The issue of abortion is so emotive that it is prone to first class irrationalities and extremisms on the right and on the left. The call for Catholics to refuse membership of and refuse to finance Amnesty International because of its new  ‘pro-abortion about-turn’ by Cardinal Renato Martino of the Pontifical Council for Justice and Peace is at best condemnable. He said the move was the ‘inevitable consequence’ of a recent decision by Amnesty's executive council to support access to abortion for women who had been raped or whose health was endangered by their pregnancy.

 

I don’t think it is appropriate to ask Americans or many Europeans to give up their citizenships since their laws recognize a woman’s right to abortion. Neither does it make sense to ask them to stop paying tax since it is also used to enforce their laws. An option of radical dissociation is not a one-size-fits-all panacea. Certainly in this case it does not fit at all.

 

Amnesty International stands for and fights for human rights globally- women and children rights, migrants’ rights, economic and welfare rights. It fights against ra

cial, sexual and religious discriminations, arm control, children soldiers, death penalty, torture, and genocide.

 

I am a passionate opponent of abortion myself even to the degree of its recourse in the case of rape but when the life of the mother is in danger and there is nothing else to do, it is not abortion in the true sense of the word but a regrettable necessity. However if the mother chooses to go instead, she is a hero sacrificing her life for her baby. If it’s the baby that goes, s/he is the hero sacrificing his/her little life for the mother.

 

This moral dilemma is sustained because of the inadequacies of the present state of medical science and technology. Once they improve, we don’t have to choose who to go or who to stay anymore. After all before the rapid progress of science and technology, when these gynaecological situations of choice present themselves, both mother and pregnancy goes. So the proposed practice of ‘regrettable necessity’ is still a work in progress.

 

Damola Awoyokun

Chairman

Continence International

(a pro-life policy centre)

Ibadan.