetic parent.) The constitutional right to abortion is simply a right to stop being pregnant, no more and no less." 

Put more simply, "Abortion isn't about killing a baby, it's about a woman's right to have her body to herself and do what she wants with her life."  While a semi-positive side effect of this line of thinking would be that abortion post-20 weeks should be taken right off the table immediately (given the potential viability of babies born after that point), the use of viability as a determining factor in the value of the baby is both absurd and horrible. It opens the door to arguments for a family member's right to end the non-independently viable life of any of their relatives; or the hospitals and governments to end the lives of patients and citizens. Sure, you may say now, that only involves people in comas (horrific enough) who aren't likely to recover at all. But that definition can and certainly will be broadened. When a member of my family had major surgery and complications occurred, he was arguably incapable of living outside of the artificial support given him for over 2 weeks, in terms of his body being able to live on its own. For that matter, anyone on a ventilator or with a pacemaker could arguably be deemed non-viable because they can't live on their own. The implications for who will live and die in future generations can only be feared at this point.  

We continue...4. "With the willing participation of the pregnant woman in sustaining the life of her fetus, it is no longer morally relevant to ask whether the fetus's lungs could breathe air if its mother were to deliver it immediately. The fetus is "viable," as against an assailant, because if left in its mother's consensual care, it will probably continue to survive. If a woman is willing to be pregnant, the fetus is thus "viable" as long as it is alive."

In other words, California law clearly states that from conception onward the fetus IS viable AS LONG AS the mother intends to carry the child to term and deliver him/her. They only apply this to the case of an unwanted abortion because they're unwilling to infringe upon the rights of the mother, but it is totally absurd to determine that a child is viable and indeed holds all the rights of a fully grown human being from day one ONLY if the mother chooses to keep him/her alive. If a child is human because the eventual result of that conception is a fully alive human being, if carried properly and delivered, then the child is human regardless of the will and desires of the mother. In fact, her determination to NOT carry said child to term should be just as much an infringement upon the viability of the child as the assailant who kills the child through a violent act. The law is clearly indicating that the biologically inevitable (given no intervening events) future result of the pregnancy confers upon the conceived child all the rights of any other human being, whether one day old or 115 years old. Otherwise, to follow their reasoning, the child's life ought to remain directly in the hands of the mother for as long as the child infringes upon her "physical integrity", which would certainly at least include the period of time wherein the child is breastfeeding. To further my argument in point three, the California laws essentially state that a human being is a human being only as long as directly involved family members are willing to suffer the setbacks of caring for him or her. In the (slightly paraphrased) words of Doug Wilson, a woman's right to do what she wants with her body includes her right to cut off a finger or a hand. It does not include a right to do what she wants to the separate body existing within her.

It seems to me (and I'd appreciate input, as I don't always think clearly when first interacting with articles) that California law should provide sufficient groundwork for the banning of all abortion. Certainly it provides us a useful tool in battling pro-abortion rights people, since I think most of them would agree that terminating a "wanted pregnancy" should be murder. Their argument is untenable, so long as we're all being consistent.