Pro-life plans.

• Author: Sleffel, Linda
• Position: Letter to the Editor

Barbara Miner's article on "pro-life" groups' opposition to birth control raises a question that has been puzzling me for a long time ("Next Target: Birth Control," January issue). These groups oppose abortion and also birth control because they believe God implants a soul in every fertilized egg at the moment of fertilization. However, scientific research shows that many of these fertilized eggs fail to become implanted in the uterus and develop into fetuses. It also concludes that 15 percent or more of pregnancies end in spontaneous miscarriages. So--assuming that one doesn't discard all scientific approaches as irrelevant--one has to wonder why these people are so opposed to abortion and birth control when what they apparently consider God's plan destroys more embryos, fetuses, or "unborn children" than either.

Linda Sleffel

Columbus, Ohio

It is time for anti-abortion and anti-birth control factions to take their philosophy a step further toward more conservative and more restrictive sexual practices and live up to the name they would like to be called: pro-life.

The question of when life begins can be answered by looking through a microscope at semen. No one can doubt that these energetic little swimmers are alive. A sperm's sole purpose in life is to penetrate an...