19 FEBRUARY 2000, Page 30

Burchill's vile bile

From Maria Niall Sir: This letter is to express my amazement at your choice of Diary writer in the form of Julie Burchill. Her attack (12 February) on the Catholic Church was highly defamatory, based on her own obvious bias and com- pletely without a shred of intellectual rigour. To allow your journal to be used by Miss Burchill to put across her own particu- lar brand of filth is to lower it in the eyes of its readers. There are bounds to everything and Miss Burchill has gone beyond them by writing what she did and you have gone beyond them by printing her article. I will repeat her most offensive line: 'The Catholic Church is against abortion; it needs an endless stream of innocent young flesh to defile.' As well as the Catholic Church, Orthodox Jews, Eastern Orthodox Christians and Muslims also object to abor- tion. To follow the line of her argument, are they, too, to be accused by Miss Burchill of being anti-abortion for the same reason?

Maria Niall

London SW1