a. The practice to be barred by law injures the common good substantially. b. The law can be enforced equitably in its incidence.

c. Enforcement of the law does not cause greater evil than it represses. Here we must make one distinction that is important, and we must make it dispassionately. An act may be moral, but illegal. An act may be immoral but legal. And finally an act can be both moral and legal. Morality and legality have little in common. Furthermore, an immoral act should not be placed in law unless it can stand the criteria listed above, namely, that it is evil, can be enforced, and is not worse than the evil it suppresses.

Concerning the specific issue of abortions there is room for discussion of whether abortion substantially harms the common good. Certainly one can make a strong argument that failing to abort may harm the common good in some cases. Similarly, one can argue that abortion may be equally destructive.

Like much unfortunate legislation on the law books, abortion laws are unenforceable, much less equitably enforceable. The practice of abortion has always been available to those willing to pay, the rich, and unavailable to the poor. Furthermore juries have always been reluctant to convict the mother of wrongdoing on the basis that she has already suffered sufficiently. Some abortionists were quacks gladly jailed, but others were reputable physicians whom juries were equally unwilling to convict or prosecutors to prosecute. The experience of the Clergy Consultation Service (CCS) on Therapeutic Abortions which, for three years, aided women to procure abortions, is a testimony to this fact. While the CCS provided information and assistance on a nonprofit basis, the legality of its service was dubious. Members operated with the full knowledge of police and judicial officials, and no action to investigate or prosecute was ever taken.

Enforcement of abortion laws indeed may cause greater harm than it represses. Unwanted children are frequently the victims of abuse. Furthermore, women who obtain illegal abortions on the black market often suffer badly. Finally carrying an unwanted pregnancy to term, the family disruption, the possibility of maternal dangers, the risks of badly defective infants, and the attendant problems, and the general trauma of an unhappy situation all argue that laws which repress abortion may cause the greater evil.

We must recognize that we cannot legislate morality, particularly when there is no way to enforce that morality equitably. To do so makes a fool of the law and the judicial process. Unenforced laws and unenforceable law breed mockery, chaos, and disruption.

THE DENIAL OF ABORTION

This paper has not dealt in statistics and the batles in which pro-abortion and right to life people love to engage. Yet something needs to be said about what happens when abortions are not available legally and safely.

For the mother whose health and life are endangered, the refusal of an abortion will have immediate results. At best her health (mental or physical) will be impaired and at worst she will die. Depending on the circumstances the child may die as well.

The defective or deformed child that is allowed birth will soon know its outcome. Some defects are relatively inconsequential. Others will cause death. De Toni Franconi Syndrome, for example, will bring about retardation, rickets, and an early death. Down's Syndrome, better known as mongolism, will bring imbecility and a shortened life. Frequently Down's Syndrome includes heart defects which will have to be repaired. Microcephalism will bring about a useless, imbecile life and a probably early death. Hydrocephalism may be repairable by surgery, at least in some cases. If not, it will produce physical grotesqueness and mental impairment. Rubella and thalidomide produce their own kind of grotesqueness and impairment. Others may genetically reproduce age-old problems like hemophilia. This is but a short and imperfect catalog, yet in all these cases, defective children will die without special care. They will be a burden on family and society and they will have very little potential to achieve a satisfactory life by any standard. Many, if not most, will be relegated to institutions which are not heavens on earth, to say the least.

The married woman who does not want a child and whose family becomes overburdened by too large a population will suffer from need. To the middle class this may seem to be a problem but to the poor this probably means an unwanted child. Whether poor or rich, the family may cope financially, but the unwanted child is a very innocent sufferer. It will do no good to recite columns of figures here, but the unwanted child is often a neglected child. Moreover, an unwanted

child frequently becomes an abused and battered child who often becomes society's outcast and criminal.

For the unmarried woman who has her child and keeps it there is the problem of social ostracism. While there is greater acceptance of illegitimacy in our society than in earlier times an illegitimate child still encounters a host of legal problems. In addition, the young mother will encounter the difficulty of obtaining financial support either by welfare or by working. With her child she will certainly be a less attractive "catch" to any prospective husband. Finally, the child may well grow up without benefit of a father.

