Local missionaries want to avoid abortions in Jamaica

18.12.2008 By Oscar Ramjeet
Caribbean Net News Special Correspondent
Email: oscar@caribbeannetnews.com

KINGSTON, Jamaica: Local anti-abortion advocates have claimed that some 22,000 terminations of pregnancy are done in Jamaica annually and the Mustard Seed Communities and Missionaries of the Poor have joined forces with the anti-abortion advocates to assist expectant mothers who are contemplating terminating their pregnancies.

The Jamaica Gleaner reported that Father Gregory Ramkissoon, Executive Director of Mustard Seed said that his organisation was willing to care for children whose mothers believed that they could not keep them.

“Please, if you know anyone who has any intention or having an abortion, please come to us. We will work with them,” Ramkissoon said.

The Catholic Bishops of Kingston, Mandeville and Montego Bay, representatives of the Coalition for the Defense of Life and other pro-life advocates hosted the press conference at the Church.

The Archdiocesan Family Life Commission has said that the government should consider alternatives to legalising abortion in Jamaica.

Ramkissoon gave the commitment to care for children when mothers sought assistance, if, at any time, mothers wished, children would be returned to them.

Father Richard Ho Long, founder of Missionaries of the Poor, told the gathering that abortion was murder.

“Taking a child from the womb is legalising murder," said Ho Long, signaling the position of his community to parliamentarians.

The heads of Mustard Seed and Missionaries of the Poor said that they had received assistance from other anti-abortion advocates to carry out the initiatives, which would include establishing pregnancy resource centres to assist women whose abortion was their only option.

Ramkisson told the Gleaner newspaper that his organisation would give pre-natal assistance which included counseling, financial assistance and a place to stay.