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Cherishing Life—from Beginning to End

Let’s get serious about the subject of life beyond the developing fetus. We all are conceived, we all are born, we all live our out-of-the-womb lives, and we all die. That is the life cycle. That is life. Being a fetus is just the first 9 months of that longer journey that, on average, lasts about 80 years.

Many of those who rant and rave about the rights of fetuses don’t give two hoots in hell about the rights of people after they are born. What about the rights of babies, and children, and young adults, and older adults, and those who are in their twilight years? Do they not have the right to life, liberty, and the pursuit of their dreams? To ignore life after birth, to turn your head from hunger, from poverty, from squalor, from lack of health care, lack of education, lack of opportunities, and to let everyone fend for themselves in a world where those elements are systematically denied is hypocrisy on a scale that rivals the callousness of the worst tyrants who ever lived.

I repeat: Life lasts about 80 years, not 9 months. Life is precious for all of those 80 years, not just for 9 months. Cherish it all; protect it all by welcoming all children into a world where they have a chance to grow, to flourish, to develop their talents, and to live healthy, productive lives—in love, in tolerance, in understanding, and in enlightenment.

A fertilized egg is not a viable life. A fetus becomes viable only after the second trimester of a pregnancy. We need to concentrate a lot more on that 3rd trimester and the following 80 years, and a lot less on those first two trimesters where life outside the womb is not possible.

I do not speak for others or for God. I speak only from the brain that he gave me to cultivate and to use. I believe he expects all of us to do the same.