ABORTION activist Goretti Horgan (May 26) has failed to refute the public perception of Northern Irelands new abortion law as extreme.

She claims that the abortion regime, imposed over the heads of the Northern Ireland electorate by the UK Government, is not at all extreme.

However, she also admits that the ferocious new abortion law permits the termination of full-term babies.

We are told that there is nothing new about the new law allowing abortion up to birth.

Indeed, up to 20,000 babies are terminated in late-term abortions in Britain each year, according to Department of Health statistics.

The Irish Citizens Assemblys recommendations on abortion were treated as the holy grail by the Irish government and its pro-abortion allies.

Yet fierce criticism was rightfully directed at it in 2017 for its astounding bias in favour of thepro-abortion position.

The real citizens assembly in Northern Ireland consisted of tens of thousands of people who marched on Belfast city centre and at Stormont in record-breaking pro-life rallies in September 2019.

Additionally, an overwhelming 79 per cent of the 21,000 people who responded to the NIOs recent public consultation were opposed to the introduction of any form of abortion.

The consensus has never been clearer there is no public support for this abortion regime.

There have been attempts to justify the disability-selective abortion which is permitted under the new legislation, including on the basis that an embryo or foetus is not a person.

But this is so wrong that it is hard to know where to begin. An embryo or a foetus (the Latin phrase for little one) is just as much part of the human race as you or I.

Any embryology textbook will tell you that life begins at conception and a human foetus is just that human.

These are necessary, scientific stages of human development. How can anyone say that a developing unborn child is not a human being?

No, abortion does not need to be available across Northern Ireland.

Women and their children need hope, real support and life-affirming resources, not the death and destruction of abortion.

In an age of 4D ultrasound scans, and at a time when we are witnessing nations worldwide working to undo permissive abortion laws, we must follow the path of science, compassion and human rights, and protect unborn children.

BERNADETTE SMYTHPrecious Life

Using Celtic mythology to support pro-abortion views shows degree of desperation

Dr OBrien of Alliance for Choice (May 25) includes a mixture of fact and fable in her defence of abortion. That St Brigid performed the first recorded abortion in Ireland in 650AD is given as fact but no contextual detail is given for this assertion. The hagiography of St Brigid was written by Cogitosus around 650AD some 127 years after her death. One translation by Liam De Paor does mention that St Brigid caused the foetus to disappear, without coming to birth and without pain. This is not suggestive of an abortion, and indeed this text is not included in modern translations. From an historical critical viewpoint it seems unlikely that this event ever happened since the source is uncorroborated. Dr OBrien merely uses the saint for political purposes. Indeed, that she has to support her pro-abortion views using historical revisionism and Celtic mythology indicates a degree of desperation in her argument.

There is no doubt St Brigid in the Catholic and Christian tradition would have condemned direct abortion. From the earliest times the Church has always condemned wilful abortion as a moral evil. A careful reading of the early Church fathers teachings supports this.

Pope, Saint John Paul II often spoke of the anti-life mentality of our era that promotes a culture of death.Abortion is not health care. It leads to the intentional termination of a human being. In the classic Hippocratic Oath it states: I will neither give a deadly drug to anybody who asked for it, nor will I make a suggestion to this effect. Similarly I will not give to a woman an abortive remedy.Dr OBrien will do well to reflect on the wisdom of the ancients.

BOBBY FORRESTCrossgar, Co Down

Thank God the dark days are gone

My social media accounts have been flooded in recent days with happy memories of May 26 2018 when voters in the Republic of Ireland voted overwhelmingly to allow abortion in Ireland after decades of exporting the problem to England. It starkly exposed the anomaly that Northern Ireland remained the only place in the islands of Britain and Ireland where women could not avail of the human right to determine their own bodily autonomy. No more. After decades of campaigning the Bill allowing Abortion in Northern Ireland finally came into line on March 31. We are still waiting for the regulations to go through final checks after the public consultation on the implementation of the bill but, have no doubt, we are not going back. Gone are the dark days when people of all religions, and none, and from every social status helped women out in dreaded secrecy to travel for abortions.Finally, our young people have a chance for a future not determined by private religious beliefs.I welcome fulsomely the changes that were hard fought for and thank all who brought them about.

MARGO HARKINDerry City

Do you dig it?

I suspected the lockdown was about to lift a few weeks ago when the Lisburn Road in Belfast was coned off and the digging began. This was reminiscent of the first week in September when the dig usually heralds weeks of disruption for the new term. The current dig is to replace street lights with new but identical poles. Even if this was necessary, surely the old poles could have been removed at the same time. Perhaps that is the next dig. With statistics showing Belfast to be the second in the league table of UK dug up cities surely it is time for some strategic oversight.

Of course theres a cycle lane coming soon but thats a deeper dig into the public purse.

NOEL PHOENIXBelfast

Still waiting

Almost the whole of page14 of The Irish News (May 26) was given over to Goretti Horgans pro-abortion views. There are two sides to this argument and I looked at the opposite page for the opposing argument.

I looked in vain. I told myself a balancing article will surely appear the following day, or the day after that, or the day after that...

Guess what ? Im still waiting.

E DOOHANDerry City

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Abortion does not need to be available across Northern Ireland - The Irish News