Sir, – It goes without saying that because a particular attitude or action may be moral, it is not therefore necessarily legal or indeed vice versa.
However, the primary human rights issue of life and death surely has an ethical dimension. This it would seem is antecedent to and in itself independent of any or every religious persuasion. The debate on abortion is constantly classed in the media as either a “social” issue or alternatively as a purely creedal persuasion. Hardly ever, it seems, does this discourse advert to any moral content whatsoever.
Rarely, if ever, have I heard the word “conscience” mentioned in this context. Does not the gift of conscience play some role at least, in addressing the issue? Secularists as well as Christian believers surely share this faculty. Indeed, secularists understandably bridle at the suggestion that their judgments may be devoid of an awareness of right and wrong. Secularists are certainly “conscientious” human beings, like everybody else. Why has conscience been eliminated from the discussions on abortion?
Moral consideration, of course, may lead to different conclusions depending on the complexion of one’s conscience. But that is not the point. It is rather that the ethical dimension would seem to have been largely air-brushed out of the discussion. – Yours, etc,