This week Cardinal Keith O’Brien delivered a sermon at St Mary’s Cathedral in Edinburgh. Railing against the increase in abortions in Scotland, he called upon universities to teach that abortion is wrong, for a “boycott” of politicians who fail to legislate against it, and for “a generation” of doctors to stop performing the operation. He likened the abortion-rate to the equivalent of “two Dunblane massacres, every day”.

The Cardinal is pretty chippy when it comes to many of the more inflammatory issues of the day. He may be pro-gay priest, but he is anti-gay marriage and anti-gay adoption, he likened sex education for children to “abuse” and has called upon Muslims to “apologise” for 9/11. And, of course, pronouncing against abortion is pretty much what you would expect a Catholic archbishop to do.

However, his outburst does come when there is something of a sea-change in the air over abortion. While Britain is vastly pro-choice, with only 3 per cent of people wanting a total ban, the anti-abortionists have been emboldened by the success of contemporaries in America, where total ban support runs at 22 per cent.

Campaigners are stepping up their activity here, in time for the 40th anniversary of legalislation in October. Three Bills have been tabled in the Commons seeking to curtail womens’ access to termination. The Human Tissue and Embryos Bill is expected to be used by pro-life MPs to tack on abortion-limitation clauses. And, as Libby Purves noted in her column last month, an “unprecedented number” of doctors are opting out of terminations, dismayed by the increase in operations.

A great deal of the reason why anti-abortion sentiment is allowed to hold ground is that the debate is just that – an ideological, religious or socio-political debate on abortion. It is rarely discussed in terms of personal experience, despite record numbers of women, 186,416 in 2006, having them.

Women – always loth to talk about the more visceral elements of female reproductive physicality – are too ashamed, or unconfident in their reception, to discuss their terminations, even with friends, or partners. This brings about the curious circumstance that, while pretty much everyone must have someone dear to them who has had an abortion, the chances of them actually discussing it with their more conservative elders, or menfolk, are remote.

Subsequently, we have a climate where anti-abortionists can discuss abortion as something that “they” do, over “there”; rather than the reality – that it has, in all likelihood, been a calm, rational, well-thought-out act, which has statistically occurred very close to home.

Last month I wrote a piece in The Times in which I mentioned how, having had two children, I had an early abortion when I found out that I was pregnant with a third, and had not – contrary to what I was “expected” to feel – experienced any indecision, guilt or trauma.

I was amazed at the reader-response – more than 400 online comments, and over 100 letters and emails. By a rule of thumb, those who were anti-abortion cited no experience of pregnancy or abortion, while those who were pro-abortion, did. The response that I found most surprising, however, was a wonderful letter from a well-known feminist columnist who said that, although she had written about abortion many times, she had never mentioned her own terminations.

It is this silence from women that the antiabortion lobby hopes to capitalise on.

One of their recent publicity coups has been highlighting the rise in young women having multiple abortions. In short, women using abortion as a primary form of contraceptive. But, of course, young women having multiple abortions is a matter for contraceptive and emotional education – not limiting access to abortion. And, besides, I would still rather have feckless young women having multiple abortions than feckless young women having multiple children. And so, clearly, would the feckless young women. And that, thankfully for both them and us, is their right.

But then, with Cardinal O’Brien simultaneously vetoing contraception, abortion and sex-education, it seems that, in 2007, the Catholic hardliners are reverting to a more old-fashioned ideal of women: that they remain virgins until they are ready to become mothers, and that they then mother, without cease, until they drop.

Personal views
Rowan Pelling, 39, writer
I had a termination after a scan showed that my baby had a condition that was almost certainly terminal. What kind of a person would ask me to carry that to term and then watch it die? I felt the loss of my child, not as murder, but as the child that I had lost.

Christina Odone, 46, former editor of the Catholic Herald
There has been a growth of pro-life sentiment. I don’t put this down to the Catholic church but to infertility affecting so many women. The thought of squandering a life terrifies them.

Barbara Hann, 52, office manager, BMW
There’s a 21-year-old girl next door who has three kids and she just doesn’t seem very interested. In some ways that’s even worse than a termination as she’s not offering these kids any kind of a life.

Haley Hann (daughter of Barbara) 21, student
Some girls can deliberately set out to get pregnant or threaten to have abortions to give guys ultimatums, which is awful.

Melissa Roberts, 24, writer
Creating an interim period sounds like a good idea but where abortions are concerned, surely the sooner the better, ethically as well as legally.

Barry Walker, 25, researcher
It’s the date of termination that bothers me – the arbitrariness of a time to define life. At some point life happens, but when?

Deepa Naik, 30, researcher in visual cultures
The mood may change, the law may change, but abortions will always happen. So it’s not about women making the choice or not – the fact is they do make the choice and their health should take priority.

Belinda Holmes, 32, writer
I was 26 when I fell pregnant, by mistake. At the time, the decision was easy. My boyfriend and I lived in different places, we didn't have much money. To have a child felt selfish and thoughtless. To not have it felt harder, but responsible.

Katerina Philips, 33, mother
In Japan they have a ritual where they say goodbye to aborted children. We should find something like that here so that we can recognise our conscious decision without condemning ourselves.

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