Malta is one of a shrinking number of Pro-Life countries in the world. In the European Union, Malta is the only nation that still bans almost all abortions. Other Pro-Life countries in the EU have faced pressure from international anti-Life groups. Flooded with foreign money and harassed by sometimes violent abortion activists, many countries that were once Pro-Life are falling to the culture of death.
This is the case in Ireland, which until 2018 was one of the most Pro-Life countries in the world with a constitutional amendment recognizing the Right to Life of the preborn child. Poland, which has strong Pro-Life protections, has faced severe pressure from the international abortion lobby after seeking to end discriminatory abortions and protect preborn babies who may have a disability. In other parts of the world, such as the Dominican Republic and parts of South America, the story is similar. Pro-Life citizens want to protect the preborn, and a loud, sometimes violent, minority of abortion activists aided by international money demand the legal killing of the preborn.
Elective abortions in Malta still carry a criminal penalty, including abortionists and the possibility of jail time for a mother who undergoes elective abortion. One Member of Parliament (MP), with the full support of the international abortion lobby, is seeking to remove that provision. Marlene Farrugia stated she is not seeking to legalize abortion but only to “save lives” by decriminalizing the lethal procedure. She acknowledged in an interview, “it is true that no woman has ever gone to prison over abortion.” Though mothers who have undergone an abortion should not be criminalized, abortion providers should face the consequences of murder.
Farrugia, who admits that Life begins at conception and has on other occasions defended the preborn, used a common tactic of abortion activists by suggesting abortions somehow save lives. She says, “There is physical death; and there is also psychological death… in other words, being traumatized for a lifetime.” Violently killing an innocent person is a particular kind of death for which there is no justification. Inventing other kinds of “death” to pit the mother against her own child, saying nothing of the trauma many mothers experience because of abortion, does not justify abortion.
As one academic observer noted, the idea that decriminalizing abortion is not a step toward legalizing elective abortion is absurd. Father Marcel Guarnizo explained to Live Action News, “The first step is always to decriminalize abortion. But abortion is just another type of murder and therefore a free, just, and democratic society should never decriminalize the killing of the unborn.” Likely, the next step after decriminalizing abortion will be for abortion lobby groups to push for the legalization of abortion in cases of rape and incest, and from there the Pro-Life country would be well on the way to legalizing elective abortion for any reason.
Thankfully, Malta’s President George Vella, who is a doctor, remains steadfastly Pro-Life. He has vowed not to sign the measure, telling Net News, “I will never sign a bill that involves the authorization of murder. I cannot stop the executive from deciding, that is up to Parliament. But I do have the liberty, if I don’t agree with a bill, to resign and go home, I have no problem doing this.” In contrast to the illogic of the MP pushing the decriminalization, he said, “You have either killed or not killed, there can be no half death. I’m very clear, there are no ifs and buts.”
There is an exception, even under the strongly Pro-Life Malta law, for cases in which the mother’s life is in danger; however, in instances when the pregnancy poses a risk to the mother’s life and health, abortion is not necessary to save her life. The direct and intentional killing of the innocent preborn child is not required to end the pregnancy and treat the mother’s health conditions that cannot be addressed during pregnancy. Clear confirmation of this fact is seen in the maternal mortality statistics in Ireland prior to 2018. While Irish law affirmed the Right to Life of the preborn child, the country still had one of the lowest maternal mortality rates in the world, demonstrating that killing the child is not necessary to properly caring for and treating the mother.