I would like to point out some problems I found with Development Alternatives with Women for a New Era's (DAWN) advertorial on Direct Abortion and Public Health published in The Sunday Gleaner of July 26 on page E9.

DAWN alleges that the proposed amendments to the Jamaican abortion law do not support "abortion-on-demand". Does DAWN itself support abortion-on-demand? The third to last paragraph of their advertorial states "Not every woman is able or willing to mother a child at the time when she gets pregnant. Nor should any woman be forced to do so." Is this not abortion-on-demand?

The part statement "no matter the circumstances" indicates that DAWN believes that circumstances can make a wrong action right. This is not so. There are three things that make up an action, and all three must be free from defect simultaneously. These three things are: the means, the ends or intentions and the circumstances or consequences. Surely DAWN is familiar with the sayings 'the ends do not justify the means' and 'the road to hell is paved with good intentions'. Well, circumstances do not justify the means of direct abortion.

There are just ways of dealing with the mother and the unborn baby as equals when the mother's life is threatened with impending death, and none of these ways include a direct or procured abortion.

Unlawful

DAWN trips over the word "unlawfully" in the Offences Against the Person Act Section 72. According to the law as published on the Ministry of Justice Jamaica website the wording is "shall unlawfully." This is a declaration that the intent behind all procured abortions is unlawful. This is brought out again in section 73 of the same Act where unlawful use is equated to the intent to procure abortion for any woman. Section 73 says "instrument ... unlawfully used or employed with intent to procure the miscarriage of any woman." The equating word is 'or' and the law, by using the word 'or' is saying that one is the other, that is, unlawful is the intent to procure abortion.

DAWN, with respect to procured abortion and discerning whether it is right or wrong, the theological and philosophical methods take precedence over all other ways of knowing, including the scientific method. This is so because the question of when is it that a human person is constituted is not a question that science can answer definitively, only in corroboration; but a definitive answer is necessary because such an answer is a fundamental need in the discernment of the legitimacy of procured abortions.

The discernment on procured abortions has been done already by the Catholic Church from the first century AD and all procured abortions have been found to be wrong. All the unborn should be treated as persons from the moment of their conception.

I am, etc.,

ROMAIN G. STEWART

romainstewart@inbox.com

Montego Bay