The Church needed to win the moral debate and raise public awareness before it could persuade governments to outlaw abortion, the head of Sydney's Anglicans has said.
As Catholic bishops announced a taskforce to consider how to support women with unwanted pregnancies, Sydney Archbishop Peter Jensen conceded the churches had, for now, no chance of winning political concessions.
But abortion was a matter of national importance, could not be swept under the carpet and was not going to go away, he said.
"It may be possible, indeed it is surely desirable, that we attend to the problem of late-term abortions at the level of government," he told Anglicare's Christmas dinner last night in a prepared speech obtained by the Herald. "But to expect our legislators to ban abortions in advance of powerful community expectations is unrealistic. The real debate has to occur in the community first."
It is Dr Jensen's first formal statement on abortion since the debate was revived after the federal election by the Health Minister Tony Abbott, a Catholic, who implored the churches to lobby for change.
Amid debate about the accuracy of statistics suggesting up to 100,000 terminations were carried out in Australia each year, the Prime Minister has ruled out any immediate Government-sponsored change to abortion laws and said he did not expect a private member's bill on the issue in the near future.
Dr Jensen said governments would not act to amend abortion laws without public support, and rousing the national conscience to persuade legislators would take time. Abortion laws were originally relaxed not because of changes to state laws but because juries would no longer convict, he said.
"In other words, the moral debate was won and lost before the lawmakers took action," Dr Jensen said. "For those of us committed to the belief that unborn life at all stages is precious and worthy of protection, there is little alternative to the lengthy task of persuasion, of appeal to consciences shaped by the word of God."
This week 43 Catholic bishops - including Sydney's Archbishop, Cardinal George Pell, called for churches, government and charities to join a national forum to promote debate.
Dr Jensen said the debate on abortion was taking place around "tired slogans from the 1960s".
"It is very difficult to find the space in which serious discussion of a moral issue can occur free from politics and posturing," he said. "On this, as on a number of other vital issues, the mood seems to be that if something is legal it must also be moral. To raise moral issues is to come under personal attack because it appears that you are assailing human rights.
"I think that we need to ask our legislators to continue their discussion and to help us have ours in the wider community.
"... We understand that it is difficult for them to act in advance of community awareness. But we also want to say that it is a matter of great national importance; don't sweep it under the carpet; it is not going to go away."