Ireland

 

Large Crowd for Irish National Vigil for Life

By Pro Life Campaign
Editor’s note. The Fine Gael is an Irish political party that is the lead partner in the current coalition government.

A section of the crowd at Merrion Square for the pro-life rally.

Photograph: Cyril Byrne/The Irish Times

A large crowd of people from all over Ireland filled one side of Dublin’s Merrion Square last Saturday for the National Vigil for Life. They were there to send a message that the pro-life people of Ireland have not given up on the unborn and will continue to seek to have their right to life protected. Organisers estimated that up to 15,000 people attended the event.
Among the speakers was David Manly, Director of Family & Life, who recalled addressing a similar event on the same spot 15 months previously. “Our purpose then was to send a clear and strong message to the Government that abortion is an unmitigated evil—for the unborn child, for the mother and for the country.” Enda Kenny [the head of the Irish government/Prime Minister] and his inner circle, however, ignored the crowd on that occasion, so they had reassembled “to protest at a gross injustice.”

Since July last year, Mr. Manly said, we are living in a country where the law now “permits direct, deliberate, and unjust killing. The Irish government enacted a law to permit a mother to take the life of her unborn child because she doesn’t want that child.”
“Legalising the killing of the unborn is a deadly wound to a country’s culture, and soon spreads infection,” Manly warned. “Already in Ireland’s political circles, we can see this contamination. Once you decide that an unborn baby can be killed, you begin to treat children, be they born or yet to be born, as things or commodities that can be bought and sold by and for adults rather than treated as persons with a unique dignity.” …

The Pro Life Campaign’s legal consultant, Caroline Simons told the crowd that senior members of Fine Gael assured their backbench TDs that once the abortion bill passed through the Dáil [the lower house of Parliament] they would have nothing to worry about because the pro-life movement would be crushed and beaten. “How wrong they were. Your presence here today is proof that we are wasting no time in starting to rebuild. It’s going to take time, but when the public comes to realise the full horror of what the new legislation involves support for the repeal of the law will gather pace.”
Other speakers who addressed the vigil were the Pro-Life Campaign’s Cora Sherlock, Lynn Coles from Women Hurt and Jennifer Kehoe, mother of a child diagnosed before birth with a life-shortening condition who is now doing well. In a special video message Julia Holcomb, former girlfriend of Aerosmith singer, Steve Tyler, spoke of their abortion regret. A new video challenging media bias was also played.

Source: NRLC News