SW News: The Catholic Bishops of England and Wales have slammed the new Public Order Bill that makes it a crime to pray before abortion facilities. In a statement issued on behalf of the prelates by Bishop John Sherrington, the Lead Bishop for Life Issues of the bishops’ conference, they said the legislation was discriminatory and “disproportionately affected people of faith”.

While voicing their support for the condemnation of harassment of women, the bishops said laws and certain mechanisms are already in place to protect women from such behavior. “There is little, if any, evidence to suggest that vigil participants engage in these behaviors,” the bishops said in the statement.
The bishops said that the implications of Clause 10 of the bill could go well beyond the limits of a safe access zone in front of abortion clinics. They said it raised serious questions about the powers of the state in connection with the individual in a free society, both those with faith and those without it.

Last week, the House of Commons members overwhelmingly voted in favor of the new bill moving one step closer to passing the legislation that establishes safe access zones outside abortion facilities. As per Clause 10, a range of activities within 150 meters of an abortion clinic in England and Wales will be criminalized. They include prayer, consensual communication, peaceful presence and practical support for women seeking an abortion.

The bishops said in the statement that the protection and promotion of life is a God-given task. They reminded the authorities that since the Abortion Act 1967 was passed, Catholics have been “engaged in peaceful and often silent witness to the dignity of human life outside the places where over 10 million unborn lives have been taken”. They added that believers feel a strong call to witness through peaceful presence on this modern-day periphery to the sanctity of life.

“The bishops hold religious freedom to be essential for the flourishing and the realization of the dignity of every human person, and recognize it as the foundational freedom of any free and democratic society. It is a fundamental right, held by the Church to be ‘the source and synthesis of rights…understood as the right to live in the truth of one’s faith and in conformity with one’s transcendent dignity as a person’” they said in the statement. They added that the new bill strikes at the “heart of being able to respond to this call and duty”.