By Garrett Pluym, February 5, 2010

In response to Faith Blum’s “Abortion Simply Defined” (Your Views, Tuesday Tribune): I am absolutely heartbroken and appalled that so many people in this country still use the Bible as a source of moral reasoning. I will not state my position on the complicated (not simple as you say) issue of abortion, as that is beside my point. My point is that you, and many others, are defending your position not based on any reasoning, but simply on a book that has been used in the not-so-distant past to justify murder (Jeremiah 50:21-22), slavery (Exodus 21:7-11), rape (Judges 21:10-24) and condemn homosexuality (Genesis 19:5-8). And I shouldn’t forget it has a talking snake and dragons.

There are countless examples of these abominations, but Christians are so good at picking and choosing “good” moral passages from an otherwise monstrous book. Richard Dawkins says it best: “Those who wish to base their morality literally on the Bible have either not read it or not understood it.” I feel insulted when people claim that we cannot have ethics or morals without a god. Morals certainly do not and should not come from the Bible. I just hope that one day soon, for the sake of humanity and the benefit of all, we stop looking so deep into outdated proverbs and start using our own modern reasoning and logic to make moral and humane decisions.