In a tragic vote on June 17, the British Parliament opted to decriminalize abortion to prevent women in England and Wales from being prosecuted for killing their unborn children. This decision, signifying the largest change to abortion laws for almost six decades, was described by LifeSiteNews as “a move all but guaranteed to open the floodgates to unlimited abortion-on-demand”.
As per the 1967 Abortion Act, abortion was legal through the first 24 weeks of pregnancy for any reason with the approval of two “registered medical practitioners” and legal up to birth in certain circumstances, such as “grave permanent injury to the physical or mental health of the pregnant woman” or “risk to the life of the pregnant woman”.
However, following the June 17 vote, women who choose to kill their unborn children after 24 weeks outside the present legal framework, will no longer face police investigation.
Besides, women can also take abortion pills at home to kill their unborn children under 10 weeks.
It is noteworthy that the law will still punish anyone who helps a woman, including medical professionals, to get an abortion outside existing rules.
Labour MP Tonia Antoniazzi tabled the amendment to the Crime and Policing Bill, which was passed by a majority of 242 votes.
According to a report by leftist media outlet The Guardian, while Antoniazzi’s amendment was approved by a majority of British lawmakers, another vote must be conducted in both the House of Commons and House of Lords, and obtain royal assent, before the change becomes law.
Adding, The Guardian reported:
“A rival decriminalisation amendment put forward by another Labour backbencher, Stella Creasy, was not put to a vote, while an amendment from Conservative MP Caroline Johnson, which sought to restrict access to telemedicine, did not pass.”
Many British Labour lawmakers voted in favor of decriminalizing abortion, including Joseph Powell, whose reply (see screenshot below) to a concerned citizen of his constituency is as telling as it is disturbing.
In his reply, the anti-life Powell justified his reasons for supporting Antoniazzi’s amendments, by claiming that he supports a “woman’s right to choose” and wants to ensure many of his constituents get “continued access to safe, legal abortion care”. Moreover, Powell maintained that he wanted women to be permitted to “make decisions about their own pregnancies” while removing “the threat of persecution” under the Offenses Against the Person Act 1861 (Powell’s reply to a pro-life acquaintance of mine who petitioned him to vote against the anti-life amendments proposed.)
Our only hope is that these abortion extremists will have overreached themselves and the ordinary person will wake up to see that the ‘it’s only a clump of cells’ lie has been revealed for what it is, since they would now prefer to let the killing of a child being born, pass without investigation.
In response to the landslide anti-life vote, Clare McCullough of The Good Counsel Network, a pro-life group based in London, voiced her regret and dismay to me:
“Words fail me. This brutal move will physically destroy more and more babies, but it will also destroy many women’s lives. And it will mean that women under pressure to abort (a substantial number of women that we see) will now be vulnerable to that pressure for the whole 9 months of their pregnancy.”
Pro-life poet Sarah de Nordwall told me in response to the anti-life vote:
“What do you say to a family longing to adopt a newborn? – ‘Oh, that baby about to be born tomorrow…it’s going to be killed by its mother rather than given to you.’ And that will be legal. This is what MPs voted for yesterday. Have you met anyone in a shop or on public transport or any person you speak to who agrees with this barbarity?
Our only hope is that these abortion extremists will have overreached themselves and the ordinary person will wake up to see that the ‘it’s only a clump of cells’ lie has been revealed for what it is, since they would now prefer to let the killing of a child being born, pass without investigation. The reaction of ordinary people I spoke to in shops or on the street yesterday when I told them what MPs had voted for was absolute shock. They looked at me astounded. And after a bewildered silence simply shook their heads and said ‘It can’t be true.’”
Likewise, Catholic Bishop Joseph E. Strickland released a statement following the vote, saying:
“With sorrowful indignation, I condemn the vote by the UK House of Commons to permit abortion up to the moment of birth—a decision so barbaric, so devoid of conscience, that it defies the very notion of civilization. This is not legislation—it is legalized slaughter. It is the cold, calculated permission to tear innocent children from their mothers’ wombs at the threshold of life. What kind of nation, what kind of people, look upon a fully formed child and call her disposable? What kind of parliament declares open season on the most vulnerable and calls it ‘choice’? Let us be absolutely clear: this is murder. Euphemisms cannot cleanse this evil. The vote in Westminster is a grave offense against Almighty God, a moral descent into depravity, and a sign of a society that has lost its soul.
Saint John Paul II warned us: ‘The acceptance of abortion in the popular mind, in behavior and even in law itself, is a telling sign of an extremely dangerous crisis of the moral sense, which is becoming more and more incapable of distinguishing between good and evil. (Evangelium Vitae, no. 58) And the prophet Isaiah cries out again in our day: ‘Woe to you that call evil good, and good evil, that put darkness for light and light for darkness … that justify the wicked for gifts and take away the justice of the just from him.’ (Isaiah 5:20, 23) To the faithful in the UK: you must resist this with every spiritual and moral force at your disposal. To be silent now is to be complicit. To the priests and bishops: you must preach, you must act, you must protect the little ones! No excuse, no delay. The measure of a nation is not its wealth, but its mercy. And a nation that slaughters its unborn on the altar of convenience has chosen death. May God have mercy on the United Kingdom. May the Blood of these innocents cry out to Heaven—and may the faithful never cease to defend them, until this darkness is cast down.”
England, Dowry of Mary, why are you squandering away your blessings and incurring Divine wrath?
May God have mercy on the United Kingdom. Mary, Our Lady of Walsingham, pray for us.
