A moral journey

Regarding the Feb. 16 article "Abortion remark angers students":

Every year in early spring, I mark two anniversaries: my brother Dennis' birth and his death some 40 years later. Dennis was born retarded, although not with Down syndrome.

I imagine we will see letters stating that Professor Albert Harris' moral position assumes there is one state of normal, one good life. I felt, though, that he tried to convey a more subtle idea. He wanted students to consider a journey that he and his wife took during her pregnancy, a visit to a land where my family lived.

I am who I am because of Dennis. I like to think some of the better parts of my nature came from living with him, whether I got them intuitively or through hard-learned lessons.

So I am grateful for Dennis, even for the hard times we had. But isn't that what people do? Take the situation we find and see what we can make of it? And might that be the point Harris tried to make? That even when we can argue for the morality of a particular action, our own nature may take us in an entirely different direction, may lead us to choose a life in a different land? And isn't that a good enough life?

Winston Atkins

Cary