First Things RSS Feed - Joan Frawley Desmond https://www.firstthings.com/author/joan-frawley-desmond en-us Copyright 2025 First Things. All Rights Reserved. ft@firstthings.com (The Editors) ft@firstthings.com (The Editors) Mon, 20 Jan 2025 16:55:10 -0500 https://d2201k5v4hmrsv.cloudfront.net/img/favicon-196.png First Things RSS Feed Image https://www.firstthings.com/rss/author/joan-frawley-desmond 60 Apologizing to the Babies https://www.firstthings.com/article/1996/10/004-apologizing-to-the-babies https://www.firstthings.com/article/1996/10/004-apologizing-to-the-babies Tue, 01 Oct 1996 00:00:00 -0400 Japan has been called “abortion heaven.” The Ministry of Health and Welfare reported 364,350 abortions in 1994, though that figure does not include abortions by the private physicians whose lucrative business has reportedly blocked distribution of the birth control pill. In a 1982 survey conducted by the Kyodo News Service, about 60 percent of women in their forties with college degrees and executive-level husbands admitted having had one or more abortions.

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]]> The Need for Moral Memory https://www.firstthings.com/article/1995/05/the-need-for-moral-memory https://www.firstthings.com/article/1995/05/the-need-for-moral-memory Mon, 01 May 1995 00:00:00 -0400 The Wages of Guilt: Memories of War in Germany and Japan By Ian Buruma
Farrar, Straus & Giroux, 330 pages, $25

Factories of Death: Japanese Biological Warfare 1932-45 and the American Cover-Up By Sheldon Harris
Routledge, 295 Pages, $25

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]]> Baptism and Development https://www.firstthings.com/article/1993/01/baptism-and-development https://www.firstthings.com/article/1993/01/baptism-and-development Fri, 01 Jan 1993 00:00:00 -0500 In the north Indian state of Bihar, there are indigenous peoples who never converted to the Hinduism of the Aryan people that conquered and settled India long ago. Some of these tribals, as they are called, exist in another century, perhaps another millennium. In one hamlet, there is a well for drinking water, but no one has used it since a child fell down it and died four years ago. The illiterate villagers fear disturbing the child’s spirit, which, they believe, still resides in that well. Not long ago, dysentery killed twenty-six tribal villagers within two weeks’ time. No one went to the doctor or the dispensary down the road, because they were suspicious of the doctor’s magic.

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