Human Rights Council notes Malaysia's low maternal mortality and strict abortion law

Yesterday in Geneva, the Human Rights Council "reviewed the fulfilment of human rights obligations by Malaysia". Pat Buckley, representing the Society for the Protection of Unborn Children, was present at the meeting for the presentation of Malaysia's national report which highlighted "strides made in the area of maternal health".

This is significant in view of Malaysia's comparatively strict abortion policies and the pro-abortion lobby's claim that Barack Obama's executive order to allow funding for abortion overseas is necessary in order to combat maternal mortality.

Malaysia's experience is reflected in other parts of the world with comparatively restrictive abortion legislation such as Northern Ireland where the maternal mortality rate is the lowest in the UK; and the Republic of Ireland, with its constitutional ban on abortion, which has the lowest maternal mortality rate in the world, according to figures published by the World Health Organization in 2007.

Pat reports on the Holy See's intervention which praised Malaysia's achievement in these words:

"While maintaining its restrictive abortion policies, Malaysia has made great strides in achieving the [Millennium Development Goal] on maternal health. The level of maternal mortality has diminished close to that of the most developed countries, according to the UNDP [United Nations Development Programme]. A near hundred percent of births is now assisted by skilled birth attendants. Malaysia has to be commended for this achievement."

Highlighted at the Human Rights Council meeting was the World Development Report 2006, published by the World Bank, which indicated that, by making midwives widely available in rural areas, Malaysia dramatically reduced maternal mortality rates. The World Bank report states:

"Despite huge improvements in health, survival, and fertility around the world in recent decades, global maternal mortality has not declined significantly. Two exceptions are Sri Lanka and Malaysia. In Sri Lanka the maternal mortality ratio—the number of maternal deaths per 100,000 live births—dropped from 2,136 in 1930 to 24 in 1996. In Malaysia it dropped from 1,085 in 1933 to just 19 in 1997.

"What can account for this impressive decline? Improving access for rural and disadvantaged communities was an important part of the strategy in both countries. Sri Lanka and Malaysia made competent, professional midwives and supervisory nurse-midwives widely available in rural areas. Midwives assisted deliveries in homes and small rural hospitals and performed initial treatment in the event of complications. They were given a steady supply of appropriate drugs and equipment and supported by improved communication, transportation, and backup services. Besides reducing financial and geographic barriers, they also helped overcome cultural obstacles and allegiances to traditional practices. Because midwives were available locally and were well respected, they developed links with communities and partnerships with traditional birth attendants.

"Malaysia and Sri Lanka pursued other complementary strategies. Transportation (in Malaysia) and transportation subsidies (in Sri Lanka) were provided for emergency visits to the hospital. In Malaysia, health programs were part of integrated rural development efforts that included investment in clinics, rural roads, and rural schools. Similarly, in Sri Lanka, the government invested in free primary and secondary education, free health care, and food subsidies for all districts. The concept was that basic health care acts in synergy with education and other types of infrastructure. For example, better roads make it easier to get to rural health facilities and facilitate transportation of obstetric emergencies. By addressing the multidimensionality of equity, these countries made significant health gains. Dramatic improvements in maternal mortality are thus possible.

"Just as important, the experiences of Malaysia and Sri Lanka show that these can be attained with only modest expenditures. Since the 1950s, public expenditures on health services have hovered between 1.4 and 1.8 percent of GDP in Malaysia and averaged 1.8 percent in Sri Lanka, with spending on maternal and child health (MCH) services amounting to less than 0.4 percent of GDP in both countries. Countries with similar income levels have significantly higher health expenditures and similar, if not higher, maternal mortality ratios. Source: Pathmanathan and others (2003)." (Page 144)

"President Blair" of Europe and President Obama - the pro-abortionists' dream team

"Tony Blair is poised to become the first President of Europe after it was confirmed that French leader Nicolas Sarkozy is determined to help him win the post", the Daily Mail reported last week.

And about this time last month the Guardian carried an interview with Tony Blair in which he suggested he wanted to be European President.

It might seem a distant prospect ... but if Blair became President of Europe during Obama's presidency of the US, it would be the pro-abortionists' dream team.

Tony Blair, the UK’s former Prime Minister is one of the world’s leading architects of the culture of death. Since being received into the Catholic Church he has refused to repudiate the anti-life laws and policies he steadfastly pursued throughout his political career. Indeed he's reportedly determined to continue his anti-life, anti-family agenda.

As for Obama - just check his record on the US National Right to Life Committee (NRLC) website "A closer look at Senator Obama's position on abortion" And last month, in one of his first Presidential actions, he signed an order "that will put hundreds of millions of taxpayer dollars into the hands of organizations that aggressively promote abortion as a population-control tool in the developing world" according to NRLC.

Obama's executive order to abort the world's poor represents a policy pursued relentlessly by Tony Blair's government and is a policy with which he remains closely associated through the Faiths Act Fellowship, an initiative of the Tony Blair Faith Foundation, on which I blogged recently. It's also a policy closely associated with Tony Blair's wife Cherie Blair, also a Catholic, who endorses the work of CEDAW committee (as well as other radical pro-abortion groups) - and specifically its work on "reproductive rights". The CEDAW committee is notorious among pro-lifers for using the CEDAW convention to bully countries into allowing abortion, even though the convention doesn't mention abortion.