For the unmarried woman who has her child and places it for adoption there will be trauma at several levels. First she will lose a portion of her life, frequently in a "home" away from home in order to keep the pregnancy a secret. Second she will feel the pain of the secrecy and the shame of her family's reproaches. If she is young she will be unable to do other than share this secret with her family. While most families react supportively, nevertheless they frequently also reproach the wayward daughter in unconscious ways, even when they do not intend. She will also encounter the pains of childbirth and its attendant discomforts. More traumatic, however, will be giving up a child she has carried for nine months with the proviso that she may never see that child again and that the child will never know its mother. The sealing of court records concerning adoptions is a practice now being challenged in the courts. Some would like to discover their biological parents. All the secrecy attending adoptions of unwanted children attests to our society's lack of understanding.

Finally there is the woman who, having been denied an abortion, seeks out her own abortion methods. While some of the illegal abortions were performed by qualified medical personnel in antiseptic conditions, all too many were performed by laymen (or women) using crude and unsterile methods. Even with the availability of legal abortions I have known a few misguided souls who sought out a lay abortionist only to return from their experience with a severe infection. Infection is only a mild outcome. Many have been rendered sterile and others have died. The number who die each year due to abortions is not really known. Depending on the source and the outlook of the statistician the figure varies. The number who obtain illegal abortions each year is even more nebulous. By all counts both figures are too high. Regardless of the law abortion has always been seen by a substantial portion of the population as a suitable, even if undesirable, method of birth control.

FETAL EXPERIMENTS

The disposal of deceased fetal material has also become an issue in our society. Some, regarding fetal material no longer in utero, as just so much flesh, have endeavored to use this material for study and experimentation. This touches upon the potentially explosive issue of medical experimentation on human beings. Certainly we should never produce fetal matter for this purpose; however, it would seem that, with the consent of the mother, fetal matter could be used for autopsy and other experiments, providing death had occurred. This would be no different than an autopsy or examination of any organ that had been removed. Creating foeti in vitro is, of course, quite another matter. It may one day be possible to create human life completely in vitro. This would not be fundamentally wrong in any way; however, the entire thought brings us so close to Brave New World as to be frightening. It does little good to frighten ourselves on the basis of what has not happened. If men are eventually able to create and mature life in vitro those men will have to face the consequences. We should not muse about what we cannot yet and do not in fact do.

A THEOLOGICAL POSITION

The Church has almost always opposed abortion. When it has permitted it this permission has been granted only within severely narrowed confines, predicated on choosing the lesser of two or more evils. Pillored by criticism, the early Church, among other things, was attacked as a religion requiring child sacrifice, a charge also occasionally leveled against the Jews.

In the 21st century which we rapidly approach we will need to retain contact with our historical roots. But the 20th century has overturned civilization. Ethical considerations which were unthinkable in 1900 are now, and will be a necessity in the near future. Population control, birth control and abortion are with us now and we cannot avoid them.

There are still those among us who resent speaking of Biblical elements as myth. At best these people mistake the trees for the woods. Myth gives us the vision to look at the world. The myth of Genesis is especially poignant at this juncture. As man repeatedly acquires new knowledge he repeatedly steps out of the Garden of Eden. Discussions about abortion and euthanasia used to be relatively academic, but today we have the capacity and the need to consider them seriously. Since we have the knowledge, we cannot unknow it. We cannot bury our heads in the sand like the proverbial ostrich. With today's medical capabilities we have gained considerable mastery over the aspects of our existence which involve birth and death. As we come out of our Garden of Eden into the world of knowing and mastery we suffer from the toil of decision and the pain of living with our decisions.

Too many people would have us ignore our knowledge. They argue that there are some things about which man should not know, forgetting:

And God said, "Let us make man in our image, after our likeness and let them have dominion over the fish of the sea and over the fowl of the air, and over the cattle, and over every creeping thing that creepeth upon the earth."

