Prenatal decisions …

Christian Century, August 9, 2003 by Matthew Lind

IT IS INTERESTING to note the parallels between the Nazi rationale for rejecting persons with disabilities and our modem personal rationalizations: "burden on society" vs. "burden on my family"; "taking food from the healthy" vs. "taking time from my normal children" (see "Put to the test," by Amy Laura Hall, June 28). However accurate these parallels may be, the result is the same: large numbers of individuals with disabilities are prevented from living their lives.

Statistics such as the fact that 90 percent of fetuses with Down's syndrome are aborted should make it evident that our society has made a judgment about the kinds of people we allow on this earth. I suspect that it won't stop with disabilities: as our technology advances, no doubt we will some day make prenatal decisions based on, say, the projected IQ of the fetus. Will 115 be high enough to earn one's way into the world?

As Amy Laura Hall points out, we are all dependent on the care of others. If we follow the sirens' song of human value based on physical and mental "perfection," we will lose the tremendous variety of gifts that God has given us through the lives of those who are different. The result will be a bleak, rather than a brave, new world.

Matthew Lind

Goshen, Ind.