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Vatican Supports International Criminal Court With Symbolic Donation

Pro-lifers Around the Globe Dismayed

Life Special Report - July 5, 2002

NEW YORK, July 5, 2002 (LSN.ca) - Pro-lifers around the globe were dismayed Monday at the Vatican's welcoming of the establishment of the International Criminal Court (ICC). Archbishop Renato Martino, the Vatican's representative at the United Nations issued a release in support of the ICC and noted that the Vatican had contributed a symbolic donation of $3,000 to the ICC trust fund set up by UN Secretary General Kofi Annan.

Pro-life lobbyists who attended the United Nations conferences leading up to the ICC's creation and have closely followed its progress have warned from its inception about the dangers of the ICC. Gwen Landolt, a lawyer with REAL Women Canada has been following the development of the ICC very closely. Landolt, an experienced UN lobbyist, told LifeSite that in an ideal world the ICC may make for a superb way of dealing with the Pol Pot's and Milosevic's of this world. However, she warned that the ICC is far from ideal. While the Vatican's worldview would be one based on Christian morality, the ICC, warns Landolt, is based on radical feminist ideology.

"Integrated all through the ICC document is feminist ideology," said Landolt. "The ICC will not be open to anything but a feminist interpretation since the prosecutor and the prosecutor's staff must be educated on gender issues." The gender feminist ideology is so far removed from Christian morality that it is in fact antagonistic to it. For example, while Christian morality would see the defence of life of the unborn as part of "human rights", feminist ideology sees a woman's right to choose abortion as an essential aspect of women's and thus human rights.

The Vatican has recognized the disparity in the vision of a world order from the perspective of the United Nations and from a Christian perspective. Writing in the Italian newspaper Avvenire in 2000, Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger, prefect of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, denounced the UN vision of a "new world order." Ratzinger noted that "at the base of this New World Order" is the ideology of "women's empowerment," which erroneously sees "the principal obstacles to [a woman's] fulfillment [as] the family and maternity." The cardinal advised that "at this stage of the development of the new image of the new world, Christians - and not just them, but in any case they even more than others - have the duty to protest." ( http://www.lifesitenews.com/ldn/2000/sep/00091801.html )

Landolt warned that the ICC is "a very dangerous thing" and suggested that "the Pope could be called before the ICC." Landolt's comments echo those of Dr. Richard G. Wilkins, Professor of Law at Brigham Young University. Wilkins, a leading authority on the ICC who regularly acts as legal counsel for pro-family NGOs (non-governmental organizations) at the United Nations, told LifeSite that the ICC could eventually be used to try "the Pope or other religious leaders" since issues such as abortion and homosexuality would inevitably fall within the ICC's jurisdiction. He explained that the ICC "currently is without sufficient checks and balances. It has the most powerful prosecutor ever with the vaguest criminal statute passed anywhere. The ICC leaves open to total discretion of the prosecutor and the court the determining of what the 'crimes' mean." ( http://www.lifesitenews.com/ldn/2002/feb/02021201.html )

The possibility that the ICC could try the Pope is hardly far fetched. Pro-abortion groups have long planned to use the ICC to force abortion on countries and individuals unwilling to bend to other pressures. At the UN Beijing +5 Prepcom in 2000, at a panel discussion, Rhonda Copelon of the International Women's Human Rights Law Clinic, who served as the chief ICC legal strategist for the powerful UN Women's Caucus for Gender Justice, said the court was a "tool" that will serve as a "model" that she said "can be used to change domestic laws" to conform with feminist goals. ( http://www.lifesitenews.com/ldn/2000/mar/00030905.html )

During the preparatory conferences for the ICC, the UN Women's Caucus for Gender Justice released a pamphlet which proposed that "withholding abortion from raped women should be explicitly defined as a war crime and a crime against humanity." International Planned Parenthood followed up on this tack in June 2000 accusing the Pope and the Catholic Church of war crimes. "The opinion and actions of the Holy See in regard to sexual and reproductive health and rights are seen by many as a kind of war, a war that contributes to the suffering and deaths of millions of innocent people, a war not conducted with guns and fire but with condemnation and psychological terror," said the IPPF letter. ( http://www.lifesitenews.com/ldn/2000/jun/00063005.html )

In March 2002 a German artist launched a suit against the pope for the Church's stand against using condoms. Karl-Friedrich Lentze filed a case at the International Court in The Hague arguing that the Pope "should be made responsible for the deaths of countless people" since, according to Lentze, the Pope's stand against condoms shows "significant contempt and arrogance towards human life". ( http://www.lifesitenews.com/ldn/2002/mar/02030504.html )

The Holy See Mission's press release on the ICC did not convey the disagreement within the Vatican on the ICC. It was the Vatican itself which fought strenuously at the United Nations to ensure the yet to be established court did not make refusal of abortion a crime and that it maintained normal exemptions for the secrecy of confession to a priest. The secrecy of the confessional was passed only after intense negotiations and over the objections of such prominent countries as France and Canada. ( http://www.lifesitenews.com/ldn/1999/aug/99081803.html )

A Roman Curia document by Archbishop Jean-Louis Tauran, the right-hand man of the Vatican Secretary of State Cardinal Sodano explains that during the ICC negotiations some countries "wanted to include an explicit reference to 'forced pregnancy' in the list of crimes against humanity. Since the term could be interpreted as a justification of abortion, either in situations of armed conflict or as a precedent for other situations, the Holy See, after unsuccessfully attempting to have the term deleted or replaced, asked that it be clearly defined. The crime was thus given a foothold in international law, but with no reference to a right to abortion." (The Defence of Life in the Context of International Policies and Norms by H. E. Mons. Jean-Louis Tauran, http://www.vatican.va/roman_curia/secretariat_state/documents/rc_seg-st_doc_2000... )

Archbishop Martino in his release in support of the ICC quoted from a 1998 statement of the pope on the ICC. However, in the pope's supportive statement he included a qualifier: "I hope that the work of this important meeting will be inspired by a desire to provide for the adequate defence of fundamental and inalienable human rights." Thus support for the ICC by the Pope comes when the ICC provides for the defence of the unborn who according to the Pope's constantly repeated teaching have the inalienable right to life. ( http://www.vatican.va/holy_father/john_paul_ii/angelus/1998/documents/hf_jp-ii_a... )

Should the ICC be dominated by pro-abortion gender feminists the Vatican takes a much different stance. A 2001 report by the Pontifical Academy of Social Sciences which addresses the ICC cautions that "An elite-dominated ICC would be no better and perhaps worse than national judicial processes." http://www.vatican.va/roman_curia/pontifical_academies/acdscien/documents/acta7-...

Jim Hughes, national president of Campaign Life Coalition Canada and a member of the board of International Right to Life told LifeSite that Vatican support for the ICC can be compared to the former Vatican support for UNICEF. "The Vatican gives token support to organizations that are potentially good. With UNICEF they supported it until the pro-life movement presented evidence that UNICEF was supporting anti-life activities after which the Vatican finally had to pull their symbolic donation and urge UNICEF to reform." UNICEF not only did not reform but dropped pretences and became bolder in participating in contraception, abortion and third world de-population programs.

See LifeSite UNICEF page which includes the Vatican's 1996 release to UNICEF expressing its displeasure with the organization.
http://www.lifesite.net/waronfamily/unicef/

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