Abortion not human right, say leaders  

CHURCH leaders have condemned a European Parliament resolution that defines “free and legal abortion” as a human right and accuses countries that restrict it of undermining democracy and personal freedom.

“Abortion is about the life of the woman, but also of the unborn child – both lives are important,” said the European Evangelical Alliance. “There are a few issues here that we can fully support, such as access to affordable, high quality gender health services for all. . . But we disagree with promoting abortion as a standard medical practice. “

The alliance, which represents 23 million evangelical Christians, responded last Friday after a heated two-day debate with 378 votes to 255, with 42 abstentions, to the approval of the parliament. The resolution has only “symbolic meaning”, since national health care does not officially fall under the competence of the European Union, but would nevertheless influence EU-wide debates.

The resolution was also condemned by the Brussels-based Roman Catholic Commission of the Bishops’ Conferences of the EU (COMECE), which also regretted its rejection of a conscientious objection for healthcare professionals.

“There is no international treaty that provides for a human right to abortion, while the right to conscientious objection is derived from the fundamental right to religious freedom,” COMECE’s Spanish Secretary General, Fr. Manuel Barrios Prieto, told Vatican News last weekend.

“Although this is a non-binding document, this vote in the European Parliament is worrying as it indicates an underlying change in mentality.”

The 77-point resolution defines sexual and reproductive health as the “cornerstone” of women’s rights and gender equality and calls on the 27 EU member states to remove “all barriers” to “high quality, comprehensive and accessible” abortion and contraception.

It states that the refusal to terminate pregnancy “for reasons of religion or conscience” is life-threatening, and calls for comprehensive sex education for primary and secondary school students as the key to “reducing sexual violence”.

The resolution also criticized Malta and Poland by name for restrictive abortion regimes, accusing them of forcing women with unsafe abortions to “risk their lives and health” – an allegation vigorously denied by pro-life groups.

After the vote, the resolution’s Croatian architect, Predrag Matic, said it was “a new era for the EU” as “the first real opposition to a regressive agenda that has trampled on women’s rights in Europe for years”, usher in.

However, the chairman of the Polish Bishops’ Conference, Archbishop Stanislaw Gadecki, told a Sunday congregation that the resolution used terminology that “resembles the language of animal husbandry rather than human development” and said that none of the many international documents referred to in the text recognized a “right to abortion”.

The chairman of the Austrian RC bishops’ conference, Archbishop Franz Lackner, told the Kathpress agency that the supporters of the resolution had ignored “the difficult situation of pregnant women in need”. . . Human health is a core concern of the Church, but classifying abortion as a health measure and as a human rights humiliates the unborn child and is ethically unsustainable.

“It is extremely worrying that such a political signal is being sent by the European Parliament on a sensitive issue that falls within the competence and responsibility of the Member States.”

More than 150 amendments were tabled against the resolution, mostly by center-right groups, while a “minority position” statement added to the text by Spanish and Polish MPs said that the definition of abortion as a human right went against the Universal Declaration of 1948 violates human rights as well as binding treaties and case law of the European Court of Human Rights and Justice.

“Human rights, which are universal and immutable, are being ideologically manipulated, with international influence undermining the sovereignty of nations and affecting their laws,” the statement said.

A spokesman for the diocese in Europe said Tuesday that Anglicans were still studying the European Parliament’s resolution and knew that access to abortion is currently “regulated by law in every national context”.

“The Church of England’s stated position combines opposition in principle with the recognition that there can be strictly limited conditions under which abortion is morally preferable to any available alternative,” the spokesman said. “This is based on our view that the fetus is a human life with the potential to relate, think, pray, choose, and love.”