Earlier this week, I reported on LifeSite's interview with Archbishop Burke who said: "There's not a question that a Catholic who publicly, and after admonition, supports pro-abortion legislation is not to receive Holy Communion and is not to be given Holy Communion". I made the point that it would be good to obtain further advice from the archbishop as to what ordinary Catholics can do to assist their priests and bishops in doing "their duty", as he puts it, in this regard. With Tony Blair's interest in the European presidency reportedly powerfully backed by Nicolas Sarkozy, the French leader, that advice is now more urgently needed.

Family doctors oppose early medical abortion which politicians want

The pro-life movement in Britain and Northern Ireland will be encouraged to hear of the report in today's GP Newspaper Online about a high level of opposition to abortion amongst GPs.

The report states:

"61% of GPs who responded to this newspaper’s GP Attitudes survey did not believe that practices should be offering [early medical abortions] at all."

GP Newspaper Online goes on to say that more than half of GPs believe that offering early medical abortions will increase the overall abortion rate.

This is significant in view of the Government's recommendation to primary care trusts to "establish an early medical abortion service and also a local abortion service where there is none currently ... "

In addition, my readers may recall that David Cameron MP, the leader of the Conservative Party, and Andrew Lansley, the shadow health secretary, are on record as supporting early medical abortions and for reviewing the (legal) restritions on nurses providing medical abortions.

All of this tells us not to lose heart. There is a lot of support in the community for pro-life values - and opposition to abortion - and we must keep up the fight, not least by reaching out to doctors and nurses with our campaigns, and keeping up the pressure on our politicians. In this connection, let me know if you want to help in SPUC's general election campaign. Contact me at johnsmeaton@spuc.org.uk

The end of human cloning

"We got beautiful little hybrid embryos, but it didn't work no matter how hard we tried", said Dr. Robert Lanza of Massachusetts-based Advanced Cell Technology, one of the authors of a study* which shows (as Reuters puts it): Animal-human clones don't work.

James L. Sherley, M.D., Ph.D. from the US (pictured), a leading stem cell scientist, senior scientist at Boston Biomedical Research Institute, who has travelled the world pointing out the inefficacy of embryonic stem cell research to his scientific colleagues, says:

"What should we, the people, think, when the experts disagree on an issue that affects us all deeply and in ramifying ways? And, more importantly, what should we expect from our elected representatives when they consider the cooing of their bevies of famous experts to be above the earnest contention of moral experts? Well, we could passively wait to see if either side proves to be right long after irreparable harm has been done to ourselves and to our fellows. We could resign ourselves to a condition in which many of our elected representatives rarely represent the rights of any but those who are the strongest economically and politically. Or, we could use our common sense to decry deception when we see it and reject such a state of affairs. Moreover, we should demand no less from our representatives, no matter how high their rank.

"In 2008, ignoring many voices of morality, ethics, and scientific reason, the British Parliament approved the controversial HFE bill, which included allowances for scientists to produce and destroy animal-human hybrid embryos. Approving MPs wrapped themselves tightly in the deceptive cloaks of “necessary and desirable” and dispatched underneath them the true principles at issue, ethical and sound. When experts disagree, we the people, and our representatives, must look beyond what is being said, to who is saying it, and why. Gentle UK scientists, of ethical bearing, with expert knowledge, and nothing to gain, courageously risked their station in their profession to object that making animal-human hybrid embryos was not only unethical, but also unsound scientifically. Not only did they adamantly predict that it would not work and, therefore, waste the people’s resources, but they also knew that it could not work. These scientists stepped forward to protect embryonic persons and the people’s resources from their noted colleagues, who called their protests rubbish, who misled the desperate hopes of the sick and injured, and who had everything to gain, starting with the people’s research funds. Where conflict of interest lives, there also live impropriety and dishonesty.

"So, here we are now, less than a year later, and the UK now has the benefit of a report from a prominent U.S. stem cell company announcing sheepishly that animal-human hybrid embryos are [rubbish] (Chung et al., 2009, Reprogramming of Human Somatic Cells Using Human and Animal Oocytes. Cloning and Stem Cells 11, 1-11). For those trained in the science, this is not news, but instead a completed fate that was known from the beginning. If those UK scientists and selected MPs, who insisted on this research so that they might obtain [government] funds and other gains, were in fact genuine in their stated motivation, then we know now that, at a minimum, they are not 'experts' at all.

"Those who did and who continue to speak out against HFEA-sponsored human embryo research should not overlook a much more important revelation of the new Chung report that the news media missed as the more important finding. This report also discloses the first detailed analyses of human-human cloned embryos. Difficulty obtaining sufficient human eggs to conceive these human clones was the basis for pursuing animal-human hybrid embryo cloning in the first place. The report clearly shows that, for their promised use for new human therapies, cloned human embryos are also too defective. So, the big story that needs to be reported is that the Chung report discloses that human cloning itself is dead on arrival.

"We the people must also not overlook the human tragedy of the Chung study. It reports the in vitro conception of 49 cloned human embryos and 135 animal-human hybrid embryos. Though even honorable scientific experts might debate the humanity of the 135, there is no doubt that 49 human beings died senselessly and avoidably for this research, which yielded what was already known with a high degree of certainty. In the future, we the people, and more importantly our government representatives, must do better to listen to the experts who have nothing to gain but the honorable protection of innocent human lives."

