Pro-life groups in the US have described the decision by a prominent US Catholic university to invite Taoiseach Enda Kenny to receive an honourary degree and speak at their graduation ceremony as “unconscionable” in light of the Government’s proposed abortion Bill.

“After our painful experience for the past 40 years, we know what legal abortion will do to Ireland,” Kristan Hawkins, president of Students for Life of America told Catholic News Agency in the US.

Hawkins said that legalised abortion in America “has led to the deaths of over 55 million preborn baby girls and boys, the victimization of millions of women, and the crumbling of families”.

The Government’s Bill is based on the 1992 X Case ruling. Among other things, it will provide for the right to have an abortion where three doctors, one obstetricians and two psychiatrists, judge that there is a real and substantial risk that a woman will die by suicide otherwise.

At the Oireachtas hearings into the abortion issue, every psychiatrist testified that there was no evidence that abortion was a treatment for suicidal ideation or suicidal intent.

In April, 120 psychiatrists agreed a statement saying the Government should not include a suicide provision in its legislation.  

Following the announcement by Boston College that Mr Kenny would speak at the college’s graduation ceremonies on May 20 and receive an honorary Doctor of Laws degree for the school’s 150th anniversary, Students for Life launched the project “Not at BC” to oppose his appearance.

College spokesman Jack Dunn cited the college’s Irish connections as a motive for the choice. Boston College was founded by a Jesuit from Ulster to serve the Irish immigrant population and maintains an Irish Studies program.

The abortion bill will also force any hospitals with maternity wards to carry out abortions regardless of ethos.

Students for Life of America said Mr Kenny has bowed to the international pro-abortion movement in his push to legalize the procedure.

The organisation said it is “simply unconscionable” for any college, particularly a Catholic one, to “honour the man who would usher in the mass death of Irish preborn children.”

“As Catholics, Christians, and pro-lifers of all faiths, the time is now to stand in solidarity with the innocent pre-born, oppose Prime Minister Kenny, and demand he stop promoting the grave moral evil of abortion in Ireland,” said Hawkins.

“Boston College must hold true to its Catholic mission and immediately revoke their invitation to Prime Minister Kenny to speak at their commencement ceremony.”