Friday, June 1, 2018

What next for the pro-life movement?

The Tablet

30 May 2018 | by Tina Beattie

What next for the pro-life movement?


What next for the pro-life movement?
A tally keeper at work in Dublin as votes were being counted

Tina Beattie on why the Church must find a better way to struggle together to be pro-life after as well as before birth
Many Catholics are deeply distressed about the result of the Irish referendum. Abortion is a uniquely challenging ethical dilemma. It is quite different to the same-sex marriage referendum which was held in Ireland in 2015. Then a significant majority – including a majority of Catholics – voted for a change in the law which allowed same-sex couples to share with heterosexual couples the difficult delights of married life. Whatever one’s theology of marriage might be, it was hard not see that referendum result in positive terms. The vote to open the way for a legalisation of abortion in Ireland invites no such unambiguously positive interpretation. At best, it can only ever be the lesser of two evils.

Those who celebrated the “Yes” vote last week with scenes of jubilation added to the grief of their fellow citizens who had voted “No” out of a deep sense of moral abhorrence, but the expressions of relief, satisfaction and joy on the faces of those celebrating the unexpectedly overwhelming victory of the Yes campaign also bore witness to how oppressive the law has been for many Irish women. Archbishop Eamon Martin of Armagh suggests that there are now three groups in Ireland – faithful, practising Catholics; Catholics who have drifted away from the Church; and a third group that is hostile to church teaching. That’s a forgivably simple analysis to make in a radio interview.
The discussions in social media groups set up by Irish women campaigning on both sides suggest a more nuanced picture. What we have seen in recent weeks is that many of those who voted Yes are faithful Catholics, respectful of the sanctity of life and of the vulnerability of the unborn, but also aware of the extent to which harsh legislation compounds the anguish of abortion. A significant factor in the referendum campaign was the engagement of older women who do not want their daughters and granddaughters to go through what they went through. In other words, maternal love and compassion played an important role in this referendum on the Yes side as well as on the No side.
Abortion is violent, ugly and painful. Even when it takes place in the early weeks of pregnancy, a flutter of human life is extinguished, and something precious is lost. Abortion leaves a scar on the soul of a woman that never heals. The decision to have an abortion is one of the most difficult a woman can face. Over the past few weeks, many women on both sides have courageously described their own experiences of abortion. We have been given a rare insight into an aspect of women’s lives that still remains largely taboo. I have never before heard what it is like even with an early abortion, to lie in a blood-soaked bed alone, squirming in the agonies and howls of childbirth, as a tiny finger-sized sliver of human life abandons its determined grip on the world – and that is just the result of so-called “medical” abortion, chemically induced in early pregnancy.
Irish women and girls have always had abortions. We have heard harrowing tales of flights to Britain and of enduring that trauma in a lonely and frightening world of strangers and bleak hotel rooms – if they can afford the “luxury” of a hotel room as well as the air fare. Otherwise, they fly back bleeding and in pain the same day. Can this be preferable to respecting a decision to end a pregnancy? Now, the women who have abortions will no longer face that double ordeal. Can this be preferable to respecting a decision to end a pregnancy?
The referendum result – and the decisive scale of it – poses multiple challenges for the Church not just in Ireland, but more generally. It shows that women inside as well as outside the Church are rejecting the idea that a hierarchy of celibate men has a God-given right to claim moral authority over their bodies. It shows yet again that belief in human dignity and the sanctity of life does not always yield simple answers to complex dilemmas. The majority of those voting in the referendum were born and raised Catholic. Most were educated in Catholic schools, where they will have imbibed Catholic doctrine from Catholic teachers. Notwithstanding that the sexual abuse of children by priests and the attempt by many bishops to cover up their crimes has virtually destroyed the credibility and moral authority of the Church and alienated many Irish Catholics, the referendum result suggests either a failure by the Church to persuasively communicate its values and teachings or the need to reconsider how those teachings are interpreted, not least because women are becoming full and equal participants in the decision-making processes of democratic societies, if not yet in the Church.
So how might the Church learn from what has been happening in Ireland in recent weeks and months? One of the longstanding principles of Catholic teaching is that it upholds the common good and the just society by distinguishing between morality and legality. The law should only be used to protect the common good – not to police people’s consciences. So even if I as a Catholic believe that every act of abortion is gravely sinful, that alone would not justify making direct abortion a criminal offence in every circumstance.