Man's dominion over all the earth is ever increasing. We cannot deny that dominion once we have acquired it. There are those who believe that the living God is the god of fate, the god of failing to act. They ascertain that when we fail to take action God shows us the way. But that is God with a small "g" for it is the god of the gaps. Fate is not divine. Leaving matters of life, birth, death, hunger, and overpopulation to fate is nothing short of superstition.

We have the capacity to make decisions. Not to decide is in itself a decision. Not to decide and say that it is left to God's will is not a leap of faith, but a leap of superstition. Once we have discovered the knowledge that gives us mastery, once we taste of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, we cannot ignore our power nor can we return to the Garden of Eden of unknowing. Yet each time we must make a choice we must work. Our brow must sweat in the agony, an agony increased by not always being sure that we are right. This kind of decision takes infinitely more faith in a living God than assuming blandly that we are right and therefore automatically vindicated. We cannot blame God for what we ourselves can decide. To do so is a refusal to face life.

Frequently today our world forces us to decide between life and existence. It is living death. God has given man dominion over the world, a dominion which increases with every scientific advance. With each new bit of knowledge we take another step away from the Garden of Eden. We cannot return, as the angel symbolizes. To leave matters to fate is to hollow and blame God for what we refuse to do and so to allow innocent persons to suffer the consequences. By the sweat of our brow we must work through such difficult decisions and we must do this in a pastoral way, reflecting the love of God that is in us through our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ.

BIBLIOGRAPHY

"Acts of 1970 General Assembly of the United Presbyterian Church," Church and Society, Sept-Oct. 70, Vol. 61, No. 1, pp. 8-11.

American Friends Service Committee, Who Shall Live?, New York, Hill and Wang 1970. A good compendium but slightly dated.

Anderson, Kenneth E., "A Matter of Life," Living Church, March 12, 1972. Bennett, John C., "Avoid Oppressive Laws," Christianity & Crisis, Vol. 32, No. 23, Jan. 8, 1973.

The Book of Discipline of the United Methodist Church, Nashville, United Methodist Press, 1972. Callahan, Daniel, "Abortion, Thinking and Experiencing." Christianity & Crisis, Vol. 32, No. 23, Jan. 8, 1973. Carmen, Arlene and Howard Moody. Abortion Counseling and Social Change, Valley Forge, Judson Press, 1973. The story of the Clergy Consultation Service which was initially sponsored by Judson Church, N.Y. and which first began at a gathering in Washington Square Methodist Church, N.Y. in the spring of 1967. Also tells of Dr. Hale Harvey and the Women's Services Clinic to which so many young women were referred when N.Y. was the prime abortion center.

The Church Assembly Board for Social Responsibility, Abortion, An Ethical Discussion, Westminster, Church House, 1965.

Clements, Leslie C., "Abortion: The Right to Life or to End Life," Study Encounter, Vol. 8, No. 2, Sept. 23, 1972, pp. 1-8. WCC study but not very definitive or helpful.

Donceel, Joseph F., S.J. "Immediate Animation and Delayed Hominization," Theological Studies, Vol. 31, No. 1, March 1970, p. 76.

Drinan, Robert F., S.J. "The Jurisprudential Options on Abortion," Theological Studies, Vol. 31, No. 1, March 1970, p. 149.

Ebon, Martin, Ed., Every Woman's Guide to Abortion, New York, Universe Books, 1971. Nearly useless except as a layman's guide to how abortions are done.

Fletcher, John, "The Brink: The Parent-Child Bond in the Genetic Revolution," Theological Studies, Vol. 33, Sept. 1972, pp. 457-485.

Fletcher, Joseph, Moral Responsibility, Philadelphia, The Westminster Press, 1967.

Franklin, John, "A Doctor Views Abortion," Church and Society, March-April 1970, pp. 40-49.

Gardner, R. F. R., Abortion, The Personal Dilemma, Grand Rapids, William B. Eerdmans Publishing Company, 1972. A very complete study.

