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1 million names against abortion Join us in urging the Supreme Court to stop the killing

(LifeSiteNews) — After the Department of Health and Social Care published the “Pregnancy Loss Review” on July 22, the U.K. government has decided to take an important step forward in recognizing the humanity of pre-born children who die in the womb and the grief of parents who lose them. The review had sought a “vision for improving the care and support available to families when baby loss occurs before 24 weeks’ gestation,” and to that end the government has decided to introduce, with immediate effect, a “certificate of baby loss” for parents who request one.

The pro-life group CARE noted that the government “is also committed to reviewing existing guidance on the sensitive handling of baby remains following awful stories of women being told to retrieve the remains of their baby from the toilet or store them in the fridge.” According to a CARE spokeswoman: “We welcome this new certificate. It’s absolutely right the Government recognises the very real sadness and trauma that go along with losing a baby through miscarriage. But it is sad that we still fail to properly acknowledge the number of babies lost to abortion pre-24 weeks. We think every baby lost, whether through abortion or miscarriage is a tragedy and should be recognised as such.”

It is an indication of how fundamentally dishonest abortion supporters are that the U.K. government is perfectly comfortable referring to miscarriage before 24 weeks — the legal abortion limit in the U.K. — as “baby loss.” If miscarriage is “baby loss,” then abortion is, by logical extension, “baby killing.” Yet the government’s position is that if the baby dies naturally, it was a baby. If the baby is violently killed by an abortionist, it is not. Nobody in power is even remotely interested in attempting to explain this ugly moral schizophrenia.

Other countries have taken similar steps — and with similar discussions taking place as a result. In February 2019, the law in the Netherlands formally changed in response to a petition signed by 82,000 people, the government now allows people to register their stillborn children as a legal person in the Personal Records Database, something that had not previously been permitted. The push for this change had been led by mothers who wished their sons and daughters who died before birth to be recognized as people of value. A woman who deeply regretted her abortion promptly came forward to register her aborted baby as a legal person, a situation that made many deeply uncomfortable.

Earlier this year, outgoing Scottish National Party leader Nicola Sturgeon put forward an initiative enabling women in Scotland who suffered a miscarriage prior to 24 weeks’ gestation to apply for a “commemorative certificate,” creating a formal record of their child’s existence. The new initiative, which began this summer, is free of charge, and those who choose to participate are able to record the loss of their child in a Memorial Book produced by the Scottish government and National Records of Scotland, which is responsible for recording births and deaths. Parents who wish to record their children’s deaths – and implicitly, their existence – can do so as long as they live in Scotland, and they will not be required to submit any medical evidence.

If parents have suffered multiple miscarriages, they can apply individually for each child, and parents can also submit applications for children they lost prior to the start of the initiative. The program is intended to “give recognition and comfort” to those who have lost children – all participation is voluntary.

Sturgeon, you may recall, is a radically pro-abortion politician — and yet she, too, championed an initiative to commemorate “baby loss,” even sharing the story of her own painful miscarriage. As it turns out, we are only allowed to grieve the death of babies that we wanted. The others, discarded like garbage, are remembered only by those who fight to give them a voice.

1 million names against abortion Join us in urging the Supreme Court to stop the killing

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Jonathon’s writings have been translated into more than six languages and in addition to LifeSiteNews, has been published in the National Post, National Review, First Things, The Federalist, The American Conservative, The Stream, the Jewish Independent, the Hamilton Spectator, Reformed Perspective Magazine, and LifeNews, among others. He is a contributing editor to The European Conservative.

His insights have been featured on CTV, Global News, and the CBC, as well as over twenty radio stations. He regularly speaks on a variety of social issues at universities, high schools, churches, and other functions in Canada, the United States, and Europe.

He is the author of The Culture War, Seeing is Believing: Why Our Culture Must Face the Victims of Abortion, Patriots: The Untold Story of Ireland’s Pro-Life Movement, Prairie Lion: The Life and Times of Ted Byfield, and co-author of A Guide to Discussing Assisted Suicide with Blaise Alleyne.

Jonathon serves as the communications director for the Canadian Centre for Bio-Ethical Reform.

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