This week the Cabinet agreed the wording for the ‘Protection of Life during Pregnancy Bill 2013’.  Unfortunately the Bill does not live up to its name. It has provided the “abortion on demand” lobby with the key which, in time, will open the door to what is called a woman’s “right to choose”.

The key is the suicide clause whereby a pregnant woman who claims to be suicidal, if her claim is confirmed by two doctors and an obstetrician, can have her pregnancy terminated.

Since there is no evidence to support the notion that termination is a remedy for suicide, indeed the death of her baby may produce suicidal tendencies, the inclusion of the suicide clause may be more a political vote catching ploy than a humanitarian gesture.

Of course there is the “X case” and the European Court judgment neither of which require legislating for abortion on the grounds of suicide. However they have provided the smoke screen for this inclusion.

If the proposed legislation passes into law Ireland will inexorably go down the route of it being tested, found unworkable and an amendment permit virtual abortion on demand.

Thus Ireland will follow the other countries who have tried unsuccessfully to limit abortion.

In the US there has been widespread abortion since the Supreme Court’s decision in 1973 to confer it as a woman’s right, the only limitation being the viability of the foetus. In Asia the females are more likely to be aborted resulting in the loss of 163 million females through sex-selective abortion and infanticide because of cultural prejudice against girls and women.

Ireland could move from being one of the safest places on earth to have a baby to one where the unborn child’s life is at risk.

A few years ago in the US a group of Catholics and Protestants produced a document called “That They Might Have Life.” They said this about abortion:

The blindness of so many to this moral atrocity has many sources but is finally to be traced to the seductive ways of evil advanced by Satan. Jesus says, “He was as murderer from the beginning, and has nothing to do with the truth, because there is no truth in him. When he lies, he speaks according to his own nature, for he is a liar and the father of lies” (St John Chapter 8 verse 44).

We have not only this blindness but a deafness to the appeal of those who care for the distressed women who have suffered an abortion and are in a lifelong struggle to cope with their sense of loss. They have to live with the consequences. They need to hear the Saviour’s invitation, “Come to me, all who labour and are heavy laden and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for I am gentle and lowly in heart, and you will find rest for your souls.”

His yoke is easy because he took our guilt and he conquered Satan, the merchant of death, when he rose from the grave. In Christ we have the victory 1 Corinthians chapter 15 verses 55-57.