Amidst all the tiresome controversy around the proposed ethos of the new national maternity hospital, which is now slated to cost, naturally, some €800m, one thing has been forgotten: The Sisters of Charity, in an act of timeless folly, volunteered for this public whipping. After all, they are choosing to donate the land on which the hospital is built. If the order had any sense, they would pull the plug now, on the whole deal.
In dealing with the Irish state, after all, they are not dealing with an honest, or consistent partner. Whatever deal they do with this Government can, and may well, be undone by its successors. And even now, any agreement with the Government will only be possible with the full and total humiliation of the nuns – a humiliation for which they must volunteer.
The public – or, at least, those members of the public who care enough about these issues to influence the national debate – have decided that the hospital must be “fully secular”.
Let us be clear, and in no doubt, about what that means: It means the hospital must offer, and perform, abortions on demand. The phrase “fully secular” refers, basically, to nothing else. It is a turn of phrase designed to obscure something which does not even require much obfuscation: Everybody knows what it means, and to be fair, a majority of the public would appear to believe that abortions should be available in public hospitals.
The nuns, however, do not believe that. Which begs the question: Why on earth would they facilitate it?
Let us be in no doubt about the ultimate terms of this arrangement: The nuns will hand over land, to facilitate the building of a hospital, and in turn, their name will be attached to it. That hospital will be used as a place where abortions are performed, which is entirely contrary to the values and ethics of the Sisters of Charity. As nuns, this is the kind of thing which they have a moral duty to prevent. To the extent that it is in their power, a religious order which opposes abortion should be blocking the Government from building such a facility at every juncture. Instead, they are facilitating it.
In fact, the law as it stands in Ireland – for however long it stands – explicitly recognises the right of people who have a conscientious objection to abortion not to be involved, in any way, in carrying out abortions. By donating this land, the Sisters of Charity, willingly, are getting involved in the carrying out of abortions. They are, after all, contributing the venue.
It is also not a particularly effective act of charity. The sisters exist, as their name suggests, to help the less well off. They do this, to their credit, often in a low-profile way. They do not seek credit for it, which is just as well, because they do not ever receive any. In the wild flights of imagination that passes for Irish public discourse, Nuns are the enemy, capable of nothing except causing pain and suffering. In this case, their act of charity is being universally presented as a cloak and dagger scheme to deny women their right to an abortion, and a latter day attempt to put healthcare in Ireland back under clerical control. Most sane people realise that this is nonsense, but the Nuns’ faith in the sanity of most Irish public debate is completely misplaced.
What they should do, but will not do, is this: Issue a statement saying that they wish the state well, but that in view of the determination of the state to perform abortions in the new hospital, the Sisters of Charity can no longer be involved in the project, or facilitate it. They should put the land up for public auction, allowing the state to purchase it if it wishes. And they should pledge that every penny of the proceeds will go towards charity for children and families who need housing, and other supports.
Such an act would, of course, inspire outrage beyond measure. The nuns would be denounced from every secular pulpit. But so what?
The Nuns, after all, have no duty in particular to save the state the cost of land. If the state wishes to build a new hospital, it is not unreasonable to expect it to pay to acquire the land necessary to do so. Withdrawing from the project would also, instantaneously, reveal the inherent illiberalism of those who would immediately demand that the land be seized from the nuns illegally, and without payment.
It would also accomplish, at a stroke of a pen, what liberals and progressives have wanted for years: Separation of Church and State. What they – and the nuns – fail to recognise, of course, is that separation of Church and State was conceived by Thomas Jefferson not as a way to protect the State from the Church, but to protect the Church from the corrupting power of the State.
In this instance, the Nuns are being corrupted. Their values are being attacked, and undermined. They are being publicly pummelled into accepting something that their order, and their church, regards as one of the ultimate evils.
For some reason, they are bearing all of this with patience, and forbearance. It will get them nowhere. They should pull the plug, and they should do it tomorrow. Let the state build its own hospital, and perform all the abortions it wants.