During last night’s first presidential debate between Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton, debate moderator Lester Holt did not bring up the issue of abortion. Although the issue sparks a huge divide between the two candidates neither of them fielded any questions on the most important topics on the minds of the majority of American voters who are pro-life.
Through Laura’s Eyes: Abortion’s False Promise of Empowerment
For decades, legalized abortion has been slickly marketed, or “packaged,” by the feminist movement and the abortion industry as “empowerment” for women.
Medical Council believes morning after pill is only ‘tip of the iceberg’ in ethical issues
The Medical Council has told the Health Affairs Committee that the morning after pill is ‘just the tip of the iceberg’, as it expressed the concerns related to ethical, health and social issues.
Dr Doreen Cassar gave a detailed presentation before the committee which met this afternoon, explaining that the pill cannot be made available over the counter for a number of vital issues related, among other things, to health.
She explained that the pill will not work on persons of more than 77kg of weight. It can also have dangerous effects on people suffering from epilepsy or asthma.
“A doctor should always bear in mind the protection of human life, from conception till death,” Dr Cassar said before going into further detail. “We believe that the morning after pill is only the tip of the iceberg. There are major issues related to the medical history of the person requesting it. But we must go beyond the medical information.”
The Medical Council argued that it is vital for the pill giver to know the sexual history of the person. She noted that, statistics show an increase in sexually transmitted diseases. “We must ask ourselves, why didn’t the couple use any contraception? Why are they requesting the morning after pill? We must also ask if the person requesting the morning after pill came on his or her own accord, or because she or he was forced.”
The Council also insisted that the pill should be only prescribed by a medical doctor, otherwise there are serious issues one might face.
“There is also a psychological issue which one must analyse. Let’s see why these persons are not prepared to take care of a baby,” she added while saying that this pill can affect the health of the nation.
Quoting the medical schedule, Dr Cassar said that a doctor cannot prescribe something which will harm the mental and physical existence of the patient and that doctors cannot impose their views on patients.
Insisting that the morning after pill should not be given over the counter, Dr Cassar asked “if a male comes to buy the pill, who are we protecting? The child or the parents?”
Labour Party MP Etienne Grech said he agreed that the morning after pill should be given through prescription.
Finally, she concluded by calling on politicians that, since there is an element of uncertainty, they should see to “err in the side of caution”.
The report on the morning after pill will be tabled in Parliament on 10 October when Parliament resumes. Committee adjourns for Wednesday 5 October.
Thousands of People Flood the Streets of Berlin for the March for Life to Protest Abortion
Thousands of pro-lifers marched in Germany on Saturday to call for an end to abortion.
The Catholic News Agency reports about 7,500 pro-lifers participated in the German March for Life in Berlin. About 1,500 pro-abortion advocates staged a counter-protest during the march, according to local police reports.
Abducted and aborted by Tony Mifsud
In his article entitled ‘United to protect children’ (August 6), Home Affairs Minister Carmelo Abela wrote: “When it comes to the well-being of our children, this is a topic that unites us all.” Yes, we are united on this.
He added: “I am part of a government which attaches great importance to protecting the best interests of children. When we hear of children being reported missing or, worse still, abducted, we are rightly alarmed. Each year in the EU, about 250,000 children are reported abducted or missing.”
Here we have to add: including some 300 unborn children from Malta, abducted and subsequently aborted beyond Maltese shores.
Abela also said: “Compared to other countries, Malta’s numbers are small, but that should not stop us from strengthening and improving the systems already in place.” There is widespread agreement on this in Malta.
Abela really put his finger on it the right thing when he said “ensuring children’s well-being and protection from harm will always be an intrinsic part of the Maltese people’s core values”.
We should add “…and we should do what it takes to keep it that way.”.
Then he gave some very grim statistics, like that international statistics show that 76 per cent of children are killed within three hours of abduction.
In 2013, at the Pro-Life Day manifestation in favour of life organised by the Malta Unborn Child Movement (MUCM) in Valletta, Abela, as representative of the Labour Party declared: “Abortion is illegal and that is how it should remain – it is nothing less than murder.”
He had also declared that “parents were obliged to do their utmost and protect their offspring from the moment of conception… Society and the State were also in duty bound to support mothers during their pregnancies and help them provide a good quality of life to their newborns”.