Gebhard, Paul H., Wardell B. Pomeroy, Clyde E. Martin, Cornelia V. Christenson, Pregnancy, Birth and Abortion, New York, Harper and Brothers, 1958. Study by the Institute for Sex Research begun by A. C. Kinsey. Covers a country by country situation. Dated but helpful.

General Convention of the Protestant Episcopal Church in the United States of America 1970, Seabury Press. "Joint Commission on the Church in Human Affairs, pp. 464-468. Approved by House of Deputies, p. 314. Approved by House of Bishops, p. 84.

Hellegers, Andre E., "Fetal Development," Theological Studies, Vol. 31, No. 1, March 1970, p. 3.

Geyirstam, G. Official editor, Annotated Bibliography of Induced Abortion, Ann Arbor Michigan, University of Michigan Center for Population Planning, 1969, 48104.

"I Had an Abortion," Social Action, Vol. XXXVII, No. 7,

March 1971, p. 22. Kidd, James L., "Facing an Agonizing Dilemma," Social Action, Vol. XXXVII, No. 7, March 1971, p. 15.

Kummer, Jerome M., Ed., Abortion: Legal and Illegal, 1971. Private Publication. Author, Box 769, Santa Monica, Cal.

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The Lambeth Conference 1968: Resolutions and Reports, SPCK and Seabury Press, 1958. Resolutions: "The Family in Contemporary Society," pp. 1.561.59. Committee Report "The Family in Contemporary Society" Section on "Family Planning" 2.146-2.151.

The Lambeth Conference 1968: Resolutions and Reports. SPCK and Seabury Press, 1968. Resolutions on "Responsible Parenthood," pp. 36-37.

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"Let's Look at Abortion," Social Action, Vol. XXXVII, No. 7. March 1971, p. 3. Mace, David C., Abortion, The Agonizing Decision, Nashville, Abingdon Press, 1972. Fair exposition of the situation. Aimed at the woman about to make a decision. She is allegedly typical which means it doesn't fit anyone well. Mangan, Joseph T., S.J., "The Wonder of Myself: Ethical-Theological Aspects of Direct Abortion," Theological Studies, Vol. 31, No. 1, March 1970, p. 125. Methodist Church, Manifold Witness, The Report of the Christian Citizenship Department, 1966.

Milhaven, John G., S.J.? "The Abortion Debate: An Epistemological Interpretation," Theological Studies, Vol. 31, No. 1, March 1970, p. 106.

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Moody, Howard, "Church, State and the Rights of Conscience," Christianity & Crisis, Vol. 32, No. 23, Jan. 8, 1973.

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A review of 20th Century Pharisaism concerning birth control and includes
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Reiterman, Carl, Abortion and the Unwanted Child, New York, Springer Pub. Co., 1971. What happens to unwanted children when abortion is denied. Much data is gathered from the Swedish experience. Schulder, Daine & Florynce Kennedy, Abortion Rap, New York, McGraw-Hill Book Company, 1971. A frankly pro-abortion stand, taken mainly from the court records in New York. Clearly outlines the risks of illegal abortions, and the trauma of being forced to deliver an unwanted pregnancy. Suggests that at least some of the homes for unwed mothers were bad trips, bound to leave deep emotional scars. Makes a strong case for legalizing of abortions, especially on the basis that abortions have always been available for the rich . . . while the poor suffered.

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To: All U.S. Senators and Congressmen.

THE ECUMENICAL FOUNDATION,
Philadelphia, Pa., January 14, 1974.

From: Eldon Bockmeyer, The Ecumenical Foundation.
Subject: The Helms amendment and ban on abortion.

Gentlemen: To bring a child into the world when the parents know it will be abused (emotionally and physically abused) because it is not loved or wanted, is a clear transgression of God's Moral Law (The First and Second Commandments) and a sin against mankind and God, according to Scripture.

God's Word and love for mankind requires birth control, and birth control requires a knowledge of birth control methods and the right to safely abort an unwanted conception as soon as possible.