Daily Reading & Meditation: Tuesday (April 24)
April 24, 2018Close at the Ear of Eve (Conscience, One of the Ecclesiastical Words of the Day)
April 24, 2018
By Micaiah Bilger, LifeNews, April 23, 2018
DUBLIN, IRELAND – Irish Catholic Bishop Denis Brennan asked voters to consider how unborn babies who can kick and yawn would be aborted if Ireland repeals its Eighth Amendment.
Brennan, who serves the Diocese of Ferns in Ireland, issued a strong pastoral message Sunday to urge voters to support the “voiceless” unborn in May, Crux reports.
Repealing the Eighth Amendment of the Irish Constitution “will strip the voiceless of their most fundamental right and make all talk of any other human rights irrelevant for them,” Brennan said.
On May 25, Ireland is scheduled to vote on whether to retain its Eighth Amendment, which protects unborn babies’ right to life. Abortion activists, backed by some of the world’s richest men, are pushing the pro-life country to legalize abortion on demand.
Pro-lifers estimate that the Eighth Amendment has saved approximately 100,000 unborn babies’ lives from abortion.
“What repeal would mean is very clear, namely that the unborn boy or girl whose heart beats at 21 days – and the older unborn baby who has all of her / his vital organs at twelve weeks – will have no rights at all in Irish law, should people vote yes to repeal,” Brennan said.
“This twelve-week-old unborn baby – who is now enjoying for the first time the ability to kick, to move and to yawn – would, in the first stretches of young life, be without the basic protection of the right to life itself,” he continued.
If the amendment is repealed, Brennan said Ireland would create a dangerous new hierarchy about the value of human life.
“To concede to any person the right to intentionally take the life of another – in this case the life of a voiceless unborn child – is not only to redefine human life as less than sacred, it is also to make a hierarchy of human life – where some lives are deemed to be of no value at all,” the bishop said.
“In matters of life and death, none of us is a supreme judge who can decide the fate of another, least of all the vulnerable and the voiceless, the unborn child,” he continued. “None of us should ever have the power to decide on the death of another.”
Catholic bishops in Ireland have been a powerful voice against the pro-abortion campaign. This spring especially, they have strongly and repeatedly spoken up for unborn babies’ rights.
However, on Saturday, Irish government leaders began campaigning for the pro-abortion side. Crux reports Prime Minister Leo Varadkar, Minister for Health Simon Harris and other leaders launched the “Yes for Repeal” campaign to urge voters to let them legalize abortion on demand.
Two polls this spring show the pro-abortion campaigners are losing ground. Still, support for abortion is higher than opposition. Last week, the Business Insider reported 47 percent of Irish voters now say they will vote to repeal the pro-life Eighth Amendment – down 9 points from an earlier poll. According to the poll, 28 percent will vote to retain it; 20 percent are undecided.