Only in Malta could a piece of legislation, which has been under consideration for several years and whose purpose is to regulate a vital field of medical treatment that has gone unregulated for so long, end up being drafted in such a way as to satisfy nobody – except the ultra-conservative “pro-life” elements and then only just.

The ones that matter – the medical profession, those dealing on a daily basis with infertile couples, legislators who have long wrestled with this issue and, most importantly, the many married couples who may wish to avail themselves of this treatment – have voiced understandable concern at its legislative deficiencies.

The Church objected, of course, and put out an inept pastoral letter to explain its position to the faithful. Fair enough.

The Church, in its so-called Magisterium, has condemned IVF for the past 44 years since Pope Paul VI pronounced the birth control pill morally objectionable on the grounds that its use was a sinful interruption of natural conception. Later Vatican pronouncements have simply extended that logic to IVF.

The Church has every right to make its views known. But the manner in which it did so in its recent pastoral letter has left a bad taste in the mouth. One would have thought that, as Cardinal Prospero Grech implied, after its experience in the divorce debate the Maltese Church would have taken the lessons to heart and been less strident in the face of another sensitive moral issue.

I suspect the bishops’ pastoral letter on the IVF Bill was drafted by Gozo Bishop Mario Grech.

It bears all the hallmarks of heavy-handedness one has come to associate with Mgr Grech (who, earlier this year, expressed himself in highly emotive language on the subject) and none of the sensitivity of Archbishop Paul Cremona. More’s the pity.

What a pity, too, that Fr Emmanuel Agius’ well considered explanation of the Church’s position (Public Policy In IVF Issues, August 14) was ignored by Mgr Grech.

What should have been mature ecclesiastical guidance on a deeply sensitive subject has ended up offending those who have gone through both the agony and the ecstasy of overcoming infertility through IVF treatment and those awaiting such treatment.

Are their offspring really not “children of God” like any other, as the pastoral letter implied, and was it really the “temptation of an easy solution” that led them down the traumatic path of IVF?

The bishops claim they practise holy compassion but, as in the divorce debate, have no hesitation in shamelessly putting the boot in if their Magisterium is transgressed.

The Church, as much as any other group in our society, has a right to hold and to express its views about social or ethical questions. But the Church cannot claim that its doctrine should automatically have the force of law, only that its views should be heard. And, importantly, that when it expresses its views it does so with compassion, not offensive over-zealousness as this pastoral letter has regrettably done.

While I am prepared to respect the Church’s doctrinal position on IVF, therefore – provided it is not expressed in the cack-handed manner of the pastoral letter – it is ultimately the job of our legislators in Parliament, not the Church, to enact laws that benefit the well-being of society as a whole.

Only in Malta, however, can legislators get themselves into the preposterous position of trying so hard to placate the Church that they consequently draw up legislative proposals that fail to achieve their key objective.

Regrettably, Justice Minister Chris Said has fallen into this trap.

The aim of our IVF legislation should be to regulate the field of assisted reproduction in such a way as to ensure that, within reasonable ethical constraints, women who are infertile may benefit to the greatest extent possible from the best medical treatment available, thus leading to a greater chance of parenthood.

As the far-seeing Fr Agius put it, “although the Catholic Church found IVF treatment morally objectionable, it also believed legislation allowing reproductive technologies could be tolerated for the sake of public order and to avoid greater evil: the unregulated practice of assisted procreation”.

The issue is not about finding a formula that can satisfy the Church’s qualms. It is not possible to achieve that because the Church’s doctrinal position is fixed and immovable. Anything the state puts forward falls foul of this doctrinal intransigence.

Being half a virgin is not an option. The state must, therefore, go for the best technical solution available ethically and medically regardless of the Church’s reservations.

The medical experts and MPs who have been examining this issue over a very long period have drawn up proposals for regulation specifically with these constraints in mind. The sooner their proposals, devoid of the narrow-minded scruples that mar this Bill, are incorporated into a new, workable draft, the better.

IVF treatment, sensibly regulated, offers the miracle of life to previously infertile couples.

It leads, in many cases, to a married man and a woman having a child, forming a family, enriching a marriage – the very state that the Church and society as a whole desires.

It is vital that Malta’s IVF legislation encourages the achievement of this objective, not frustrates it.