Your Opinion: Responding to McCaskill abortion stance

Dear Editor:

I appreciate the opportunity to reply to Sylvester Kesel's letter printed Feb. 15.

First, so we are all on the same page, an embryo becomes a fetus at 11 weeks gestation, and infancy (babyhood) begins at birth. So let's all use accurate language developed by the medical experts, otherwise we run into a lack of credibility.

Seventy-eight percent of Americans support the legality of abortion; two thirds of whom want abortion to remain safe and legal even though they cannot imagine that they personally would make the choice to not carry a pregnancy to term. By the age of 45, one-forth of American women have had an abortion, women who identify as Catholic being no less likely to choose abortion than women of other religions or no religious affiliation.

So with this enlightenment, we see that Sen. McCaskill appears to be representing her constituents well.

It is my fervent hope that most Catholics are not eager to sacrifice the lives of women when they experience life-threatening pregnancy complications which would leave their other children motherless.

I thank Mr. Kesel for having reached out to genuinely seek an understanding of what may motivate a legislator like Senator McCaskill. In turn, I am on a quest to try and understand precisely what is magical about the moment of birth that makes an infant less worthy of protection from pain, starvation, and abuse than they had been just moments before. It's proving challenging for me to wrap my head around the concept that every pregnancy must be carried to term no matter the outcome for the mother and child, and the denial of paid family leave, a living wage, and affordable healthcare to protect the well-being of the child and their family unit thereafter.

All of the facts and numbers I have sited here came from strictly nonpartisan sources.

More can be learned at CatholicsForChoice.org.