Sir, – It was with dismay and I would have to admit some anger that I read of Coadjutor Archbishop of Armagh Eamon Martin’s stance on abortion and the legislators and medical professionals who facilitate it (Home News, May 21st).
As a general practitioner of over 25 years practice I have given advice and information and indeed been part of that very difficult decision-making where abortion appears to be the best option. I do not see it as my role to be judgmental but to try and find the best solution in a given solution. I have always felt that some of the core issues of Christianity to be non-judgmental, caring and forgiving.
These do not appear to be evident in Archbishop Eamon Martin’s statements. I certainly do not see self-excommunication as an option and wonder if any of the paedophile clergy have self excommunicated.
I find it difficult to comprehend that a “caring” church would ban both contraception and abortion without reserve.
I cannot allow my professional integrity to be undermined by the threat of self- excommunication. Moreover, I will not. – Yours, etc,
Dr BLANAID
MacCURTAIN,
Castleconnell,
Co Limerick.
Sir, – Can anyone honestly argue that human life does not begin at conception? It seems the Government can. The Protection of Life during Pregnancy Bill offers a definition of “unborn” as “following implantation”. Why then does the Bill also need to expressly exclude “emergency contraception” from its scope if the pre-implanted embryo is not included in the proposed definition of “unborn”? Doesn’t this exclusion amount to an admission as to the abortifacient effect of the morning after pill from which it follows that the pre-implanted embryo is also “unborn”?
Why can’t our constitutional regard for the equal right to life of the unborn be interpreted to include pre-implanted unborn life? The scientists who are so keen on embryo research and couples who are longing to conceive are not in any doubt in this regard. – Yours, etc,
Fr EAMONN McCARTHY,
Freemount,
Charleville,
Co Cork.
Sir, – As a doctor who has participated in terminating pregnancies in various roles, including countersigning their approval, I am saddened by the letters I have been reading for months on these pages.
Women are not one homogeneous group relishing the prospect of abortion on demand. Do people really think women will renounce condoms, forget contraception altogether, forego the “morning after pill” and, with a bold sense of nonchalance, encamp in abortion clinics, celebrating the bloody end of yet another one-night stand?
I have yet to meet a woman who set out in life to terminate a pregnancy and was delighted that her time had come.
Instead I have seen many, many women struggle to decide what is best for them, their existing children, and their unborn child whose future they can imagine. They chose termination with sadness, regret, fear and sometimes a sense of relief. Many of them cried making the decision and carrying it out.
This “debate” seems beleaguered by useless pedantry over what will only represent a very small proportion of the already small proportion of women travelling abroad for terminations. One’s relationship with God, or lack thereof, is very personal. It is up to women to individually reconcile their choice with what fits their beliefs towards God(s).
Let’s stop judging women and instead show some compassion. Termination is a difficult choice to make without adding societal guilt. – Yours, etc,
Dr DAVID MURPHY,
Langdon Park Road,
London,
England.
Sir, – Prof Eamon O’ Dwyer (May 21st) is to be congratulated on providing compelling evidence from the consequences of the 1969 Californian Therapeutic Abortion Act – over 60,000 abortions sanctioned under its mental health provisions in its first year – and applying it tellingly to the present Irish debate.
I would urge Prof James Mackay (Rite and Reason, May 21st) to consider it carefully, particularly in the context of his suggestion that an increasing demand for abortion under the suicidal ideation provision would be unlikely and that to think otherwise makes one guilty of having a poor view of women. I think that the latter point introduces unnecessarily an emotive element to a problem that needs to take account of all relevant empirical as well as moral factors, by studying outcomes in other jurisdictions as objectively as possible. – Yours, etc,
ABBAN MURPHY
Sunnycroft Road,
Hounslow,
Middlesex,
England.