* Young Chung, Colin E. Bishop, Nathan R. Treff, Stephen J. Walker, Vladislav M. Sandler, Sandy Becker, Irina Klimanskaya, Wan-Song Wun, Randall Dunn, Rebecca M. Hall, Jing Su, Shi-Jiang Lu, Marc Maserati, Young-Ho Choi, Richard Scott, Anthony Atala, Ralph Dittman, Robert Lanza. Reprogramming of Human Somatic Cells Using Human and Animal Oocytes. Cloning and Stem Cells, February 2009 DOI: 10.1089/clo.2009.0004

More advice needed from Archbishop Burke

Archbishop Raymond Burke (pictured), the head of the Apostolic Signatura, the Church's top canonical court, has said regarding Catholics who support pro-abortion legislation: "There's not a question that a Catholic who publicly, and after admonition, supports pro-abortion legislation is not to receive Holy Communion and is not to be given Holy Communion" (LifeSiteNews reports).

Archbishop Burke continues:

"The Church's law is very clear. The person who persists publicly in grave sin is to be denied Holy Communion, and it [Canon Law] doesn't say that the bishop shall decide this. It's an absolute."

He says: "I don't understand the continual debate that goes on about it."

This is an interesting and important statement about church law, in my view. It reflects, after all, what an awful lot of Catholics and non-Catholics are thinking who are a considerably less qualified in canon law.

Archbishop Burke offers clear guidance as to how bishops and priests must proceed with regard to prominent Catholics who support pro-abortion legislation. The archbishop says: "There's not a question that a Catholic who publicly, and after admonition, supports pro-abortion legislation is not to receive Holy Communion and is not to be given Holy Communion" (My emphasis).

LifeSite's report continues: "When asked what the solution was, [Archbishop Burke] responded, "Individual bishops and priests simply have to do their duty. They have to confront politicians, Catholic politicians, who are sinning gravely and publicly in this regard. And that's their duty. And if they carry it out, not only can they not be reproached for that, but they should be praised for confronting this situation."

It would be good to obtain further advice from the archbishop as to what ordinary Catholics can do to assist their priests and bishops in doing "their duty" as he puts it.

Catholic universities in US and Rome place African bishops in impossible position

Archbishop Buti Tlhagale, (pictured), the archbishop of Johannesburg, has denounced biological colonialism whereby "Harvesting ovarian human eggs in Africa will help meet the needs of embryonic stem cell research in industrialised countries" in his presidential address to the South African Catholic Bishops' Conference who met last week.

In the same address, in a clear reference to the The Committee on the Elimination of Discrimination against Women (CEDAW) he refers to "unscrupulous campaigners" intending to legalize abortion. The CEDAW committee is notorious among pro-lifers for using the CEDAW convention to bully countries into allowing abortion, even though the convention doesn't mention abortion.

As I have mentioned before, I am very sorry to say that Cherie Blair, a fellow Catholic, endorses the work of CEDAW committee (as well as other radical pro-abortion groups) - and specifically its work on "reproductive rights". On a page in the Women of the World section of her website, Mrs Blair says:

"The [United Nations] Convention [on the Elimination of Discrimination against Women (CEDAW) ... is the only human rights treaty which affirms the reproductive rights of women".

"Reproductive rights" is a term commonly used to include abortion on demand.

The page on Mrs Blair's website ends by linking to the CEDAW committee, which is responsible for monitoring the implementation of the CEDAW convention.

With Catholic universities in the US and Rome inviting Cherie Blair, a leading promoter of radical pro-abortion campaigning groups, to speak on subjects such as human rights and family life, it places African bishops seeking to protect their countries from "unscrupulous campaigners" in a well-nigh impossible situation.

Irish Government's deceit on right to life of unimplanted human embryo

Pat Buckley (pictured) has an excellent post on the right to life of the human embryo in Ireland. He provides the legal background to a case in the Irish Supreme Court in respect of the right to life of three unimplanted embryos.

Pat Buckley tells us that Mr Donal O’Donnell SC representing the Attorney General and the Irish State, told the court that an embryo is not an “unborn” within the meaning of Article 40.3.3 of the Irish Constitution and that, in his opinion, the destruction of fertilised embryos prior to implantation in a woman’s womb is permitted under law.

Then why, Pat suggests, did the Irish Government ask the Irish people in 2002 to vote in a referendum on an amendment to the Constitution to limit legal protection to the child implanted in the womb?

Why I won't be giving to the second collection for the Catholic Education Service

There's a second collection this weekend in many Catholic parishes in support of the Catholic Education Service (of England and Wales). I will not be making a contribution since I have a conscientious objection to doing so.

As a Catholic parent I am very concerned about the ambiguous policy of the Catholic Education Service which welcomes the presence in Catholic schools of Connexions. Connexions is a government agency which is committed to giving schoolchildren, under the age of 16, access to abortion and abortifacient birth control drugs and devices without parental knowledge or permission. As a result of this policy, it's clear that children in Catholic schools are being given such access, in spite of Connexions' undertaking to respect the Catholic ethos of the schools.

Furthermore, The Telegraph reported in November that the National Children bureau and Sex Education Forum have called for every 11 to 18-year-old in England to be able to receive advice on contraception, pregnancy tests and screening for sexually transmitted diseases between lessons. Such advice can include confidential access to abortion.

The thinking behind the conclusions of the NCB/SEF reports is clearly set out in the Sex and Relationships Education Framework, the “core document” of the Sex Education Forum of which the Catholic Education Service is a member. It is a document to which all Forum members agree in order to meet membership criteria as it makes clear on page 4 of that document.

