"China's Birth Limits Create Dangerous Gender Imbalance"

From the AP, a horror show full of nightmares.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20090410/ap_on_re_as/as_china_gender_imbalance

Some quotes, in blue:

China has 32 million more young men than young women — a gender gap that could lead to increasing crime — because parents facing strict birth limits abort female fetuses to have a son, a study released Friday said.

There it is, in plain, blunt language. To put that 32 million number in perspective, the entire population of CALIFORNIA based on the 2000 census was a bit over 33 million.

The prevalence of sonograms in recent years has allowed parents to learn the gender of their fetus about 20 weeks into pregnancy, Hesketh said, leading to a rise in abortions based on sex. Abortion is legal and widely available.

Technology can be a blessing from God, but if misused by sinful human beings, it can become a scourge. Sonograms, coupled with abortion being "legal and widely available."

Many countries ban abortion after 12 or sometimes 24 weeks of pregnancy unless the mother's life is at risk. China's laws do not expressly prohibit or even define late-term termination.

Even late-term abortion is available in China, allowing a couple who's already hemming and hawing about this abomination to have the maximum amount of time to make the wrong, horrendous decision.

"From other research, it is clear that sex-selective abortion does indeed contribute to these high sex ratios, but so do other things (such as) non-reporting of girl births, abandonment, even infanticide," Riley said.

INFANTICIDE. ABANDONMENT. So instead of parents raising up their children with love in the fear of the Lord, we have a complete perversion of parental duties and the possibility of murder even OUTSIDE of the womb. I know the natural human heart is depraved, but this level of barbarity is simply stunning to me. And yet I know that but for the grace of God, I could be right there, too!

Ratios in Jiangxi and Henan provinces were the highest in the country, with 140 boys for every 100 girls in the 1-4 age range, the study said.

Hesketh told The Associated Press she thought rates were highest there because both provinces are poor and have largely secular Han Chinese populations. China's often disadvantaged ethnic minorities are exempt from birth limits, and researchers found normal sex ratios in the minority regions of Tibet and largely Muslim Xinjiang.

And here we see how the problem is worst in largely secular regions, how the problem would be even WORSE without what I understand to be a very rapidly growing Chinese Christian segment of the population.

Evangelical Christians are often accused of being "sexist," even though Biblical gender roles can lead to the most loving, sacrificial, and Christ-honoring families, working together in joyful harmony. Even though women and daughters are cherished and honored and protected, even at the expense of major or sometimes even mortal peril for the men.

And yet look at what happens when unfettered secularism, without the influence of godly men and women, takes hold of a population? You have the worst kind of sexism possible. INFANTICIDE OF BABY GIRLS, SOLELY BECAUSE THEY'RE GIRLS.

I am so unbelievably saddened, particularly on this glorious day commemorating Christ's death on the Cross. My desire is to channel that sadness into regular prayer for China, and to consider other ways of helping the growing Christian church in China.

The study said enforcing the existing ban on sex-selective abortion could lead to normalization of the ratios.

One final note. The study's proposed solution? MORE government regulation, rather than, oh, I don't know, perhaps REMOVING the unnatural restriction on having children?

Psalm 127:3 - Lo, children are an heritage of the LORD: and the fruit of the womb is his reward.