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Vatican Academy for Life Calls For “Brave Conscientious Objection” to protect life

Doctors, nurses, druggists and administrative staff, judges and politicians urged to take stand

By Hilary White

ROME, March 16, 2007 (LifeSiteNews.com) – The Vatican’s Pontifical Academy for Life yesterday issued the document generated from last month’s conference on the theme “Christian conscience in support of the right to life.”

The document specified, “An indispensable requirement of justice is respect for the principle of equality, which requires the protection of everyone's rights, especially of the weakest and most defenceless.”

The conference called for the “mobilization” of all those concerned with human life that must extend to the political field. “More and more various attacks on human life,” strong pressure from activist organizations, court rulings and legislation opposed to the sanctity of life, were cited as the challenges facing Christians and others in the health care professions.

Quoting Pope Benedict, who had addressed the assembly, the document called for “brave conscientious objection” on the part of doctors, nurses, druggists and administrative staff, judges and parliamentarians. The assembly had specifically addressed the problem of “emergency contraception” that creates an abortion in the earliest moments of pregnancy.

Citing a “crisis of authority” as a major difficulty, the statement highlighted the need for an ongoing “formation and deepening of the conscience” according to Christian principles: “The light of reason illuminated from the faith.”

Christians are faced with the challenge of forming a correct conscience while immersed in a culture dominated by “the loss of the faith and often one tendency to shelter itself in shapes of extreme rationalism”

The Vatican conference, held February 23 to 24, was attended by approximately 420 scholars and members of the Academy.

Read the document (Italian):
http://www.vatican.va/roman_curia/pontifical_academies/acdlife/documents/rc_pont...

Read previous LifeSiteNews.com coverage:
Pontifical Academy for Life Will Address Moral Implication of Artificially Conceived Human Embryos
http://www.lifesitenews.com/ldn/2006/feb/06020710.html

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