A legal challenge to allow women in Northern Ireland to procure abortions funded by the National Health Service (NHS) has been taken to Britain’s Supreme Court. The case was launched by a mother and daughter who travelled to Britain to allow the daughter to have her pregnancy terminated. The brought the case after the Court of Appeal ruled that health services in England and Wales have no obligation to provide publicly funded abortions in Northern Ireland. The Supreme Court has allowed for submissions from six pro-abortion groups in the case. Reacting to the case, the Society for the Protection of the Unborn Child (SPUC) said: “A bad decision in this case would not only lead to more children being killed by abortion, it will also have serious implications for the rule of law and the value of Northern Ireland’s devolved institutions.”

A court in the US state of Louisiana has ruled that a priest is not compelled to report information of a criminal nature received during confession. The judgement, handed down by the state’s Supreme Court, arose from a case in the Catholic Diocese of Baton Rouge in which Fr Jeff Bayhi became the subject of a lawsuit from Rebecca Mayeux who claimed she was being abused by a parishioner but that the priest did nothing to stop the abuse and did not report it to the police. In its ruling the court stated it was not “conclusively determined” whether a priest in confession is a mandatory reporter of child abuse under provisions of the existing legislation. Thus, “any communication made to a priest privately in the sacrament of confession for the purposes of confession, repentance, and absolution is a confidential communication … and the priest is exempt from mandatory reporter status,” the court ruled.

A court in the Canadian province of British Columbia has confirmed the accreditation status of a faith-run university which had been threatened with sanction for imposing a covenant on students to abstain from sex until marriage. The British Columbia Court of Appeal ruled that Trinity Western University (TWU) Law School had no case to answer after the local law society alleged discrimination against the LGBT community and said the law society’s decision to deny accreditation limits the university’s right to freedom of religion in a disproportionate way. A spokesperson for TWU said after the judgement: “Everyone, religious or not, should celebrate this decision as a protection of our Canadian identity.”

The Canadian province of Québec recorded a much higher than expected rate of death by euthanasia in the first seven months since the method was legalised. Figures compiled by the Québec euthanasia commission reveal that there were 262 reported euthanasia deaths between December 2015 and June 2016. Presenting the figures to parliament, the province’s Health Minister Gaétan Barrette expressed surprise at the number and admitted: “I mentioned many times that I was expecting about 100. It’s almost three times that…on a one-year period, it will be over 300 … that in itself is surprising to me.” Examinaton of the figures has led one news outlet to state that 21 of the total euthanasia deaths did not meet the requirements as set down in law for seeking assisted suicide.

The first Christian Mass in over two years has been celebrated in the newly liberated city of Qaraqosh, Iraq. Having ousted fighters of so-called Islamic State (ISIS), Iraqi forces cleared the way for the Immaculate Conception Cathedral at the centre of the city to host a religious celebration as a symbol of the city’s hard-won freedom. Led by Syrian Catholic Archbishop Petros Mouche of Mosul, Kirkuk and the whole Kurdistan, worshippers sang hymns in Aramaic and listened as the prelate called on Christians to clean up this city from all traces of [ISIS], the hatred of which we have all been victims”. Of the cathedral itself, seriously damaged but still standing, the Archbishop said: “This church is a symbol for us.”

Britain’s Department of Health has announced that it has approved a form of earlier pre-natal screening which opponents say will increase the rate of abortions for babies diagnosed with Down syndrome. The Department is now set to roll out use of Non Invasive Pre-Natal Testing. The move comes despite a letter signed by 279 health professionals across Britain which accuses the Royal College of Obstetricians and Gynaecologists of “advocating that women with a prenatal diagnosis of Down syndrome should end their pregnancy”, arising in part from the ‘cost effectiveness of caring for children with the syndrome. Nine out of ten diagnosed Down Syndrome babies are already aborted in the UK.

Poland’s President Andrzej Duda has pledged to support a restriction on abortion for children with disabilities. Just weeks after abortion advocates staged major protests against any tightening of abortion laws, President Duda declared current laws “ineffective” in protecting the unborn. In addition to cases of rape, incest and the health of the mother, Poland allows for abortion of foetuses deemed to be suffering ‘severe deformities’, though this is often interpreted to include babies with disabilities such as Down syndrome. “I believe that the lives of these children are too poorly protected at the moment,” President Duda said. The President’s message has been echoed by Prime Minister Beata Szydlo who has just unveiled a new ‘Pro-Life’ programme to provide more support to families raising children with disabilities.

Northern Ireland’s First Minister has criticised the region’s Equality Commission (ECNI) for its part in the Ashers Bakery case. Arlene Foster MLA said the ECNI had not “covered themselves in glory” in dealing with the discrimination claim made against the Christian owners of Ashers during the so-called same-sex cake row, and for offering no assistance to the family during the hearing. The body’s actions had been “quite troubling”, she said. Instead of “accepting the metropolitan liberal elite definition of equality they need to look at what real equality is and look at the faith communities in Northern Ireland and that is something they haven’t been doing”, she added.

A judge in Britain has ordered a boy to be placed into the care of his father after it emerged that social workers had been backing the child’s mother in dressing him in girl’s clothes and forcing him to live as a girl for two years. In a custody hearing, the judge praised the child’s Catholic school for bringing the issue to light and criticised social workers for ignoring concerns expressed about the boy’s welfare. It was found that social workers had failed to check on the mother’s false assertion that the boy had been diagnosed as transgender and had subsequently prevented professional assessments of the child. The judge stated that the “profile and sensitivity” of transgenderism “blinded a number of professionals from applying their training, skill, and, it has to be said, common sense.”

The European Parliament has adopted a resolution to offer protection to Christians in Iraq once the offensive to retake the city of Mosul is complete. Tabled by the European People’s Party Group, the resolution – which will also offer protection to other minority groups such as Yazidis passed by a huge margin of 488 votes to 11 (with 100 abstentions). The motion to pass the resolution noted the dreadful regime inflicted on the people of Mosul and the fact that people are now starving as they await liberation. “The coming liberation of Mosul is… the defining moment when it comes to the future of Iraq’s indigenous peoples,” said Swedish MEP Lars Adaktusson, who initiated the resolution. “Now that Islamic State is on its way to being driven out of Mosul, it is indispensable that the EU, together with other countries, shows solidarity with minorities…That means the creation of maximum regional autonomy in Northern Iraq for Christians – Chaldeans, Syriacs, Assyrians – Yazidis and Turkmen indigenous populations.”