Papa Benedetto Speaks Out on Politicians Who Support Abortion - Will American Catholic Politicians Who Do So Listen?

Sad to say probably not. & by not doing so cause grave harm to their souls.

What happenned is that Papa Benedetto held a press conference on Vatican 1 during his flight to Brazil for his pastoral visit & participation in CELAM. The questions covered a wide range of topics including relativism & what he hoped to accomplish on his pastoral visit. During the press conference a couple of questions about the abortion issue, esp as it applied to Mexico came up. Here are the questions & his answers:

Second Question (from Mexico):

Your Holiness, in Brazil there’s a proposal for a referendum on the subject of abortion. Two weeks, Mexico City decriminalized abortion. What can the church do about this tendency, to ensure that it does not extend to other Latin American countries? As you know, the church has been accused of interference in Mexico. Do you support the position of the Mexican bishops that legislators who approve these laws are excommunicated?

Pope Benedict XVI:

Well, there’s a great struggle of the church on behalf of life. You know that Pope John Paul II made this struggle a fundamental point of his entire pontificate. He wrote a great encyclical on “The Gift of Life.” Naturally, we go forward with this message. Life is a gift, life is not a threat. This seems to me important.

The roots of this legislation lie, in the first place, in a certain egoism, and on the other hand, also in doubt about life as a gift, about the beauty of life, as well as doubt about the future. The church responds to these doubts, above all by saying, ‘Life is beautiful. It’s not something doubtful, but it’s a gift. Even in difficult circumstances, a human life is a gift. Therefore, we have to recreate this awareness of the beauty of the gift of life.’

Regarding doubt about the future, obviously there are many threats in the world, but faith gives us the certainty that God is always more powerful in the reality of history. Thus, we can give life to new human beings with trust, and with the knowledge that faith guarantees the beauty of life. In the future, we can resist this egoism and these fears which stand at the roots of this legislation.

Fourth Question (from La Repubblica, Italy):

Thank you, your Holiness. In your speech upon arrival, you say that the church forms Christians, provides moral indications, so that people will make free decisions in conscience. Do you agree with the excommunication given to legislators in Mexico City on the question of abortion?

Pope Benedict XVI:

Yes, this excommunication is not something arbitrary, but it’s part of the Code [of Canon Law]. It’s based simply on the principle that the killing of an innocent human child is incompatible with going in communion with the Body of Christ. Thus, [the bishops] didn’t do anything new, anything surprising or arbitrary. In that light, they simply announced publicly what is contained in the law of the church, and the law of the church is based upon the doctrine and the faith of the church, which expresses our appreciation for life, that human individuality, human personality, is present from the first moment [of life].

What the Pope is doing is taking his responsibilities as Chief Shepherd of the Flock seriously. He knows that those who ignore the Church's teaching on abortion do so at the risk of their eternal souls being condemned to Hell, yes HELL!. So he is speaking out to warn them. He is also speaking out in support of his brother Bishops who are properly exercising their pastoral authority as head of their dioceses. (Hopefully a few more American Bishops will see this & gain the courage to do what they need to do also.)

The press, including Catholic, try & present excommunication & being forbidden to receive Communion as merely a punishment being pushed on those who support abortion as a way to force them to toe the line. It isn't. The rules found in Canon law exist more to lead people to repentance & a return to following Christ, not merely to punish. Any punishment that is involved is the type of discipline that a loving parent enforces on a child to train the child in the right way to go. & those rules follow the precepts found in Scripture (If your brother sins. . . ).

An edxcellent take on the Canon Law aspects of the Pope's statements is found in a post on Edward N. Peters, JD, JCD blog: Legislating in mid-air? First thoughts: possible, but not likely. In it he also supports what I said about the true purpose of the regulations found in Canon Law: "the same law that seeks above all, "the salvation of souls" (1983 CIC 1752)."

Papa Benedetto is showing his loving care for his flock in speaking out boldly on this issue. He takes his role as successor to Peter seriously. By supporting the actions of the Mexican Bishops he is doing what Christ told Peter to do, "strenthen your brothers".

As I said most of the media tend to misrepresent this as punitive rather than palliative. (EWTN news is 1 of the few exceptions) They don't want to face the truth, may because if they do so, it will force them to face the truth about their spiritual lives & the presence of sin in it. They want things to be grey not black & white (relativism at its worst, not that there is any best).

The Pope knows that his message isn't always welcome & showed his grasp of this in the answer to the final question posed to him: "In every part of the world, there are lots of people who don’t want to listen. We hope that at least, they hear, so that if they hear, they will also be able to respond. We also seek to convince those who don’t necessarily want to hear us. Naturally, even Our Lord wasn’t able to succeed in getting everyone to listen. We don’t expect that in any given moment we’ll be able to persuade everyone. But, I’ll try, with the help of my collaborators, to speak to Brazil in this moment with the hope that many people want to listen, and that many can be convinced that this is the path to take."(emphasis mine) He will not let the fear of rejection stop him from speaking out the truth.

