St. Basil, the Great, First Canonical
Letter to Amphilochius, 374 A.D.
"A woman who has deliberately destroyed a
fetus must pay the penalty for murder." 188:1
"Those also who give drugs
causing abortions are
murderers themselves,
as well as those who receive the poison which kills the
fetus." 188:8
St. Augustine of Hippo, Enchiridion of Faith, Hope, and
Love, 23,86, 421 A.D.
"...though I know not whether man can find an answer:
when it is that a
human being in the womb begins to live, and whether there
is also a
certain kind of hidden life there which is not yet apparent in the
movements
of the living being. It seems very rash to deny that those fetuses
ever lived,
that are cut away and ejected limb by limb from the wombs of the
pregnant,
lest the mothers perish too, if the fetuses be left there dead."
St. Augustine of Hippo, Marriage and Concupiscence, 17, 419 A.D.
"It
is, however, one thing for married persons to have intercourse only for the wish
to beget children, which is not sinful: it is another thing for them to desire
carnal pleasure in cohabitation, but with the spouse only, which involves venial
sin. For although propagation of offspring is not the motive of the intercourse,
there is still no attempt to prevent such propagation, either by wrong desire or
evil appliance. They who resort to these, although called by the name of
spouses, are really not such; they retain no vestige of true matrimony, but
pretend the honourable designation as a cloak for criminal conduct. Having also
proceeded so far, they are betrayed into exposing their children, which are born
against their will. They hate to nourish and retain those whom they were afraid
they would beget. This infliction of cruelty on their offspring so reluctantly
begotten, unmasks the sin which they had practised in darkness, and drags it
clearly into the light of day. The open cruelty reproves the concealed sin.
Sometimes, indeed, this lustful cruelty, or; if you please, cruel lust, resorts
to such extravagant methods as to use poisonous drugs to secure barrenness; or
else, if unsuccessful in this, to destroy the conceived seed by some means
previous to birth, preferring that its offspring should rather perish than
receive vitality; or if it was advancing to life within the womb, should be
slain before it was born. Well, if both parties alike are so flagitious, they
are not husband and wife; and if such were their character from the beginning,
they have not come together by wedlock but by debauchery. But if the two are not
alike in such sin, I boldly declare either that the woman is, so to say, the
husband's harlot; or the man the wife's adulterer."
St. Clement of
Alexandria, Christ the Educator, 2:10, 202 A.D.
"If we should but control our
lusts at the start and if we would not kill off the human race born and
developing according to the divine plan, then our whole lives would be lived
according to nature."
"Women who resort to some sort of deadly abortion
drug kill not only the embryo, but, along with it, all human kindness." Ibid,
23:174
St. Jerome, Letters 22:13, 380 A.D.
"You may see many women
widows before wedded, who try to conceal their miserable fall by a lying garb.
Unless they are betrayed by swelling wombs or by the crying of their
infants...Some go so far as to take potions, that they may insure barrenness
...Some, when they find themselves with child through their sin, use drugs to
procure abortion, and when (as often happens) they die with their offspring,
they enter the lower world laden with the guilt not only of adultery against
Christ but also of suicide and child murder...Yet it is these who say: "...my
conscience is sufficient guide for me..."
St. John Crysostom, Homily 24
on Romans, 391 A.D.
"For I have no name to give it, since it does not take
off the thing born, but prevent its being born.
Why then dost thou abuse the
gift of God, and fight with His laws, and follow after what is a curse as if a
blessing, and make the chamber of procreation a chamber for murder, and arm the
woman that was given for childbearing unto slaughter?"
Flavius Josephus,
though not a Church Father, was the main Jewish historian of his time,
37-101 A.D., so he lived during the time of the Apostles. He had this to
say:
"The law, moreover enjoins us to bring up all our offspring, and
forbids women to cause abortion of what is begotten, or to destroy it afterward;
and if any woman appears to have so done, she will be a murderer of her child by
destroying a living creature, and diminishing humankind:
if anyone,
therefore, proceeds to such fornication or murder, he cannot be clean."
Josephus against Apion, 2:25...
As you can see from these historical
writings which I have shown,
there is nothing new regarding the abomination
of Abortion.
Holy
Scripture once again is true to the point...
"All things are full of
weariness, a man cannot utter it; the eye is not satisfied with seeing, nor the
ear filled with hearing. What has been is what will be, and what has been done
is what will be done; and there is nothing new under the sun. Is there a thing
of which it is said, �See, this is new�?
It has been already, in the ages
before us. There is no remembrance of former things,
nor will there be any
remembrance of later things yet to happen among those who come
after."
Ecclesiastes 1:8-11
The Pro-Life Rosary Back
to Home Page...
