“MJ, sadly the effects of the policies of the Catholic Church, kill far more women in the third world every year, then bin Laden ever killed.”

Nonsense. Abortion kills them and their children. The Catholic Church policy is anti-abortion.

” But keep grasping at straws to come up with a reason for the situation in Holland, as straws is all you have.”

The key thing with Holland seems to be an anti-abortion value derived from their history Catholic tradition. That counts for a lot. Nothing else explains their situation. For the record I’ve known Australians who consider themselves Catholic, accept contraception but draw the line at abortion.

”… where tens of thousands of women are hospitalised due to botched backyard abortions…”

and many even more babies are killed due to failure to embrace Catholic policy by all involved..

”I meant Catholic policies. No other Christian religion is as political as the Catholic Church and tries to deny people people their human rights, as the Catholic Church does.”

The Catholic Church policies are the best protection of human rights by valuing human life.

“I am intolerant of one thing, that is intolerance..”

Stop being so modest. You are intolerant of the Catholic Church. That is clearly established.

“Meg, clearly my posts are passing over your head…”

Enjoy the fantasy.

” They should not need to die by the hundreds of thousands, because of the effects of religious dogma…”

Stop blaming the Church because someone gets an abortion and someone else botches it. If Church dogma was adopted it would not happen.


”The so called good intentions of the Catholic Church really don't matter, if the effect is that they kill people.”

Abortions always kill people. The Catholic Church does not approve of abortions.

“… So your church can be blamed for those deaths.”

The Church is both blamed for restricting liberty by denying abortions and blamed for the consequences of abortions.

”I won't write any more in one post, it might only confuse you further.”

She clearly isn’t confused. The truth hurts so you lash out and engage in personal attack.

"If Church dogma was adopted it would not happen."

MJ, you show similar logic and similar intolerance of others as the Taliban. You'd be fine in their country, if you adopted their religious dogma too.

You also show a complete lack of empathy for the plight of women and why they have abortions in the first place. Risking their lives for such a procedure, clearly they are experiencing huge trauma to make the decision in the first place. All that seems to matter to you is dogma, if they don't follow it and die, well so be it. Those deaths could be stopped tomorrow, if the church undertook its proper role, ie to preach to its flock, but stopped trying to enforce its dogma as law in many countries. That makes the Catholic Church as political as the Taliban and I criticise them too.

In Holland about 3-4% of the population regularly attend a Catholic Church. Abortion is legal and is available for free to anyone who wants one. People just don't need them to the same extent as elsewhere, as good contraception does the job. If that same policy was adopted in other countries of the world, the world would be a better place.

The Catholic Church is welcome to fantacise about its holy sperms dogma, if followers want to believe that stuff, fine. Some of us actually value thinking, breathing, suffering people as more important. Keep that dogma for fanatical Catholics, don't try to enforce it on the rest of us politically, or you are no better then the Taliban in your philosophy.

Yabby,

“"If Church dogma was adopted it would not happen."

MJ, you show similar logic and similar intolerance of others as the Taliban. You'd be fine in their country, if you adopted their religious dogma too. “

Don’t even bother trying to twist it like that. We have been there before.

We both know that Meg stated that “Bin Laden encourages killing of innocents, more akin to your comments, not mine…” so you want to turn it around the other way but you are stringing a long bow.

” if they don't follow it and die, well so be it.”

No. What I think it is horrific if either mother or baby die. But that doesn’t change the fact that they are not following Catholic dogma yet you blame Catholics for them not following Catholic dogma.

Lets be candid. The game you are playing could be useful to silence a Catholic lacking in faith or intellect but blaming the Church for abortions is not a sound basis for intellectual discussion and we have called your bluff so why bother?

”In Holland …”

In discussing the low abortion rate you tried to explain it by legal abortion. I cited UK’s much higher rate. You tried to claim that it was due to sex education but the links you provided established that sex education is not compulsory in Holland and is in the UK and that in the UK contraception is one of the focuses. It may be that the Dutch sex education is better in one way or another but the relevant issue is contraception.

Sweden has an 18.1 to 21.5 per 1000 abortion rate. They rejected Catholicism a long time ago. They are not a third world country. They introduced sex education in 1942 and made it compulsory in 1956. Yet their abortion rate is almost as high as the Phillipines.

In any event, are you so lacking in argument with regard to the merits of abortion that you need to sidetrack things with the bizarre argument of trying to twist things to show that the Catholic Church promotes abortion?

"Bin Laden encourages killing of innocents"

Bin Laden encourages killing of those who don't follow his religious dogma. You are saying that if people die, who don't follow Catholic dogma, well so be it. The effect is much the same. I think that is shamefull.

What we know is that desparate women do desparate things, if they are legal or not. We know that if better family planning, ie contraception and abortion under proper medical conditions was made available, the lives of hundreds of thousands of women a year could be saved. No children are involved, a dividing cell is not a child.
At 12 weeks, or the first tremester, it cannot be called a child, no matter how you try to twist the semantics.

In sex education as in any education, its not just about money spent or compulsion, but about the what works to achieve results. The Dutch have clearly figured it out with their pragmatic approach and are quoted time and time again in all debates on teenage pregnancy, where their rates are 10% of say in the US, where abstinance etc is preached and has failed. When those abstinance intentioned girls are then hormonally struck at some point, they know very little about contraception and snap, next thing they are pregnant.

The world would be a better place, if other countries adopted similar methods and laws as the Dutch. There would be far less suffering and misery, hundreds of thousands of lives would be spared.
Those are all very valid reasons for me to believe what I believe,
religious dogma or not. I would also campaign against FGM if it was religious dogma, or beating wives, even if its relgious dogma.
Rational thought, to make the world a better place, with less suffering and misery, all makes far too much sense to me to ignore.

Yabby (17/4/06)- I can hardly be bothered to comment on some of your absolute trash - no offence of course. But how you can say it is not a baby when ALL organs are clearly present, including those needed for VISUAL gender identification is beyond me. Do you truly know NOTHING about embryology? Please educate yourself. There is an old saying "Better to keep your mouth shut and let everyone THINK you are a fool, than to open your mouth (or your post in this case) and prove it".

Re your comments 29/3/06. Much to my great joy, there has never been ONE brother or sister flushed down the toilet. I am pleased to say my health, heart and conscience has never been compromised by contraception.

Scout - Re your post 27/3/06 Of course you didn't ask for my input re IVF - in case you haven't noticed, this is a forum and one does not need to be ASKED to repond to anything. So I not only stand by but reiterate my comments.

God bless you all at Easter!

Yabby - a further comment. Surprise, surprise, we are all a clump of cells - cells in a very distinct order making a human being. Whether we are 2 days gestation, 10 days gestation, 6 months gestation or 103 years old, we are all clumps of cells. This does not and will never diminish our worth. it is merely a statement of fact. We are all, as is every living thing, a clump of cells, albeit some of us more intelligent and content with our lives than others. :-))