Just as it is the victors who write their biased view of history so it is that it is the Government allied to the media that produce their biased script for the referendum.

The word ‘repeal’ has become something of a mantra in the hands of those seeking to introduce abortion. ‘Repeal the 8th’ trips easily off the tongue but it is only part of the story. Their repeal not only involves the 8th amendment but the 13th (Right to Travel) and 14th (Right to Abortion Information). These came about as a result of the X Case where a young girl, who was claimed to be suicidal, had been prevented from having an abortion in Ireland. This was then catered for in the Protection of Life During Pregnancy Act 2013. It
made provisions for the finding of the court in the X Case, allowing abortion where the life of the woman was at risk, including a risk of suicide.
These changes permitted abortions in the ‘hard cases’ where medical intervention is required to safeguard the health of the mother. But what of the unborn child. What steps have out Government taken to attend to the child’s welfare? They had the Supreme Court comb the Constitution to see if the unborn child might have any other rights (other than the right to life) and when the answer was negative proceeded to produce this Referendum which attempts to remove from the unborn baby its right to life. So much for Pádraig Pearse’s declaration of the new nation’s resolve to cherish all its children equally!

Just as the word ‘abortion’ has been sanitised and has lost something of the horror which always attends that sad and bloody event so has the ballot paper been shed of any distracting text. We are to be asked a plain ‘yes’ or ‘no’ to approve or not to approve the 36th amendment. But even the sanitised ‘abortion’ word does not make it on to the paper.
We are being asked simply to do our duty and vote ‘yes’ so that the Government can deal with the rights of the mother and her unborn baby without having to trouble us again!
The only answer to all this is a resounding ‘NO’.
Of course the Government is not as insensitive as all that. They have been educated into believing that the child in the womb only becomes human after a certain period. About the length of this period there is a great deal of uncertainty but without any other terms of reference to guide them 12 weeks will do. The fact that science says that all the DNA is present at conception will just have to be ignored. After all humankind is more than a clump of cells!
Of course the Bible agrees with science! David the Psalmist recognised his sin and in psalm 51 we have his repentance. Without mitigating in any his own guilt he saw that he, like the rest of us, had inherited the sin of Adam. This did not happen after a certain period in the womb, and not after 12 weeks, but he writes “Surely I was sinful at birth, sinful from the time my mother conceived me”. David reckoned that he was present in the womb from conception. He also was given to understand that he, and we all, are a creative work of God. He writes in Psalm 139 verses 13/14 “For you created my inmost being; you knit me together in my mother’s womb. I praise you because I am fearfully and wonderfully made.”

So what is all the fuss about? We have a tiny percentage of the female population who are pregnant and wish they were not. Surely the charitable thing is to assist both mother and the child to delivery when a decision for the child’s future can be made. The current offer of legally killing the child is not a Christian solution. Vote NO.