Sir, - I was relieved to see that Peter de Rosa (October 11th) is again quite rightly highlighting the need for discussion of the treatment of very early life. He and I raised this question in August, 1996. It was again raised in December, 1997 and in June 2000. No one has come forward - despite Father Padraig McCarthy's very welcome response (June 20th) which appeared to consider only late miscarriages and stillbirths - to accurately state the position on our treatment of early life.
This issue is about our treatment of very early life: from the moment of conception. If we accept that life begins at conception, then we should always treat and respect that life as if it were fully formed. But we don't. We are inconsistent in our approach. We carelessly dispose of embryos. We do not have procedures for dealing with early life should something happen to it naturally, say in an early miscarriage.
The abortion debate cannot proceed until we have absolute clarity on our position on early life. Either we treat early life as fully formed life or we accept that in some way it is indeed different. We cannot have it both ways. We cannot condemn abortion and yet casually dispose of early life should it happen naturally. We need a church, medical or ethical response to this very difficult and essential question. Can any of your readers help? - Yours, etc.
Kathleen Kelleher, Rathdown Park, Greystones, Co Wicklow.