Last year, it was reported that government backbencher Deo Debattista had urged the government to set up a ‘pro-life’ clinic to help expectant mothers thinking of aborting their unborn children. This newspaper also quoted Rebecca Gomperts, the Dutch provider of abortions on the high seas, as having said that about 300 expectant Maltese mothers aborted every year.
Very small Maltese unborn children, who have a legal status according to a number of Maltese laws, are being abducted out of Malta to be aborted… very sadly we have to add, by their parents… in UK and elsewhere.
What we don’t know, so far, is if the body parts, the tiny baby hearts, lungs and brains of aborted Maltese children are being callously harvested and sold, that is trafficked for profit, to university and company laboratories like Planned Parenthood, the largest abortion business in the US.
What we don’t know, so far, is if the body parts, the tiny baby hearts, lungs and brains of aborted Maltese children are being callously harvested and sold
The government and civil society should unite even further in their resolve to protect also the lives of these 300 unborn childen.
The way forward has been charted already by Deo Debattista. The government should help in as many ways as possible a number of voluntary organisations already working in this field, to reach out to these women and offer them further compassionate, counselling and advisory services, to help them spare the lives of their unborn children.
Labour MP Etienne Grech, chairperson of the Health Committee of Parliament seems to have other views. He said it was his belief that there can be no life without brain activity, quoting JM Rollingring’s theory that : “The brain is the only unique and irreplaceable organ in the human body, as the orchestrator of all organ systems and the seat of personality.”
For him, it appears, human life does not begin at conception.
Grech should take note of a very significant statement made by a bioethics expert Pierre Mallia in July: “It is a fact that life does begin at fertilisation… and that science is not absolute, as many make it out to be.”
He also said that “ resorting to so-called scientific advice that many base their arguments on can also be tantamount to deception if you choose the arguments that suit you.”
Yes, the well-being of all our children, from conception, unites us all. This is reflected in the fact that, so far, all four Maltese political parties declare that they are pro-life. This is something which does not exist in any other country in the world.
This has been demonstrated in Malta every year, in February, for the last 10 years when the MUCM organised Pro-Life Days which included the active participation, and pro-life speeches, of political parties and even the President.
Our supreme aim should be to keep it that way and to continue “to be proud to be the best in Europe” and the world, not only, as the Prime Minister said, “in having the lowest unemployment in the eurozone and a declining poverty rate” but also in protecting all Maltese and other children living in Malta “from conception”, as our laws state so explicitly…until the end of life.
That includes not legalising the morning-after pill when there is still a lot of doubt, scientifically, if it is abortifacient or not, notwithstanding the fact that the chairperson of the Medicines Authority is advising the authorities differently.
It also includes not going for widespread embryo freezing in connection with IVF when it is very likely that in the process unborn children, still in the embryonic stage, can be killed accidentally, or negligently.
Tony Mifsud is coordinator, Malta Unborn Child Movement
Ref: http://www.timesofmalta.com/articles/view/20160917/opinion/Abducted-and-aborted.625236
From treasure to trash by Prof. Patrick Pullicino
Men are more likely than women to seek pleasure from sexuality and so women have traditionally been sexual gatekeepers for men. In the past, the potential need to care for a dependent child had a tempering effect on women’s behaviour.
That any child, once conceived, should be treasured and nurtured for life was never in question. This delicate balance also served to select men who were motivated by love and would honour a lifetime commitment to marriage.
The first downward step was oral contraception. Those who opted to go on the pill were able to dramatically lower the ‘risk’ of having to nurture a child for life. Once the unpredictability of conception was removed, ‘gatekeeping’ was not so necessary. Procreation was no longer inherent in sexual relations and women started to become more opportunistic in their sexual behaviour.
Children were now displaced from the centre of a woman’s ‘love-life’ as their birth could now be avoided.
The pill was not completely reliable however and those who did not take it regularly still ran the risk of pregnancy with sexual intercourse. The resourcefulness of the pharmaceutical industry then produced the morning-after pill (MAP) which has a 98 per cent ability to prevent pregnancy if taken within 72 hours of intercourse.
