The Iona Institute has asked a number of Catholic moral theologians and philosophers to respond to a number of questions about whether there is a moral duty to take one of the Covid vaccinations when offered one, whether they should be a legal compulsion to do so, and finally whether companies such as airlines should...
As mentioned in the previous blog, a document in support of euthanasia and assisted suicide has been submitted the Oireachtas Committee on Justice by a small group of Irish doctors. That blog examined how the document’s reasoning illustrates the existence of a slippery slope even while denying it. This blog will look at its ambiguous...
A new group called ‘Irish Doctors supporting Medical Assistance in Dying (IDsMAiD)’ has made a submission to the Oireachtas Justice Committee that is examining Deputy Gino Kenny’s ‘Dying with Dignity Bill’. The submission denies that a slippery slope exists once you legalise the measure, while at the same time confirming its existence by opening the...
Today is the deadline for submissions to the Oireachtas Justice Committee concerning Gino Kenny’s ‘Dying with Dignity Bill’. What is happening in other countries that have gone this path becomes more relevant than ever. Euthanasia and assisted suicide were legalised in Canada in 2016 and, since then, the number of patients killed in hospitals and...
Thanks to prenatal screening, far fewer babies with Down Syndrome are being born than was once the case. A recent study shows that across Europe as a whole, the reduction is in the order of half, but in Ireland prior to the introduction of abortion two years ago, it was ‘only’ 8pc, whereas in Spain...
Among the many other things it examines, the report on the Mother and Baby Homes published last week looks at how other countries in the past treated unmarried mothers. It throws a spotlight on how various countries in the first part of the last century promoted eugenics, which frequently targeted unmarried mothers, labelling them ‘feeble-minded’,...
In 2020, New Zealand had great success in protecting its people from Covid-19, a naturally-caused infection, but in a seeming paradox it opened the door to euthanasia, and further liberalised its abortion law, both of which allow for the deliberate killing of human beings. New Zealand was the first country to put euthanasia to a...
The report on the Mother and Baby Homes makes for often disturbing reading. Unmarried mothers were routinely consigned to institutions such as mother and baby or county homes and eventually separated from their children. One organisation followed a different path, namely the Legion of Mary. The report itself acknowledges this. It says: “before the 1970s,...
It goes against the lazy stereotype of the traditionalist, bread-winning male and the subservient wife who does all the housework, but new research has found that men who attend religious services regularly spend more time doing housework than most other men. The other group of men who do more housework than the norm, are non-religious...
Last November, the Iona Institute drew attention to an academic study from University College Cork which strongly indicates that late-term abortions are taking place in Irish hospitals, with the babies sometimes being left to die following a termination. The study was mostly ignored by mainstream media in Ireland but attracted some attention internationally. It was...
