So the MPs were allowed to vote with their conscience on this issue, but were denied this right when it came to the EU and the Treaty. Nick Pryor, London, England said it all "Our MPs are the elected representatives of their respective constituencies. They should vote according to the will of the people who elected them," So if not voting with their consciences then it should at least be according to the will of the voters. Why all the double standards with Gordon Brown?

Douglas Cochrane, Halifax,

Since when was the Church entitled to dictate how MPs should vote? Or (to put it another way) why do MPs seem to think that they entitled to vote solely by reference to their own personal convictions?

Our MPs are the elected representatives of their respective constituencies. They should vote according to the will of the people who elected them, based upon informed reflection of the merits of the legislation before them. If the majority of the people represented by an MP would favour the legislation, the MP has a moral imperative to support the Bill, notwithstanding any personal reservations.

It appears the Church is trying to assert a moral veto over parliamentary decision-making by appealing to individual MPs' personal convictions. If so, we have more to fear than the moral implications of this isolated piece of legislation.

Is this the thin end of the wedge? Are we witnessing the erosion of the church/state divide that has already run wild in the States? God forbid...

Nick Pryor, London, England

So Gordon Brown won't insisit on a 3 line whip for the bill allowing all to vote with their concience?
But this only allows the catholics to insisit on their own "3 line whip" for their views, disturbing the state's process and once again ensuring the baseless beliefs of the vatican rule over society's democratically elected chambers.
If we accept that the catholic MPs vote for the catholic point of view and not their party line, then we might as well give up and have a catholic state. Or why not a Muslim state? Or any other religion?

Matt, Antibes, France

Weak man! Should have shown courage by standing up to the Catholic brigade who kept silent when their clergy abused children for decades. These religiou brigade will come for more having tasted the blood. Cameron should be ashmed for not standing up for research which every one believes except those who still argue that the Earth is flat and Gelileo was a nutter.

Rob, Brighton,

I am sorry for putting it so strongly, but the fact that people are still questioning the "humanity" or otherwise of the human embryo is so bizarre that one struggles to understand the mind that could contain such idiocy.

Jerome Lejean, the famous French physicist who discovered the cause of Down's Syndrome, once gave evidence to the US Senate and during it, said: "If an embryo at the MOMENT OF CONCEPTION is not a human being, it will never turn into a human being. Conversely, an embryo at the MOMENT OF CONCEPTION can ONLY become a human being, not anything else. Ipso facto, an embryo at the MOMENT OF CONCEPTION can ONLY be a human being".

Why are people so very blind? Is it that decades of abortion have effectively sold you all the lie that an embryo is not a human being?

A lie that means a government can now tell us that we are only human beings ONLY WHEN the law says we are! What madness, what political obscurantism in the service of utter moral degradation this is!

Benedict Carter, Moscow, Russia

I'm disgusted - though sadly unsurprised - by the church's efforts to prevent research that will help humanity: morally bankrupt as ever.

Hugh, London,