Abortion has crept into many societies on the back of contraception and the MAP will surely accelerate its acceptance
The pill was deceptively marketed as ‘emergency contraception’ to try and obscure its abortive effects on any conception that had already occurred. It could equally have been called ‘emergency abortion’ however, as it is not difficult to see, that since most successful conceptions occur within the time period of action of the MAP, much of its effect has to be due to a loss of the fertilised ovum.
This is abortion. With the MAP, the woman’s defence against pregnancy is taken to a second level. In this ‘emergency’ use of the MAP the woman has to accept that abortion may occur. At least subconsciously, she assents to take a potentially lethal step against the life of a child. The MAP therefore further devalues the lives of children in a society that legalises the MAP, in an incremental downward step over the contraceptive pill.
The third and final step which is inevitable once the life of a child is made disposable by allowing the MAP is abortion.
Abortion is extended to situations that do not fulfil the arbitrary designation of ‘emergency’. Once a society is sufficiently desensitised to the evil of killing the most vulnerable expression of its newest members, the door is open to abortion of confirmed pregnancies.
Abortion has crept into many societies on the back of contraception and the MAP will surely accelerate its acceptance. What was treasure will sadly end up as trash.
The Maltese have always treasured children. Children are a deep source of love in the community. Some groups are portraying the MAP as necessary to societal progress, for a woman to control her own body regardless of any potential life she is carrying.
Is it progress for a woman to be empowered to destroy what she should be nurturing with all her heart? The MAP is lethal for life at its most vulnerable and, if accepted, will deeply damage not only children, but women and the unique love the Maltese have for children.
Prof. Patrick Pullicino is a neurologist.
Ref: http://www.timesofmalta.com/articles/view/20160909/opinion/From-treasure-to-trash.624469
Brexit: Europe in jeopardy by Dr. Klaus Vella Bardon
The referendum on Brexit has been a severe blow to European unity. This development will have a far-reaching negative impact on both Britain and the rest of Europe.
Although, for once, the British had the opportunity to vote in a clear manner, where every vote counted, almost 30 per cent did not vote on such a crucial issue. The result was an indictment of a political class that believes that it knows it all and treats the electorate patronisingly.
The immigrant crisis, which is spiralling out of control, was exploited to the hilt by the anti-EU politicians and activists, who in their campaign proved even more dishonest than their opponents.
The Brexit result should be a wake-up call for all Europeans, especially those who claim to have Christian values.
For too long, the political and social development of a united Europe has been reduced to economic rationality. The Christian philosophy of social democracy has been dented, and the core values that inspired men like Alcide De Gasperi, Robert Schuman and Konrad Adenauer have long been given only lip service.
Lobbying should be declared and open, so that people are able to judge what is at stake
Such people, who really passionately believed in a united Europe, were those who came through World War II and believed in a democracy based on solidarity and subsidiarity. Such men of principle no longer exist. It is now mostly a matter of short-sighted, short-term, political and financial advantage.
Yet the rot in Europe runs deeper. Rabbi Jonathan Sacks, this year’s recipient of the prestigious Templeton Prize, pins it down. Sacks did not mince words. Our civilisation is in imminent peril, despite all the advantages and comforts that modern technology has bestowed. He mentions four crippling flaws.
Firstly, we are addicted to debt. This is portrayed in the fiscal irresponsibility abetted and exploited by the financial world. Secondly, the breakdown of the family unit. This has been accelerated by easy divorce and the virulent gender ideology that has led to the virtual destruction of the concept of the traditional family.
Thirdly, the growing gap between the super-rich and the rest. Finally, the demise of the West is the result of an intractable demographic crisis in which the current generation rejects the responsibility of child-rearing.
These four realities are all interlinked and a consequence of the abandonment of Europe’s Christian identity, reflected now by an unrepresentative, bloated bureaucracy where policies are often determined by underhand lobbying.
A prime example can be seen in the series of trade negotiations being carried out, mostly in secret, between the EU and the US by the Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership. It has been branded an assault on European and US societies by transnational corporations.
The spectre of lobbying in the EU is hardly referred to in the local media. Yet in Leħen Is-Sewwa (July 24), Dun Anġ Seychell, quoting a local paper, pointed out that despite the EU managing, after much effort, to force lobbies and their budgets to be registered, two countries refused to publish this information – Britain and Malta.
