As Malawi mulls over abortion law reforms, it is okay to oppose abortion and still defend women’s right to choose, writes DR GODFREY DALITSO KANGAUDE
BLANTYRE- Malawi
I am a Catholic, and I advocate the decriminalisation of abortion. I believe direct abortion is a sin. Yet I oppose the state’s criminalisation of abortion because I believe it is unjust to girls and women.
Some may find this contradictory. For me, it raises a question that moral condemnation alone cannot answer: what justifies the state’s use of criminal punishment, and who bears its consequences?
DR KANGAUDE - Prohibition never stops abortions
I take my faith and its teaching on abortion seriously. My faith does not depend on whether the state criminalises abortion. As a lawyer, I also take seriously my responsibility to question laws that produce injustice.
I recognise that the Church’s teaching extends to legal protection of unborn life, including penal sanctions. But invoking that teaching does not settle whether a particular criminal regime is just. Its purpose, its effects and the burdens it imposes must still be examined.
My concern is, therefore, not to persuade Catholics that abortion is morally acceptable. It is to question whether opposition to abortion justifies maintaining criminal laws that harm girls and women. The strength of our convictions cannot exempt those laws from scrutiny.
Who bears the consequences?
In Malawi, a girl or woman facing an unwanted pregnancy may also face poverty, interrupted education, abandonment or pressure from a partner. These circumstances can give her strong reasons to seek an abortion. Criminal prohibition does not make those circumstances disappear. Nor does prohibition mean that abortions stop.
The World Health Organization reports that restricting access does not reduce the number of abortions, but affects whether they are safe. That evidence challenges the assumption that criminalisation necessarily achieves the protection claimed for it.
The main point for me, however, is that the consequences are unequal. Pregnancy involves a man, but its physical burdens fall on the girl or woman. In some cases, a man pressures her to terminate the pregnancy. She then bears the physical risks, including those of an unsafe abortion.
Criminalisation can compound this inequality by making safe care harder to obtain and creating fear of seeking help. The injustice extends beyond the possibility of imprisonment. It includes the harm that can follow when a girl or woman has few resources and limited access to care.
The fact that abortions continue does not, by itself, prove that criminalisation is unjust. But neither can the law’s stated purpose excuse its consequences.
We must ask whether punishment is proportionate, whether it achieves its purpose, and whether less harmful responses are available.
Inspiration from the Gospel
It might sound ironic to some, but I draw inspiration for addressing injustice from the story of the woman caught in adultery. Her accusers were custodians and guardians of moral, religious and cultural law. They brought her before Jesus, seeking his affirmation that she should be stoned.
My reading of the story is that Jesus questioned why only the woman faced punishment when the act involved a man. Where was he? Perhaps he was one of these very men, or someone they knew. For me, his absence raises questions about whose wrongdoing is exposed and whose is protected.
Even if the accusers claimed to be acting under the highest law of Moses, Jesus did not simply accept their demand. Adultery involves women and men. How, then, was the law being interpreted and applied to bring only the woman forward for punishment? Would killing her address the wrong they claimed to oppose?
Did Jesus therefore justify adultery? I do not think so. In my reading, he condemned the sin without accepting that stoning the woman was the answer.
This is what inspires my approach to abortion. I can hold that abortion is morally wrong while questioning the justice of criminalising it. Invoking morality or the authority of law does not answer the question: is the punishment itself just?
What should the state do?
The state must justify its use of criminal punishment. Those who defend criminalization must explain how it protects life and why its burdens on girls and women are justified. I also ask my Church: should we rely on the state’s criminal machinery to uphold our teaching? If we support its use, we must account for what it does to those subjected to it. Concern for unborn life cannot make the suffering of girls= and women irrelevant.
Decriminalisation means removing criminal penalties for abortion. It does not require anyone to approve of abortion morally. Nor does it mean abandoning standards of care, consent or accountability. Coercion and violence remain wrong, and healthcare still requires regulation.
My position is that the state should respond through healthcare, protection and support rather than criminal punishment for abortion. Churches can continue to teach, counsel and offer practical assistance. Men must also be held responsible for their conduct and obligations.
I remain Catholic. I remain morally opposed to direct abortion. I also remain committed to challenging laws that I believe are unjust to girls and women. I am open to engagement with my argument. But that engagement must address the question I am raising: does the state’s criminalisation of abortion deliver justice to those who bear its consequences?
DR GODFREY DALITSO KANGAUDE is the Executive Director of Nyale Institute and co-chairperson of Sexual and Reproductive Justice Network in Malawi