Drs. Miriam and Mark Sciberras, on behalf of Life Network Malta, will once again be attending the March for Life being held in Rome on the 8th of May 2016.
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Surrogacy, an affront to female and human dignity by Dr. Michael Asciak
A disgrace to the rights of all women to be induced to be used as bearing slaves and a negation of the rights of many children conceived through surrogacy to be brought up by their genetic parents. Just before we started our Easter holidays and while still in the throes of ‘Panamagate’, events abroad quietly gave the lie to another of the Labour Party’s progressive ideas. On the 15th March of this year in Paris, the Committee on Social Affairs, Health and Sustainable Development of the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe voted against a report for a Resolution (Doc. 13562) lauding and accepting surrogacy (hired women’s womb) as a means for reproduction!
In December 2015, the European Parliament voted by a strong majority to forbid all practices of Surrogacy without exception, by a large majority. In its Annual Report on Human Rights and Democracy in the World and the European Union’s policy on the matter, the position of the European Parliament is very explicit: it “condemns the practice of surrogacy, which undermines the human dignity of the woman since her body and it’s reproductive functions are used as a commodity; considers that the practice of gestational surrogacy which involves reproductive exploitation and use of the human body namely of vulnerable women in developing countries, for financial or other gain, should be prohibited and treated as a matter of urgency in human rights instruments”.
The only solution is to ban surrogate motherhood on an international level, just as the sale of children is forbidden, and to plan for criminal sanctions for offenders, especially the intermediaries. It is eminently the responsibility of the Council of Europe to guarantee instruments for defending Human Rights, as requested by the European Parliament.
In Sweden, Justice Eva Rosenberg has just issued a report calling for a ban on both altruistic and commercial surrogacy as it puts undue pressure on women to become surrogate mothers both in Sweden and abroad and little is known how it affects the children themselves. In Sweden, the legal mother is the birth mother and one wonders what would happen if a surrogate had to change her mind about the pregnancy and refuse to deliver the child to the persons who commissioned the surrogacy?
Left wing Swedish journalist Kajsa Ekman wrote to the Guardian newspaper stating bluntly that, “Surrogacy may have been surrounded by an aura of Elton Johnish happiness, cute newborns and notions of the modern family, but behind that is an industry that buys and sells human life. Where babies are tailor-made to fit the desires of the world’s rich. Where a mother is nothing, deprived even of the right to be called ‘mum’, and the customer everything.
The West has started outsourcing reproduction to poorer nations, just as we outsourced industrial production previously. It is shocking to see how quickly the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child can be completely ignored. No country allows the sale of human beings – yet, who cares, so long as we are served cute images of famous people and their newborns”?
Surrogacy restricts women’s’ freedom by surveillance and contracts to tell them what they may or may not do, where they may go and even what they may or may not eat. Surrogacy endangers the life of mothers by increasing perinatal mortality especially in third world countries where many surrogates are contracted. Surrogacy exploits women’s’ bodies as they are used for their reproductive capacities and then literally forced to disappear from the child’s parentage at birth. Many poor women even as young as 13 years old, are induced to “volunteer” by the money offered by relatively rich parents of heterosexual or homosexual orientation.
Surrogacy gives rise to innumerable legal disputes especially if the mother carrying the baby changes her mind and wishes to keep the baby, or if abnormalities of the foetus are detected and the hiring parents want an abortion to take place with the result that patronage may be withdrawn and the hired mother left alone with a disabled child to care for.
Surrogacy breaks the parentage link with the child. The parentage of the child is deliberately split between gamete providers, the surrogate mother and the intended parent(s). Thus a child could have up to six parents: the genetic mother (oocyte donor), the genetic father (sperm donor), the surrogate mother, her husband (presumption of paternity) and finally the intended parents. This is contrary to a child’s right to know and live with his or her mother and father. (Art. 7, Convention on the Rights of the Child).
Surrogacy is dehumanizing for the surrogate mother and the child. Separating a child from the one who carried him is as much of a hardship for the child as it is for the mother who has to relinquish her child. Surrogacy transforms the child into an object to be sold or exchanged. The child is the object of a contract. Internationally, surrogacy prices vary between $25,000 to more than $100,000. The contracting parties claim ownership rights over the child. These types of “mafia” networks involved in the sale of children are not only reserved for developing countries. In the United States alone, in 2011, a network involving the sale of children was dismantled. It had been organized by lawyers who claimed that the children involved had been conceived for intended parents who subsequently changed their minds.
