Infanticide in Massachusetts

Printed from:

Know that I am still in Alexandria … I ask and beg you to take good care of our baby son, and as soon as I receive a payment I shall send it up to you. If you are delivered of a child, if it is a boy keep it; if a girl discard it. You have sent me word, “Don’t forget me.” How can I forget you? I beg you not to worry.

—  Letter from Hilarion to his wife, Alis, 1 B.C.

This letter sent from a husband away on business in Alexandria to his wife in another part of the Roman Empire seems remarkable in the contrast of the tenderness he shows his wife and his as-yet-unborn son and the callousness he demonstrates to his as-yet-unborn daughter. But exposure of unwanted female infants and deformed male infants was legal, morally accepted, and widely practiced by all social classes in the Greco-Roman world. This letter has been widely quoted by researchers and historians of the Roman Empire, as one of the prime reasons why the male/female ratio in the Roman Empire was approximately 135/100, leading to a highly dysfunctional society.

For us, it is a stark reminder that infanticide was widely practiced in the pagan Greco-Roman world. It is hard to believe, but it may well be practiced here in the Commonwealth of Massachusetts. In recent days, a bill has been introduced in the Massachusetts legislature called the ROE act. ROE stands for Remove Obstacles and Expand Abortion Access. While sounding innocuous, the bill would, in fact, countenance abortion until the baby’s first breath and perhaps even after the baby was delivered. And if passed, this bill will indeed return us to pagan times here in post-Christian Massachusetts.

An important work about Christian culture, ethics, and behavior written towards the end of the first century A.D is the Didache. The Didache, also known as The Teaching of the Twelve Apostles, is effectively a manual of Christian discipleship and speaks directly to the practice of infanticide and abortion:

“There are two ways:  a way of life and a way of death. There is a great difference between them. … In accordance with the precept of the teaching, ‘thou shall not kill,” thou shall not murder a child by abortion nor kill one when born. The way of death is this:  they show no compassion for the poor, they do not suffer with the suffering, they do not acknowledge their Creator, they kill their children and by abortion cause God’s creatures to perish.”

In Massachusetts, we appear poised to take the final step in returning to the pagan way of life 2,000 years ago. Currently, abortions in the Commonwealth are banned after 24 weeks unless the woman’s life is in danger due to the pregnancy, or if the pregnancy would pose a “grave impairment of her physical or mental health.” The ROE Act would take out the “grave impairment” language, paving the way for abortions without even theoretical restriction in the third trimester. While the effect of an abortion is one dead and one wounded, this change in the law would be even more tragic, as medical technology has advanced so dramatically that babies delivered after 23 weeks routinely survive and grow into healthy children and adults.

In a bow to pagan mores, the ROE Act would also delete the section in current Massachusetts law that requires doctors to “take all reasonable steps … to preserve the life and health of the aborted child,” including the requirement of having life-supporting equipment in the room. Moreover, the ROE Act would also no longer require a teen to receive the approval of a parent or judge for an abortion. Finally, there is an unenforced provision in the current law which requires a 24-hour waiting period before the abortion is performed, and the ROE Act would remove that provision as well.

The specter of infanticide in Massachusetts and other blue states is no gross exaggeration. Just weeks ago, the governor of Virginia, Ralph Northam, explained how infanticide would be practiced if Virginia’s new law were to be passed. Now Massachusetts Democrats, state Senator Harriette Chandler (D-Worcester) and state Representatives Patricia Haddad (D-Somerset) and Jay Livingstone (D-Beacon Hill), have introduced this appalling ROE Act into the Massachusetts legislature. The bill would permit unrestricted third-trimester abortions and infanticide in Massachusetts. Do Massachusetts citizens really have so little respect for the sanctity of life that they want us to revisit the pagan days of the Roman Empire? Citizens of good will and moral probity must rise up and do everything in their power to defeat this wicked bill.