Ruadhán Jones
Pro-life TD’s and Senators have formed a new group to challenge the Irish humanitarian crises of abortion, euthanasia and other life and dignity issues.
The Oireachtas Group for Life and Dignity (OLDG) was co-founded by independent TD’s Carol Nolan and Peter Fitzpatrick and launched Wednesday, 2 December.
Carol Nolan
Speaking to The Irish Catholic, Carol Nolan said she was delighted to co-chair the group, saying it will stand up for “the right to life and the dignity of people young and old, born and unborn”.
“Issues around the right to life at all stages will be paramount and indeed we won’t be shying away from any contentious issues that go with that,” Ms Nolan said. “Other issues would include human trafficking, modern day slavery, quality palliative care, freedom of conscience and disability rights.”
She hopes that the group will provide a voice for Christian and social-conservative values, saying it’s important people “stand-up and stay strong in their views”.
“We have a responsibility as Christians to challenge every injustice and what’s happening unfortunately, we’ve seen that Ireland is turning to a culture of death,” Ms Nolan said. “We’ve changed radically from the way we were as a country and I think now more than ever it needs to be challenged, we need every voice there to raise these issues and work with our group.”
Unfinished business
Peter Fitzpatrick, Independent TD for Louth and co-chair of OLDG, said that the group formed because they felt they had “unfinished business”.
“The pro-life side were accused of scaremongering before the referendum, but I think you can see know that we were telling the truth,” Mr Fitzpatrick said. “If you look back at 2019, we lost 6,666 lives. There were 6,666 abortions that happened in Ireland.
“The good thing is that it’s an all-party group and we all have the same goals,” Mr Fitzpatrick continued. “What we want to do is talk about the born and the unborn, young people and old people. We want to look at the quality of palliative care and disability rights. You know, all these things that come under freedom of conscience… it’s a case of getting everybody’s shoulder behind the wheel so that we can achieve our goal.”
Senator Rónán Mullen, one of two senators who have joined the OLDG so far, said that he believes there’s an urgent need for people who support life and dignity to raise their voices.
“There’s the tendency in some quarters to think that the pro-life side of the argument lost in 2018,” Mr Mullen said, “that somehow it’s our duty just to shut-up and crawl under a rock and get on board with whatever the majority thinks or appears to think and never put out a contrary view. Or that it’s not the duty of the media to cover such contrary views. But of course, that’s not the case.
Public life
“We have a job to do to make our voices heard in public life and the media. Forming this group on public life is one way to ensure that happens,” he concluded.