At the same time, almost 41pc of births were outside of marriage, an increase from last year.

Commenting on the figures, Seán O’Connor of the CSO said: “we can see the number of births has decreased by 1,002 (or 6.9%) when compared with the same quarter in the previous year, down from 14,449 in Q2 2022 to 13,447 in Q2 2023.

“Births to mothers aged less than 20 fell from 222 in Q2 2022 to 176 in Q2 2023. The average age of mothers was 33.3 years in Q2 2023, up slightly from 33.2 reported in the same quarter in 2022, while 10 years ago, the average age was 32.2 years for the same period.

“More than two in five (40.9%) births were outside of marriage/civil partnership, compared with the same quarter a year earlier when 44.2% of births were to mothers outside of marriage. Ten years ago, in Q2 2013, this proportion was more than one in three (34.0%) births.”

A vaguely worded assurance from the Department of Health that pro-life marches won’t be affected by new exclusion zone legislation has raised alarm.

Following a query from The Irish Catholic regarding so-called ‘safe-access zones’ around abortion providers, the department said in a statement: “There is no intention to criminalise bona fide protest marches which incidentally pass through safe access zones.”

Leader of Aontú Peadar Tóibín TD was sharply critical, saying the assurance it provided was “incredibly vague”.

“I would have serious concerns over the fact that we are potentially facing a situation where a human right, a right to life protest, could be refused by the Government on the main street of the capital city in our country while a protest supporting further deregulation of abortion could be allowed – so the Government would take a political decision on the objectives of a rally before a rally or a protest would happen,” he said.

“That is a very, very dangerous development, it’s a dystopian development in a liberal democracy, and I would appeal for the Government even at this stage to withdraw it.”

34.5% of women experience depression post abortion according to a new meta-analysis of psychiatric literature recently published in the peer-reviewed journal BMC Psychiatry.

The authors analysed 15 studies across the world – from China, Germany, Iran, Australia, Kenya, Jordan, Kosovo, Denmark, Lithuania, Turkey, and the Netherlands. They noted that post-abortion depression is a “common problem for all women of reproductive age.”

Moreover, the review shows that women from lower-income nations are more likely to experience post-abortion depression compared to women from higher-income nations.

The overall findings were somewhat skewed however as the meta-analysis also included data from three research papers dealing with spontaneous abortion/miscarriage. When these three papers are set aside, the studies focussing solely on induced abortion show even higher rates of depression post abortion.

Less than half of respondents to a survey on attitudes to death say they want a funeral, according to research just published in the UK.

The researchers say it confirms that society today “keeps death at arm’s length and out of sight”.

Madeleine Pennington and Nathan Mladin of the Theos think tank say people are increasingly likely to grieve for others behind closed doors: “religious or not, we think a funeral should celebrate the life of the deceased and hold space for mourning together, but less than half of us (47%) now say we want a funeral at all”.

They add that while financial pressures play a part in these decisions, religious and spiritual perspectives are even stronger determinants of whether people want a funeral or not.

“In this sense, reducing religious affiliation has made greater room for market forces to shape how we grieve. The result is a significant realignment in British grieving practices. And further changes to the ways we grieve may come, given higher levels of openness to emerging ‘grief technologies’ among the young”.

The pastoral center of Christ the King Cathedral in Loikaw, Myanmar, was bombed on Nov. 26 and occupied by the Burmese military the next day, according to reporting by Agenzia Fides, the news arm of Pontifical Mission Societies.

Though no one was killed in the bombing, the pastoral center’s ceiling collapsed and Bishop Celso Ba Shwe and the 80 refugees taking shelter in the church were forced to flee, per the Hong Kong Catholic news service UCA News.

Shwe said in a statement published by Agenzia Fides that “the Burmese army tried to take the Christ the King Cathedral complex three times” before finally occupying it on Nov. 27.

“As a local bishop,” Shwe said, “I, together with the priests, tried to convince the military generals of the importance of the religious sites and asked them to leave the place to spare, where displaced people are also welcomed.”