Surely the Catholic Education Service should dissasociate itself publicly from the NCB/SEF reports and begin actively and publicly to resist, and encourage parents, teachers and boards of governors to resist, the government's anti-life, anti-parent, pressures being brought to bear on schoolchildren?

Doctors must resist crime of euthanasia despite court decision, say bishops

A powerful statement from the Archbishop of Udine on the case of Eluana Englaro (pictured), who is facing death by starvation in the city of Udine, is part of a significant pattern. One Catholic bishop after another is appealing to health professionals to resist pressure to kill Eluana, despite last November's court decision granting her father permission to kill her by removing her feeding tube.

Like other outspoken comments by bishops, the Archbishop Pietro Brollo of Udine could not be more clear about the need for health professionals to resist the decision of the court that she can be starved to death. He says:

“Udine is ready to embrace Eluana Englaro, a daughter of this land. Upon learning of her arrival, I ask first of all that this woman be guaranteed care, hydration, nutrition and every means that someone who is sick, particularly someone who is very incapacitated, is due by those who have the professional duty in conscience to provide a cure.”

Last week I reported that Cardinal Severino Poletto, the archbishop of Turin, was reported to be urging Italian doctors to resort to conscientious objection if they are ordered to let Eluana Englaro—known as the Terri Schiavo of Italy—die of starvation.

And earlier this week, Cardinal Javier Lozano Barragan, the president of the Pontifical Council for Health Care, said in a newspaper interview that removing Eluana's feeding tube "is tantamount to an abominable assassination and the Church will always say that out loud."

Last weekend the archbishop of Bologna said in his homily: "In the body of this woman, and in her fate, there is an image of the fate of the West ... ".

These bishops are doing their pastoral duty to care for one vulnerable human being. Pope John Paul II said in Evangelium Vitae: "Every individual, precisely by reason of the mystery of the Word of God who was made flesh (cf. Jn 1:14), is entrusted to the maternal care of the Church". (EV, 3)

Their call for resistance also reflects papal teaching. Again Pope John Paul II wrote:

"Abortion and euthanasia are thus crimes which no human law can claim to legitimize. There is no obligation in conscience to obey such laws; instead there is a grave and clear obligation to oppose them by conscientious objection. From the very beginnings of the Church, the apostolic preaching reminded Christians of their duty to obey legitimately constituted public authorities (cf. Rom 13:1-7; 1 Pet 2:13-14), but at the same time it firmly warned that "we must obey God rather than men" (Acts 5:29). In the Old Testament, precisely in regard to threats against life, we find a significant example of resistance to the unjust command of those in authority. After Pharaoh ordered the killing of all newborn males, the Hebrew midwives refused. "They did not do as the king of Egypt commanded them, but let the male children live" (Ex 1:17). But the ultimate reason for their action should be noted: "the midwives feared God" (ibid.). It is precisely from obedience to God-to whom alone is due that fear which is acknowledgment of his absolute sovereignty-that the strength and the courage to resist unjust human laws are born. It is the strength and the courage of those prepared even to be imprisoned or put to the sword, in the certainty that this is what makes for "the endurance and faith of the saints" (Rev 13:10)." (EV, 73)

Ethical issues concerning the Californian octuplets

All children are equally entitled to be welcomed and loved whatever the circumstances in which they came into this world. This truth, however, does not absolve us of the obligation to reflect on the rights and wrongs relating to the circumstances in which new people are conceived. I was therefore pleased to receive this response on the recent report about octuplets who have been born in California. It was sent by Southern Cross Bioethics Institute, professional advisers on bioethics to SPUC.

The Californian Octuplets

The recent report that octuplets had been born in California is replete with uncertainties. The initial report simply stated that infertility treatment was used, possibly meaning that drugs were taken which increase the number of eggs released. However, a subsequent report in which the grandmother of the octuplets was interviewed, raised the possibility that the children resulted from the transfer of embryos left over from previous infertility treatment. In the same report, it has also become apparent that the existing six children of the woman were also conceived using IVF. The woman is single and it is unclear how the expensive treatments were funded. The family circumstances, in which the mother lives with her parents and her six existing children, appear very modest.

Presuming the reports to be accurate, there are a number of significant ethical issues that arise.

First, the intentional conception of children who will not have a father is unethical regardless of whether infertility treatment is used. There is a considerable consensus among experts that the best developmental circumstances for children exist when they are raised with their natural mother and father. Circumstances may arise following conception in which that is not possible, in which case options exists which are directed to protecting children and providing the best alternate circumstances. But to set out with the intention to deny children a father or mother shows disregard for their well-being.

Second, IVF clinics act irresponsibly by participating in such conceptions. The report that a sperm donor was used raises all of the ethical problems associated with sperm donors, in particular whether the children will ever get to know who their biological father is.

Third, if fertility drugs were used to increase the chance of multiple pregnancies when the health risks to children and mother are so well known and documented, the medical professionals involved have acted unethically by contributing to the initiation of such a high risk pregnancy. If multiple embryos were transferred, the clinics involved have also acted unethically, but with even greater irresponsibility given the apparent direct intention to cause a high risk pregnancy. A high order multiple pregnancy like this present serious risks to the life and health of the mother and the children in both the short term and long term.

Fourth, depending upon which IVF processes were used, numerous embryos may have been discarded as part of the ‘normal’ course of infertility treatment. This is one of the present realities of IVF treatment, regardless of the number of embryos transferred to the woman. Calls for infertility treatment to involve the transfer of just one embryo do minimize the chances of multiple pregnancies; however, even the transfer of a single embryo involves a range of ethical problems (see single embryo transfer document).