Not suprizingly a question about Archbishop Oscar Romero came up. Papa Benedetto made an excellent point about how some people are trying to hijack the Archbishop: "The problem is that some political factions wanted to claim Romero for themselves, like a banner, unjustly." These people are trying to turn the Archbishop into a symbol of their political agenda, like liberation theology. & in doing so, they are actually causing harm to the cause for his becoming a saint. Papa Benedetto makes it clear that Archbishop Romero cannot be tied to any such agenda. & it seems to me that as long as theser groups try to do so, it will force the Church to delay his cause to prevent just such an attempt at hijacking at these factions are trying to do. (Given what I have seen by some of the Social Justice Moonbats here in the USA the Pope's concerns are well placed. Archbishop Romero's motives have been turned from the spiritual that they were to purely political with a heavy emphasis on his supposed support of liberation theology. These groups in the US are probably a part of the factions the Pope is refering to.)

That Papa Benedetto said what he did about the Bishops should come as no surprize. They are consistant with what he has always said. Remember the letter he sent to (& was basically ignored by) Theodore Cardinal McCarrick when he was head of the Congregation of the Doctrine of the Faith. (See Pope says no Communion for pro-abortion politicians, Pope Supports Excommunication for Pro-Abortion Politicians - "Incompatible with Receiving Communion" & Cardinal McCarrick Continues to Conceal Rome's Insistence that Pro-Abort Politicians Be Denied Communion for more on this.)

Thank God, we have been blessed with a Pope who takes his responsibilities seriously. Let us pray that the Holy Spirit will move on the hearts of those who hear his message & let it convict them to follow what God is speaking through his servant, Papa Benedetto.

You can read the entire transcript of the press conference here.

(Added: 11 May 2007 4:00 am courtesy of Fr. John Zuhlsdorf's blog What Does The Prayer Really Say?. I will add his English translation when it is available.)

Here are the 2 questions above in Italiano:

FIRST:
Domanda: Santità, in Brasile c’è una proposta di referendum sul tema dell’aborto; a Città del Messico due settimane fa è stato depenalizzato l’aborto. Cosa può fare la Chiesa per arginare questa tendenza, affinché non si estenda ad altri Paesi Latinoamericani, tenendo presente che in Messico il Papa è stato accusato perfino di ingerenza per avere appoggiato i Vescovi? Ed è d’accordo con la Chiesa messicana che i parlamentari che approvano queste leggi che va contro i valori di Dio devono essere scomunicati?

Papa: C’è questa grande lotta della Chiesa per la vita. Voi sapete che Papa Giovanni Paolo II ne ha fatto un punto fondamentale di tutto il suo pontificato. Ha scritto una grande Enciclica sul Vangelo della vita. Andiamo naturalmente avanti con questo messaggio che la vita è un dono e la vita non è una minaccia. Mi sembra che alla radice di queste legislazioni ci sia da una parte un certo egoismo e dall’altra parte anche un dubbio sul valore della vita, sulla bellezza della vita ed anche un dubbio sul futuro. E la Chiesa risponde soprattutto a questi dubbi: la vita è bella, non è una cosa dubbia, ma è un dono ed anche in condizioni difficili la vita rimane sempre un dono. Quindi ricreare questa coscienza della bellezza del dono della vita. E poi l’altra cosa, il dubbio sul futuro: naturalmente ci sono tante minacce nel mondo, ma la fede ci dà la certezza che Dio è sempre più forte e rimane presente nella storia e quindi possiamo, con fiducia, anche dare la vita a nuovi essere umani. Con la consapevolezza che la fede ci da circa la bellezza della vita e circa la presenza provvida di Dio nel nostro futuro possiamo resistere a queste paure che sono alla radice di queste legislazioni.

SECOND:
[Marco] POLITI Domanda: Santità nel suo discorso di arrivo Lei dice che si tratta di formare cristiani dando indicazioni morali, poi loro decidono liberamente e coscientemente. Lei condivide la scomunica data ai deputati di Città del Messico sulla questione dell’aborto?

Papa: La scomunica non è una cosa arbitraria, ma è prevista dal Codice (n.d.r. codice di diritto canonico). Quindi sta semplicemente nel Diritto Canonico che l’uccisione di un bambino innocente è incompatibile con l’andare alla comunione in cui si riceve il Corpo di Cristo. Non si è quindi inventato qualcosa di nuovo, di sorprendente o di arbitrario. È stato solo ricordato pubblicamente quanto è previsto dal Diritto della Chiesa, da un Diritto che è basato sulla dottrina e sulla fede della Chiesa, sul nostro apprezzamento per la vita e per la individualità umana, sin dal primo momento.

(Note: I find it sad the the 1 English source of what was actually said from 1 of the greatest dissenting, least orthodox & least Catholic papers in the USA, NC Reporter. Added: 11 May 2007, 3:58 am)

Sadly the Vatican spin doctors are trying to tone down what the Pope said. I suspect that this will give those bishops the very out that Papa Benedetto was trying to close. Vatican tones down papal remarks on pro-abortion Catholic politicians

It has been interesting to see the variety of reactions, from those who are doing the spin, to those who are trying to say the Pope created new legislation where he didn't, to those of use who see it for what it was, a teaching moment used by the Pope to remind us of what the Church's teachings & law actually say. (Added: 11 May 2007 4:06 am)

(Photos: Papa Benedetto, Vatican website; Vatican 1 [Alitalia Boeing 777-200 plane], REUTERS/Dario Pignatelli)