Religions unite to denounce abortion clinic
Date October 19, 2012 - 10:24AM
Cultural conflict ... a pro-life campaigner holds up a model of a 12-week-old embryo outside the Marie Stopes clinic. Photo: Reuters
BELFAST: A millionaire businessman who bankrolled the British National party addressed a protest rally yesterday at the opening of the first private abortion clinic on the island of Ireland.
Jim Dowson, a one-time associate and fundraiser for the BNP leader, Nick Griffin, joined anti-abortion groups from Dublin and Catholic west Belfast as well as Free Presbyterians in a demonstration outside the Marie Stopes clinic in Belfast.
He told several hundred activists it was "good to see an issue that united Protestants and Catholics in Northern Ireland".
A protester outside the Belfast clinic. Photo: AP
Dowson was forced out of his local Orange Lodge (a protestant group) in Scotland and took part in demonstrations against fellow Orangemen, attacking them as "atheists and boozers", after he became "born again". He has fallen out with the BNP leader and his party.
The abortion clinic protesters also included the Rev David McIlveen, of Ian Paisley's Free Presbyterian church, and Catholic priests. The clinic will provide non-surgical, medical abortions for women who are up to nine weeks pregnant.
In pouring rain, Catholic demonstrators sang hymns and recited the rosary while Protestants waved placards. They marked the tolling of a bell at noon with a solemn recitation of the Angelus prayer.
Afterwards, both sets of demonstrators clapped and cheered when Bernadette Smyth, spokeswoman for the pressure group Precious Life, predicted their campaign would "run Marie Stopes out of Ireland".
A white van with a billboard on the roof declaring "Abortion is murder" drove outside the clinic sounding its horn. Its registration — County Monaghan in the Republic — indicated that the campaign against the clinic spanned the border as well as the north's religious divide.
The demonstrators were cheered by news that Northern Ireland's attorney general, John Larkin QC, had called for a special Stormont investigation into the legality of the clinic's opening. Larkin, the chief law officer in the province, said he could not intervene but would be happy to give advice to the power-sharing government.
It emerged that the clinic's management would be summoned to Stormont to explain how they are complying with the law. Alban Maginness, of the Social Democratic and Labour party, said during a meeting of the justice committee: "What worries me in relation to Marie Stopes is that this clinic is outside the [tax-funded] National Health Service. It does not appear to be regulated.
"Given the contentious nature of their support for abortion it is necessary that the law is fully complied with and that we are assured by Marie Stopes. I think this is an important task for this committee and I hope that the Marie Stopes organisation will respond positively to any invitation so then we can inquire from them what their position is within the law."
Jim Wells of the Democratic Unionist party, who also sits on the Stormont health committee, said the issue of abortion had now become a legal question. He said: "There is a huge public interest on this subject. It is only appropriate to examine it. This has become a legal issue rather than a health issue. The public expect us to do something."
Outside the clinic, Ciara Coyle, who had travelled from Derry to Belfast to join the protest, said she believed abortion was wrong "no matter what the circumstances are". Asked how she and other activists could prevent the clinic from operating, Coyle replied: "Unfortunately all we can do is pray, to pray and to protest peacefully. To be in the streets. I just can't understand why our politicians and the likes of the health minister can't stop this already."
She denied that there was a demand among women in Northern Ireland for abortion services. "I do believe that Northern Ireland is a pro-life country, like the whole of Ireland, and we will continue to make our stand," she said.
Most pro-choice campaigners in Belfast chose to avoid confrontation and stayed away, but one woman stood amid hundreds of anti-abortion activists demonstrating her support for the clinic. Danni Stanfield, 21, a student from Belfast, said: "Many of the people here today who are pro-life, if they were in that situation themselves they might take a different point of view.
"I don't think many here today have come from the background where they have gone through abortions themselves. I am pro-choice but I had to come here and support the clinic. I am not saying to women who get pregnant unplanned that they should have an abortion but rather that they be allowed that choice."
Defying attempts to shout her down, Stanfield held aloft a homemade placard with a question on it for those who want no abortion in any circumstances anywhere in Ireland: "Been in the situation? Only then does your opinion count."
A spokesperson for Marie Stopes said that since opening the clinic's doors they had been inundated with queries about their services in Belfast.