Fifth, both reports carry with them the implication that it would have been appropriate to abort some of the children once the high number was known. Such ‘selective reduction’ is a particularly horrible process that, if followed, would have meant the surviving children would eventually become aware of their chance survival whilst there brothers and sisters died at the abortionists hand. What psychological damage that would produce is unknown but potentially profound. It is to the mother of the octuplets credit that she refused to have any of the children’s lives terminated.

In conclusion, whilst the natural healthy birth of octuplets understandably raises awe and respect for medical staff who use their skill and expertise to ensure a safe arrival, the use of such skill in IVF treatment which deliberately places children and mother at such high risk cannot be met with the same admiration. Neither can admiration be held for medical professionals who so readily discard embryos as a normal part of infertility treatment. Even less can any admiration be held for some of the same medical personnel who would be ready to ‘selectively reduce’ - that is terminate - the lives of some of those children, whilst they grow alongside their siblings.

UK Government depicts unborn as fully human and alive in anti-smoking campaign

I welcome and congratulate the government on their new campaign aimed at expectant mothers who find it tough to stop smoking. This has got to make sense, as research shows. The Foundation for the Study of Infant Deaths point out in their research factfile on reducing the risk of cot death:

"Evidence from a very large number of studies worldwide consistently demonstrates that maternal smoking during pregnancy increases the risk of SIDS."

According to PA News:

"The ad campaign, from NHS Smokefree, will highlight how every smoked cigarette restricts essential oxygen to the baby. A baby's heart has to beat harder every time a pregnant woman smokes, it will show."

The NHS Smokefree website and its pregnancy calendar makes fascinating reading. Whilst it's account of the development of the baby in the womb is not entirely accurate (eg the baby's heart starts to beat between 21 - 25 days from fertilisation and not between week 6 - 7 as the NHS calendar indicates), nevertheless the text is full of references which are clearly intended to bond mothers to babies who are depicted as fully human and fully alive. For example, under week 3 - 4, it states:

"Well done! Quitting smoking is the best decision you can make for you and your growing baby."

And under Week 8 - 12, it states:

"The baby is now called a foetus meaning 'young one'". SPUC could have written that!

Now does anyone mind if I say something blindingly obvious? Exactly the same Government which focuses on the humanity of unborn babies, starting with fertilisation, in order to target mothers who find it tough to stop smoking, is also targeting mothers in order to offer to have their babies killed. Here's the language that's used about unborn babies by organizations funded by the government to do its dirty work:

In describing abortions, Marie Stopes claims that “gentle suction is used to remove the pregnancy from the uterus” when describing surgical abortion, FPA talks about “taking pills to expel the pregnancy” and BPAS, when describing a late term dilation and evacuation, states: “Forceps are used to remove the pregnancy.” You can find more examples here of what I'm saying.

This is government-funded propaganda at its worst. As George Orwell put it: “Political language ... is designed to make lies sound truthful and murder respectable, and to give an appearance of solidity to pure wind.”

I do hope - for the sake of children and their parents - that the government campaign to stop expectant mothers from smoking is successful. I also hope that the public will recognize more and more the government's inconsistency and treachery in promoting the killing of unborn children - even seeking to target every secondary school in the country, including church schools, providing access to abortion clinics for children as young as eleven without parental knowledge or consent - through the use of misleading language by their pro-abortion partners as they seek to cover up their crimes against humanity.

Purdy assisted suicide appeal is misguided

SPUC has been granted status as an intervenor in the case brought by Mrs Debbie Purdy (pictured) against the Director of Public Prosecutions (DPP), who has declined to publish a prosecuting policy specific to assisted suicide. The case is being heard today by the Court of Appeal.

Paul Tully, SPUC general secretary, said:

"We have great sympathy for Mrs Purdy because of her medical condition, but her legal case is misguided and dangerous. Suicide is a course of action which everyone in society, from individuals to parliament naturally discourages. If we favour suicide for individuals who are suffering, we send a message to all those who are sick or disabled that their lives are not worthwhile."Naturally, those who are sick and disabled often feel they are a burden on others. That is a burden that society must carry willingly and with love, not an excuse for helping them express their sadness by self-destruction.

"We welcome the involvement of the DPP in this case and we commend his legal arguments. His firm resistance to this attack on the law is vital to upholding fundamental rights and freedoms of everyone.

"We are appalled by the continuing attacks on the right to life of those who are elderly or disabled or suffering from progressive degenerative disease. These attacks which would be firmly resisted by public bodies like the BBC if they were directed against young offenders, victims of abuse, or other high suicide-risk groups, are promoted by those who regard disabled people as a burden to be disposed of if the individual loses a sense of their own worth.

"The recent case brought before the GMC against Dr Iain Kerr, the Glasgow doctor to gave lethal drugs to a suicidal patient, indicates the importance of having well-enforced systems to stop doctors becoming the arbiters of life and death over vulnerable patients."

Father's right to kill his daughter will result in countless other killings

Monsignor Ignacio Barreiro, the chief of Human Life International's Rome office, told me this morning that the fate of Eluana Englaro (pictured), granting the right of a father to kill his daughter, would lead directly to the killings of countless other Italian patients.

Early yesterday Eluana was transferred from a clinic near Milan to a hospital in Udine where her feeding tube will be removed resulting in her death by starvation and dehydration.

