TDs have been taken to task for refusing to mandate pain-relief for babies suffering late-term abortions. Writing in the Irish Times, Rev Dr Chris Hayden, a priest of the diocese of Ferns and editor of Intercom magazine, said a vet putting down a horse will do all in his or her power to ensure that the animal is comfortable, unstressed and pain-free. What then, he asked, “might be the problem with extending the same ‘humaneness’ to an unborn human?”
Dr Hayden said that nobody is arguing that the unborn is not sentient, or that dismemberment or poisoning do not cause it agony, so it begs the question: why not make pain-relief mandatory, in law?
The answer, he writes, “is as simple as it is sinister.”
“Give any recognition, anywhere in the legal apparatus, of the sentient nature of the unborn, and you open a door towards a recognition of humanity. Open that door, and you might open another – and another. We can’t deny the reality of an unborn creature writhing in agony inside its human mother while the abortionist’s tools take hold. This has been recorded on ultrasound. We can’t deny it, but we must not recognise it either. It is an inconvenient truth.”
The Archbishop of Dublin has voiced his support for Catholics wishing to resist the abortion law currently going through the Oireachtas.
In remarks to the Irish Times, Archbishop Diarmuid Martin said, “There’s a clear Catholic teaching that if legislation is against the basic principles of faith of people that they can’t be forced to carry it out.” On the right of medical personnel to not be forced to participate in abortions, he said: “The Minister himself has recognised the place of conscientious objection. We’ll wait and see exactly what comes out as to whether the solutions the Minister presents are going to be adequate.”
Asked whether this right of Catholics not to obey laws in certain circumstances also included legislation on divorce, same-sex marriage and family planning, Archbishop said: “There’s a hierarchy of truths in Catholic teaching and the centrality of some aspects. If people have conscientious objection it’s a very important thing to remember it. For me, very often social change comes from people who stand up for their commitments.”
Minister Simon Harris has described as ‘offensive’, allegations that he made untruthful claims regarding the lack of prohibition on late-term abortions.
Speaking in the Seanad yesterday, Independent Senator Ronan Mullen said voters were repeatedly told there would be no late term abortions, and quoted Mr Harris stating in the Dáil that ‘it is important to be clear and truthful that in cases where there is foetal viability early deliver and the full range of neonatal care is the reality’.
However, Mr Mullen said, there was no provision in the legislation “requiring even a consideration of saving unborn life in an emergency situation”.
He added: “it is impossible to conclude Minister that you have been truthful now in the light of what the Bill now says”.
He also asked “what protects against abortion right up to birth on mental health grounds” and said it was “bizarre” that in situations where there is abortion on grounds of mental health that the medical practitioners does not have to be a psychiatrist.
The Minister told the Senator “we don’t need you to protect pregnancy because women do that, women are the greatest protectors of their pregnancies”. And he said it was “particularly offensive” of Mr Mullen to pick a section of the Bill linked to emergency situations when a woman was at risk of dying or of serious harm.
The Minister said the only place in the bill that allows abortion post-viability is the emergency provision. “Your efforts to say ’including mental health’ as though that’s some sort of made up thing over there is setting this country back 50 years.”
The right to life is a primary human right according to former Taoiseach, John Bruton. In a speech delivered at the Irish Catholic Doctors’ Learning Network Annual Conference in Swords, Co Dublin, last weekend, Mr Bruton said that the pro life case is that the right to life is the primary right, “because, without life, one simply cannot exercise any of the other rights. It flows from that that the primary responsibility, of the state, and of each of us as citizens, is to protect life.”
He also said the State by facilitating, and paying for, the taking of life, is abandoning one of its core functions which is to protect life.
Regarding conscientious objection, the former Taoiseach said “no person, medically qualified or otherwise, should be forced by the threat to his/her employment, or of criminal sanctions, to be involved in the ending of a human life, against his or her religious convictions.” He cited Article 44.2.1 of the Irish Constitution which, he said, “guarantees, subject to public order and morality, the ‘free…..practice of religion’”.
The Catholic Bishop of Elphin, Kevin Doran, has said the Abortion Bill has no moral force and if it becomes law must be resisted. “Catholics have no obligation whatsoever to obey this law,” he told the Irish Independent.
Bishop Doran said the fundamental presupposition is that citizens should always obey a just law. “But this is an unjust law and therefore it has no moral force,” he said.
Bishop Doran said resistance should not simply be theoretical: he cited the example of the Dunnes Stores workers’ boycott of South African goods and said the tradition of “constructive resistance” was well established. He said doctors, nurses and midwives who oppose abortion should unite. “They will have to stick together because if they don’t they’ll be picked off individually. But what we would be saying is that they as a substantial body [should] simply refuse to participate or to refer.”
He called on teachers, not just Catholic teachers in Catholic schools, “but people of integrity who believe absolutely that this is a human being” to reflect their beliefs in their teaching. “They can’t just roll over and say ‘we’ll teach that it’s just a cluster of cells’ or ‘this is OK because the law says it is OK’. You would be calling on teachers to be consistent with the truth in their teaching.” He also said people working in the pharmaceutical industry may not want to be involved in making drugs used in abortions. He said if such workers were to say they didn’t want to be involved in making drugs that are designed to kill, “now that takes courage”.
