baby Archives - DOES GOD EXIST? TODAY

December 5, 2020December 1, 2020

Safe Haven Baby Box

In the Dark Ages, nuns of the Roman Catholic Church would put a “baby box” near the door of the convent where they lived. They did this because people were leaving babies on the doorstep, frequently in unsanitary conditions. The baby boxes contained swaddling clothes and were kept clean. In America today, an organization called Safe Haven Baby Boxes has revived the baby box idea with some 21st-century technology.

The Safe Haven Baby Box is installed in an exterior wall of a fire station or hospital. It has an exterior door that automatically locks upon the placement of a newborn inside. There is an interior door that allows a worker to reach the baby from the inside. When someone places a baby in the box, it triggers an alarm, so workers know to pick up the baby. The boxes are temperature controlled to prevent risk to the baby, although the average wait time to pick up the infant is three minutes.

The baby box idea has had strong support from Willie Robertson of Duck Dynasty fame. It’s an obvious response to the abortion problem in America. It allows a woman who has a baby a “red tape free” way of making sure the child has a legal adoption while keeping the birth mother anonymous. Since the program began in April of 2016, there have been 52 baby boxes installed in Indiana, Illinois, and Ohio. Eight babies have been surrendered in Safe Haven Baby Boxes, and three were surrendered to firefighters at baby box locations. Also, Safe Haven has referred over 500 women to crisis pregnancy centers.

There are situations where a pregnant woman does not want to kill her child but wants just to be free of the situation. This is especially true of rape, but it can be a solution in other cases. New safe haven laws exist in various states, so counselors need to know what is available to help women who find themselves in a difficult situation.

Here is their contact information:

Safe Haven Baby Boxes
PO Box 185
Woodburn IN 46797
(888)742-2133
shbb@SafeHavenBabyBoxes.com
https://shbb.org/

August 17, 2020August 16, 2020

Chemical Abortion Medications by Mail

Some high school and college girls brought to our attention several advertisements for “medication abortions” using an “abortion pill.” A pro-life group called Students for Life Action tells us that Planned Parenthood is sending the chemical abortion medications by mail. This is an attractive means of securing an abortion for a young woman who doesn’t want anyone to know about her pregnancy.

In reality, the abortion “pill” is not a single pill, and taking it is not like taking an aspirin. The chemical abortion involves two different medications. The first is mifepristone which initiates the abortion. The second misoprostol which causes cramping and bleeding to empty the uterus. Cramping and bleeding can last several hours or even several days, and some bleeding and spotting can go on for several weeks.

The promoters of medical abortions are telling people that there is “an abortion pill.” They are not telling them how it works and how traumatic the procedure is. It is easy for a boyfriend to trivialize the chemical abortion process, but cramping, bleeding, vomiting, diarrhea, fever, and dizziness are all common side effects of the use of the two pills.

It is essential to understand that abortions of any kind kill a baby. The child has its own DNA. Morning sickness is the woman’s body telling her that there is a foreign body inside her. The use of chemicals to kill the baby is dangerous to the mother and can have many side effects. Saying that a woman has the right to decide what will happen to her body is true, but she needs to make the decision long before a child is growing inside her.

Selling chemical abortion medications by mail is not a good solution for unwanted pregnancies. God has given us rules for sexual conduct, and the rules work, if we follow them. We oppose abortion at all levels. We believe that education by God through His Word is the only way men and women can make good choices and avoid the pain and consequences of bad decisions.

Reference: Students for Life Action, PO Box 96923, Washington DC 20090-6923

May 18, 2020May 17, 2020

Origin of Our Microbiome

The microbiome consists of trillions of beneficial bacteria that support our bodies in many ways. Some bacteria play an essential role in digestion and in separating the waste and processing it so that it can be excreted. Other bacteria play a role in our reproductive system. When I was a student at Notre Dame, there was a germ-free laboratory on campus where researchers raised animals with no bacteria. One of the complications of doing that was that even rabbits could not conceive if they were germ-free. For years, scientists have debated the question of the origin of our microbiome.

One interesting discovery that has come from prenatal research is that pre-born babies have their own microbiome separate from their mothers. For the past century, medical experts believed that babies acquired their microbiome at or shortly after birth. Research like that done at Notre Dame was thought to support the” sterile womb paradigm” hypothesis. Recent research has suggested that the origin of our microbiome may be from small amounts of bacteria built into the placenta. Discover magazine (June 2020, page 16) reviews the debate over when babies get their microbiome. Part of the problem is that it is very easy for contamination to get into the research specimens creating confusion over whether the bacteria were natural or if they came from contamination.

Our interest in this subject is not so much about the origin of our microbiome as to look at the implications of the data. Everyone agrees that the baby does not have its mother’s microbiome. Some microbes like E. coli are so common that they are found in all microbiomes. Beyond those, there is a unique makeup to each person’s microbiome, including newborns and pre-born babies.

Maintaining that a baby is an extension of the mother and therefore has no rights is to ignore the evidence. Morning sickness is caused by the mother’s immune system not recognizing a foreign object, the baby, and going into defensive mode. The baby growing inside the mother is a unique person with its own genetic makeup, awareness, and microbiome.

The abortion issue ignores the evidence and attempts to create a new vocabulary to make it seem less brutal, but taking a baby out of the womb and killing it is still infanticide. As tough as this issue is, we need to not shield the vile nature of this process by ignoring the evidence. Instead, we should look for solutions that recognize the value of life and the worth of every human being.