Using a Natural Law perspective, examine these cases. Compare your view with the Roman Catholic view (see the Catholic catechism on abortion).
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Dorothy, 14, and her mother Rachel are among the first clients to arrive. She is nervous and embarrassed, waiting to be told off for getting pregnant at such a young age. Bare-faced and wearing an Alice band and simple T-shirt and jogging bottoms, she looks painfully young.

When she discovered that she was pregnant she told her mother and visited her "pretty useless" GP. He gave her the number of a youth sexual-health service near her home in North London which, in turn, referred her here. At her first consultation a week ago, the nurse spoke to her alone to make sure that she was not acting under duress and genuinely wanted to end the pregnancy. That is a statutory duty.

The first of two drugs was administered then, and today Dorothy will receive the second. That will begin the medical abortion once she gets home.

"I am very relieved that no one is trying to make me feel terrible. I feel bad enough anyway. My mum is very upset. I am looking forward to things being back to normal," she said.

Her mother agrees. "This has all been a nightmare. I felt the world had fallen in when she told me. They were really good at the youth service. The people there were quite young and they didn't make Dorothy feel bad. They referred us here and everyone has done their best to make it easy for us. No one has made me feel I am a terrible mother."

Source: Times May 24th 2010

Hint: Natural law theory asks us to focus on the intention, the act itself and the consequences (in so far as the end result ought to fulfil the condition of building a fulfilled and flourishing life, and if you’re a Christian, a flourishing life that accords with God’s revealed will). In this case the child is underage, and feels terrible about the situation and the mother is angry. Remember that Aquinas taught the first principle of natural law is ‘do good and avoid evil’ and that we have an innate sense of what this involves – and also we should ‘harm no-one’. The consequences of keeping the child seem to be undesirable as the child will be unwanted and the teenaged girl harmed. There are three precepts that might be considered relevant: the preservation of life if we consider the foetus to have the status of a human being, an ordered society which may not think unwanted children are desirable and the worship of God and respect for commands such as ‘thou shalt not kill”. Is this a case of two ‘evils’ coming together and choosing the lesser evil – to kill a foetus versus to ruin a young girl’s prospects of a happy and fulfilled life? How absolute is the ‘thou shalt not kill a foetus’ divine command?

This is one interpretation of what Natural Law might suggest is right in this scenario, but can you think of alternatives ?"

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