Hey do you know how Fundamentalists always say that life begins at conception? The Mayo Clinic would like to politely disagree with that.

So for decades now the anti-abortion movement has been telling anybody who will listen, and many who are actively trying to run out of earshot, that life begins at conception.

They use this argument to not only fight against abortion, but to argue against emergency contraception pills, like Plan B.

However most people with even a rudimentary understanding of biology recognizes that a fertilized human egg is really not viable at conception, and in fact multiple billions of them never make it past the fertilization stage.

If you do not believe me, then here let the Mayo Clinic explain it better:

Weeks 1 and 2: Getting ready 

It might seem strange, but you're not actually pregnant the first week or two of the time allotted to your pregnancy. Yes, you read that correctly! 

Conception typically occurs about two weeks after your last period begins. To calculate your due date, your health care provider will count ahead 40 weeks from the start of your last period. This means your period is counted as part of your pregnancy — even though you weren't pregnant at the time. 

Week 3: Fertilization 

The sperm and egg unite in one of your fallopian tubes to form a one-celled entity called a zygote. If more than one egg is released and fertilized, you might have multiple zygotes. 

The zygote typically has 46 chromosomes — 23 from you and 23 from the father. These chromosomes help determine your baby's sex, traits such as eye and hair color, and, to some extent, personality and intelligence. 

Soon after fertilization, the zygote travels down the fallopian tube toward the uterus. At the same time, it will begin dividing to form a cluster of cells resembling a tiny raspberry — a morula.

Week 4: Implantation 

By the time it reaches the uterus, the rapidly dividing ball of cells — now known as a blastocyst — has separated into two sections. 

The inner group of cells will become the embryo. The outer group will become the cells that nourish and protect it. On contact, the blastocyst will burrow into the uterine wall for nourishment. This process is called implantation. 

The placenta, which will nourish your baby throughout the pregnancy, also begins to form.

Week 5: The embryonic period begins 

The fifth week of pregnancy, or the third week after conception, marks the beginning of the embryonic period. 

This is when the baby's brain, spinal cord, heart and other organs begin to form.

Kind of makes a difference when you recognize just how long it takes before a zygote even begins to look like an actual baby, don't you think?

The anti-abortion movement likes to use truly horrific images to upset people, but the facts are that the majority of abortions happen during the first trimester when the zygote/fetus is really one or two inches long, and it still quite undeveloped.

And if a woman takes an emergency contraception medication the chances are extremely good that the fertilized egg has not even attached itself to the uterine wall yet. And therefore is not yet, by medical standards, a viable pregnancy.

You would think that knowing that, anti-abortion activists would be all for contraception, both preventative and emergency, but they are not.

And the reason they are not is because this has nothing to do with saving potential human beings, and everything to do with oppressing women and making sure that there is a cost to any recreational sex that does not abide by the rules dictated in their morality.

Alabama State Senator wants to pass personhood bill because he is afraid that unborn zygotes might go to hell.

I guess this story is a day or two old now, but I just stumbled across it the other day and felt it was something that really needed more attention.

This from the Daily Sentinel:  

State Sen. Shadrack McGill said he plans to try again to push pro-life bills in the Legislature. 

“Did you know you can be charged up to $250,000 for destroying an eagle egg, but you can destroy babies in the womb?” McGill asked this week during an interview with the Times-Journal. 

The senator said he still wants to see a “personhood” law that would put into state law that life begins at conception. Such bills failed to make it out of the Legislature in the two regular sessions since 2010 when McGill was elected and Republicans gained a majority in Montgomery. 

“Just based on the Scripture alone, the Psalm that talks about God knowing us before he placed us in our mother’s womb, is enough for me to know that that is a life inside of a mother,” said McGill, R-Macedonia. 

“So my question concerning aborted babies is, where do they go, heaven or hell? I just want to know what [people’s] perspective is.”

As I think many of you are probably aware this idea of unborn babies going to hell has NEVER really been part of the Protestant or Baptist teaching.  Many Catholics used to believe that unbaptized babies went to "Limbo" but apparently that was never part of the Catechism and later Pope John Paul ll beseeched the International Theological Commission to make it official that such was not the case, and they responded thusly:

“Vatican sources said yesterday that the commission would recommend that Limbo be replaced by the more “compassionate” doctrine that all children who die do so “in the hope of eternal salvation.”” (Times, November 30, 2005) 

Of course Senator McGill seems to be aware of none of this, and I seriously doubt it would make much difference as he seems to make all of his political policy decisions based on a complete lack of the understanding of biology, and solely on his overzealous religious beliefs, which even extend to fertilized eggs not yet placed in a mother's womb.

You might want to sit down for this next part.

“I sympathize with the folks who have had to go the expensive route of the in-vitro process, and thank God for that knowledge that the doctors possess,” said McGill, who noted that a fellow senator’s family grew through in-vitro fertilization, a fact that held up the debate in past years. 

“My understanding of that process is they fertilize 10 eggs in a petri dish. Basically they take three of the strongest and insert those into the womb, into the mother, and pray for the best,” McGill said. 

“If the mother conceives, then what do you do with the seven remaining fertilized eggs?” 

McGill said he previously suggested Williams change the wording to say life begins “at fertilization inside the mother’s womb.” 

“And I never had peace about that,” McGill said. “That’s what we tried and that failed.” 

The senator said that, after prayer, he thinks life begins at the moment of fertilization, be it inside the mother or “creatively outside the mother’s womb.” 

“That union between the sperm and the egg is where life begins, and maybe where God places his spirit inside that child, so to speak,” McGill said. “Therefore, I would hope that the legislation that we push in the future would state that all the eggs fertilized need to be placed in the mother’s womb.” 

McGill said that means doctors should fertilize only as many eggs as they plan to implant.

So McGill is attempting to pass legislation that would force a doctor to put every single fertilized egg into the mother receiving in vitro fertilization which of course  means the doctor would only be able to fertilize one or two, which dramatically reduces the possibility of one of them being strong enough to implant into the uterus, or else fill her up. Octomom style, with up to ten fertilized eggs and hope they all did not turn out to be viable.

How many women do you think would be willing to pay thousands of dollars for in-vitro fertilization, with the viability this dramatically reduced, then?

You know the only thing worse than having politicians making policy based on Biblical teaching, is having them make policy based on their misunderstanding of Biblical teaching.