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New South Wales Votes for Cloning, Archbishop Stands Fast

Cardinal Pell referes to "today's fashionable notion of the primacy of conscience, which is, of course secular relativism with a religious face."

By Peter J. Smith

SYDNEY, June 8, 2007 (LifeSiteNews.com) – Parliamentarians in the New South Wales (NSW) lower house voted 65-26 to lift a ban on human cloning that would allow researchers to clone and destroy human embryos for stem-cell research.

Yesterday’s conscience-vote saw NSW MPs reject appeals from a coalition of Christian leaders led by John Taylor, president of the Baptist Union of NSW, Anglican Archbishop of Sydney Peter Jensen, and the Catholic Archbishop George Cardinal Pell.

Cardinal Pell, however, gave a strong defense of the human life at stake in the ban and infuriated NSW politicians with his suggestion that Catholic MPs face “consequences” for voting to repeal the ban.

Premier Morris Iemma, and his deputy, John Watkins, both Catholics, nevertheless dismissed the Archbishop’s admonitions. They were joined by other Catholics defying Church teachings, including one MP who said he preferred to go to Hell rather than vote against repealing the ban on human cloning. (http://www.lifesitenews.com/ldn/2007/jun/07060607.html)

In a statement today Cardinal Pell decried the supposed “outrage” over hypothetical punishments for anti-life Catholic politicians as a “huge diversionary tactic” designed to focus the attention “away from the destruction of human life.”

“Most government efforts in Australia are backing the wrong horse,” observed Pell, who questioned why government has rejected the proven promise of adult-stem-cell research to finance embryonic stem-cell research, which has produced no cures, “except massive grants for the researchers.”
 
“All of us who wish to remain Catholics have to be measured against Catholic teaching,” said Pell. “To be a disciple of Christ means accepting discipline because the Catholic Church has never followed today's fashionable notion of the primacy of conscience, which is, of course secular relativism with a religious face.”
 
“In a pluralist democracy bishops are free to explain Catholic doctrines and discipline, while all individuals and legislators are free to accept or reject what is proposed,” reminded Pell.

“But actions have consequences, some of which follow naturally, some of which are imposed and just as members of a political party who cross the floor on critical issues don't expect to be rewarded and might be penalized, so it is in the Church.”

A number of politicians have acted in the name of pluralism to muzzle the shepherds of the Catholic Church in Australia. Archbishop Hickey of Perth has been placed under a parliamentary investigation for allegedly “threatening” to refuse communion to Catholic politicians who vote to enable cloning/embryonic stem-cell research.

Australia’s Prime Minister, John Howard, scoffed at notions that either Hickey or Pell were directing politicians and defended Pell’s actions.

"I find it rather ironic to hear a string of Labor Party members of the NSW Parliament complaining about alleged direction by Cardinal Pell when on a daily basis they are directed by trade union bosses how to vote," Howard said.

The Upper House will not take up repeal of the ban until the end of June.

See related coverage by LifeSiteNews.com:

Australian Archbishop Under Investigation for Telling Anti-Life Catholic Politicians not to Receive Communion
http://www.lifesitenews.com/ldn/2007/jun/07060708.html

Catholic Australian Politician would Rather "Go to Hell" than Back Down on Embryonic Stem Cell Issue
http://www.lifesitenews.com/ldn/2007/jun/07060607.html

Cardinal May Withhold Communion from NSW Premier for Supporting Cloning
http://www.lifesitenews.com/ldn/2007/jun/07060511.html

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