Mark Keown

I see that the NZ Herald is reporting that fewer nurses in Auckland are prepared to work in second trimester abortons. Some of these nurses have worked at them for a time but have now withdrawn (see http://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=10555056 ). This is a small sign of light in the darkness of abortion in NZ; some in the medical profession have a conscience. We need to pray that over the next decades and centuries, our civilisation shifts to realising that a civil society should protect the most vulnerable of all people including the unborn child, the elderly, the sick and disabled. They are not inconveniences to kill off! We need to work constructively and determinedlyto end this horrendous evil and injustice. Perhaps the nurses will help lead the way.

Yesterday the NZ Herald reported that a trial was beginning to make the morning after pill available free over the counter ( http://www.nzherald.co.nz/section/story.cfm?c_id=204&objectid=10508753 ). Theoretically this is to reduce teen pregnancies. This is a shocker! The morning after pill is simply another form of potential abortion. Of course the recipient does not know whether they are pregnant, so it is not active abortion; but, it is potential or passive abortion. This is an astonishing decision. It shows that we have absolutely no concern for the unborn child. It is another example of child-abuse! Sure, teen pregnancies are a problem, a big problem. But the answer is not to respond to one problem with legitimising the killing of the unborn child! I am disturbed that the main response I am hearing is a concern that this will lead to more promiscuity. It may well do so, but that pales in comparison to the problem of killiing babies! This is another example of the horror we face...

I agree entirely with the rising chorus against violence against children now with the recent problems with baby Nia etc. It is time for NZ to get its act together. We need to see children as precious, to be loved and nurtured, treated with gentleness and not harshly. We need to educate people to know how to raise children. We need to promote programs which give parents training. We need greater support for families and parents. But again the outcry raises questions for me in terms of consistency. In May I blogged about abortion and again I find myself getting annoyed that people want to rise up and stop the beating of children yet we kill 17,000 children a year in the womb! People cry out against this on the basis that children are defenceless and need our protection and love; it is a child's inalienable right to be raised with love and never the victim of violence. Yet, we continue to kill them when they are at their most defenseless in the womb of their mother. The justification...

At the BCNZ chapel last week our principal Mark Strom gave a great address on William Wilberforce using clips from the upcoming movie on his life and speaking about the need for us as the people of God to take on great social issues of our day as he did with slavery. I asked at the end of the chapel what the social issue of our day is. On a global scale there are some monster social issues like poverty, human rights, disease, child-oppression, slavery, oppression of women, the legacy of war, global warming and more. Perhaps poverty and the death of a child every 3 seconds is the greatest problem the world faces. On a national level there is the growing divide between rich and poor and the associated problems of illness, life-expectancy, illiteracy, family violence and violence against children and other issues and especially among Maori and Pacific Islanders. Yet for me perhaps the biggest issue certainly in the west, remains abortion. The Scriptures speak of God working in a human lif...