The European Court of Justice (ECJ) ruling came after a Belgian woman alleged the local municipality where she worked had infringed her religious freedom by telling her she couldn’t wear a hijab.

The municipality’s terms of employment required employees to observe strict neutrality, which means any form of proselytising is prohibited and the wearing of overt signs of ideological or religious affiliation is not allowed for any worker.

Hearing the case, the Labour Court in Liège said it was uncertain whether the condition of strict neutrality imposed by the municipality gave rise to discrimination contrary to EU law.

The ECJ answered that the authorities in member states had a margin of discretion to designate the degree of neutrality they want to promote.

A Hungarian national with a progressive degenerative condition has brought a challenge to his nation’s ban on assisted suicide before the European Court of Human Rights.

Defending the ban, ADF International has argued that the prohibition must be upheld in line with the European Convention on Human Rights’ (Article 2) protection of the right to life.

In its submission to the Court, the legal advocacy organization highlights the inevitable abuses that ensue when legal protections for the right to life are eradicated: “Removing such provisions from law creates a dangerous scenario where pressure is placed on vulnerable people to end their lives in fear (whether or not justified) of being a burden upon relatives, carers, or a state that is short of resources.”

“We cannot abandon our essential human rights protections.”

“While Mr. Karsai’s condition demands our greatest compassion, we cannot abandon our essential human rights protections. Hungary is bound under European and international human rights law to safeguard human life,” stated Jean-Paul Van De Walle, Legal Counsel for ADF International, present at the Court’s oral hearing in Strasbourg yesterday.

A leading Catholic prelate in Nigeria has denounced so-called “blasphemy laws” as a violation of basic freedoms after one woman was killed by a mob and another is set to stand trial for allegedly blaspheming Islam.

Twelve states in the Muslim-dominated northern part of Nigeria have implemented some form of Islamic sharia law, under which blasphemy is a crime which can be punished by death. Critics object that such laws are often used to target and harass religious minorities.

“No person should be silenced or imprisoned for peacefully sharing their views,” said Archbishop Ignatius Kaigama of the national capital of Abuja.

The comments came in the wake of the lynching of Deborah Emmanuel Yakubu, a university student, who had been accused of blaspheming Islam, and the arrest of 45-year-old Rhoda Ya’u Jatau for sharing a WhatsApp message that condemned Yakubu’s death.

“What has happened to Rhoda should never have happened,” Kaigama told Crux.

“Freeing her from incarceration now will help greatly in moving our country to a direction where the rights and lives of its people are truly valued and this will be an important first step to restoring that hope,” he said.

It is likely to be another week before the wording for the referendum to delete the protection afforded mothers in the home in the Constitution will go to Government for approval. The Government wants to replace it with gender-neutral wording.

Despite some indications over the last week that the wording for the referendum would be considered at today’s Cabinet meeting, it is now expected to go before Minsters next week.

The original intention of holding the referendum this month was abandoned some time ago and March 8th – International Women’s Day – is now likely to be the polling day.

The plans are also set to include inserting recognition of family carers and also an aspiration that the State should “strive to support the provision of care” in the home into the Constitution.

The number of abortions in England and Wales for 2023 could reach an unprecedented high of 325,000, according to an independent public health consultant.

Kevin Duffy says official government data for January to June 2022 reported a staggering 17% increase over the same period in 2021.

On 22 November 2023, Parliament published written evidence submitted by MSI Reproductive Choices to the inquiry ‘Impact of the rising cost of living on women’. Citing the 17% rise in 2022 MSI-RC says: “As a leading abortion provider [we have] seen an even bigger rise. For example, the first period in 2023 saw an increase of 32% compared with the same time period in 2022…”

Duffy says the official 2022 full-year data from the Office for Health Improvement and Disparities (OHID) has not yet been published, but “based on the OHID data for the first six months of 2022 and making an estimate for 2023 based on MSI’s written evidence, we can project a total of 325,000 abortions in 2023”.

This would mean that 1-in-3 pregnancies now end in abortion, up from 1-in-4 in the past.