A solution

The critical issue of abortion is remarkably complex on many levels, all the way from whether it should be resolved by each state or nationally by the Supreme Court, to whether abortion is each woman’s right to chose based on the constitutional right of privacy, or whether it is murder. Strongly held beliefs and serious moral arguments may never be resolved to everyone’s satisfaction, but in my opinion, the underlying facts are remarkably simple and uncontroversial.

When two human beings for whatever reason — intentionally or not, married or not, of the same race or religion or not, etc. — cause a male’s sperm to meet a female’s egg, the eventual result is a fetus that, given enough time in the womb, frequently results in the birth of a human baby. What makes this simple process so controversial is the question of exactly when in this process a human being is created, and when that human acquires his or her constitutional rights as an American citizen.

The answer to this question, whether we like it or not, is a religious rather than a political one. Ask a Catholic family or clergy member and the answer is typically “conception,” but ask a Jewish family or any rabbi and the answer is typically “birth.” And what separates America from the radical Taliban or similar religious fanatics, is that our founders gave us the separation of church and state.

So come on folks, exercise your own decision about abortion in your own family, based on your own religious belief, but let other families make theirs. Problem solved.

Arthur Rosenfeld, Norfolk