The Influence of Religion Over Family Planning: the Case of the Republic of Macedonia (original) (raw)
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New reproductive technologies and religion in Serbia and Croatia
Religion in Contemporary Society, 2017
The paper focuses on the Orthodox and the Catholic bioethical perspectives on assisted reproduction in Serbia and Croatia. Different positions are discussed in the chapter: theological positions, the official Church teachings, political agendas, and views of the general population and population interested in infertility. The paper argues that regulation of assisted reproduction and the prevailing social norms are influenced by the teachings of the two dominant religions in Serbia and Croatia. The Orthodox Church has more liberal attitudes towards new reproductive technologies than the Catholic Church. These differences are reflected in public discourse and legislation of Serbia and Croatia.
The European Journal of Contraception & Reproductive Health Care, 2016
Religion is embedded in the culture of all societies. It influences matters of morality, ideology and decision making, which concern every human being at some point in their life. Although the different religions often lack a united view on matters such contraception and abortion, there is sometimes some dogmatic overlap when general religious principles are subject to the influence of local customs. Immigration and population flow add further complexities to societal views on reproductive issues. For example, present day Europe has recently faced a dramatic increase in refugee influx, which raises questions about the health care of immigrants and the effects of cultural and religious differences on reproductive health. Religious beliefs on family planning in, for example, Christianity, Judaism, Islam and Hinduism have grown from different backgrounds and perspectives. Understanding these differences may result in more culturally competent delivery of care by health care providers. This paper presents the teachings of the most widespread religions in Europe with regard to contraception and reproduction.
Attitudes of Major Religious Organizations in Ukraine to Abortion and Reproductive Medicine
Occasional Papers on Religion in Eastern Europe
The attitude of the largest religions of Ukraine to reproductive medicine is determined by a variety of practical approaches, which are still in process of change between the rather strict negative official position of major religious organizations of Ukraine, on the one hand, and a rather liberal approach to reproductive medicine in secular legislation of Ukraine. The harsh negative official position of the main religious organizations of Ukraine to surrogacy and abortions is presented in a joint document adopted by the Ukrainian Council of Churches and Religious Organizations. While the diversity of practical approaches of these organizations is represented by the speeches of the leaders of these organizations and current decisions within each of the churches are made up according to the context in every case of artificial fertilization or abortion. Most religions in Ukraine take a compromise practical position: Church representatives allow men and women who are married but unable to have children to seek reproductive medicine on medical grounds. Also, while opposing abortion as an undoubted sin, church representatives still allow exceptions in most cases-in the case of rape or a clear threat to the life of the expectant mother. Religious justifications for the status of the human fetus as one that acquires human rights at a certain stage of its development play an important role. Despite different views on the emergence of a new person, most representatives of religious organizations in Ukraine tend to allow in some cases recourse to both reproductive medicine and abortion.
PARENTS' RELIGIOUS AND SECULAR PERSPECTIVES ON IVF PLANNING IN SERBIA
The social and institutional background of this research can be summarized as the relation between public and governmental policies on the one hand, and the experience of patients and IVF experts on the other. Namely, one third of all pregnancies achieved in state-funded in vitro fertilizations (IVF) obscure some ethical and health issues, especially among patients who abandon the state-funded IVF programme in Serbia. The goal of the current research is to identify, describe and understand ethical and social issues that parents encounter in attempts to fulfil their idea of a sovereign (parental) life through IVF. The method comprised a tri-level analysis based on semi-structured interviews with participants who exhibit personal experiences of basic ethical principles and social and health needs within IVF. The results obtained indicate that all three explored levels of patients' experience build a picture of Assisted Reproductive Technology (ART) as a means of a sovereign or good (parental) life. However, the cultural image of the fulfilment of expected parental social roles resulted in a denial of autonomy and led to self-abnegation through silent acceptance of unethical practices. There is an overlap of the margins of secular ideas and roles on the one hand, and religiosity on the other, making such consent socially acceptable and more easily explainable. Finally, the conclusion reached is that apparently a decrease in sovereignty of parental decisions causes a loss of trust in state clinics and medical procedures, reduces solidarity (as both a religious and secular social value) and establishes norms and patterns of social injustice and inequality.
The Right to Abortion in North Macedonia: A Brief Study
2021
Equitable access to safe abortion is part of the corpus of human rights. Providing women with access to safe abortion means protection and realization of one of their fundamental human rights. However, around the world, even nowadays, women face not only legal obstacles, but as well stigmatization and conviction against fulfillment of the right to abortion. In North Macedonia there a multiple type of barriers and large inequalities related to the accessibility and availability of reproductive healthcare services. Women with low socioeconomic status are mostly affected. The need for contraception has not been met and reproductive healthcare services are unevenly distributed across the country.
The Right to Abortion in North Macedonia
2021
Equitable access to safe abortion is part of the corpus of human rights. Providing women with access to safe abortion means protection and realization of one of their fundamental human rights. However, around the world, even nowadays, women face not only legal obstacles, but as well stigmatization and conviction against fulfillment of the right to abortion. In North Macedonia there a multiple type of barriers and large inequalities related to the accessibility and availability of reproductive healthcare services. Women with low socio-economic status are mostly affected. The need for contraception has not been met and reproductive healthcare services are unevenly distributed across the country.
The Right to Abortion in North Macedonia Corresponding author Daniela Antonovska, MA [Gender Studies
Equitable access to safe abortion is part of the corpus of human rights. Providing women with access to safe abortion means protection and realization of one of their fundamental human rights. However, around the world, even nowadays, women face not only legal obstacles, but as well stigmatization and conviction against fulfillment of the right to abortion. In North Macedonia there a multiple type of barriers and large inequalities related to the accessibility and availability of reproductive healthcare services. Women with low socioeconomic status are mostly affected. The need for contraception has not been met and reproductive healthcare services are unevenly distributed across the country.
Journal of religion and health, 2017
This article draws upon qualitative ethnographic data collected between 2005 and 2013 in southern Romania among women who have been consistently using abortion as a contraceptive method. It particularly considers the role that lived religion might have played in some individuals' strategies to render abortion a justifiable practice. Over the last seven decades, Romanian women's experiences of abortion have often been at odds with both secular and religious regulations. This study shifts the perspective from the biopolitics and the bioethics of abortion toward women's own reproductive decision-making strategies in a context of enduring traditional patriarchy. It explores the fluid and pragmatic ways in which some Romanians use the notions of "God's will," "sin," "redemption," "afterlife," and "Godparenting" to redefine abortion as a partially disembodied reproductive event. As a reproductive decision-making resource, l...
Prizren Social Science Journal, 2020
Developments in science and technology have, among other things, challenged the family. Human values, which change in step with this technological progress, have faced many legal, moral and ethical dilemmas which await answers from the science on bioethics. We are in such a situation when we discuss about many advances in contemporary and national family law, including new forms of family reproduction that differ from a natural process of child conceiving. The authors in this paper bring comparative aspects of biomedical and family legislation of the Republic of North Macedonia and Republic of Kosovo. Among other things, they emphasize that given the traditional and biological model of the family in our society, new reproductive forms are a very reserved topic in the family and biomedical field, but it awakens a curiosity of discussions on ethics, philosophy and legal regulation of reproduction of human beings in both countries. The numerous stereotypes that prevail in the society of both countries regarding the application of artificial reproduction technology methods are contrary to many legal and medical justifications for couples who do not have the opportunity to become parents in a biological (natural) way. Therefore, the purpose of the authors is to provide accurate and grounded information through this text about the legal framework and medical options available to all persons who wish to exercise their reproductive right to establish a family.