Two more new members of the Pontifical Academy for Life hold controversial positions on bioethics.
Rabbi Professor Avraham Steinberg, one of 45 ordinary members of the Pontifical Council for Life appointed this week, has argued for the permissibility of ending a pregnancy in some cases.
Steinberg told Australia’s Radio National in 2008 that an embryo has “no human status” before 40 days. After 40 days it has “a certain status of a human being, not a full status”.
As a result, Steinberg says, “Abortion is not permissible by Jewish law, but if the situation of the mother is in a psychological upset to a degree that it may cause her serious trouble, then abortion may be permissible despite the fact that for the foetus’s sake, we would not allow it.
