Students For Life Ireland, a pro-life student group, have hit out at the Health Minister, Simon Harris, over what they’ve labelled his “obsession” with the abortion issue to the detriment of other health concerns like the trolley crisis. Speaking in response the Health Minister’s recent remarks on exclusion zones, spokesperson for the group, Luke Silke also criticised the Minister’s use of the term ‘safe access zones’, describing it as “deliberately inflammatory”.
“It implies that pro-life people are a dangerous threat, which is an incredibly unfair way to depict a sizeable chunk of the voting public. There is nothing ‘safe’ about abortion, it is the only procedure performed by a doctor which is deemed a failure if the baby survives, and a success if the baby’s life is ended”.
He added: “Students For Life Ireland have always been of the view that sensitivity is warranted during vigils outside abortion-providing clinics or hospitals, and that no woman should ever face harassment. We share the Garda Commissioner’s view, however, that the existing legislation around harassment is sufficient and we believe that an introduction of ‘exclusion zones’ would be unconstitutional and undemocratic. Last year the government voted against some very humane amendments to the abortion bill, which were tabled by pro-life politicians. An amendment seeking to ensure that the unborn be granted pain relief prior to late term abortion was defeated. These zones are not ‘safe zones’ for the human beings, no different to us but in size, whose lives are being ended within the zones”, concluded Mr Silke.
Nigeria has been named as a key country of concern for 2020 by Christian persecution watchdog Release International.
‘Tens of thousands of Christians are being driven from their homes by the ongoing persecution in Nigeria,’ says Release CEO Paul Robinson. ‘While the death toll is rising, the world simply watches. Nigeria’s government appears to lack the will or the power to prevent the killings.’
Christians in Nigeria are being targeted by three Islamist terror groups: Boko Haram, its offshoot ISWAP, and heavily armed Fulani militia who are killing thousands and taking over their villages.
Release International’s Nigeria partner, Archbishop Ben Kwashi, says: ‘Across the north, the mainly Muslim Fulani have been taking land from predominantly Christian farmers by force and occupying their villages.’
‘They attack, typically, in the middle of the night while people are sleeping. They shoot in the air and create panic to drive the villagers out. When the people flee from their houses into the darkness, the Fulani lie in wait with their machetes and cut them down. Again and again. And the government seems powerless to stop them.’
Writing in a recent book, Neither Bomb Nor Bullet (Lion Hudson 2019), Archbishop Kwashi warns: ‘Nigeria has become the largest killing ground for Christians in the world today.’
The Northern Ireland Office will introduce a raft of changes to protect critics of same sex marriage from prosecution.
The Christian Institute had raised concerns only last week about free speech and religious liberty after marriage is redefined in law.
Public law specialist Ivan Hare QC found the threshold for prosecution for incitement to hatred was “substantially lower” in Northern Ireland than in England and Wales.
The Institute’s deputy director Simon Calvert said he expects many churches to preach in support of traditional marriage and doesn’t want the police using public order law to punish ministers for preaching the bible and arrest them for what they say from the pulpit.
The Secretary of State Julian Smith has now said that legislation is being amended to underline that mere criticism of same-sex marriage will not be an offence, and to ensure religious bodies cannot be sued for declining to support same-sex weddings.
The changes will also protect religious groups that dismiss staff who enter a same-sex marriage.
China announced it will soon implement harsh new measures requiring all religious personnel to support and implement total submission to the Chinese Communist Party, sparking concern among Chinese Christians.
Asia News reports that the new administrative measures will be put in place for Chinese religious groups starting Feb. 1. The measures complete the “Regulations on religious affairs” revised two years ago and implemented on Feb. 1, 2018.
Under the new rules, every aspect of the life of religious communities — from formation, gatherings to annual and daily projects — is subject to approval by the government’s religious affairs department.
Additionally, all religious personnel are required to support, promote and implement total submission to the Chinese Communist Party among all members of their communities.
The oldest abortion centre in the UK has closed after fifty years.
The Calthorpe Clinic in Birmingham became the single largest abortion facility in the UK with an annual caseload of around 10,000 clients.
It had a chequered safety record with one of its doctors found guilty of professional misconduct in 2003 after one woman almost died under his care. It is also alleged to have carried out sex-selective abortions. Many of its clients were Irish.