"Eluana's father is legally responsible for her killing" Monsignor Barreiro said. "He has been fighting for years to have her feeding tube removed and now he has decided to move her to a hospital where this will be done."

Monsignor Barreiro said that he completely agreed with Cardinal Carlo Caffara, the archbishop of Bologna, who said in his homily last weekend: "In the body of this woman, and in her fate, there is an image of the fate of the West ... ".

"Eluana is highly symbolic of the struggle with the culture of death" Monsignor Barreiro told me. It would create a precedent whereby judges, against the law, can decide it's right to kill patients. We are not fighting for Eluana's life because she has limited signs of consciousness but because of her dignity as a human being."

As I pointed out last week in relation to Cardinal Poletto's comments on Eluana's fate, Monsignor Barreiro's position reflects the constant teaching of the Catholic Church re-stated on 1st August 2007 by the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith (CDF) in "Responses to Certain Questions of the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops Concerning Artificial Nutrition and Hydration" and further explained in the CDF's helpful commentary on their responses to the US bishops.

Christian nurse reportedly suspended for offering to pray for a patient's recovery

In a country in which Dame Joan Bakewell, who has made several pro-euthanasia statements, is appointed by the government to represent elderly people ... in a country in which one of the most quoted philosophers on pro-life issues, Baroness Mary Warnock, says that that people with disabling conditions have a duty to die prematurely ... in a continent in which the European Commission requested the EU Network of Independent Experts to publish a legal opinion promoting, without any foundation, the right to abortion and the right to euthanasia ... I get very worried when I read today that a Christian nurse from Weston-super-Mare has reportedly been suspended for offering to pray for a patient's recovery.

Obama’s order to abort world’s poor: Pro-abortion lobbyists target Kenya

Watch out very carefully, particularly if you live in a developing country … The international pro-abortion lobby is going into overdrive to create a completely false image of reaction in the developing world following Obama’s executive order to abort babies in developing countries.

Under the headline “American abortion debate reaches into Nairobi slums” the Associated Press have put out a story saying: “Aid workers and experts say President Barack Obama's decision to allow aid money to flow again to international groups that offer abortion counseling will help restart programs desperately needed in Africa, the continent hardest hit by a so-called ‘gag rule’.” Read on – and you will find one pro-abortion professional after another being quoted, working for groups like Marie Stopes International, Population Action International, Family Health Options Kenya (which was legally registered in Kenya and affiliated to the International Planned Parenthood Federation (IPPF), in 1962); all of them purporting to speak for the poor in Kenya, in support of legalized abortion. They’re virtually an international professional army of pro-abortion lobbyists – and the weapons they use (principally the weapon of misrepresentation) are aimed at the unborn and their mothers.

Unfortunately for this army of international pro-abortion professionals, today’s Sunday Nation reports that the vast majority of ordinary Kenyans, belonging to one of the world’s poorest nations, are opposed to proposed legislation (most of them totally opposed) which would promote and allow easy access to abortion on demand, with virtually no safeguards to protect unborn children. The Sunday Nation story says:

“Fifty six per cent of Kenyans totally oppose such a law, with a majority of them living in rural areas, according to research by the Steadman Group conducted last month.

“However, it is not that the remaining 44 per cent support abortion. Of these, 30 per cent sit on the fence, saying abortion should be legalised only if the life of the mother is in danger.”

And, unfortunately for this international professional army of pro-abortion lobbyists, there are good men in Kenya prepared to speak the truth – like Cardinal Njue, who called on Kenyan Catholics to "Stand firm against this evil of abortion" in a powerfully worded message; and Dr Stephen Karanja, the head of the Kenyan Catholic Doctors Association, who said about the result of the US election: “They have no business electing a person who is going to destroy our countries. And that is what they have done. This is something that a lot of people don’t realise, that what these Americans do affects innocent people thousands and thousands of miles away.”

If you want to do something practical to oppose Obama’s appalling decision, one of his first actions as US President, to abort the world’s poor: take the time to write now to President Mwai Kibaki, the Kenyan President, and to Vice-President Stephene Kalonzo Musyoka of Kenya, calling on them to resist US and other financial and political pressures, and, in particular, to oppose the Reproductive Health Bill drafted for Kenya by the pro-abortion lobby. Take time, if you can, to read here a clear analysis of this eugenic and coercive bill. You can write to them by post at: Office of the President, P.O. Box 30510, Nairobi, Kenya and Office of the Vice President; Jogoo House Wing A, Taifa Road, PO Box 30478, NAIROBI, Kenya, 00100 (As far as I can see, email addresses for the Kenyan President and vice-President are not publicly available, unless someone can enlighten me at johnsmeaton@spuc.org.uk

Mexico's experience proves once more: strong religious leadership defeats abortion

There's excellent news from Mexico. Not only has the Mexican state of Colima rejected an initiative by Mexican socialists to legalize abortion by an overwhelming majority (19 votes to 1!), the Catholic Church has been given the credit for this pro-life victory.

Reportedly, Adolfo Nunez Gonzales of the Party of the Democratic Revolution (PRD), who introduced the measure, has attributed his defeat to the influence of the Catholic Church, saying:

"It's not a secret for anyone that the Catholic Church is a sector with a lot of power and weight, and that, of course, what is said in a church one Sunday or whatever day the mass is done, influences the people to analyze it all week".

