ABORTION BATTLE
One bishop says church ‘tunnel-visioned’, other insists legalisation will be forcefully opposed
THE leaders of two churches in Jamaica are sharply divided on the controversial issue of abortion, with one scolding some clergymen and their flock for being “tunnel-visioned”
and trying to dictate how women should live their lives, while the other argued that the church is the largest platform in the country and will strongly oppose any attempt by Parliament to legalise abortion, come hell or high water.
“We are just so tunnel-visioned and limited in religion, and that is not the lifestyle of Christianity,” declared Bishop Winston Watson, senior pastor at Acts Church Jamaica.
“There’s a difference between Church and Christ follower. Church is traditionalism. Church is legalism. Church follows tenets that some man took a Bible and interpreted it based on their biases and based on what they wanted to do to control somebody. And then they shoved it down the throats of people and, over the years, people have been left to follow this way of life. Not Christianity, not fellowship with Christ,” Watson, who heads a congregation of about 450 believers — 50 local and 400 overseas — told the Jamaica
Observer.
“A woman has a responsibility for herself. I cannot tell a woman what to do. And the Bible never said a pastor has control over a woman’s body or has control over a woman other than his wife. But we want to dictate what every woman out there does, and we cannot legislate that kinda morality. No matter how we try, we can’t do it,” Watson said.
But Bishop Rohan Edwards Sr, who leads a congregation of 1,200 members with five churches across Jamaica, rubbished Watson’s argument.
“The church is the largest platform in Jamaica right now, bigger than all politicians, and if we want to block something, we can. And we’re trying to block the legalisation of abortion. The church is saying this is totally wrong and we’re not going to stop until people understand. We’re not going to put up with it. Whatever it takes, the church of Jesus Christ is going to push against it,” Edwards insisted.
He argued that majority of Jamaicans are against abortion and that should carry some weight.
“If 70 per cent of the people on the island are saying we don’t want abortion, why are we fighting for it? Why are we trying to push it? Only 30 per cent of the people in the island wouldn’t mind that they have abortion removed from the books. The statistics have proven that, so we want the Government to respect us and Mrs Flynn, who is pushing that thing, her eyes need to be opened,” added Edwards.
He was referring to St Andrew West Rural Member of Parliament Juliet Cuthbert-flynn, who is asking Parliament to repeal sections 72 and 73 of the Offences Against the Person Act, which makes abortion illegal and substitute it with a civil law — The Termination of Pregnancy Act — as was recommended by the Abortion Policy Review Group in 2007.
Bishop Watson backs CuthbertFlynn, whose private member’s motion has earned the wrath of some church leaders, among them Bishop Alvin Bailey, vice-president of the Jamaica Association of Evangelicals, who has said her “pro-abortion promotion reflects the heights of moral decadence and a devilish disregard for the sanctity of human life”.
Said Bishop Watson: “The basic issue with hurch is that the Church is attempting to push down people’s throats the answers to questions people in the world are not asking. And the questions that people in the world have, we really have not determined what the answer is for ourselves. And since we don’t have those answers for ourselves, we are not ready to truly, realistically and honestly, answer.
“We have not identified who we are. We have not looked at the word of God in the context of the love of God, the grace of God, and the mercy of God, so that we answer the questions outside of a denominational setting, outside of a legalistic setting.”
Nonetheless, Bishop Edwards remains steadfast on what he described as a “high topic”.
“We are strong on the whole aspect of abortion because we figure that the unborn has a voice. We’re not downplaying any other matter that we’re faced with in the country and highlighting abortion, but abortion is one of the high topics which people think is controversial. It is one of the high topics that we’re grappling with at this moment, because that’s what they want to legalise in the country,” he said. However, he suggested that, in instances of life-threatening complications during birth, his position would be different.
Earlier this week, Caribbean Policy Research Institute (CAPRI) entered the debate, but its recommendation that minors be allowed to terminate pregnancies without parental involvement was blasted by Bishop Bailey as “atrocious, disgraceful and alarming”.
CAPRI, in a report titled ‘Coming to Terms: The Social Costs of Unequal Access to Safe Abortions’, which was co-funded by the European Union, said: “The requirement of parental consent or notification may delay young women’s abortion care leading to more risky and costlier late-term abortion procedures, or even cause the young women to resort to illegal or self-induced abortions in a fear of parental reactions.”
Last year, veteran pollster Bill Johnson conducted two public opinion surveys for the Observer which found that more Jamaicans believe that the country’s abortion law should not be changed than those who say legislators need to make amendments.
The polls, conducted March 12-15, 2020 and July 9-12, 2020 among 1,200 voting-age Jamaicans islandwide had a margin of error of plus or minus 2.5 per cent.
Johnson reported that when his researchers asked whether or not the law should be changed “to make it easier for a woman to have a legal abortion in the event of rape, or incest, or if her life is in danger?” 59 per cent of respondents in the July poll said no, while 35 per cent said yes. In the March poll the numbers were 54 per cent no and 40 per cent yes.