Christians have prayed and offered help to women outside the clinic for decades.
Rachel Mackenzie who herself once had an abortion at this centre went on to become a regular prayer volunteer outside the gates, said ‘I am so relieved that no more children will have their lives ended here as my son once did.’ Another woman who regretted her abortion there and who also became part of the Christian 40 Days for Life campaign outside the clinic, Linda Hope, said ‘I want other women to know there’s a better option than that pain. No one told me, so I want to be the voice that tells them’.
The Government has tasked its special rapporteur on child protection to examine calls to grant additional parental rights to LGBT couples who use surrogacy and third party sperm and eggs to have children.
Third party gametes deliberately break the natural ties and surrogacy is banned in many countries on the grounds that it exploits women and commodifies children.
Minister for Health Simon Harris has signalled his willingness to amend forthcoming legislation on assisted human reproduction, based on UCC law lecturer Conor O’Mahony’s recommendations.
Many same-sex parents will soon be able to register both of their names on their child’s birth certificate, but that change does not cover same-sex couples using surrogacy and certain other arrangements to have children.
That change will come into effect when Sections 2 and 3 of the Children and Family Relationships Act are commenced on May 5th next.
Campaign groups have criticised the spending of almost €10 million of taxpayers’ money on hiring Catholic and Church of Ireland chaplains for State-run multidenominational secondary schools.
Atheist Ireland says this funding is not being spent in a transparent manner and discriminates against secular and minority faith parents.
The Dáil’s Public Accounts Committee is currently investigating the public funding of chaplains in third-level institutions. Atheist Ireland has formally requested that the committee extend its investigation to include the appointment of chaplains to secondary schools.
The appointment of chaplains to ETB schools flows from legally binding agreements with the churches dating back to the 1970s.
These agreements oblige about a quarter of the 270 ETB-run secondary schools to maintain a Catholic ethos and provide students with two hours of religious instruction.
One abortion on average is carried out every day at one of the country’s leading maternity hospitals in 2019, the first full year of operation of the country’s new abortion law.
Each abortion would have occurred at the ninth week or later, as abortions prior to that are initiated at GP surgeries. He admitted that the ‘vast majority’ of abortions are facilitated by GPs via the abortion pill.
Official figures of the total number of abortions carried out in 2019 have not yet been released.
Dr Malone also revealed that one of the main challenges at the Rotunda was when pill-induced abortions failed to complete and the women require scans and follow-up treatment in hospital.
A Government Minister has attacked a Catholic parish for explaining Catholic teaching on IVF to other Catholics.
Minister for Health, Simon Harris, was responding to a Catholic parish in Tullamore who posted on social media the Church’s opposition to IVF.
Mr Harris described the comments as “extremely hurtful”.
He continued: “I thought and certainly hoped we had moved to a point as a country that this sort of inappropriate interference in decisions that individuals and couples make about their own lives would be left to them”.
A judge in the UK ruled on Wednesday that it was legal for a leading think tank to fire a worker for arguing publicly that biological males who identify as transgender women are not real women. Harry Potter author, JK Rowling, weighed in on behalf of the sacked worker.
The Centre for Global Development (CGD) fired tax expert Maya Forstater in March 2019 over a series of tweets in which she said that “men cannot change into women.”
She sued the CGD on grounds of discrimination, but in a ruling published Wednesday, employment tribunal Judge James Tayler said Forstater’s view is “not a philosophical belief protected by the Equality Act” and “is not worthy of respect in a democratic society.”
He continued by saying that Forstater “is absolutist in her view of sex and it is a core component of her belief that she will refer to a person by the sex she considered appropriate even if it violates their dignity and/or creates an intimidating, hostile, degrading, humiliating or offensive environment.”
JK Rowling, tweeted in support of Ms Forstater, writing: “Dress however you please. Call yourself whatever you like.Sleep with any consenting adult who’ll have you. Live your best life in peace and security. But force women out of their jobs for stating that [biological] sex is real? #IStandWithMaya #ThisIsNotADrill”.
She has since been denounced by trans activists as a ‘Terf’, or ‘Trans Exclusionary Radical Feminist’. Well known former athletes Martina Navratilova and Sharon Davies, MBE, have also come to Forstater’s defence.