These children were sold for $100,000. Even if there were no financial gains at issue, the individuals suffer inevitable consequences, notably psychological ones. Neither can one ignore the consequences of such transactions on the other children of the surrogate mother. Surrogacy is an international booming market segment: hundreds of clinics, agencies and young women propose their services for this practice. The annual turnover for the reproductive market in India was estimated at $ 400 million in 2011, and is now $2 billion, and $6.5 billion in the United States.
Surrogacy is also highly contrary to human rights and international law. The 1926 Convention against Slavery states: “Slavery is the status or condition of an individual over whom any or all powers attributing ownership rights are exercised”. In the Convention on the Rights of the Child, Article 35 prohibits “the sale of or the trafficking of children for any purpose or in any form”. According to the Hague Convention, Article 1 has the particular purpose “to establish safeguards to ensure that international adoptions are carried out for the best interest of the child (…) and thereby prevent child abduction, the sale or the trafficking of children”.
Surrogacy is also incompatible with The Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women, adopted on December 18, 1979, which became operative on September 3, 1981. Article 6 requires that “State Parties shall take all appropriate measures, including legislation, to suppress all forms of traffic in women and exploitation of prostitution of women”. Article 11f adds that States must ensure, “the right to health protection and to safety in working conditions, including the safeguarding of the function of reproduction”. This applies perfectly to the exploitation of the reproductive function of surrogate mothers.
No State which claims to respect human dignity should allow the official sanctioning of a legal contract the object of which is a human being in this case a child, and which involves a scheduled abandonment by the mother and a distorted and wilfully disguised parenthood of the same child.
Yet here we have it in our dear Malta, where our Minister for Equalities and the progressive Labour Government is earnestly considering legislation to allow surrogacy to become legal in order to ensure that male homosexual couples have the same rights to reproduce as female homosexual couples and male and female heterosexual couples. An inequality that does not actually exist as it does not compare like with like in functions or capacities.
I should remind the general public that in 2012, when the current Embryo Protection Act, was being enacted in Parliament by the PN and which makes surrogacy illegal, the Labour Party then too lobbied strongly in favour of the inclusion of surrogacy as a regular means of reproduction until they dropped their cause because of the impending general election and possible loss of votes. The moral chasm here was already wide and apparently visible for those who wanted to see and hear.
One should not be surprised now that we observe and hear of so many serious moral discrepancies in government by a governing body. Neither should we be surprised to see this government putting forward legislation with no moral qualms as to regulating against the true nature and true essence of man! After all, the end justifies the means and one wonders how a party which used to consider itself as having a social bearing, adopts a moral ethic that is so individualistic, existentialist and subjective in outlook!
Dr Michael Asciak MD, M.Phil, PhD, PGC in VET.
Ref: http://www.independent.com.mt/articles/2016-04-03/newspaper-opinions/Surrogacy-an-affront-to-female-and-human-dignity-6736155736
Politics without principles by Dr. Klaus Vella Bardon
In 1908, G.K. Chesterton wrote the following reflection in his masterpiece Orthodoxy: “When the businessman rebukes the idealism of his office boy, it is commonly in some such speech as this: “Ah! Yes, when one is young, one has these ideals in the abstract and these castles in the air; but in middle age they all break up like clouds, and one comes down to a belief in practical politics, to using the machinery one has and getting on with the world as it is.
“Thus, at least, venerable and philanthropic old men now in their honoured graves, used to talk to me when I was a boy. But since then I have grown up and have discovered that these philanthropic old men were telling lies. What has really happened is exactly the opposite of what they said would happen. They said that I should lose my ideals and begin to believe in the methods of practical politicians.
“Now, I have not lost my ideals in the least; my faith in fundamentals is exactly what it always was. What I have lost is my old child-like faith in practical politics.”
No doubt, many of us can relate with such a powerful observation, especially in the light of repeated exposure of sleaze and corruption that at long last seems to shock our undemanding electorate. The sad reality is that too often such exposures seem to be only exploited for partisan gain and are not the result of a firm commitment to clean out the encrustations of dishonesty that clog the corridors of power.
In politics, the only thing that seems to count is electoral success, and at all costs
Many of us are aware of government decisions that are anything but even-handed. Justice seems to be a slogan dragged out from time to time to score points against the opposing party. Yet those who had property or businesses expropriated or have been denied rightful permits, employment or promotions, are acutely aware of how unjust those in power can be.
To add insult to injury, seeking redress in the courts of law is too often, and at best an exercise in futility, and at worst a drain on time and money that leaves the injured party worse off. The absence of moral uprightness in business and the political arena reflects poorly on the level of our country’s catechesis.
