Professor Thomas Healy

This second speaker at yesterday's conference was the most inspirational talk I have heard concerning practical bioethical issues.

He began with a personal experience he had when he arrived at work one morning to find two abortions on his list. He went straight to his computer and typed out his letter of resignation in the likely event he would be fired for what he was about to do. He went straight to his superior and said, 'I will not be available for these operations.' The Lord was looking down on him because she replied, 'That's OK, I'm free then, I'll do it!' Later he told a story of an interview he was taking of a young Catholic Anaesthetist in which he asked, 'How would you feel if you were asked to be available for an abortion?' The interviewee answered, 'I'd be fine, I'm not performing it I'm only providing the anaesthetic.' The Professor refused him the position.

Professor Healy went on to give some very interesting facts:

'If you think 6 million abortions in the UK since 1967 is bad, try over 47 million since 1972 in the States.'

'Fertilising the ovum of a cow with the sperm of a human isn't new! Since the discovery of IVF they have been testing the viability of human sperm by fertilising Guinea Pig Ova.'

'My brother-in-law went into hospital for a simple procedure during which it is expected that the patient will become unconsious. When my brother-in-law did become unconscious they immediately sedated him and wrote DNR (Do Not Rescitate) on his notes. If I hadn't discovered this and demanded the removal of the DNR threatening them with immediate national newspaper coverage I wouldn't have enjoyed a skiing holiday with my brother-in-law last month.'

He also commented on the latest news that doctors are refusing to perform abortions and abortionists do not talk about their job in public (see Fr Tim's blog for some very good posting on this) saying the reason for this is that performing an abortion just doesn't give the job satisfaction any other procedure does. When a surgeon has the choice between saving a life in a quadruple bypass and ending a pregnancy by murdering an unborn child he/she will choose the former.

Another story he told was when he was talking to a fellow medic about when life begins and his colleague said life begins at birth. The Professor's response to this was, 'Then you must be God! Last week you performed a Caesarean Section on a 32 week pregnant woman. Therefore at the moment you removed the child from her womb you created life because there are other women in the Maternity Ward who are 32 weeks pregnant who, according to your logic, don't have living humans in their wombs!'

I have saved the Professor's most important story for last.

He told us that whenever he entered a theatre after an abortion had just been performed he would automatically clean the equipment even if it had already been cleaned by the previous anaesthetist because of what it had just been used for. He also told us that whenever he entered the theatre he could feel something but couldn't quite put his finger on what it was. One day as he entered theatre the usual feeling went through him and his assistant asked, 'Professor, whenever you enter the theatre after a termination do you feel a strange sensation?' He replied, 'Yes, but I can't quite work out what it is.' She wrapped her surgical gown around her and said, 'Its cold, so cold, so very cold!' He told us 'That was exactly it, the temperature hadn't changed but it was freezing cold! Why? Because God wasn't there! The Holy Spirit had left to take the soul of the murdered child to Our Lady!' He continued, 'The only other time I have felt that sensation was just after the war in Belsen Concentration camp.'