Instead of engaging with the EU to improve its performance, Britain chose to block transparency on such a vital issue. So much for blaming the EU for all its ills. It is the political class at the national level that bears the blame for corrupting wholesome political development in Europe.
These lobbyists are not just covering business interests. There are also pressure groups, such as LBGT groups, that conceal their role and funding. Such behaviour is the antithesis of sound democracy. Lobbying should be declared and open, so that people are able to judge what is at stake.
A further example of the abuse of political clout is the pressure in the EU by powerful interests such as that of billionaire George Soros, one of the US’s richest men, who uses funds to destabilise the current, democratic, pro-Catholic government in Poland and now also aims to fund groups fighting Ireland’s restrictive law on abortion.
Meanwhile, in Malta, the government continues to undermine the family and promote laws that threaten the sacredness of life.
Christians are expected to involve themselves in the political arena and fight these negative developments. Otherwise, Europe has no future.
Dr. Klaus Vella Bardon is vice-chairman of Life Network Foundation Malta.
Ref: http://www.timesofmalta.com/articles/view/20160907/opinion/Brexit-Europe-in-jeopardy.624291
Science, truth and goodness by Peter Cassar Torreggiani
Science and technology could help advance man’s future in truth and goodness, but the opposite can also happen if professionals don’t really care about right and wrong. So would it do good to use Parliament to facilitate the use of pills that can undermine the processes of childbirth in the name of love?
Wouldn’t this be dangerous for democracy, as when citizens are corrupt they do harm to one other in a widespread fashion? Even if it’s true that the facts at the beginning of human life are not so clearly discernable, nonetheless what goes on beforehand indicates the life of virtue.
For instance, in prostitution a third factor in the person of a pimp is often involved even if not immediately apparent. Are the science and technology of the big pharmaceutical companies taking over the role of the pimp through the provision of pills, altering the natural biological process of the interaction of male and female bodies? Is this that dangerous combination of sex and violence?
Good governance prefers to promote the life of virtue, where peace and prosperity reign through the agreement of wills. Indeed it is this global civilisation of love towards which Malta should be inclining the soul of Europe. For what is really to be discovered in the cultural contrasts of moral relativity is the truth about personal relationality, whether it be about money and power or sexual intimacy.
Albeit being so miniscule an island, yet our true happiness as humans can help seek out the latent joy of true love in choices being made in respect of another’s body.
Through this element of sublime relationality, what is to be discovered is true interpersonal communion in its infinite intimacy, where time, space, and attendant emotions can indeed take life into a different dimension of existence, albeit fleetingly.
Ref: http://www.timesofmalta.com/articles/view/20160904/letters/Science-truth-and-goodness.623981
Human life is not a disposable value by Dr. Michael Asciak
I am not going to reply to Prof. Anthony Serracino Inglott’s letter in last Sunday’s TIMES entitled Emergency Contraception in the sarcastic way that he wrote about me, in deference to boring the public to death with medical details. I will simply point out that there is a wide gap in the pharmacological specifications that he himself has felt fit to quote.
In the specifications for Levonelle 1500 micrograms (levonorgestrel) he quotes that “at the recommended regimen, levonorgestrel is thought to work mainly by preventing ovulation and fertilisation if intercourse has taken place in the preovulatory phase, when the likelihood of fertilisation is highest. Levonelle 1500 is not effective once the process of implantation has begun”. What if it has not yet begun? It is evident that in the specifications themselves there is a lacuna or hole which Anthony Serracino Inglott seems to be playing on!
What if implantation has not yet begun – can it be prevented from beginning? What happens between fertilisation in the fallopian tube and the around five to seven-day period before the embryo comes to implant in the uterus? There is a glaring omission here and a profound silence! What exactly does one expect if the indications of the drug concerned is to cause the prevention of pregnancy? Is the literature incomplete for any particular reason? What about prevention of the beginning of implantation which is nowhere to be reckoned in the SmPC that he himself quotes?
As I wrote in my original article, there is much conflicting medical literature on the effects of levonorgestrel after ovulation has occurred, as to whether there is a prevention of implanatation of the embryo or not. Some studies and medical literature say it does prevent implantation of the embryo, some others say that there is no evidence that it does so (no concrete evidence that it does not do so). Nobody knows what vested interests are behind these reports as nobody knows what the vested interests are behind some of the opinions here in Malta.