In politics, the only thing that seems to count is electoral success, and at all costs. This seems to give our politicians carte blanche to use any means to achieve power. Sadly, the politics of Machiavelli seem to be well entrenched. I am sure that there are politicians in both our major parties who deep down disagree with the shabby manoeuvring and bad political decisions made by their own leaders, especially decisions that are made without any political mandate whatsoever.
Nowhere is this more conspicuous than in the single-minded imposition of the LGBT agenda in recent years by the government in power that unreservedly champions their agenda. The logic behind it is obvious. The LGBTs are well organised and well financed. Unfortunately, they are only concerned with their own narrow interests irrespective of how this impacts the common good.
Even the Leader of the Opposition has succumbed to the blackmail politics of the powerful LGBT lobby. He seems unbelievably unaware or indifferent to the long-term negative impact this will have on family life which has been steadily unravelling as too many Maltese jettison the Christian values that once underpinned our society.
As the remarkable Rabbi Jonathan Sacks said six years ago, the freedoms we take for granted are based on our Judaeo-Christian heritage that was rooted in moral absolutes that included the non-negotiable dignity of the human person, the sanctity of human life, and the imperative of conscience and the consent of the governed. Today, every one of them is at risk.
Thankfully, there are signs that an alliance of new political forces are reacting to this sad state of affairs. Hopefully they will live up to authentic democratic values and not give in to blackmail from any quarter.
Politics with principles might then become a reality.
Dr. Klaus Vella Bardon is Vice-Chairperson of Life Network Foundation Malta
Ref: http://www.timesofmalta.com/articles/view/20160410/religion/Politics-without-principles.608402Continue reading
Mum Dad & Kids – Sign the Initiative!
The organisers of the Mum, Dad & Kids European Citizens’ Initiative (ECI) are happy to announce that it is now possible to sign in favour of marriage and family online and support this ECI!
Please take a few minutes to visit our website and sign.
Click here to access Mum, Dad & Kids European Citizens’ Initiative (ECI) website
Gay ‘marriage’ by Prof. Patrick Pullicino
British Prime Minister David Cameron has been said to have adopted a “poisonous form of radical moral liberalism” in championing the cause of gay ‘marriage’ in the UK. The same can now be said of the Maltese Prime Minister and leader of the Opposition.
Why is it that politicians in Western countries are falling over each other to bring in gay ‘marriage’ without an electoral mandate and when it is clearly against the wishes of the majority and will only affect a small minority of the population? Endorsing gay ‘marriage’ as a form or equivalent of marriage betrays complete confusion as to what marriage is. Politicians should have the intellect to realise how seriously damaging the introduction of gay ‘marriage’ is to society, the family and most importantly of all to children.
Leading politicians who personally bring in gay ‘marriage’ bear personal responsibility before God for ravaging their own societies and attempting to destroy the family. Make no mistake about it, this is what legislation of gay ‘marriage’ would facilitate.
Marriage is a lifelong covenant between a man and a woman, blessed by God for the good of the spouses and for the procreation of children and their education. The lifelong commitment is necessary to provide a secure environment for the bringing up of children.
Divorce has already pushed much suffering on children for the sake of parents’ selfishness and becomes more likely if God is left out of marriage. Gay ‘marriage’ in which procreation is impossible and the body anatomy is used for what it was never created is nothing but a grotesque caricature of marriage.
The love between spouses in a true Catholic marriage is modelled on the love within the Holy Trinity and parents have a deep responsibility to use marriage to raise children and bring them to God. The Catholic family is the heart of society.
Malta, with the great love there is for children, should be the last place in the world in which the family and children are threatened in this way.
Professor Patrick Pullicino is a member of Life Network
Ref: http://www.timesofmalta.com/articles/view/20160404/letters/Gay-marriage.607760
Gender Ideology Harms Children
March 21, 2016 – a temporary statement with references. A full statement will be published in summer 2016.
The American College of Pediatricians urges educators and legislators to reject all policies that condition children to accept as normal a life of chemical and surgical impersonation of the opposite sex. Facts – not ideology – determine reality.
