LONDON, March 22, 2005 (LifeSiteNews.com) – Britain’s Chief Rabbi, Dr. Jonathan Sacks, was quoted Friday by the Jewish Telegraph saying that current British law allowing abortion without questions up to 24 weeks has had serious ill effects. “The current law has consequences few foresaw at the time. Too often, abortion is being used for convenience. This is unethically unacceptable.” The rabbi’s comments came after Catholic Cardinal of Westminster, Cormac Murphy O’Connor, said that the legal limit for abortion ought to be lowered from 24 weeks to 20.
The rabbi said, “The time has come to reconsider our stance on abortion and to give weight to the rights of the unborn child. Abortion is permitted only to save or safeguard the life of the mother.”
Dr. Rowan Williams the Anglican Archbishop of Canterbury and titular leader of the worldwide Anglican Communion said that opposition to the current open situation is growing. “In the country at large, not least among young people, there is a groundswell of distaste about it,” he said.
The current wave of commentary by religious leaders follows a proposal by Tory leader, Michael Howard to lower stage in a pregnancy at which a ‘termination’ is legal from 24 weeks to 20. This effort is in accord with Pope John Paul’s 1995 clarification on the responsibilities of Catholic politicians in which he said it was permissible for a politician to support restrictive measures that do not totally ban abortion.
While many news services characterized Dr. Williams’ statements as urging the British public not to make abortion an election issue, Dr. Williams in fact said that voters might like to question candidates on the issue.
Dr Williams said, “For a large majority of Christians – not only Roman Catholics, and including [me] – it is impossible to regard abortion as anything other than the deliberate termination of a human life.”
The media’s misrepresentation likely flows from some observations of Dr. Williams who said it is unlikely that the issue will create the kind of polarization seen in the US. He said it was not possible given current political climate to make it an election issue. “The idea that raising the issues here is the first step towards a theocratic tyranny or a capitulation to some neanderthal Christian right is alarmist nonsense,” he said.
“The plain fact is that no party has made, or is likely to make, commitments on this matter as part of a set of its electoral pledges,” he said. “No party has given the least indication that it would seek anything but a free vote on any related question. But – a large but -all the party leaders have admitted in various ways that they are far from happy with our abortion law as it stands.”
Dr. Williams said that the opposition to abortion does not necessarily flow from the ‘Christian right,’ but often from women. “The trend is inexorably towards a sharper recognition of the foetus as a natural candidate for ‘rights’ of some kind. In light of this, it is a lot harder to reduce the issue to an individual’s right to choose. And this is not something said primarily by patriarchal clerics, but increasingly by women, and young women at that.”
Dr. Williams concluded, “It would be a real failure if, agreeing that it was not an electoral issue, provided an alibi for taking it seriously as a public issue.”