Augustine is clear to distinguish that all or even some abortions are not examples of murder, but rather that all abortions and all attempts at contraception are examples of cruel lust (libido crudelis) or harlotry or adultery. (Dombrowski and Deltete, 21) However, in the Enchiridion (3), he says, "But who is not rather disposed to think that unformed fetuses perish like seeds which have not fructified" " clearly seeing hominization as beginning or occurring at some point after the fetus has begun to grow. Most theologians of his era agreed with his views on abortion. (Abortion and ) In a disciplinary sense, the general agreement at this time was that abortion was a sin requiring penance if it was intended to conceal fornication and adultery.
Another such theologian who shed some light into this debate was Thomas Aquinas (1225-1274 AD.). More than Augustine, Thomas was more concerned with the ontological status of the fetus in the early stages of pregnancy. Moreover was the concern whether there actual was a real human person from the "moment- of conception; if there is, then abortion many very well be seriously immoral even in the early stages of pregnancy. Catholic opinion held that there is a real human person from the first moment of conception, or at least that we cannot be sure that this is not the case. Thomas held the delayed hominization view because of his hylomorphism, where the human soul is the form of the human being. Thus, the human soul is to the body (hyle) like the shape or form (morphe) of a statue is to the actual statue. Thomas recognized that whatever was growing in the mother's womb early in pregnancy was not yet a real human body; hence, it could not be animated by a human sole. We can say that the fetus at the early stages is potential for a human body and is worth virtually nothing. This can be seen when the Catholic Church adopted the hylomorphic conception of human nature at the Council of Vienne in 1312, which forbade the church to baptize any premature births, giving no reason to baptize nothing.