Now every person with common sense knows that if there is serious doubt as to whether or not something is going to damage a human being, one does not approve it unless one is certain of what is happening. This is the primum non nocere of the medical profession. One of the first principles of medicine is, first, do no harm! If there is substantial doubt as to the action of the drug with respect to human damage (to the embryo), then the onus of proof would be on the prescriber and authoriser of the drug. If I remember well, there were several people who, during the parliamentary sub-committee hearings, attested to the negative effect of Levonorgestrel leading to the embryo failing to attach to the uterus. Apart from Professor Brincat, who testified the way he did (he also thinks that human embryos should be frozen during IVF procedures), there was another consultant gynaecologist who also testified to the damage caused by Levonorgestral to the embryo after ovulation occurs – or is Professor Serracino Inglott conveniently forgetting this too?
He takes me to task because I corrected myself about the drug Ulipristal (progestogin modulator) where, if anything, I accepted that, like Levonorgestral, it may be used before ovulation, but from the beginning I always said that like Levonorgestrel, it should not be used after ovulation. I have always been consistent on this particular point. As for the Italian Bioethics Committee, my answer is, where is the properly constituted Maltese Bioethics Committee? I can only wish that we had a Bioethics Committee that functions like the Italian one, composed of prestigious experts from all fields and which issues profound majority and minority reports on the relevant biomedical issues. It may not mean that I agree with all the Italian Committee’s reports but that is another thing.
Our Maltese bioethics committee is a practically non-existent and non-functional one and was never adequately constituted by this government with academics from the various disciplines, because it does not behove this notoriously subjective government to have a truly functioning committee to objectively advise it about these issues. Just as in the environment and in other quarters, this government has its own reasons and political agenda for not getting objective opinions published or acting on them if they are – and truth is often the first casualty.
I have been practicing my profession for 33 years and, like all doctors, I know that when treating patients one must not only consider the science but also the human circumstances surrounding that person, because applied medicine involves a knowledge of human psychological, social and philosophical issues that also need to be weighed in the balance of the final decision: a ‘feeling’ for the profession that general practitioners and other physicians learn not to ignore, a feeling based on facts but not only of the scientific kind! Medicine is both a art and a science: a science like the ovulation tests often used by patients to determine whether they are ovulating or not in order to determine their fertile period. An art like deciding when to treat a patient who is the victim of a rape or incestuous behaviour!
As for Minister Helena Dalli, she should not just rely on the Medicines Authority for an opinion. One swallow does not a summer make! She should have a wide access to other professional opinions and authorities too, unless of course it might suit her to rely on just one opinion in order to advance her ‘civil liberties’ agenda!
Dr. Michael Asciak MD, M.Phil. (European Studies and Genomics), PhD (Bioethics), PGC in VET. Senior Lecturer II in the Institute of Applied Science at MCAST.
Earth Ought Not to Look Like Hell by Richard Aleman
“These dazed dupes will gather again together and attempt to believe their dreams and disbelieve their eyes.”
These are the words of GK. Chesterton aimed at eugenicists, following his successful campaign to defeat the “Feeble-Minded Control Bill,” the 1912 proposed legislation to confine and sterilize mental or “moral defectives” for “the improvement of the British breed.”
William Inge, the Anglican dean of St. Paul’s Cathedral, publicly rebuked the English writer, saying that only “irrationalist prophets like Mr. Chesterton” could resist the “logic” of eugenics.
Chesterton’s so-called attack on reason would be justified if only his defense of the weakest and most vulnerable wasn’t so reasonable and logical.
By terminating the reproductive capabilities of these “undesirables,” eugenicists believed they could reduce or completely eliminate negative traits from spoiling future generations. They would do so by wielding the power of the State to sterilize and confine anyone they deemed degenerate and unworthy of procreating.
This “scientifically organized State” intentionally wrestling with the “old culture of Christendom” by means of the cleansing of society of undesirables, served as fodder for Chesterton’s 1922 book Eugenics and Other Evils:
“I do not deny, but strongly affirm, the right of the State to interfere to cure a great evil. I say that in this case it would interfere to create a great evil.”
