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What do you think about abortion?

Joshua: I think it’s something very deep. It’s a 50/50 issue: people agree with it, people don’t agree with it, people disagree with the people that disagree with it. I think if there’s a situation where a woman’s been raped then it’s fine to abort the baby.

Ciaran: It’s OK if you don’t want the baby, so say you got pregnant and then when the time came and you didn’t want the baby because you weren’t ready, it would be fine, but then if you just did it for no reason then I don’t think that’s OK, because you’re killing life basically.

Katie: I agree with abortion but I don’t agree with how abortion is set out now, because the cut-off point of when you can have your baby aborted is very late, and studies have shown that babies can feel pain before then. They also just let people have abortions without checking background circumstances. I think you have to check because if a person continuously keeps getting abortions then someone should teach them about contraception.

Zac: I think it depends on the time it happens, because if it’s earlier on, I’m not saying you won’t feel bad, but you might feel less bad. If you do it really late on that’s not good.

How do you think a youth worker could support someone who’s thinking about having an abortion?

Joshua: They could talk them through it. They could pray for them.

Nche: They could talk them through other options available, like adoption.

What about if you supported friends who were thinking about having abortions, would that be difficult?

Katie: It’s hard if it’s a friend of yours, because it’s easier to say it depends on the circumstances, like it’s easy to say you don’t think they should have an abortion if they chose to do it and there’s no situation surrounding, but if it’s a friend of yours, you want the best for your friend and what they want. So, thinking from an outside perspective, if there were medical problems surrounding it, or if it was non-consensual then I think it should be allowed, but you shouldn’t freely be allowed to have an abortion if there’s no reason.