Abortion comes down to decisions

Sanctity of Life.  Do those words strike a nerve?  On January 22, as a nation, we acknowledged the 29^th year of celebrating the Sanctity of Human Life.   In 1983 former Surgeon General C. Everett Koop asked President Ronald Reagan to create a special day to focus on the intrinsic value of human life. That same year, President Reagan issued a proclamation establishing a National Sanctity of Human Life Sunday.

The idea came out of an organization, now known as Care Net, which is an international organization that provides support to the nation’s ever-growing number of life-affirming crisis pregnancy care centers.  Hope Pregnancy Care Center of St. George is a member of Care Net.

In President Reagan’s speech addressing SOHLS he acknowledged that more than 15 million unborn babies have died due to legalized abortion. In the year 2007, the last reporting year available, Centers for Disease Control reported that 827,609 legal abortions were performed (cdc.gov).

SOHLS has a special meaning to me because my son, Ryan, was born at 1:47 a.m. on Sanctity of Human Life Sunday in 1990, weighing only 1090 grams (two pounds, six ounces).  He fought for his life, with help from a plethora of doctors, nurses and specialists. 

Ryan came home from the hospital 80 days later, just a week before his original due date, weighing only four-and-a-half pounds.  Over 80 thousand babies were aborted during the time that Ryan was in the hospital.

To date there have been more than 50 million legal abortions performed since the passing of Roe V. Wade. Some would say we don’t need 50 million more people in this country anyway.  But my point is, if those babies were unplanned to begin with, they should not have been conceived. There is no reason, with today’s methods of pregnancy prevention, that even one baby should be lost to abortion.  I support abstinence outside of marriage.  But those who don’t live by this moral conduct can go to any local store and find a myriad of contraceptives available.  Though not one is one-hundred-percent effective, a combination of more than one method can prevent pregnancy.

Abortion is not just a moral issue. It’s a question of good discernment.  We take precautions everyday in life to avoid negative consequences. If we don’t want a speeding ticket we don’t speed.  If we don’t want to get lung cancer we don’t smoke.  If we don’t want to fly through a windshield in an accident, we were a seatbelt. 

Why should unplanned pregnancy be any different?  Again, I am one-hundred percent in favor of abstinence outside of marriage.  You might not be. And that’s okay.  But can you agree with me that abortion would be totally unnecessary if precautions were taken?

I’m not addressing the moral issue of sex outside of marriage. I can’t do that in 500 words.  I’m simply stating that with today’s technology there is no reason for almost a million babies to be aborted every year. Abortion always leaves one dead and at least another one wounded.

Rhonda Tommer is a resident of Santa Clara and a member of The Spectrum and Daily News Writers Group.  She can be reached at r.tommer.writersgroup@gmail.com.

Hostility can drag down your health

One of the most amusing things I do in a given week is to read The Vent in this newspaper.  If you want a feel for how your neighbors are feeling on a given subject, spend a few minutes in this most informative section of the paper.

According to contributors of the vent the city’s purchase of a merry-go-round was a waste of city money and was good for the city to invest in.  Bicyclists are lawbreakers and motorists don’t give bicyclists a break.  The speed limits of some roads are too low, and yet on those same roads they should be lower. 

There are too many motorists who run red lights, don’t use their turn signals and talk too much on the phone while driving.  Police are pulling over law abiding motorists when they should be out catching criminals.

The powers that be need to fix the roads, yet there are too many roads under construction.  We need slow down the growth Washington County and we need to improve the infrastructure so the community can grow. 

Yep, if you want to put your finger on the pulse of what’s important in Washington County just read The Vent. I particularly like the comments that start out with, “To the guy who…” or “to the driver of the…” I presume that if we were required to put our names on our comments there would be fewer people ranting about what displeases them the most.

The Vent gives a good sampling of some of the negative emotions that run deep in our community.  For every page of complaints we will find two or three “Kind Thoughts.” 

I recently finished reading my new favorite book, Deadly Emotions by Don Colbert, M.D.  By using his own patients as examples, Dr. Colbert makes a good argument for the need to “understand the mind-body-spirit connection that can heal or destroy” us, as his subtitle suggests.

He makes a good case for how anger and hostility can be closely related to hypertension and coronary artery disease; resentment and bitterness can bring about autoimmune disorders, rheumatoid arthritis, lupus and multiple sclerosis; or how anxiety can produce panic attacks and heart palpitations. Repressed anger could cause migraines, TMJ, Fibromyalgia and other chronic pain.

As I and others in a book discussion group dissected this book it became very obvious that negative emotions could prove to be at the very least physically debilitating.

Anonymously writing to the paper when we get bent out of shape could mean that there’s an anger issue that needs to be addressed.

Prolonged stress and the inability to relax is another topic addressed by Dr. Colbert. As a society we need to learn to relax.

I will continue to be amused by The Vent each week. But I would enjoy seeing a whole page of “Kind Thoughts” and fewer negative comments.

Now, to the guys riding their bikes on Red Hills Parkway: There’s no bike lane during construction.  Are you trying to get yourselves run over?

Rhonda Tommer is a member of The Spectrum and Daily News writers group and a resident of Santa Clara.  She can be reached at r.tommer.writersgroup@gmail.com