Women seeking abortion in January will be left in the lurch unless doctors ‘step up’ and start executing the procedure, Minister for Health Simon Harris has warned.
He said he acknowledged some medical professionals were raising issues of genuine concern. However, he said he wanted to hear “solutions” and then for “clinical leadership to prevail”.
His comments come after warnings from obstetricians that abortion would not be ready to roll out in hospitals at the start of January. The Minister is to meet doctors’ representative organisations today, where an outline of new clinical guidelines is expected to be considered. “I will be using this opportunity to ask the stakeholders to put their shoulder to the wheel and assist the HSE in providing this much needed service. I am eager to hear their concerns, not through the airwaves or the papers, but directly and I will not shirk from my responsibility in responding appropriately. But I also want to hear solutions.”
The Sunday Business Post reported yesterday that Dublin’s three maternity hospitals were unable to guarantee they would be in a position to carry out abortions from the beginning of January.
Mr Harris said on Sunday “without a start date, women will still travel and will still take illegal pills. Any delay will affect the 12 women a day who find themselves in crisis pregnancies and only have the internet or the plane as solutions.”
Leading obstetricians are seeking to delay the introduction of abortion in January “because of risks to patient safety due to inadequate preparation” for it. However, Dr Peter Boylan, who has been charged by Health Minister, Simon Harris, with implementation of abortion ‘services’ has said it will begin next month.
Writing in today’s Irish Times, former master of the Coombe Women and Infants University Hospital Prof Chris Fitzpatrick, who voted for repeal of the 8th in May, criticised the Government’s “frenzied attempt to meet a dangerously unrealistic deadline”.
He and other members of the Institute of Obstetricians and Gynaecologists have called for an EGM to debate a motion that abortion legislation “cannot” commence next month and “should not take place until these risks are addressed”. Obstetricians from Dublin and outside Dublin, and from large and small maternity units, had signed the motion and the signatures were collected “within a matter of hours”.
Dr Fitzpatrick said in The Irish Times: “We are on the verge of introducing a new termination of pregnancy service, which, if rushed into operation on January 1st as scheduled, will pose a serious threat to the health and wellbeing of women … compounded in addition by inadequate planning and insufficient resources,” Prof Fitzpatrick writes.
Prof Fitzpatrick stresses that he is not a conscientious objector to abortion. “I will participate in the provision of this service – but only when it is safe to do so. At present I am operating in an information vacuum.”
He says it is “frightening” that there are no agreed models of care, published clinical guidelines or clarifications on key ethical issues and clinical concerns with less than one month to go to the introduction of the service.
Unrelatedly, Minister for Health Simon Harris said claims from anti-abortion politicians that the legislation was being rushed through the Oireachtas were “offensive”.
“When I hear some opponents of the legislation suggesting that it is being rushed I actually think that’s really offensive to women in this country,” he said. “I think it’s offensive to people who’ve been working to arrive at this point for 35 years.”
In a prime example of freedom of religion, Brother Kevin Crowley of the Capuchin Day Centre in Dublin lambasted the Government’s response to the housing crisis while receiving an award in Leinster House for his own work helping the homeless and destitute of the city.
Speaking in the members’ restaurant after becoming the fourth recipient of the Oireachtas Human Dignity Award, Br Kevin said “It’s absolutely appalling to think in 2018 that the Government cannot face up to the fact that we have a crisis in our country. We have a crisis in our cities for the homeless people. We have a crisis for the children. We have a crisis for their families. These people should not be walking the streets .”
He questioned the State’s strategy in addressing the crisis. “Where are we? Where are our politicians? Where is the money going to? Recently, there was a hotel got, I think, €9 million for homeless people. How many houses could we have built for that? It is a crying shame.”
The award was given by the Oireachtas Human Dignity Group, whose founding member, Senator Rónán Mullen (Ind), said Br Crowley had “earned the respect of the Irish people”.
Ireland’s Catholic bishops have said they are “dismayed” that the voices of those who voted against repealing the eighth amendment have been ignored since last May’s referendum.
In a statement following their winter general meeting, the bishops said that amendments to the Abortion Bill that many would have deemed to be “very reasonable” had been rejected.
“We are dismayed that, for the most part, the voices of those who voted against abortion in May’s referendum have been ignored,” the bishops said.
“As we stated after our Autumn Meeting, Irish society must have respect for the right of conscientious objection for all healthcare professionals and pharmacists. They cannot be forced either to participate in abortion or to refer patients to others for abortion.”
The bishops said “every one of us has a right to life. It is not given to us by the Constitution of Ireland or by any law… The direct and intentional taking of human life at any stage is gravely wrong and can never be justified.”
The continued: “Women’s lives, and the lives of their unborn children, are precious, valued and always deserving of protection. Any law which suggests otherwise would have no moral force. In good conscience it cannot be supported and would have to be resisted.”
Legislation to provide for an extensive abortion regime for the first time in Ireland was passed by the Dáil following an extended debate.
The so-called Regulation of Termination of Pregnancy Bill was approved by 90 votes to 15 with 12 abstentions. The Bill will now go before the Seanad as the Government rushes to have it enacted in time for its planned introduction date in January.
A total of 65 amendments were tabled but only changes brought by the Minister for Health, Simon Harris, were passed. Fianna Fail refused to back any pro-life amendments.
