I watched a TV show in which a 61 year old woman served as a surrogate mother for her daughter. The daughter was married. She and her husband had tried to have children and failed. In their desperation for a child of their own, they sought a surrogate mother. While the situation of the "grandmother becoming the mother" is an oddity that brought attention to this situation, the point I want to make is about the issue of life in the womb. I know that my brothers understand and accept the fact of the human person present in the womb at conception, but I want to share this thought with you in case it may be of help as you witness for the sanctity of life.

Often, as we argue the issue of the moral imperative to respect and protect the life of the person in the womb, we will hear such things as, "It is only a blob of tissue, not a human person." The fact of surrogacy in bearing children is proof that the fertilized egg, the zygote, the blastocyst, or any other term relating to a human person in the earliest stages of development is in fact a human person and not a blob of tissue. Consider the expectations of the biological parents who have contributed the original two cells from which the new life is formed. They fully expect that, not only will the "tissue" that they have placed in the surrogate's body develop into a fully formed human being, but that it will be "their child." If the surrogate is the possessor of the tissue, then how could the child develop to be that of the parents from whom the conception  originated, having the genetic similarity and all of the characteristics that makes the child theirs in a biological sense? We know that the expectation of the parents is reasonable because we understand that the human person anticipated from its humble beginnings as a "fertilized egg" or a "zygote" is in fact the person whose development occurs within the body of the surrogate mother.

Consider, too, the conclusion of the parents if the surrogate were to have an abortion at any stage of the process. Is it not reasonable to for them to experience shock or horror at the death of their child? Is it not reasonable for them to know and believe that their child was once alive in the womb of the surrogate and is now dead at the hands of the abortionist? But if the child is just tissue, then these people are insane to hold such belief.

It is near idiocy for an educated person to suggest that the developing human is only a blob of the mother's tissue with which she may do whatever she pleases. It is sad that we even have to debate the issue, but never be silent and accept lies as the truth, my brothers. Fight for and defend the child in the womb and God will honor you with treasures in heaven.