Courtney McGrailDear Editor, In your June 4 edition you publish an advertorial in support of the Mater Hospital Foundation’s “Make Your Will Week”. The excellent work of the medical, nursing and other staff of the hospital are described in the advertorial and it may be that some readers of The Irish Catholic will be moved to offer financial support for this work. I will not be among their number.
In September 2013, a statement from the Mater Hospital, which is owned by the Irish Sisters of Mercy, indicated that the hospital would comply with the Protection of Life During Pregnancy Act 2013. In the following month Fr Kevin Doran, the representative of the Archdiocese of Dublin on the Mater Board (now Bishop of Elphin), resigned his position stating that “I could not, in conscience, support a statement which indicates without qualification a willingness to comply with the law as provided for in the Act”.
Since then the decision of the Mater to comply with the abortion law has not been reversed or qualified in any way. In these circumstances potential donors or testators have no way of knowing whether their financial support for the foundation will be used to fund treatments, procedures or other activities (e.g. laboratory tests) conducted in pursuance of the hospital’s commitment to comply with this unjust law. In the absence of some reassurance on this question your readers would do well to consider carefully before supporting an institution which is prepared to be compliant in the deliberate destruction of innocent human life.
Yours etc.,
Paddy Barry,
Killiney, Co. Dublin.