Church in Spain committed to fighting abortion and euthanasia despite election results

Madrid, Spain, Mar 12, 2008 / 16:13 pm

The Archbishop of Toledo and Primate of Spain, Cardinal Antonio Canizares, said this week the Church would continue defending “the values that are in danger” and, concretely, would fight “against the widening of the law on abortion and against euthanasia.”

Canizares made his statements in an interview with the Italian daily Il Corriere della Sera, two days after the Socialist party in Spain carried the day in the country’s general elections.

“We don’t have anything to be sorry over,” as it would be “a betrayal if we renounced defending life, from conception to natural death,” he said in response to a question about the Church’s position on recent legislation.

“We are not against democracy, we are for it,” he said.  Whoever denies the right to life is against democracy and leads society towards disaster,” the cardinal stated, warning that at this time, “a cultural revolution is taking place not only in Spain but throughout the West,” in which “the dictatorship of relativism” is reigning, which was denounced by Benedict XVI at the outset of his pontificate.

In this context, “Spain represents the most advanced point of this revolution,” especially after the laws passed by the Zapatero government “that deny the evidence of nature and reason, entrust to the State the moral formation of young people, and propose founding a new culture based on a false understanding of freedom,” the cardinal stressed.

Regarding the issue of abortion, Cardinal Canizares explained that the Church would call for “the full application of the current law,” which, if done, “would prevent many of the 100,000 abortions that take place each year in Spain from happening.”  He also expressed support for the moratorium on abortion called for by Italian journalist Giuliano Ferrara.  “I will fight for the abolition of abortion, which is worst degradation in the history of humanity,” the cardinal said.