Letters
Kudos from Rev. Greene
Thank you so much for your truly excellent February 2002 issue of The Interim. As a reader of many years, I think it is one of your best, if not the very best.
There was a first-rate interview with my dear friend and fellow picketer, Linda Gibbons. If anyone ever gets to heaven, it will have to be Linda. Her objectivity and total lack of anger after all she has been through is an inspiration to us all. Then there is my old hero and long-cherished friend (also fellow picketer) Father Ted Colleton, whose Irishness alone will get him past the Pearly Gates. He has just given me a wealth of new info for my next Epiphany homily. Thank you Father Ted. Next we come to another old friend, Dave Dooley, whose expose of current conservatives would make Edmund Burke roll over in his grave.
Finally we come to Sue Careless's excellent survey of life and sexuality issues in the Anglican Church. Despite the hierarchy's determination to make the Anglican Church of Canada relevant (to what may I ask?) there are a few bright lights which Sue missed. Dr. Ian Gentles, professor of history at Glendon College, York University has written some of the best pro-life articles of recent times (such as. "Care for the Dying and Bereaved"). Ian (also a fellow picketer at Morgentaler's and elsewhere) was my very excellent rector's warden when I was the parish priest at St. Bartholomew's Regent Park (1977-1993) in Toronto. Then there is the world famous Dr. Robert Salter, professor and head of orthopedic surgery in the University of Toronto and chief of surgery at the Hospital for Sick Children in Toronto. Dr. Salter was warden at St. Paul's (Anglican Church) on Bloor Street. For over a generation he has been writing excellent pro-life articles (such as "Modern Medicine, Genetics and the Future of Mankind") a lecture given at the University of South Wales in 1977). Thirdly there is Rhodes scholar and professor of neuro-surgery at the University of Toronto,. Dr. Harley Smythe, another very active pro-lifer and also a warden at his parish church. These three would certainly give a balance to the liberal Eric Beresford – and finally I presume that in her references to "Catholics" she really means "Roman Catholic" – the official name.
All in all, a first rate-issue – so much so that you are getting a lot of national press from your excellent quizzing of the pro-life and not so pro-life candidates in our forthcoming leadership meeting of the Alliance party.
Enclosed is a small donation to help keep The Interim coming.
(Father) R.S.H Greene
Calgary, Alta.
What Chretien actually said
In his informative and worthwhile article about the meaning of conservatism (February Interim), Professor David Dooley paraphrases Jean Chretien as having said the abortion issue is "settled" in Canada. Actually, what the prime minister said was much more hateful than that. He said we have "social peace" on the issue. Imagine equating murder with peace! By using such language, the prime minister was not conveying a neutral attitude but rather a positive endorsement of the current situation whereby unborn babies are unprotected in law. Roughly 2,100 years ago, the author of the Book of Wisdom seemed to anticipate the likes of Chretien: "Even though they live in a great war of ignorance, they call such evils peace." (Wisdom 14:22).
Lise Anglin,
Toronto, Ont.
Life and death and the organ donor
I read Dr. Shea's article on organ donation, with a mixture of repulsion and fascination. When I concluded with his review, I pondered the questions. "How many participants of the harvesting team would, using the same criteria they bestow on the rest of humanity, honestly donate their organs?" And, "Would the term brain death hold the same meaning to them as it poses to us?"
Penny Anderson
Young, Sask.
What about the baby?
Thank you for your paper and the vigilance on behalf of the unborn. It is a tough battle that you have taken on and one we can not relinquish. Abortion has probably been practiced since time began. So I believe that it is not so much your aim to stop all abortions but rather to bring about an awareness which will bring back a deep sense that abortion is all ways murder and should not be made easily available.
I am not sure if I am incorrect in assuming that the suffering of the aborted baby has been given much consideration. As much as I know that abortions are wrong, the mother ultimately makes the decision and the baby has no voice in the matter. I understand that many women regret the abortion. Some becoming mentally ill etc.
But what about the baby? If it is doomed to die does it also have to suffer in an undeserved way. What is done to sedate these baby's before the other wise torturous proceedings? If an abortion is wanted why torture a child?
Is it time to press for laws that prescribe a procedure to provide a painless death for these babies?
The advocates of abortion and certainly the women who have abortions would not want excruciating and agonizing pain for the little one that is so cruelly rejected.
Tim Hapel
Thunder Bay, Ont
Cloning and God's will
Physicians Severino Antinori and Panaycotis Zaros, both of whom vow to soon clone human beings, said "when the objective is to help men and women, than the objectives can justify everything. What is ethical is what is right for people." In other words, human judgment is more important than Gods rule and promises.
I had to think of Sara's decision when she gave her slave girl to Abraham as a wife. Human decisions against Gods plans will have huge consequences. It would not be the first time that human reasoning is way off. Sara's decision started the trouble we have now in the middle East!
M.A Homburg
Terrace B.C
Stop paying for abortions
Changes in the health care system are a necessity. Sindi Hawkins, B.C.'s minister for health says it can't wait till the Romanow Commission releases its recommendations. The B.C. government has already slashed health-related services, many of them hurting those most in need.
One procedure that Ms Hawkins can stop funding is abortion. Information received through the Freedom of Information Act, shows the Medical Services Plan paid $4,664,981 for 40,014 abortions during the years 1991-1994. Obviously, today the cost of an abortion is much higher; also the number of abortions has increased. The stated amount does not include office visits, blood tests, ultrasound, follow-up examinations, hospitals or clinic overhead costs. With all of the above, the cost of abortion now stands at over $15,482,000 per year. Then there is the ongoing funding of freestanding abortion clinics, and the incarceration of those who extend a helping hand to those seeking abortions.
Abortion is not medically necessary, as admitted by the Canadian Abortion Rights Action League, which called on the government to continue funding abortion in spite of its being a socio-economic, rather than a medically necessary, procedure.
What sensible people have known all along is that pregnancy is not a disease, and that abortion does not improve the health of the mother by destroying her unborn child. In fact, abortion poses complications to the mother. She is also at greater risk of getting breast-cancer later on.
Polls have consistently found that the majority of taxpayers don't want to pay for abortions. The B.C. Unity Party has called on the government to defund abortion. And yet, the B.C. Liberals have pledged to "protect current funding and existing levels of access to abortion services throughout the province as a matter of confidence in the government."
Let your voice be heard. Tell Premier Gordon Campbell to stop paying for the destruction of human life.
Hilda Krieg
President,
Surrey-Delta Pro-Life Society
Surrey, B.C
Editor's Note: The Interim calls for an end to all abortion. The idea that the baby suffers incredibly during an abortion and requires protection from the torture involved, speaks to the brutality of the act of abortion and the necessity to ban the procedure.
