Why Muslim sisters and brothers should join the pro-life campaign

There are many reasons why Muslims should campaign against attacks on the sanctity of life including abortion, destructive embryo experimentation, euthanasia and assisted suicide. Here are some of the most important arguments:

ISLAMIC/RELIGIOUS:

• GOD is the only Owner of life. Life is sacred in Islam and no one should take steps intentionally to end an innocent human life.
• It is prohibited in the final Holy book Al Qur'an and in the sayings of the final prophet Muhammad (peace be upon him) intentionally to end the life of any unborn child (abortion) or to kill oneself or assist someone to end their life.
• There is not one single statement in the Islamic Holy Scriptures which allows abortion, euthanasia, suicide or assisted suicide at any time or in any circumstances.
• Punishments are prescribed for anyone intentionally ending or helping to end an innocent human life.
• We are asked in the Qur'an to defend the life of the weak, vulnerable and the defenceless.
• There are clearly prescribed rights of the unborn baby in Islam, for example, the right of life.
• The right of life is similarly granted to a baby or adult who is disabled.
• Muslims are requested to work with non-Muslims to protect and save lives.
• To kill an innocent human life is like killing the whole of mankind and to save a human life is like the saving of all mankind (according to the Qur'an), and is highly rewarded by GOD.
• To allow abortion and euthanasia is lethal to our souls.
• Any child is a great gift from the Creator.
• On the Day of Judgement, we all will be asked: what have we done in order to stop the intentional killing of innocent human lives, as in abortion and euthanasia?
• Already, requests for abortion from among our own Muslim women are rising!

HUMANE:

• It is unjust, irresponsible and against the good of society to end an innocent human life, as in abortion or euthanasia.
• A caring supportive family and society should protect all human life.
• The procedure of abortion is barbaric and cruel - the baby is usually given no painkillers
• Every day in Britain as many as 600 unborn babies, innocent and defenceless, are killed by abortion!
• The correct response to a person who is elderly, infirm, chronically ill or disabled is to care for them, not to end their life.
• An unborn child or someone who is chronically ill, disabled or old is no less human than any other person and should be treated with the care and respect owing to all human beings.
• The UN Convention on the Rights of the Child has upheld the life of the child, before and after birth.

HEALTH/MEDICAL:

Many women have physical and/or psychological problems at some time after their abortion.

• Post Abortion Trauma, formally defined as a category of Post Traumatic Stress Disorder, which may either be acute or delayed. There are a wide range of symptoms, including: a sense of emptiness and loss; feelings of anger, guilt and remorse; depression; relationship difficulties; sleep disturbances - recurrent dreams; drug/alcohol abuse, sexual dysfunction or promiscuity.
• Physical problems can include: heavy bleeding (haemorrhage), serious infection (peritonitis), blood clots (thrombosis and pulmonary embolism), damage to the cervix, difficult future labour, premature deliveries, repeated miscarriages, and infertility. Many studies have identified a link between abortion and an increased risk of breast cancer.
• Abortion is an unnecessary surgical or medical procedure on a healthy woman and as such is a drain on limited medical resources, especially in the third world.

The practice of euthanasia affects a whole society - not just the individuals killed.

• If doctors are given the power to end patients' lives, the bond of trust between doctors and patients will be damaged.
• Vulnerable people, including those with a disability or a chronic illness or the elderly, may be deterred from seeking medical help out of fear of being killed.
• There is substantial evidence that so-called "passive" euthanasia is now practiced by some doctors in Britain.
• Those whose life is judged as not worth living may be influenced to agree to an assisted suicide if the present law in the UK is changed. There have been attempts to legalise assisted suicide, the latest, unsuccessful, attempt being Lord Joffe's Assisted Dying for the Terminally ill Bill.

SOCIAL

• Most abortions (about 90%) carried out in the UK are done for social rather than medical reasons.
• We in the UK, like most of Europe, face a demographic problem: over the past few decades fewer and fewer children are born, who are needed to contribute to the future survival and welfare of society and to look after the old and needy.
• We live in a country where abortion is seen as the only answer to unexpected pregnancy, and young people are not taught the value of abstinence and chastity.
• Our young people live in a society where promiscuity is rife and where cases of sexually transmitted diseases increase year on year.
• Many thousands of women suffer from serious psychological problems after their abortion but there is little recognition of the need to avoid abortion for this reason.
• Vulnerable people who are old, sick or disabled are sometimes neglected when they are in hospital and are at risk from existing and proposed laws which will further erode their right to life
• The culture of death is spreading in the UK. The media portray people who oppose abortion, sex before and outside marriage, assisted suicide and euthanasia as a religious (mainly Catholic) minority who wish to impose their "narrow-minded" morality on the rest of the country.
  

Islam does not permit abortion, immoral sex education, destructive embryo experimentation, euthanasia or assisted suicide. We cannot say that such evil does not affect us because we are Muslims, it does. It affects our children at school and in colleges; it affects us all if we need hospital treatment.

Please join with me in the Society for the Protection of Unborn Children (SPUC), which campaigns to protect all lives from conception until natural death. SPUC Muslims is a division of the Society reaching out to the Muslim community - please help us peacefully oppose the culture of death in this country.

Dr A. Majid Katme (MBBCh, DPM)
Muslim Coordinator, SPUC
Pro-life, pro-family Muslim Campaigner (UK/UN)
T: 07944 240 622 E-mail address: muslims@spuc.org.uk

Dr. A. Majid Katme is available to give talks on Islam and abortion, Islam and euthanasia, Islam and human cloning and other issues affecting the sanctity of human life.