Because pregnancy is not an illness

I've wrestled my conscience about getting involved in the recent discussion about Cardinal O'Brien's outburst about politicians supporting abortion. As a liberally minded Catholic I do think I can shed some light on the issue that has caused much consternation and not a little intemperate language amongst fellow party members. But I always hesitate to talk about abortion for, unlike His Eminence, I do think that it is unwise for a single man never likely to sire children, to pontificate on the issue.

But today's Observer ups the ante a little with this: MPs to fight for abortion on demand in which some want to remove the few remaining blocks that attempt to ensure that would be termination clients get what amounts to the most cursory advice and counseling about the potential consequences of abortion.

It quotes my neighbouring Lib Dem MP Evan Harris, who is reported as saying that "women should not face any greater hurdles to obtaining an abortion than for any other routine surgical procedure, such as having their appendix out."

Well now see, this is where I have a problem. A pregnancy is just not comparable to an illness that needs treatment and where if you ignore treatment you put your life in danger. In such an illness it is not really the patient who makes the decision either. The doctor recommends and the patient consents. You don't get people coming into hospital asking for an appendicectomy "on demand".

It may not be the position of the Secularist Society of which Evan is a member (and whose discussions and policies, just as those of Catholics do, presumably inform their members' thinking and decision making), but philosophically and objectively, pregnancy is at least the start of a potential new life (not to wish to aggravate the discussion by claiming, as I believe, that conception is the point of creation of a new and unique life). And in my experience, of a few friends who have had abortion, and a few male friends whose partners have had abortions, a termination seems often to result in later feelings of guilt, depression, sometimes of irreconcilable tension between partners and so on.

But I don't mean to have a go at Evan particularly, I merely want to use this new move on abortion to talk about the Cardinal's position. You see, even as a Catholic, and one who does believe that philosophically at least abortion is the termination of a unique new life, personally I could never vote absolutely against freedom of choice for the individual to procure a safe and legal abortion. But I say that on the grounds that the church also demands pluralism in civic society. Sure, they usually mean this to apply to Iran or China where Christians may be an oppressed minority, but they can't have it both ways - it applies just as much to others' right to exercise their beliefs in countries that have a primarily Christian religious heritage.

And far from being a secularist party, our Liberal history is one of defending the rights of individuals to practice whatever faith they believe in, or none. And given that there are differing opinions on when life begins and whether or not abortion amounts to legalized killing even amongst Christian groups, I could never vote to impose one minority faith view on everyone. That does not mean I "support" abortion, merely that I don't think the law of the land should be used to impose one group's moral opinion over another and that it should be up to the individual facing such a drastic choice not to be criminalized because of one faith's position.

But it is a difficult line to follow. We don't approve of murder do we? And we would never countenance a "right to choose" murder - perhaps for example in the case of "honour killings" in some faiths it is a debate that is not that unimaginable. So if you believe that abortion is intentional killing how can one ever vote in favour of people's right to choose to kill another being? I can only suggest that, unlike the Cardinal, I have no right to judge another's conscientious decision and that if there is a being with a big book listing everything we've done in our lives she will probably want to take into account all the good we may have done in our lives as well as the occasional mishap (often occasioned by mitigating circumstances not completely within our control).

I saw a program on teenaged sexual activity last night. One boy made the point that "we don't bother to prevent pregnancy any more, we have the morning after pill for contraception". While we have a group in society whose fecklessness seems to promote such a laissez-faire attitude to pregnancy itself, I believe that to remove all safeguards that attempt at least to counsel people on their choices would be a step too far.

Evan of course is at least consistent, in wanting good quality early start sex and relationships education. And the combination of knowing properly how your body works and how relationships work before landing yourself in the situation of having an unwanted pregnancy would probably do as much to reduce the number of abortions as any law restricting abortions themselves. But while we don't have that, and seem always to shy away even from debate on it, we should not be making abortion that default fall back for what sometimes amount to bad decisions about the when, where and how of sexual activity. That does not contribute to "safe, legal and rare".

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