Influences of Catholic Church Social Justice Teaching on Abortion in Australia?

j asked:


The submission of this assignment must appraise the role and influence of religion to the current situation of abortion.
I have chosen an article from oct 08 that explains the bill reform. Here is the article;

12 October, 2008
Catholic opposition to the Victorian Government’s Abortion Law Reform Bill intensified Australia-wide this week as the controversial legislation moved towards a vote in the Victorian parliament – a clear confrontation between a State government and the Church.

In response to a Day of Prayer, to defeat the bill, called by the Archbishop of Melbourne, Archbishop Denis Hart, thousands of pro-life supporters packed Melbourne’s St Patrick’s Cathedral last Sunday, with the legislation, having been passed in the Victorian legislative assembly, due to be debated in the upper house

Archbishop Hart, in a rare presentation to the Australian media, vowed to defy the new law if it came into being: Catholic health care workers would not comply with the so-called reforms.

Catholic Health Australia’s chief executive, Martin Laverty, declared the bill would deprive Catholic health services of the ability to act in accordance with conscience.

The new laws tabled would give women open access to abortion up to 24 weeks into pregnancy.

And women in the later stages of pregnancy could also qualify, at a doctor’s discretion.

“If it passes, we will be put in an untenable position,” Mr Laverty said.

“The Bill provides a mechanism to remove our right to be different from others…our right to keep providing the Catholic maternity services we’ve offered Victoria since its beginnings. It may be taken away,” he said.

“The bill may breach Victoria’s Charter of Human Rights. It relies on a component in the Charter that exempts its application to abortion law. Legal opinion says the drafters were wrong to do so.

Legal opinion offered to Catholic Health Australia affirms the Bill breaches the Charter.”

“With the Bill mandating some health practitioners to act in contradiction of their conscience, staff in Catholic hospitals may face discrimination at law.

Under the legislation doctors with a conscientious objection to abortion would be required to refer a woman to doctor who didn’t. They would also be obliged to perform abortions in an emergency if necessary to protect the woman’s life.

Archbishop Hart said “I would say we can’t perform and we can’t refer … we have nowhere to go.

“That is a firm, irrevocable position and I believe it is the only position that people of conscience can hold,” the archbishop said.

At one stage in the Day of Prayer vigil thousands from the congregation and others, singing hymns and praying, converged on the steps of the Victorian Parliament where spontaneous speeches were made.

The demonstration closed Melbourne’s Spring St for more than an hour

Faiths represented during the Day of prayer included Melbourne’s Anglican archdiocese, the Uniting Church, Presbyterian Church and Lutheran Church.

Archbishop Hart told the congregation “We are here as brothers and sisters … we testify to the unique value of each human without distinction from conception to natural death.”

Catholic Health Australia represents the 15 Catholic hospitals that operate in Victoria, some of which have done so for more than a century.

Martin Laverty pointed out that over that time those hospitals had always worked in partnership with Victorian government and the Victorian community.

“They are centres of excellence in cancer, cardiovascular, trauma and, of course, also in the maternity care they provide,” he said.

“Our opposition to abortion is clearly known. Our hospitals are an integral part of Victoria’s health system, handling up to one third of births across the state, each year.”

“Catholic health providers contribute significantly to the State’s health system. In turn the system has respected our principles as Catholic providers.

“Given the massive scale of Catholic services in the wider health system, why should this change now?”

Dr Brigid McKenna, policy officer for the Sydney archdiocese’s Life, Marriage and Family Centre, has described the bill as “a terrible anti-life bill” which “would be likely to increase the rate of abortion”’

She added: “If passed, Victorian law will abandon vulnerable unborn human beings and their mothers.

“The law will also fail health care professionals by omitting a no-disadvantage conscientious objection clause for doctors, and compelling nurses to assist in a late term abortion against their conscience.

“Abortion is not ‘an ordinary medical procedure’. It is never therapeutic or healing or caring. Abortion only ever ends a human life and wounds human hearts.

“We should legislate for life, not death.”

The bill to give Victoria the most liberal abortion regime of any state has been supported by the Lower House (47-35 votes), with Premier John Brumby confident