Northern Ireland Police Say Praying in a Hospital That Does Abortions is a Crime

Police guidance in Northern Ireland indicates that carrying a Bible, reading Scripture or praying inside hospital areas covered by abortion buffer zones could be treated as a criminal offense under the region’s abortion buffer zone law.

The Abortion Services (Safe Access Zones) Act (Northern Ireland) 2023 creates 100-meter protected zones around facilities that kill babies in abortions. The law bans any conduct that influences, prevents or impedes access, or causes harassment, alarm or distress to a protected person.

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New PSNI guidance to officers states there are no exemptions for clergy, pastoral care or religious activity.

“Describing conduct as pastoral, prayerful or religious in nature does not determine whether an offence has been committed,” the guidance says. “The test is not how the person describes their own behaviour – it is whether that behaviour, assessed objectively and in its full context, influenced, impeded, or caused distress to a protected person, or was reckless as to whether it did so.”

The interpretation means even passive religious expressions, such as carrying a Bible or offering consensual prayer with patients or families, could trigger investigation or prosecution if they occur within the abortion buffer zone and are judged to potentially influence or distress someone nearby.

Reading Scripture at a patient’s request or praying with grieving parents inside such zones could place chaplains at risk.

This approach has already produced a conviction that critics describe as a direct attack on gospel preaching.

In May, retired pastor Clive Johnston, 78, was found guilty and fined £450 for leading a small open-air Sunday service near Causeway Hospital in Coleraine. The service included preaching from John 3:16, singing hymns and displaying a wooden cross.

Court evidence confirmed the message contained no reference to abortion.

“This is a dark day for Christian freedom,” Johnston said. “We held a small, open air Sunday service near a hospital. We made no reference whatsoever to the issue of abortion. And yet the buffer zones law is so broad that holding a Sunday service has been found to be a criminal offence. And at 78 years of age I find myself, for the first time, convicted of a crime.”

Johnston added that the gathering was peaceful and that the law should not criminalize ordinary gospel preaching in public spaces.

“I know it was an unusual place to hold an open-air service but that was the point: There shouldn’t be any public spaces in Northern Ireland where you can be prosecuted and convicted simply for preaching the gospel,” he said. “If someone is out there causing trouble, stirring up violence, harassing or verbally attacking people, then, absolutely, go ahead and prosecute them. But I wasn’t doing any of those things as the police video shows and as everyone involved in this case accepts.”

Ciarán Kelly, director of The Christian Institute, which supported Johnston’s case, said the guidance shows the law is being stretched to threaten routine Christian ministry in hospitals.

“According to this guidance, a chaplain praying with parents mourning the loss of a child and then reading the famous words of Psalm 23 – The Lord is my shepherd – could fall foul of the law,” Kelly said. “Indeed, it seems someone simply carrying a Bible through certain parts of a hospital could face a criminal investigation if someone thinks it could potentially influence a wholly unrelated abortion decision.”

Kelly warned of a broader “very damaging chilling effect.”

“Patients do not lose the right to spiritual care because they happen to be in a hospital where abortions are also provided,” he said. “The very suggestion that consensual prayer or Bible reading could ever become a criminal matter should concern everyone who values basic freedom.”

Pastor Jonathan Campbell of Newbuildings Independent Methodist Church said the restrictions make no sense in a hospital setting.

“It’s unthinkable that the Bible, or even just clerical dress, could be off-limits on hospital grounds in case someone might find it offensive,” Campbell said. “The Christian message is one of hope and comfort to those who are ill, worried and grieving. It cannot be the case that in Northern Ireland, church representatives are unable to comfort those in need.”