Half Million saved by Eighth Amendment to Irish Constitution

Before I join the crowd at todays Celebrate the 8th rally organised by the prolife campaign I’ve been thinking about a few figures.  For England and Wales in 2014, the last published year, the government figures say that 184,571 abortions were carried out.  With 56.6 million people living in those countries the abortion rate is therefore 1 per 303.  The equivalent for Ireland, with a population of 4.58 million would be 15,115  annual abortions.  If we had abortion since 1983, that being 33 years ago then the total abortion figure, based on the above, would have been 498,795 or half a million approx. 

I understand that somewhere between 3,000 and 4,000 women currently travel to England or Wales for abortions and I have often heard this fact being used as a reason why we should allow it here.  Perhaps it’s England and Wales who should change their laws as what was thought to be “restrictive” abortion law in 1967 was soon proven to be “abortion on demand”.

While I respect and support a woman’s right to choose matters regarding her own body, and while I will never as a man understand the pressures an unexpected pregnancy brings on some, the presence of a second body (the baby) surely ought to put limitations on such a right to choose.  

A Question for all the Smart Alec's out there...

Well ...2 questions actually:

Q1: Ever heard of the term "The Lamb of God"?

Q2: If so do you know what it means?

Over the last few years I have asked this question many many times and 100% answer "yes" to Q1 and at least 95% answer "no" to question 2.  The proper answer to Q2 is not just helpful but essential in understanding the true meaning of life. Can you answer Q2?

Jesus and YouTube

Ifey Stanley, a humble servent of Jesus

Would Jesus use YouTube if it was around 2,000 years ago?  I don't know to be honest.  I see how he was moved with compassion and often told those healed to tell nobody,  which of course never happened,  while in other cases he was quite public with the demonstration of the Kingdom of God's presence through miracles.  He spoke privately to many while on other occasions he preached publicly on a hillside or by the shore from a boat, taking advantage of the natural acoustics.  I was with Ifey Stanley 2 weeks ago doing outreach in Temple Bar and he filmed a miracle of healing, as he often does, and like Torben Sondergaard of The Last Reformation his street videos give huge encouragement to other evangelists and believers, while others question this public demonstration of miracles.   I had the privilege to spend some fellowship time with Ifey and I have to say he is an extremely likeable and humble chap.  What he didn't record on the video was the chap praying to receive Jesus after his healing.

He correctly sees miracles of healing being of lesser importance than repentance and the new birth in Jesus but he understands that the miracles are what gets peoples attention.  I concur with this view as I myself have often seen God's power break through deep intellectual barriers.  Miracles are truly the "dinner bell" of salvation.

In themselves the videos may not convince the deepest sceptic but then again I don't believe that what thy were made for.  We live in an age when people can broadcast to the world from their smartphone and a world where people get their information largely from Facebook and the like. The temptation to be watchful for is that our motivation drifts from compassion for people in outreaching to simply trying to promote our own ministry, something I believe neither Ifey nor Torban are guilty of.  Would Jesus use YouTube?...I'll let you decide!