1. Human sexuality is an objective biological binary trait: “XY” and “XX” are genetic markers of health – not genetic markers of a disorder. The norm for human design is to be conceived either male or female. Human sexuality is binary by design with the obvious purpose being the reproduction and flourishing of our species. This principle is self-evident. The exceedingly rare disorders of sex development (DSDs), including but not limited to testicular feminization and congenital adrenal hyperplasia, are all medically identifiable deviations from the sexual binary norm, and are rightly recognized as disorders of human design. Individuals with DSDs do not constitute a third sex.1
2. No one is born with a gender. Everyone is born with a biological sex. Gender (an awareness and sense of oneself as male or female) is a sociological and psychological concept; not an objective biological one. No one is born with an awareness of themselves as male or female; this awareness develops over time and, like all developmental processes, may be derailed by a child’s subjective perceptions, relationships, and adverse experiences from infancy forward. People who identify as “feeling like the opposite sex” or “somewhere in between” do not comprise a third sex. They remain biological men or biological women.2,3,4
3. A person’s belief that he or she is something they are not is, at best, a sign of confused thinking. When an otherwise healthy biological boy believes he is a girl, or an otherwise healthy biological girl believes she is a boy, an objective psychological problem exists that lies in the mind not the body, and it should be treated as such. These children suffer from gender dysphoria. Gender dysphoria (GD), formerly listed as Gender Identity Disorder (GID), is a recognized mental disorder in the most recent edition of the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of the American Psychiatric Association (DSM-V).5 The psychodynamic and social learning theories of GD/GID have never been disproved.2,4,5
4. Puberty is not a disease and puberty-blocking hormones can be dangerous. Reversible or not, puberty- blocking hormones induce a state of disease – the absence of puberty – and inhibit growth and fertility in a previously biologically healthy child.6
5. According to the DSM-V, as many as 98% of gender confused boys and 88% of gender confused girls eventually accept their biological sex after naturally passing through puberty.5
6. Children who use puberty blockers to impersonate the opposite sex will require cross-sex hormones in late adolescence. Cross-sex hormones (testosterone and estrogen) are associated with dangerous health risks including but not limited to high blood pressure, blood clots, stroke and cancer.7,8,9,10
7. Rates of suicide are twenty times greater among adults who use cross-sex hormones and undergo sex reassignment surgery, even in Sweden which is among the most LGBQT – affirming countries.11 What compassionate and reasonable person would condemn young children to this fate knowing that after puberty as many as 88% of girls and 98% of boys will eventually accept reality and achieve a state of mental and physical health?
8. Conditioning children into believing a lifetime of chemical and surgical impersonation of the opposite sex is normal and healthful is child abuse. Endorsing gender discordance as normal via public education and legal policies will confuse children and parents, leading more children to present to “gender clinics” where they will be given puberty-blocking drugs. This, in turn, virtually ensures that they will “choose” a lifetime of carcinogenic and otherwise toxic cross-sex hormones, and likely consider unnecessary surgical mutilation of their healthy body parts as young adults.
Michelle A. Cretella, M.D.
President of the American College of Pediatricians
Quentin Van Meter, M.D.
Vice President of the American College of Pediatricians
Pediatric Endocrinologist
Paul McHugh, M.D.
University Distinguished Service Professor of Psychiatry at Johns Hopkins Medical School and the former psychiatrist in chief at Johns Hopkins Hospital
References:
1. Consortium on the Management of Disorders of Sex Development, “Clinical Guidelines for the Management of Disorders of Sex Development in Childhood.” Intersex Society of North America, March 25, 2006. Accessed 3/20/16 from http://www.dsdguidelines.org/files/clinical.pdf.
2. Zucker, Kenneth J. and Bradley Susan J. “Gender Identity and Psychosexual Disorders.”FOCUS: The Journal of Lifelong Learning in Psychiatry. Vol. III, No. 4, Fall 2005 (598-617).
3. Whitehead, Neil W. “Is Transsexuality biologically determined?” Triple Helix (UK), Autumn 2000, p6-8. accessed 3/20/16 from http://www.mygenes.co.nz/transsexuality.htm; see also Whitehead, Neil W. “Twin Studies of Transsexuals [Reveals Discordance]” accessed 3/20/16 from http://www.mygenes.co.nz/transs_stats.htm.
4. Jeffreys, Sheila. Gender Hurts: A Feminist Analysis of the Politics of Transgenderism. Routledge, New York, 2014 (pp.1-35).
5. American Psychiatric Association: Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, Fifth Edition, Arlington, VA, American Psychiatric Association, 2013 (451-459). See page 455 re: rates of persistence of gender dysphoria.
6. Hembree, WC, et al. Endocrine treatment of transsexual persons: an Endocrine Society clinical practice guideline. J Clin Endocrinol Metab. 2009;94:3132-3154.
7. Olson-Kennedy, J and Forcier, M. “Overview of the management of gender nonconformity in children and adolescents.” UpToDate November 4, 2015. Accessed 3.20.16 from www.uptodate.com.
8. Moore, E., Wisniewski, & Dobs, A. “Endocrine treatment of transsexual people: A review of treatment regimens, outcomes, and adverse effects.” The Journal of Endocrinology & Metabolism, 2003; 88(9), pp3467-3473.
