Brown’s Empty Compromise and other matters

A brief digest from BBC On-Line.

Human Fertilisation & Embryology Bill

Gordon Brown has decided that Labour M.Ps will be able to vote with their consciences, after all. Kind of. Private Eye’s Supreme Leader’ has decreed that his M.Ps can have a free vote for certain elements of the Bill. However, M.Ps will still be expected to vote for the whole Bill when it comes before the Commons. This, to my mind, makes the compromise a rather empty one. the Prime Minister is still an ally of the utilitarian secularists who believe in nothing and will do anything to achieve ‘progress’. 

Tougher Sentences for Gun Crime

In its Have Your Say column, the BBC writes,

A top UK police officer says judges don’t always hand out the mandatory five year sentence for carrying a gun. Could tougher sentences be a deterrent?

No, they won’t be. The gallows never stopped murders being committed. Tougher sentences will never stop those who wish to from carrying a gun. We will never solve the problem of crime until we realise that the retributive way of dealing with criminals is not the way forward. They need help. The system should geared towards helping them to be penitential. And if they commit a crime again, they should be helped again. And again.

Sarkozy to Boycott Beijing?

After sweeping to power in the French Presidential elections last year, Nicolas Sarkozy’s star has fallen of late following gains for the Socialist party in Parliamentary elections. However, he can only be congratulated if he does choose to boycott the Opening Ceremony of the Beijing Olympics. China does not deserve the Olympics. That they are going there is a disgrace and encouragement to the Communist regime. The counter argument here is that the Games will help China open up. Maybe it will, but I don’t hear anyone say that the Moscow Games helped the Soviet Union to ‘open up’.

Lord Winston’s Valuable Contribution

Lord Winston steps into the row over the Government’s Human Fertilisation & Embryology Bill. Criticising Cardinal O’Brien’, he says that the Catholic Church,

“[is] playing on fears which are just not justified. These cells are destroyed after a short period and they should leave science to the scientists because the Catholic Church has not got a good record in denouncing medical advances.

“If they care about the sanctity of life they should want human life protected and they should want some of these horrendous diseases eradicated.”

Firstly, if he thinks that the Embryology Bill is justified because the cells used live only for a short time (14 days maximum), then he is missing the point of the Church’s objection. As I stated in my earlier post, the Catholic Church takes a different view to Secularists (although Lord Winston is an Orthodox Jew?) in respect of when life begins.

Secondly, so the Church should leave science to the scientists. Yes, of course it should; but surely his Lordship is not so naif to believe that science does not have an ethical and spiritual dimension. If science should be left to scientists, then consideration of those factors should be left to ethicists and theologians. Of which, Lord Winston is neither.

Thirdly, I am glad to hear that the Catholic Church does not have a good record in denouncing medical advances. Presumably, therefore, it is better at lauding them. But perhaps Lord Winston means quite the reverse. The Catholic Church need bow to no one when it comes to medicine. Show me an occasion when she has wrongly denounced a medical advance and I will show you an occasion on which she has furthered the cause of medicine.

Fourthly, finally, if only Lord Winston cared about human life as much as the Church does. Sadly, he is as tied to his own orthodoxy as he believes the Church to be and it leads him to waste his time and others with nonsense comments that advance the debate not a whit. 

Stand Up and Be Counted

H/T to the Hermeneutic of Continuity for this blog dedicated to examining the iniquitous Human Fertilisation and Embryology bill.

The HFE Bill: Some Responses

Further to yesterday’s post on the Government’s Human Fertilisation and Embryology Bill, I note that Holy Smoke and CentreRight both have posts on the subject. The CentreRight article is of particular interest as it is written by Louise Bagshawe, a Catholic and prospective (Conservative) parliamentary candidate. She notes that the Tories do not whip conscience votes – what the Labour leadership is attempting to do with its Catholic M.Ps. I am glad that that is so. Given that neither Conservative or Labour Party hold policies that can be completely acceptable to Catholics, it could be the difference between choosing to vote or giving up altogether on the whole wasteful process.

On the Human Fertilisation & Embryology Bill

The Daily Telegraph reports on Cardinal Keith O’Brien’s condemnation of the Labour Government’s Human Fertilisation and Embryology Bill.

The Catholic Church believes that life begins at conception. Therefore, any interference with that life from any point onwards is an interference with a human being. This view is completely at odds with the view of the secular world, which regards life as beginning at birth. Thus, Secularists have no problem with the use of embryos in stem cell experiments while the Catholic Church does.

Who is in the right? Well, that very much depends upon whether God exists and, if He does, whether He is the God of the Christians or not. Speaking as a Catholic, you may guess which side I am on.

For that reason, I believe that Cardinal Keith O’Brien is right, and not even being very controversial to describe the Labour Government’s Human Fertilisation and Embryology Bill as being ‘monstrous’. For not only will the Bill allow embryos to be used for stem cell research, but fused with animal embryos. Frankenstein’s Monster indeed.

Supporters of the Bill speak with all the seductiveness of the sirens when they give their reason for their backing of the bill. They ‘believe hybrid embryos could lead to cures for diseases including multiple sclerosis and Alzheimer’s disease.’

There we have it. The embryos will remove suffering from the world. Who could possibly argue against that? Well, only those who do not see embryos as things and things to be used as one wishes.

Put in different terms – no one would allow their child, or parent for that matter, to be experimented upon for the sake of anything, disease or otherwise. That was the kind of thing that the Nazis did. And that is the matter for Catholics. Human embryos are human beings. They are children unbron. Thus, their use in experiments is Nazi in inspiration and a sin in realisation. Abuse of embryos must stop. Full stop.

The Telegraph reports that Catholic ministers in Gordon Brown’s Cabinet are considering resigning because Brown will not give them a free vote. Our prayers must go to those ministers as they face an extremely difficult decision. Perhaps they ought to resign, but could they do more good outside the Cabinet than within? I do not know the answer, but would suggest that they only ought to resign if they feel that the Government is so anti-Christian that it could never convert.