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A Levada Centre poll revealed that a majority of Russians (59 percent) are opposed to the introduction of new restrictions on abortion, whereas 26 percent support such an initiative. In the June poll, 54 percent thought that abortion should be solely at the discretion of the woman involved. Another 32 percent would allow abortion only under certain circumstances. Only 4 percent of the respondents were for a complete ban on the procedure. Of those surveyed, 67 percent think that the government should stay out of the debate, leaving it up to the people. At the same time, one in five (21 percent) recognise the need for government action to restrict abortions, but 12 percent were undecided on this point. Most Russians (78 percent) would like to see the authorities implement educational programmes and develop social aid schemes in order to prevent abortions. Only 17 percent believe that the state should use criminal prosecution to combat abortion.
The poll also surveyed respondents’ views on other issues of family policy. The idea of an extra tax upon divorce went down to overwhelming defeat (70 percent opposed it, 21 percent supported it). Schemes to encourage at least three children (on average) per family won the support of 73 percent, whilst only 20 opposed it. On 29 May, experts of the Coordination Council of the RF Presidential Council for the Implementation of the National Strategy of Action for Children 2012-17 proposed measures for the prevention of abortion and the strengthening of the role of the Church and other religious organisations in family policy. The draft Concept of State Family Policy for 2025, states, in particular, the need for greater accountability for violations of the abortion law and the establishment of socio-psychological services aimed at the prevention of abortion and allowing women to bring their babies to term in all hospitals.
3 July 2013
Interfax-Religion
http://interfax-religion.ru/?act=news&div=51813
Editor’s Note:
You’d find the same situation here in diaspora Orthodoxy as you’d find in the Rodina. Very few (mostly fanatic “religious hobbyists”) are for a total ban on the procedure. Most would favour sensible restrictions on it… realising that’s the best deal that we can get in a pluralistic society. Indeed, we have no right to force our beliefs down someone else’s throat using the police power of the state… after all, we’re NOT papists, who DO believe that. Like it or not, the total abolitionist stance is crackbrained and doomed to failure. I stand for a true Pro-Life programme… generous aid to single mothers, the provision of contraceptives to all who wish them (the Church allows such… another area where we disagree with the papists), and an equitable tax system that makes all layers of society pay their fair share (unlike the present arrangement where the affluent effluent have a MUCH lower responsibility… the legacy of Slobberin’ Ronnie and George the Fool).
I WILL link hands with those who are so-called “Pro-Choice” if it means that the goal of a Fair and Equitable Society for All is advanced (a VERY Christ-like goal, if I may say so). I don’t have to agree with someone completely to see that they’re on the right road. Your real choice is between a Fair “One for All and All for One” Society and a Thieving “Me First” Society… there’s no other choice out there. If you support the so-called Free Market, you support an ideology that’s profoundly and essentially anti-Christian… after all, HH calls it a “fraud”… and Pope Francisco agrees with him. Ponder that, if you will…
BMD
Voices from Russia 
12 July 2014. My Comment in Another Forum on the Hobby Lobby Abomination
Tags: american evangelicals, Birth control, Catholic Church, Christian, Christianity, David Green, Evangelical, Evangelicalism, evangelicals, Hobby Lobby, legal affairs, morality, morals, Pentecostalism, Pentecostalists, political commentary, politics, Religion, Religion and Spirituality, SCOTUS, Supreme Court of the United States, United States, USA
THIS is David Green’s attitude to the rights of others… only his count, dontcha know! “I’ve got mine and you have NO say at all!” Any questions?
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Corporations aren’t people… ergo, they can’t have religious beliefs. Even the slow learners know that. Therefore, the decision is crank from the git-go. It’s a dodge by the owners to use religion as an excuse to impose their values on others. It’s clear… you may hold whatever belief that you wish, but you may not use the police power of the state to impose it on others. That goes for the Catholic Church, too… many of its employees aren’t Catholics, so, they can’t impose Catholic teachings on them via birth-control restrictions. By the way, I’m not a secularist, I’m an Orthodox Christian… we do allow artificial birth control via oikonomia.
The stipulation is clear… no one may use the law to push their religion or to coerce others to follow this-or-that tenet of their faith. That’s the long and the short of it.
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Let’s give you a little detail that wasn’t in the original comment. The owner of Hobby Lobby, David Green, is a religious nutter (an anti-Christian Pentecostalist) who attributes his success to “my faith in God” (he’s one of the “elect” because he’s “successful”… that idea has bedevilled the Prods ever since the time of Calvin). He takes half of his pre-tax profits and uses it to finance crackbrained “Evangelical” projects such as the so-called “Liberty University” (it’s neither free nor a university in the best sense of the word). If you can avoid it, DON’T patronise Hobby Lobby. Burwell v. Hobby Lobby is bad law… it’s a new Plessy v. Ferguson… it deserves the same fate. It creates a “separate but (in)equal” situation… the rich can use “religious belief” as a cudgel to avoid whatever law they wish to. No real Christian supports this decision… reflect on that… Christ would NOT have used such a tactic, no siree!
BMD