I hate to get in the way of Martin Spillane’s thorough trouncing of anti-abortionist Klaus Vella Bardon. But I do object when Vella Bardon deliberately misinterprets what I wrote in my article “Pro-choice Irish” (May 30). His latest letter, ‘Extreme cases’ (July 12) refers.

The majority of my article reported objectively what had happened in the Irish referendum and why. The personal views I expressed about the outcome were as follows.

“In an overwhelming and defining vote, which may hold lessons for Malta, Ireland has dropped its near-absolute ban on abortion.” I quoted Kant’s words and the inspiration of the Enlightenment: “Have the courage to use your own reason.”

I went on: “It is about the right, in all conscience, to make your own choices. This is what Irish women have done… The determining factor [for Irish Catholics] was the requirements of justice… not the Church’s doctrine on abortion, which may be preached to all but forced on none whose conscience it offends.”

“Indeed, the referendum was called because the majority of Irish women had already made the psychological shift in favour of making the final choice.”

I concluded: “Ireland has grown up. It has demonstrated clearly that, in the case of abortion, it is about the principle of not having women’s bodies policed by Church or State. With the passage shortly of new abortion laws… Ireland has struck a powerful blow for freedom.”

I am unavowedly in favour of freedom of choice. Freedom of choice obliges nobody who does not want an abortion to have one. But it is not the prerogative of the government or the Church to dictate when, and to how many children, a mother will give birth.

Vella Bardon may not like it but that was the essential lesson of the Irish referendum.