The following piece was written in 1986 by Anthony Gilles, a columnist in St. Anthony Messenger. Gilles writes:

Because legalized abortion is premised on such a precarious theoretical foundation, abortion advocates have had to devise increasingly far-fetched arguments to buttress their position. Here are their 10 most common arguments and the fallacies on which they are based.

1) "No one knows when human life begins." As a matter of act everyone does know when human life begins. In the words of the California Medical Association's journal, California Medicine, this argument demonstrates "a curious avoidance of the scientific fact, which everyone really knows, that human life begins at conception and is continuous, whether intra- or extra-uterine until death." Actually, since the argument that " no one knows when human life begins" has not really convinced anyone, abortion advocates have now virtually abandoned it in favor of arguments that are more rhetorically and emotionally appealing.

2) "Without legalized abortion both unsafe, 'back-alley' abortions and parental abuse of unwanted children will increase." Aside from the fact that statistics sine 1973 actually indicated the contrary, proponents of this second argument imply that without legalized abortion prospective parents who otherwise would have legally aborted their child will suddenly be at the mercy of an uncontrollable impulse either to seek a "back-alley" abortion or to abuse their child should it be born. Such an argument suggests that legalized abortion is simply a safety valve as it were for persons who lack free will, a dubious rationale for people who claim to be "pro-choice" advocates.

3) "Since men can't get pregnant they can't advise women not to have abortions." This anti-intellectualist slogan supposes that there is no way facts I cannot directly experience can be communicated to me by someone else. In actuality, although I can never know what it is like to be pregnant, I can nonetheless be educated by previously pregnant women. As one who has been so educated I conclude that women opposed to abortion make more compelling arguments than women who favor abortion.

4) "If men (or the Pope) could get pregnant abortion would be a sacrament." As this rhetorical barb indicates, the pro-abortion position is concerned not so much with abortion as it is with male-female relations. By steering the debate away from unborn children to male oppression, abortion advocates stimulate both feminist hostility and male guilt, thereby neutralizing anyone who "self righteously" tells women not to abort. In actuality, of course, neither men nor the Pope created the phenomenon by which pregnancy results from sexual intercourse.

5) "Unless women have the right to legal abortions they will be forced to suffer unbearable psychological and emotional stress caused by an unwanted child." This is a curious argument for people to make who otherwise argue that women are the equals of men. Unless such people entertain the fantasy that men do not suffer from psychological and emotional stress, they seem to be suggesting that women aren't strong enough to hold up under hardships. If, as proponents of this argument suggest, women are rendered hysterical by an unwanted pregnancy, then perhaps they are not emotionally qualified to assume positions of leadership in our society after all, an assumption belied by the millions of career women who are also excellent mothers.

6) "Denying a woman the right to abortion denies her control over her own body." This is more of a cliché intended to invoke an emotional response than it is an argument. One could list hundreds of ways in which society prevents women from controlling their own bodies, such as for example, laws requiring motorcyclists to wear helmets or, more to the point, laws prohibiting the use of one's body to destroy the body of another, which is what abortion accomplishes.

7) "Pro-lifers are single-issue fanatics." This canard presumes the sloganeer's omniscient awareness of every social issue to which the pro-lifer is dedicated. I wonder why only pro-lifers are subjected to this charge. Were not blacks in the 60's and war protesters in the 70's "single-issue" zealots? Even assuming the truth of this labeling technique, it says nothing which proves or disproves the morality of abortion.

8) "Sometimes poverty, a teenage pregnancy or other social problem virtually forces a woman to have an abortion." Such a rationale presumes that a terrible violent procedure like abortion is a proper means to solve problems. As our 13-year experience with legalized abortion has demonstrated, violence gets us nowhere. Can abortion advocates point to even one social problem that has diminished since abortion became legal?

9) "We should not force our moral beliefs on others." Not only should we do this, we in fact are doing this. Most of us, for example, impose our moral beliefs every day on thieves, murderers and rapists. In our system morality is the basis of law. I cannot think of one law in effect in this country which is not the result of someone's moral preference. For abortion advocates to prohibit me from imposing my beliefs on them, they must impose their own beliefs on me.

10) "There is no precedent to indicate that legalized abortion is related in any way to a general dissolution of civilized morality as claimed by abortion opponents." This argument is best rebutted in a decision issued by the West German equivalent of our Supreme Court, which on February 25, 1975, rejected legalized abortion, in the court's words, "principally as a reaction to the 'destruction of life unworthy of life,' and to the 'final solution' and 'liquidations' which were carried out by the National Socialist Regime as measures of state."

Since 1973 about 30 million innocent unborn lives have been taken. Let us pray for politicians and courts, especially the members of our Supreme Court, that they fight for the right to life for the unborn. Let us pray for God's continued strength for all who have a deep passion for this issue and spend much time and energy being a voice for the voiceless unborn. Let us pray for the conversions of all who are pro-choice and for the conversion of all who are pro-life when it comes to the unborn but are anti-life on other issues such as capital punishment and denying medical insurance for those who can not afford to purchase it. Let us also pray for women and men who continue to suffer spiritually and emotionally because of their direct or indirect involvement in an abortion.