The Pennsylvania Pro-Life Federation recently completed its annual Pro-Life Student Essay Contest, and as always the entrants were amazing and the judges had a difficult time choosing a winner.  This essay, written by homeschooled ninth grader Kara Miller of Dillsburg, won first place in the Jr. High category:

When was I a choice? When was I a child? I was born at 25 weeks and 6 days. I was 1 pound, 12.8 oz. and 13.5 inches long. What makes me different from 25 week old babies in the womb? The only difference between me and them is location. Yet I was protected under law, and they are slaughtered.

In the 45 years since Roe v. Wade, more than 60 million American babies have been brutally murdered in the name of women’s rights.¹ Worldwide, since 1980, nearly 1.5 billion have been slaughtered.² That is 1.5 billion human beings, made in the Image of God, never allowed to see the light of day.

Some people believe abortion should be legal, while others do not. We can all agree, however, that each baby aborted was a potential life.

The fundamental question is when does life begin? If it begins at conception, then abortion is murder, and there should be no disagreement about the issue. If, however, it begins at birth, or really any point after conception, then it can be argued that there is nothing inherently wrong with abortion. According to an Embryology textbook, “The zygote and early embryo are living human organisms.”³ In 1981, the Senate concluded, “Physicians, biologists, and other scientists agree that conception marks the beginning of the life of a human being – a being that is alive and is a member of the human species.”⁴ According to Dr. C. Ward Kischer, Professor Emeritus of Human Embryology, “Every human embryologist, worldwide, states that the life of the new individual human being begins at fertilization.”⁵ This means that abortion is murder.

Abortion should also be illegal for the sake of the babies, their parents, and the society.

The babies are heartlessly killed, and they are defenseless. Their short lives are shattered, almost before they begin.

The parents of aborted children have to live with the guilt of murder their entire lives. What makes it even worse is their sin is hidden, because many people don’t see abortion as wrong, and so they rarely have the relief of confession and justice. They lose a child, and they know it. They will miss, mourn, and remember that child for the rest of their lives.

The society is missing billions of people, their potential wasted.

People who are for abortion claim that unborn children are part of the woman’s body, and she should be able to choose what to do with it. The problem with this argument is that they are not her body. I have shown that each is, at conception, an individual human life, not part of the mother. If not, why does it have separate DNA, unique fingerprints and all the characteristics of a separate being?

In conclusion, abortion should be illegal for the sake of the babies, the parents, and the society. The pro-abortion arguments are not persuasive because a baby is not part of the mother’s body. Life begins at conception, and should be protected from that point forward.

1. http://www.numberofabortions.com/ as of 8:15 AM 3/7/2018
2. http://www.numberofabortions.com/ as of 8:17 AM 3/7/2018
3. Moore, Dr. K. L., Persaud, Dr. T. V. N., Torchia, M. G. (1993) Before We Are Born: Essentials of Embryology and Birth Defects https://www.justfactsdaily.com/the-science-of-abortion-when-does-life-begin/
4. Official Senate Report from the Hearings of the Senate Judiciary Subcommittee, April 23-24 1981. https://www.liveaction.org/news/life-begins-at-conception-science-teaches/
5. Kischer, Dr. C. W. Professor Emeritus of Human Embryology of the University of Arizona School of Medicine. (2017, March 22). ‘When Human Life Begins’ American College of Pediatricians. https://www.acpeds.org/the-college-speaks/position-statements/life-issues/when-human-life-begins