A Christian Eye on Politics
Over an incredible period of two days (May 19th and 20th 2008), the British Parliament has bowed to pressure from the current liberal, permissive and anti-Christian Labour Party Government in giving the go-ahead for Frankenstein-type human/animal embryo development. Many MPs and religious lobby groups had fought valiantly to prevent this from happening but were defeated by staunch hard-line liberals now entrenched in the British Parliament (especially in Liberal Democrat and Labour Party ranks). But credit must be given to many Conservative MPs who had fought this move to the bitter end.
These moves have effectively made Britain a virtual 'rogue state' since a highly dangerous pathway which has already been banned by 21 countries has recklessly been embarked upon. The claim of certain scientists that such experimentation could lead to the cure of killer diseases has been voluminously rejected by many other scientists. Even three British cabinet ministers refused to back these moves. Scientists now have unprecedented freedom to carry out experiments to unite human and animal embryos in the laboratory. This is truly a highly dangerous Frankenstein path and nobody can predict the outcome for these people will be tinkering with the very essence of life. This places enormous power in the hands of scientists without even any need for them to undergo personality suitability tests - its a bit like asking a small child to play with a huge articulated truck - the possibilities are truly terrifying! As one member of the House of Commons was heard to privately remark,
"The stated aim of the need to find cures for human diseases is not convincing. The heavy government support for a scientific path that most of them do not even understand raises the possibility of sinister ulterior motives...where are we really going?"
As the Daily Mail Comment pointed out on May 20th,
"...We have overturned millennia of moral thinking and stepped into territory hitherto reserved for science fiction horror stories."
Along with the embryo bill, members of Parliament have been voting on the time limit for abortion, the first such parliamentary vote for 18 years. Scandalously, Britain has become the abortion capital of Europe with abortions in the UK currently allowed at the unbelievably high figure of 24 weeks. This is a very late period for an abortion to be performed and confidence was rather high that this absurdly high figure would be reduced. Opinion polls had revealed that three-quarters of British women and two-thirds of British doctors believed that 24 weeks needed to be reduced. Conservative MP Edward Leigh, who proposed a 12-week limit, said it would bring Britain in line with most of Europe. Unfortunately this was defeated in the House of Commons on the evening of May 20th. Of course, as Biblical Christians, we believe that abortion should never occur and that all abortion is murder. Nevertheless, to allow abortion to occur at a stage when tiny babies are already sucking their thumbs and responding to external stimuli is plainly a disgrace and a horrendous moral stain on British society. Ex Conservative Cabinet minister Ann Widdecombe asked why "viability" of the child should be the only determining factor in setting the limit for abortions. And Liberal Democrat Dr John Pugh said:
"There are people in our world today in no way inferior to us in capacity, intelligence and beauty who were born at 22 weeks. That ought to give us cause for reflection."
While Biblical Christians would eventually wish for a total ban, in the meantime, one would hope for a ban on all late abortions. Optimism that an improvement in the current situation would be achieved had been high going into the final debates since advances in medical knowledge meant that nobody now doubts that tiny babies can survive very early premature birth and the concept of depriving such tiny babies of the possibility of life for purely social reasons would surely be abhorrent to most civilized people. The move to outlaw abortions after 12 weeks having been defeated, optimism remained high that Parliamentary MPs would nevertheless support a time-limit reduction to 20 weeks. But MPs, quite disgustingly, also rejected a reduction to 20 weeks to the shock of many people! Despite the strength of the new evidence against late abortions, the proposed cut to 20 weeks was defeated by the shocking margin of 332 votes to 190. One can only conclude that numerous MPs had either not read about the new medical knowledge, that they simply did not care, or that they were overly in awe of militant and aggressive "pro-choice" female lobby groups.
However, shortly before midnight on May 20th a mere two week reduction from 24 to 22 weeks was voted upon by MPs - now this was truly a tragic compromise, nevertheless confidence was high that at least this paltry and insufficient two week abortion limit improvement to 22 weeks would be achieved, probably with comparative ease, and that this might be a start for more improvements in the future. Incredibly, however, even this tiny reduction was defeated, this time by by 304 votes to 233.
These despicable goings-on in the British Parliament over two days in the May of 2008 makes the writer of this article frankly ashamed to be British. We British seem determined to make our beautiful land the moral cess-pool of the world. Dignity, decency, respect and moral integrity now appear to be considered as national jokes. Too many of our leaders live lives of comfort, privilege, prosperity, self-satisfaction, self-indulgence, cynicism and utter disdain for all moral courage and nobility. I find myself saying yet again,
Where will it all end?
The Christian Hawk,
The Houses of Parliament,
London.
May 20th, 2008.