Ahead of a vote Thursday in the European Union, Catholic bishops say that killing babies in abortions can never be a fundamental right.
Members of the European parliament are set to vote on a proposal tomorrow that would insert a “right to abortion” in the European Union’s Charter of Fundamental Rights. A draft resolution would amend the EU charter to falsely declare “everyone has the right to bodily autonomy, to free, informed, full, and universal access to sexual and reproductive health and rights, and to all related health care services without discrimination, including access to safe and legal abortion.”
But the Commission of the Bishops’ Conferences of the European Union, which is made up of Catholic bishops from the EU member states, released a statement disagreeing.
“The promotion of women and their rights is not related to the promotion of abortion,” COMECE said in an April 9 statement.
“We work for a Europe where women can live their maternity freely and as a gift for them and for society and where being a mother is in no way a limitation for personal, social, and professional life. Promoting and facilitating abortion goes in the opposite direction to the real promotion of women and their rights.”
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The EU Charter of Fundamental Rights cannot include rights that are not recognized by all and are “divisive,” the bishops noted.
“The right to life is the fundamental pillar of all other human rights, especially the right to life of the most vulnerable, fragile, and defenseless, like the unborn child in the womb of the mother, the migrant, the old, the person with disabilities, and the sick. The Church has always taught this,” the bishops continued.
Earlier this year, France made history by becoming the first EU country to embed a fictitious “right” to abortion in its constitution. Lawmakers from both chambers of parliament easily passed this horrific amendment
The bill in this liberal nation garnered an overwhelming 780-72 vote in favor, prompting nearly the entire joint session to rise for a prolonged standing ovation. Leading pro-life campaigners were saddened to see politicians clapping for killing babies.
French President Emmanuel Macron pledged to safeguard abortion against any potential future attempts to protect women and their babies. Following the vote, Macron announced that the amendment would be formally incorporated into the constitution on Friday, March 8 — International Women’s Day — during a public ceremony in central Paris.
He emphasized the vote’s significance as a source of “French pride” and a “universal message,” expressing his sentiments on social media.
Before the vote, the Vatican said there is no right to take away the right to life of human beings.
“The Pontifical Academy for Life recalls that in the era of universal human rights, there can be no ‘right’ to take a human life,” the Vatican’s pro-life office said in a statement.
The group appealed to “all governments and all religious traditions to do their best so that, in this phase of history, the protection of life becomes an absolute priority”.
“The particular life situations and difficult and tragic contexts of our time must be addressed on the basis of a law which seeks above all to protect the weakest and most vulnerable,” it added.
In France, making abortion a right could allow abortions up to birth for any reason since any limits would likely be interpreted by a court as contravening that so-called right.
Earlier this year, during the annual March for Life in Paris, about 20,000 people urged lawmakers to reject the pro-abortion change.
Nicolas Bauer, associate researcher at the European Centre for Law and Justice, said the proposed amendment is a radical move by pro-abortion leftists.
“By inserting it into the constitution, the left wants to make abortion sacred as if it were a value at the heart of the national ‘social contract,’” Bauer told the Catholic News Agency last year. “From being a crime, abortion has become a banal medical act, and the left now is seeking to make it a fundamental right, superior to every other right.”
According to the French Ministry of Health, there were 222,000 abortions in 2020 that ended the lives of babies before birth.