Excellent! That's exactly what Pope John Paul II called for, in 1995, in Evangelium Vitae when he wrote: "What is urgently called for is a general mobilitzation of consciences and a united ethical effort to activate a great campaign in support of life ... " (EV, 95)

Four years earlier, on 19 May 1991, Pope John Paul wrote a personal letter to "each of my brother bishops" saying: "All of us, as pastors of the Lord's flock, have a grave responsibility to promote respect for human life in our dioceses. In addition to making public declarations at every opportunity, we must exercise particular vigilance with regard to the teaching being given in our seminaries and in Catholic schools and universities."

Equally excellent are the outspoken comments of Archbishop Raymond Burke, called to Rome recently to head the Church's top canonical court, who has observed that the US bishops' statement Faithful Citizenship had contributed to Obama's victory in the recent US presidential election. LifeSite news reports as follows:

"Archbishop Burke, citing an article by a priest and ethics expert of St. Louis archdiocese, Msgr. Kevin McMahon, who analysed how the bishops’ document actually contributed to the election of Obama, called its proposal 'a kind of false thinking, that says, there’s the evil of taking an innocent and defenceless human life but there are other evils and they’re worthy of equal consideration.

“But they’re not. The economic situation, or opposition to the war in Iraq, or whatever it may be, those things don’t rise to the same level as something that is always and everywhere evil, namely the killing of innocent and defenceless human life.”

What's happened in Mexico shows that with strong religious leadership, from all faiths and none, throughout the world - the pro-life movement not only can prevail, the pro-life movement will prevail. We've seen this also in Northern Ireland - where politicians of different faiths who are totally unafraid of declaring their religious faith - have resisted pro-abortion efforts to impose Britain's Abortion Act on Northern Ireland for over four decades.

Let's continue to hear it for the unborn from bold bishops and from other religious leaders. Abortion is the top political issue of today. 4,000 babies are killed in Britain every week. If it were 4,000 policemen, teachers, Catholics, Muslims, being killed each week - who would doubt that this was the top political issue on which to judge politicians? If a difference is being made for the unborn, then they're not being treated as fully human.

It breaks my heart. I still find it shocking that we live in a country which allows us to murder our children: Fr Guy de Gaynesford

The parish priest of St. Mary's and St. Petroc's, Bodmin, Fr Guy De Gaynesford, delivered a moving homily in support of the White Flower Appeal for the Society for the Protection of Unborn Children. Listen to it here.

Latin American reaction to Obama's funding of overseas abortions

Mr Barack Obama's presidency began ignominiously with an order to allow US funding for abortion overseas. The Archbishop of Santo Domingo, Dominican Republic, said the move, which would cost lives, contrasted with the decision to leave Iraq. Cardinal Nicolás de Jesús López Rodríguez said the president was mistaken and the measure would further bring down America's morality. Senator Liliana Negre de Alonso, vice president of the Argentinian senate, said using taxpayers' money for abortion eroded the principal human right – the right to life. Congresswoman Martha Lorena de Casco of Honduras said the move threatened her country's legislation. Mrs Christine Vollmer of the Latin American Alliance for the Family said: "Instead of a positive message of wanting to work to better conditions for every Latin American, President Obama has announced his willingness to fund the enemies of the people of Latin America whose laws generally are very respectful of the right to life before birth." Yes to Life of El Salvador said Mr Obama shouldn't press their nation to imitate America's "tragic, anti-life experience".

Fearless Bishop O’Donoghue makes plea to fellow bishops on catechetics

In a forthright talk at Oxford University this evening, Bishop Patrick O’Donoghue has fearlessly explained how many Catholics in Britain have rejected “much that is essential to Catholic faith and practice, relentlessly criticising the Church’s past, placing their own judgement above the authority of the Church, these ‘Catholics’ advocate, and import into the Church, what the secular world holds up as ‘good’ as being in keeping with the ‘tolerance’ and ‘compassion’ of Jesus – divorce, contraception, abortion, IVF, homosexual acts/unions, embryonic stem cell research.”

Bishop O’Donoghue was speaking at the Newman Society, Oxford University's oldest student Catholic society, on Why I wrote Fit for Mission: Church, the bishop's document, published last year, which has won a number of plaudits from the Vatican. (Cardinal John Henry Newman pictured above)

Bishop O'Donoghue's talk provided a frank analysis of how secularism is influencing the Catholic Church, continuing a theme he developed in last weekend’s Catholic Herald. He spoke about “obstacles” put in the way of “the authentic implementation” of the Second Vatican Council by Catholics “particularly in positions of leadership in schools, seminaries, parishes, and dioceses”.

“ … Looking around at the pathetic situation of catechetics in this country”, Bishop O’Donoghue said, “and the extent of ignorance and apostasy among generations of Catholics since the Council, we have to ask ourselves, ‘Why has Pope John’s vision for the Council not been realised in this country?’…”

In a plea to his brother bishops, he asked: “Why are some Catholic education authorities, even bishops in this country, so fearful of Fit for Mission Schools?” – an earlier document in which he called on parents, schools and colleges to reject anti-life sex education.

“After all”, the bishop said, “it only re-iterates the teaching of the Church and it is has been widely and publicly welcomed by the Vatican and many bishops, clergy and laity around the world?”

Bishop O’Donoghue continued:

“In Fit for Mission? Schools and Fit for Mission? Church I have sought to identify the obstacles that have blocked the true vision and grace of the Council. Let me briefly list what has got in the way and continues to do so …

“… Catholics in this country have interpreted the Council as signalling a wholesale rejection of aspects of the Church’s identity, out of a desire to be open to modernity … A wide-spread caricature of the Council’s Decree on Religious Freedom has resulted in many Catholics holding that if – in conscience – they disagree with any teaching of the Church then they have the freedom – even the duty – to reject that teaching.

