Sir, – Lucinda Creighton has invoked the situation in China and India in the Dáil, in her speech in opposition the legislation on abortion (Home News, July 2nd). I suggest that if she were a member of the Chinese government rather than the Irish one, she would be in favour of the one child policy. China has suffered a human population explosion and it must take strenuous measures to prevent a bad situation from getting an awful lot worse.
In China, the alternative to the population control policies now in force are famine and widespread and deadly social unrest. That is why the Catholic Church and its offshoots are repressed by the Chinese authorities. Its attitude to all matters reproductive would result in disaster.
It may happen anyway if Chinese economic growth, which is fuelled by cheap production costs and currency manipulation, all under centralised control, none of which meets with the full approval of other global powers, cannot be sustained.
Ms Creighton should refrain from commenting on what is a very serious issue for another country, albeit one that is very far away. Simplistic is the best thing you can say about her contribution. Hopefully her constituents are able to see it for what it is. – Yours, etc,
SEAMUS McKENNA,
Farrenboley Park,
Windy Arbour,
Dublin 14.
Sir, – Patsy McGarry states, “The Catholic Church’s current position on abortion appears to owe more to theology than to science.” This is quite an extraordinary statement for a religious affairs correspondent to make. Theology is not only one of the sciences, but has long been regarded as “the queen of the sciences”.
For example, the scientific revolution of the 16th century was the culmination of many centuries of systematic progress by medieval scholastic theologians. The Catholic Church has always thought that there cannot be a breach between faith and reason. Pope John Paul II wrote an encyclical on same "Fides et Ratio"; and Pope Benedict XVI delivered a profound discourse on same in the course of his famous Regensburg University lecture.
As for Mr McGarry’s attempt to allocate a particular date to the church’s teaching on abortion, the fact is that the church frequently formally codifies its teaching on these matters, and arrives at a settled position. With regard to abortion, in accordance with the science, the church accepts that at conception a unique being is created with a unique set of DNA, which is retained unto death. In logic therefore, it cannot countenance the deliberate destruction of this being. – Yours, etc,
ERIC CONWAY,
Balreask Village,
Navan, Co Meath.
Sir, – Patsy McGarry’s review of the Catholic Church’s changing position on the beginning of human life does not exhaust the possibilities (Rite & Reason, July 2nd).
Plato, and some of his early Christian admirers thought that the individual human person existed as a soul before the conception of the body they would eventually inhabit.
This idea finds expression in the Book of Wisdom (8: 19-20), where Solomon says, “I was a boy of happy disposition: I had received a good soul as my lot, or rather, being good, I had entered an undefiled body”.
This line of thinking led to Pope Sixtus V's 1588 bull Effraenatam, which imposed excommunication, revocable only by the pope himself, on all users of contraception. – Yours, etc,
Dr JOHN DOHERTY,
Cnoc an Stollaire,
Gaoth Dobhair,
Co Donegal.
Sir, – The members of the 31st Dáil are elected by the people to represent the will of the people. They are supposed to legislate for the people. If certain members cannot isolate their personal views from proposed legislation, they should not be in public office. – Yours, etc,
DOROTHY LIDDY,
Kilquade,
Greystones,
Co Wicklow.
Sir, – In response to Dr Gerard Montague (July 2nd): Could we please keep the debate to this century at least; as even the Catholic Church no longer argues that heretics should be burned.
Could we also recognise that while the Catholic Church is the most up-front in its opposition to the pro-abortion position, it is far from being alone, with many who are not members of any church being in support of its position. – Yours, etc,
PATRICK DAVEY,
Dublin Road,
Shankill, Dublin 18.
Sir, – We must all be grateful to Patsy McGarry (Rite & Reason, July 2nd) for reminding us that arriving at the point where we regard an unborn child as a fellow human being was the result of a long, slow but steady progress: much like that society has made, and continues to make, in all the other cases – tribe, class, religion, gender and race – where we were all too inclined to distinguish ourselves from those others who were not quite fully human. – Yours, etc,
WILLIAM HUNT,
Northbrook Avenue,
Ranelagh, Dublin 6.
Sir, – In South Africa we are used to seeing and deploring the sight of MPs sleeping during discussions in the House of Assembly. This week I watched what should have been a most, probably the most, important debate this year on the abortion Bill in Dáil Éireann. There was scarcely half a dozen TDs, including the person speaking, in the House. Not even the Taoiseach nor the Tánaiste were present. It is a disgrace considering that these people are being paid huge salaries and very generous expenses to attend and represent the Irish people. Is it any wonder the country is in the state it is at present? – Yours, etc,
BRIAN P O CINNEIDE,
Essenwood Road,
Durban, South Africa.
Sir, – So, according to Miriam Lord (Home News, June 29th), Peter Mathews recognises no boundaries in his passion to halt the abortion Bill. Good for him, I say, and it is a pity there are not more like him in his enthusiasm for the most basic right of all, the right to life.
Miriam Lord refers to Mr Mathews pointing out the dangers in the legislation “as he sees it”. He is not alone in spotting the dangers in this Bill, as was evidenced in the submissions to the Oireachtas Committee, which the Government has chosen to ignore. In fact, the decision was taken to proceed with the legislation before the evidence was heard.
We hear so many calls for politicians with integrity and principles, that it ill behoves people to denigrate those who display these qualities. I would like to thank Mr Matthews for his stance, in spite of the price he may have to pay for it, and I hope and pray that many others will have the courage to do follow his example. – Yours, etc,
MARY STEWART,
Ardeskin,
Donegal.
Sir, – Brian Lougheed (June 28th) finds two statements regarding abortion as reported in your newspaper on June 24th “worryingly contradictory”.
The first reported statement was recently re-issued by the Irish Catholic bishops and is as follows: “The church does not teach that the life of a child in the womb should be preferred to that of a mother”.
The second reported statement appears to have been taken from an interview given by Raymond Cardinal Burke to the Catholic Voice newspaper earlier this year and is as follows: "It is, however, contrary to right reason to hold that an innocent and defenceless human life can be justifiably destroyed in order to save the life of the mother."
These two statements presented in isolation might appear to be contradictory, but they are not so if properly understood. They can be reconciled if the term “destroyed” as used by the cardinal is understood as referring to the intentional destruction of the child in the womb and not to a situation where the child dies as an unintended and undesired side-effect of life-saving medical treatment given to the mother. This is the only reasonable way to interpret the statement of the cardinal; in other words he was referring only to direct abortion.
The cardinal's statement is in accordance with the teaching of the Catholic Church – see for example the encyclical Evangelium Vitae (Gospel of Life) of Blessed Pope John Paul II at paragraph 62 where he pronounces: "I declare that direct abortion, that is, abortion willed as an end or as a means, always constitutes a grave moral disorder, since it is the deliberate killing of an innocent human being."
Referring to direct abortion the pope continues: “No circumstance, no purpose, no law whatsoever can make licit an act which is intrinsically illicit, since it is contrary to the law of God which is written on every human heart, knowable by reason itself, and proclaimed by the church.” – Yours, etc,
MICHAEL AHERN,
Shannon Drive,
Corbally,
Limerick.