The National Catholic Bioethics Quarterly

Volume 18, Issue 3, Autumn 2018

Trent Horn
Pages 435-442

Abortion and Good Samaritan Arguments

Some defenders of legal abortion claim that even if the human fetus is a human being with the same right to life as an adult, abortion is not necessarily morally impermissible. They argue that abortion can be considered a form of indirect killing that results from the refusal to provide life support through one’s own body, which another person has no right to receive. While Catholic moral theology does not require people to donate organs against their will, this principle does not justify direct abortion.