Some contemporaries of Chesterton, such as eugenicist George Bernard Shaw, urged the use of gas chambers for eradicating the disabled and unfit: in a 1910 lecture, Shaw reportedly said, “A part of eugenic politics would finally land us in an extensive use of the lethal chamber. A great many people would have to be put out of existence simply because it wastes other people’s time to look after them.”
However, most “enlightened” eugenicists attracted supporters by using language that sounded humane, appealing to science and progress.
But Chesterton understood exactly what they meant when they spoke of the “feeble-minded.” They meant the lower classes. They mean: ‘humanity minus ourselves.” And when they spoke of enriching humanity, they meant something else entirely:
“They mean that the public is to be given up, not as a heathen land for conversion, but simply as a pabulum for experiment… They do not know what they want, except that they want your soul and body and mine in order to find out. . .. All other established Churches have been based on somebody having found the truth. This is the first Church that was ever based on not having found it.”
Eight years after Chesterton devoured the eugenicists for breakfast, Pope Pius XI issued the encyclical Casti Connubii. The Holy Father singled out the unrelenting eugenicists, who “by public authority wish to prevent from marrying all those whom, even though naturally fit for marriage, they consider, according to the norms and conjectures of their investigations, would, through hereditary transmission, bring forth defective ofispring…”
Pius’s condemnation of eugenics drew responses from the official organs of the eugenics movement, failed to engage the substance of teaching and proceeded predictably to question the encyclical’s authority, raising the possibility (in the minds of those soft on eugenics) that Pius may have overreached rather than called upon the weight of his office.
With respect to abortion, American eugenicists such as Margaret Sanger accused the pontiff of hiding behind papal pedagogy to mask his own “defiant medievalism” and of “condemning many a woman to die in the hopeless agonies of childbirth.” They intended this rhetoric to re-ignite an anti-Catholic prejudice and fan the flames of fear about Rome’s supposed plot to destroy Protestant America.
The eugenics movement had indeed found a formidable enemy in the Church. Catholic advocacy groups were well-oiled, organized, and impassable opponents. Clergy worthy of their cassocks rejected eugenics in the United States and proved themselves loyal to mater ecclesiae. For example, the most prominent Catholic social thinker of the period, Rev. John A. Ryan, described eugenics as a “pseudoscience” designed by “the immoral perversion of the human faculty,” and attacked contraception as the frustration of new life that “prevent it from attaining its natural end.” Ryan also wisely observed the implications of subordinating “the weaker groups to the welfare of society,” which would become “instruments to other human beings,” perfectly echoing Chesterton’s sentiments about eugenics breeding wage-slaves for “docility” and fostering “enterprise in a few masters.”
Although Casti Connubii warned against the state’s tampering with “the integrity of the body.” and Chesterton feared that eugenics would lead to the leviathan state, Julian Huxley – whose paternal grandfather Thomas Henry enjoyed a friendship with Charles Darwin – did not mince words about government’s enforcement of eugenics. “In one or two centuries…we shall tell the man who can’t provide for himself and his family that he cannot have State aid unless he agrees not to have any more children.”
Twenty-six years after Margaret Sanger renamed her American Birth Control League the “innocuous” Planned Parenthood, Pope Paul VI’s encyclical Humanae Vitae “precipitated a storm of dissent.” Its rejection of artificial contraception was met with opposition by self-proclaimed pragmatists, who turned their backs on marriage, the poor, the elderly, and the handicapped.
In hind-sight, Paul has been proven right. Men and women today are objectified, the marital act has been divorced from procreation, and our posterity continues to be extinguished systematically by our culture’s cheapening of human life.
Chesterton closes Eugenics and Other Evils with the irony that eugenicists, “naturally fearing they might be deficient… [are] so truly scientific as to have resort to specialists.”
Today, as science predicts the unnatural selection of perfect human beings, and the appetites of the world’s ravenous wolves strategically discredit the teachings of the Church, may we tremble before the Blessed Sacrament and pray that Our Lord’s swift justice prevails upon the hearts (and minds) of men, because “Earth is not heaven, but the nearest we can get to heaven ought not to look like hell.”
GILBERT MAGAZINE – May/June 2016