Catholic Information Service for Africa (Nairobi)
24 August 2007
Pretoria — The Catholic Church in Southern today reiterated its rejection of a 1996 law allowing abortion after the Protestant South African Council of Churches Africa made a statement in favour of the legislation.
The Catholic Church distanced itself from the statement submitted by the SACC general secretary to the Western Cape provincial hearings on the Choice on Termination of Pregnancy Amendment Bill (B 21 - 2007).
"The Catholic Church reiterates the primacy of the right to life as an inalienable right and a constituent element of a civil society and its legislation," the Secretary General of the Southern African Catholic Bishops Conference, Fr Vincent Brennan, said.
"The Catholic Church sees this right exercised within a consistent life ethic to which all Christians are called. This informs the Catholic Church's continued and unchanging opposition to the Choice on Termination of Pregnancy Act, passed in 1996."
Society and the Church, Fr Brennan said, cannot profess to support the right to life and yet allow thousands of women to experience the distress and need which causes them to contemplate abortion.
Admitting that the Catholic Church was aware that the pro-abortion law was already in force and was not likely to be repealed, Fr Brennan said there was, however, a need to limit the harm done by such a law and to make every effort at lessening its negative consequences at the level of general opinion and public morality, on condition that opposition to such laws is clear and well known.
"The Catholic Church, exercising this consistent life ethic, is committed to various initiatives that provide vulnerable women with alternative choices to abortion, such as adoption," he said.
"The Catholic Church is also committed to building an environment, both within the Church and in the broader community, which strengthens the vulnerable and actively encourages positive behavior change."
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