9. FDA Drug Safety Communication issued for Testosterone products accessed 3.20.16: http://www.fda.gov/Drugs/DrugSafety/PostmarketDrugSafetyInformationforPatientsandProviders/ucm161874.htm.
10. World Health Organization Classification of Estrogen as a Class I Carcinogen: http://www.who.int/reproductivehealth/topics/ageing/cocs_hrt_statement.pdf.
11. Dhejne, C, et.al. “Long-Term Follow-Up of Transsexual Persons Undergoing Sex Reassignment Surgery: Cohort Study in Sweden.” PLoS ONE, 2011; 6(2). Affiliation: Department of Clinical Neuroscience, Division of Psychiatry, Karolinska Institutet, Stockholm, Sweden. Accessed 3.20.16 from http://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371/journal.pone.0016885.
source : American College of Pediatricians
Launch of the One of Us Federation
Saturday 12th March 2016 marked an important historical step for the defence of human life in Europe. An international new force for life and human dignity has been established under the name of “One of Us European Federation for Life and HumanDignity”, abbreviated as the “One of Us Federation”. This Federation is a non-profit apolitical and non-denominational organisation. The launching in Paris at the Salle Gaveau, included 1200 participants from the 28 European countries and 31 national organizations. There were participants from France, Belgium, Luxembourg, Germany, Netherlands, Denmark, Sweden, Poland, Slovenia, Spain, Italy, Bulgaria, Rumania, Slovakia, Czech Republic and Portugal. At this launching, Malta was represented by Life Network Foundation Chairman Dr Miriam Sciberras, and International Life Network Secretary, Dr Mark Sciberras.
The President, Jaime Mayor Oreja ( former Interior Minister of Spain), opened the Forum by stressing that Europe’s citizens are keen to reclaim the human values of their founders: the respect of each and every human being from conception to natural death.
The Aims of the Federation are:
a. The unconditional recognition of the inherent, inalienable human dignity as source of human and civil rights and freedoms. Human dignity should be inviolable and protected by public authorities.
b. The development of a culture of life in Europe, through promoting and supporting activities that involve the defence of human life, especially at its most vulnerable stages of development ( conception and gestation, childhood, maternity, sickness, old age and end of life).
The topics discussed during the one day forum included the American Planned Parenthood Scandal and its consequences for Europe, the Threat or Reality of Euthanasia in Europe, Surrogate Motherhood, Eugenics and sale of Gametes.
The panel of distinguished speakers included Jean-Marie Le Mene ( President of the Jerome Lejeune Foundation), Katalin Novak ( Minister of Family Hungary), Alberto Ruiz Gallardon ( former Minister of Justice Spain), Jean-Frederic Poisson ( French MP), Miroslav Mikolasik ( MEP and Chairman of EPP Working Group on Bioethics and Human Dignity, Slovakia), Carlo Casini ( former MEP Italy), Gian-Luigi Gigli ( President of Movimento per la Vita Italy), Phillipe de Villiers ( former French Minister), Jan Figel ( former European Commissioner Slovakia) and Konrad Szymanski ( Secretary of State for European Affairs, Poland).
The panel of fiery enthusiastic pro-life speakers spoke of the challenges facing Europe today, and how, by joining forces and with a clear target we must fight for the defence of any and all human life.
The day concluded with the One of Us Award Ceremony. The first award was given to Pattaramon Chanbua, a mother of a baby born with Down syndrome who generated an international emotional outcry when her story was revealed in summer 2014. Baby Gammy was conceived together with his twin sister through an agreement of so called “surrogate motherhood. “However, as diagnosis revealed that Gammy had Down syndrome, the mother was threatened to abort as the Australian couple who contracted only wanted to keep the healthy sibling.
Dr Mark Sciberras
International Secretary
Life Network Malta
Press Release
The recent and unwarranted call by the Prime Minister to introduce gay marriage and the quick endorsement of the same by the Leader of the Opposition, is another blow against the institution of marriage.
Life Network Foundation, would like to set the record straight and point out to the main political leaders that the issue of gay marriage never featured in their respective parties electoral manifestos.
It is presumptuous of both party leaders to make such statements without political mandate.
Maltese people who still cherish the traditional values of life and family are feeling left out.
As a result, a substantial part of the population – that part that believes that marriage should only be between one man and one woman and open to life – is no longer upheld by the leaders of the main political parties.
Do Dr Joseph Muscat and Dr Simon Busuttil presume that a substantial part of the people can be ignored?
Life Network appeals to the general public and especially to MP’s on both sides of the house to make their voices heard in defence of marriage