The idea of the pluralist society goes back roughly to the eighteenth century, to the days when separation of Church and State was launched with the Constitution of the United States. This American separation was unlike the separation of Church and State brought about a few years later, during the French Revolution (which began in 1789). The latter was essentially one of [...]
There have been indications for some time that the next big push from the permissive lobby in Britain will be to legalize incest. In 1975, the British Sexual Law Reform Society (SLRS) produced a report recommending that the age of consent should be reduced to 14, including incestuous relationships. The Family Planning Association (FPA - a public-funded charity) tacitly supported this report. [...]
In order to grasp at once the seriousness with which the question of pluralism and secularism today must be treated, let us recall the issue which has become its most controversial sign: the legalization of abortion. Part of an article I wrote in 1971 summarizes this contradiction: In our democratic society people believe that political problems, whatever their nature, can always be [...]
Sometimes I'm very sad inside. People around me smile and laugh, carry on with everyday talk about weather, sports, TV, diets and the job. I often feel like a stranger trapped in fantasyland. People are oblivious, escapist, apathetic, materialist, wounded, scared, frustrated, lost and blind. Even dead. I'm filled with compassion, real pity for men, for women for our human family. We [...]
There is a New Ethic broadly held in Canada today. This New Ethic assumes that there are lives not worthy to be lived and that these ought to be put to death before or after birth. The New Ethic would judge each life by its quality and meaningfulness and would put to death those whose lives did not meet the required standard. [...]
Family planning touches on so many issues vital to the health and happiness of people that any thorough discussion of the subject will eventually become moral in nature. We have discussed the impact that family planning methods can have on an individual’s health, on a woman’s image of herself, on a couple’s relationship, on simple concepts of justice and shared responsibility. These [...]
As my business occasionally takes me to different parts of Canada, recently I have begun to contact various pro-life groups in the cities I visit. In August, for example, I was in Calgary and in Edmonton (two days each), and in September, business took my partner and I to Vancouver for a week. I cannot speak too highly of the kindness and [...]
Over the last number of years many people have begun to grasp that there are interrelationships between such things as abortion, sterilization, the contraceptive mentality, homosexuality, euthanasia, artificial insemination, sperm banks, test tube babies, surrogate motherhood, cloning and experimentation on embryos. Those who accept abortion, for example, will experience no pangs of conscience in experimenting with human embryos, killing them when no [...]
For years, we have listened and approved as the heads of various governments have told us that we citizens who enjoy the advantages of living in developed nations have a responsibility to help those in under-developed countries. So, we share our scientific knowledge, we export out advanced technology, we send out experts in every field to teach those not as “advanced” as [...]
The arguments favoring abortion rest on the proposition that women with unborn children have the unqualified right to dispose of those children, including action encompassing the extinction of those children, according to their convenience. The proposition is asserted that women are entitled to administer their bodies as they see fit, without being inhibited by the values of society. This is a simple-minded [...]
Returning to Toronto after teaching for three years in the University of Aberdeen, in Scotland, I have been asked to try to interpret the pro-life situation in Britain in hope of seeing what can be learned from the British experience. I believe that a look at that experience can be helpful since the present situation in Britain is considerably worse than it [...]
From a letter to H. Morgentaler Dear Henry: Forgive the liberty of calling you by your first name. It’s just that I feel I know you so well after all these years of watching and listening. I would have written before but there didn’t seem to be any point. You seemed so single-mindedly consumed with the pursuit of your career. I was [...]
At the annual Canadian Bar Association meeting held in Quebec City in August, one of the guest speakers was obstetrician and gynecologist Dr. Patrick Steptoe, who together with Prof. Robert Edwards of Cambridge University, developed the technique of in-vitro fertilization, which led to the birth of the first “test-tube” baby, Louise Brown. The thrust of Dr. Steptoe’s whole talk was to justify [...]
Free will and the ability to assume responsibility for one’s actions establish the spiritual importance and dignity of man. Indeed, we have come to equate maturity with a willingness to direct our behavior in terms of our goals as well as to accept the consequences of our choices. If we look at family planning methods in this light, we can see that [...]
If you have given a donation to Oxfam Canada, don’t be surprised to receive a begging letter from Doris Anderson, a director of CARAL (Canadian Abortion Rights Action League). The letter solicits funds to fight for Henry Morgentaler and against the Joseph Borowski legal case. Last year CARAL sent out a similar begging letter signed by Margaret Lawrence, a well-known Canadian writer, [...]