Confronting the A-Word In Canada

The National Post printed a story today on the "A-word." Anne Marie Owens asks,

How did abortion, that most contentious of issues, become one that is simply not discussed publicly?

Although I didn't find much new in the article, it's still very good that the A-word has made it again into one of Canada's national newspapers. The author made a very good point that the lack of discussion is not necessarily a simple matter of complacency.

Beneath the surface of what is often regarded as a sort of national sense of complacency about abortion, there is considerable evidence of confusion, passion and an intensity of opinions.

Perhaps Anne Marie Owens is picking up on something that few have recognized.

What is so surprising about this recent medical journal debate is not so much the tone or details of the arguments but that such an open and free-flowing discussion on this topic is happening at all. For any number of reasons, that is not generally the case in Canada.

Ms. Owens conclusion is actually quite encouraging, if indeed events unfold as she imagines they might.

The issue of access will go before the court again too, when later this month, the Morgentaler Clinic sues the government of New Brunswick over provincial regulations that insist hospital abortions be performed by a gynecologist, be approved first by the gynecologist and another doctor, and does not cover the cost of abortions in clinics.

Canada's abortion debate may well be back where it was in 1988, with a court-focused dispute forcing a wider discussion about the disconnection between the avowed accessibility and the reality of access.

And that can only be a good thing. Those of us who care about the Unborn need to be watching for every opportunity to turn the focus away from the A-word [which is meaningless to most people at this stage] and onto the VICTIMS of the brutal practice of child-killing. Let's be sure everyone listening has the opportunity to hear and to answer the real, important question, What is the Unborn?

Without facing that question, we don't exactly know what we are killing, right? And someone has to live with the consequences, right?