Bad Language

Last Sunday, at a church I went to while visiting friends, I jotted down these couple of things the pastor said, as examples of what not to say.  The context is preborn children, women in the church being pregnant, etc.

"Even now being crafted..."

The first, "even now being crafted," is perhaps less obvious as to why it's wrong, but basically, it implies that preborn children, while they're in the womb, are being crafted, but we who are born are no longer being crafted.

But in fact, if preborn people are being crafted, then so are we, for that word must mean the same thing here as being developed, developing, which we are all doing until we die.

But if he used the word "crafted" to mean "created," then that is actually blatantly false, because the moment each of us was created was fertilization, when the sperm and the egg united and created a new being; anything beyond that is not creation (for that has already been accomplished), but is actually just development of the already created individual.

See, the only fundamental difference between between preborn people and the rest of us is level of development.  We are the same type of creature.

I was talking to a friend about these things Sunday evening after the service, and he was saying he doesn't really think it's wrong to say that phrase, he doesn't think it's that big of a deal.  But he added (something like), "except that abortion is a thing.  If not for abortion, it wouldn't be a big deal."

Yes, exactly.  I pointed out, "Yes, but it is a thing."  That's the point.  It is legal, seen as morally neutral, or even a moral good in our country, to kill children before they reach a certain age, and here we are in the church, using language that just eggs on the mindset that preborn people are different from us, adding to the problem!

And the second thing the pastor said is another example of that.

"Is going to be a big sister..."

He was talking about this little girl who was running around church with a shirt that said "big sister," and that's how the parents communicated that they're preggo again, and then when the pastor announced that right before he prayed, he said of the little girl that she "is going to be a big sister"!

No!  She already is a big sister!  Her little sibling, though just newly created, is already her little sibling, and is one of us.  We must stop thinking of preborn children as different than we are.