The Second Vatican Council reaffirmed the traditional belief that personal conscience is the ultimate arbiter in making moral decisions, and freedom of conscience must be respected even if one thinks another person is wrong. Of course there are limits with regard to moral autonomy, and those limits have always been decided around issues of the common good and shared social values. Is there a point at which abortion might shift from being a personal moral decision to being a question of the common good?
Abortion has always been seen by the Church as a serious moral wrong. Traditionally there has been a distinction in church teaching between the moral gravity of early abortion and the more severe gravity of late abortion, rooted in the belief that the human person comes into being gradually in the early months of pregnancy. Perhaps it is time to consider recovering that distinction. If, as some anticipate, Irish law changes to allow abortion on request up to 12 weeks, that might be a way of recognising the end of the first trimester as the point at which abortion becomes a question of social concern that cannot be confined to the private domain. This would not entail a change in church teaching on the sanctity of all human life, from the moment of conception, nor would it inhibit it from fostering a culture of life in which each child is welcomed and treasured or from showing practical concern for all women who might be considering abortion, or who have had one. But the centre of its attention would no longer be on political campaigning with regard to laws relating to early abortion. Early abortion would become a moral rather than a legal issue, and the Church would draw on its own long tradition of reasoned debate to maintain its opposition to direct abortion in all circumstances.
The credibility of this position will be undermined if women continue to be excluded from exercising magisterial authority, if the prohibition against all forms of artificial contraception is not relaxed, and if opposition to abortion is not accompanied by understanding and support for women facing difficulties in pregnancy and mothering. Church teaching to date has said nothing of substance about maternal mortality and the physical and psychological risks associated with pregnancy and childbirth. The Church’s struggle against abortion should not be a struggle to force a woman to carry to term an unwanted pregnancy. It is a moral struggle, but it is also an educational, economic and social struggle. It is a struggle to create a society that provides secure housing and health care for all, and to weave a social safety net capable of holding the most vulnerable, desperate and isolated members of society. It is a struggle to foster a culture of life that celebrates every child, not as a possession or as a commodity but as a gift to be cherished, that recognises that every child is a shared responsibility, and that, as the proverb says, it takes a village to raise a child. It is also a struggle to educate men to take responsibility for their sexuality and its consequences – a significant but unacknowledged factor with regard to many unwanted pregnancies.
But there is another aspect to this. Research shows that while in the short term abortions might increase as a result of a liberalisation of the law, the most effective way to reduce abortion rates in the longer term is to respect the moral responsibility of women themselves. There is mounting evidence to show that, with few exceptions, abortion rates are declining in countries where women are educated and have access to contraception and safe, legal and early abortion. When women have a choice, they increasingly choose to have the child. Perhaps a society in which such choices are available is one in which women also feel respected and cared for – secure enough perhaps to go ahead with a problem pregnancy.
The struggle against abortion will continue. It is the nature of that struggle that is now in the spotlight. If this is a struggle for human dignity, then it will always be a struggle on behalf of both mother and child, and it will be informed by a clear-sighted awareness that the elimination of abortion in every circumstance is not possible. There are pregnancies that threaten the life of the mother or that are likely to result in the birth of a dead or dying child. For women who feel strong enough to cope with such a prognosis, it may be an admirable decision to continue the pregnancy, but there is no moral tradition that says it is right to force martyrdom on another person. If martyrdom is not freely chosen, it is torture. That is why many of us believe that the criminalisation of early abortion is a form of torture. (Late abortion is euthanasia, and should be debated as such.) Catholics must also ask searching questions about creeping eugenics. Again, these searching questions cannot be asked without at the same campaigning for lifelong health care and social, psychological and economic support for sick and disabled children and their parents.
The Church teaches that abortion is a grave moral wrong. But we have learnt that criminalising abortion or denying women access to it does not save the lives of babies. It kills women. Illegal or unsafe abortion remains a significant cause of death and injury among the world’s poorest women and girls, and the figures show no signs of declining. So let’s find a better way to struggle together to be pro-life after as well as before birth. And this is a political, economic and social struggle as well as a struggle about sexual ethics and women’s rights.
Tina Beattie is professor of Catholic studies at the University of Roehampton, London.

No comments:

Post a Comment