“For many, the authority of the autonomous conscience has overthrown the authority of Christ given to Peter and the Apostles. Catholics have forgotten that a conscience ill-informed about the divine law and natural law has a predisposition to make errors of judgement, due to being easily swayed by passion and self-interest, and weakened by habitual sin. As a consequence for some Catholics the objective authority of the Church’s doctrine, morality and discipline has been replaced by a subjective, personal judgement of the so called ‘pick and mix’ generation of Catholics … ”

Doctors, nurses and pharmacists must resist anti-life laws, says Turin archbishop

Cardinal Severino Poletto (pictured), the archbishop of Turin, is reported to be urging Italian doctors to resort to conscientious objection if they are ordered to let Eluana Englaro—known as the Terri Schiavo of Italy—die of starvation.

Cardinal Poletto's statement immediately follows strong comments from the Vatican condemning US President Obama's arrogance over abortion. Obama's promise to sign the Freedom of Choice Act which seeks to compel medical professionals to provide abortions, with no opt-outs for conscientious objection, reflects political trends elsewhere in the world. This includes Britain - on euthanasia by neglect - and in Europe, where unelected international bodies are seeking to advance a new doctrine of human rights, including the right to abortion, as human rights expert Jakob Cornides has pointed out.

Cardinal Poletto's intervention and leadership in the case of Eluana Englaro are exactly what's needed in the world today. He says: “No human law can go against conscience, obliging it to commit acts that are against our own convictions ... This is valid for a doctor who is being asked to practice an abortion, as well as for the one who is forced to remove Eluana’s feeding tube, or for the pharmacist who refuses to sell a certain pill”.

SPUC has been reporting on this story since July last year. Eluana was injured in a vehicle accident in 1992 since when she has been in a semi-coma "showing some signs of extremely limited consciousness", according to Monsignor Barreiro, director of the Rome office of Human Life International. He added: "However, we are not fighting for Eluana's life because she has limited signs of consciousness but because of her dignity as a human being".

Cardinal Poletto's comments reflect the constant teaching of the Catholic Church, re-stated on 1st August 2007 by the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith (CDF) in "Responses to Certain Questions of the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops Concerning Artificial Nutrition and Hydration".

The CDF document, which is in question and answer form, begins:

"First question: Is the administration of food and water (whether by natural or artificial means) to a patient in a “vegetative state” morally obligatory except when they cannot be assimilated by the patient’s body or cannot be administered to the patient without causing significant physical discomfort?

"Response: Yes. The administration of food and water even by artificial means is, in principle, an ordinary and proportionate means of preserving life. It is therefore obligatory to the extent to which, and for as long as, it is shown to accomplish its proper finality, which is the hydration and nourishment of the patient. In this way suffering and death by starvation and dehydration are prevented ... "

In a most helpful commentary on their responses to the US bishops, the CDF shows how the Church's position on "the nutrition and hydration of patients in the condition commonly called a 'vegetative state'" has been its consistent teaching on this matter, making a careful distinction between this medical situation and the "use and interruption of techniques of resuscitation". The Commentary states:

" ... The Address of Pope Pius XII to a Congress on Anesthesiology, given on November 24, 1957, is often invoked in favor of the possibility of abandoning the nutrition and hydration of such patients. In this address, the Pope restated two general ethical principles. On the one hand, natural reason and Christian morality teach that, in the case of a grave illness, the patient and those caring for him or her have the right and the duty to provide the care necessary to preserve health and life. On the other hand, this duty in general includes only the use of those means which, considering all the circumstances, are ordinary, that is to say, which do not impose an extraordinary burden on the patient or on others. A more severe obligation would be too burdensome for the majority of persons and would make it too difficult to attain more important goods. Life, health and all temporal activities are subordinate to spiritual ends. Naturally, one is not forbidden to do more than is strictly obligatory to preserve life and health, on condition that one does not neglect more important duties.

"One should note, first of all, that the answers given by Pius XII referred to the use and interruption of techniques of resuscitation. However, the case in question has nothing to do with such techniques. Patients in a “vegetative state” breathe spontaneously, digest food naturally, carry on other metabolic functions, and are in a stable situation. But they are not able to feed themselves. If they are not provided artificially with food and liquids, they will die, and the cause of their death will be neither an illness nor the “vegetative state” itself, but solely starvation and dehydration. At the same time, the artificial administration of water and food generally does not impose a heavy burden either on the patient or on his or her relatives. It does not involve excessive expense; it is within the capacity of an average health-care system, does not of itself require hospitalization, and is proportionate to accomplishing its purpose, which is to keep the patient from dying of starvation and dehydration. It is not, nor is it meant to be, a treatment that cures the patient, but is rather ordinary care aimed at the preservation of life.

"What may become a notable burden is when the “vegetative state” of a family member is prolonged over time. It is a burden like that of caring for a quadriplegic, someone with serious mental illness, with advanced Alzheimer’s disease, and so on. Such persons need continuous assistance for months or even for years. But the principle formulated by Pius XII cannot, for obvious reasons, be interpreted as meaning that in such cases those patients, whose ordinary care imposes a real burden on their families, may licitly be left to take care of themselves and thus abandoned to die. This is not the sense in which Pius XII spoke of extraordinary means ... "