Politics
Tuesday January 29, 2008
Mother Teresa's Successor Adds Voice to Vatican Call for Moratorium on Abortion
TODAY'S HEADLINES
E-MAIL
PRINT
By Hilary White
CALCUTTA, January 29, 2008 (LifeSiteNews.com) - Sr. Nirmala Joshi, the sister who succeeded the beatified Mother Teresa of Calcutta as head of the religious order the latter founded, has called for a moratorium on abortion to match a recently agreed UN declaration on the death penalty.
Sr. Nirmala called abortion "the greatest destroyer of peace". Speaking to AsiaNews, Sr. Nirmala said, "The culture of life loves life and protects life, promoting love, beauty, joy and peace - says Sr. Nirmala - The culture of death destroys life and sows hatred, discord and unhappiness…..The choice is ours".
The concept that abortion is directly related to war, is one often attributed to a comment made by Mother Teresa: "The greatest destroyer of peace today is abortion, because it is a war against the child - a direct killing of the innocent child - murder by the mother herself."
"If we accept that a mother can kill even her own child, how can we tell other people not to kill one another?"
The Missionaries of Charity are famed around the world for their work with the "poorest of the poor", particularly with children and infants abandoned in the lowest economic strata of Indian society.
The comments by Sr. Nirmala come in conjunction with a movement to abolish the death penalty by the UN. The UN General Assembly adopted a "non-binding moratorium," urging countries that maintain the death penalty to suspend its application.
The idea of expanding on the UN's resolution to include a moratorium on abortion was first formulated by Italian journalist, Giuliano Ferrara, director of the daily newspaper "Foglio" and a non-Christian former Communist Party leader. It was quickly taken up by the Vatican, but also by Lenin Raghavarshi, an Indian atheist and winner of the Gwangju Prize for Human Rights. The Korean Catholic Bishops Conference joined the movement with a statement that the "logical conclusion" of the UN death penalty moratorium is to "extend it to a moratorium on abortion."
Read related LifeSiteNews.com coverage:
Editorial: Poland, the Pope, and the Death Penalty
http://www.lifesitenews.com/ldn/2008/jan/08010802.html
Vatican-led Global Anti-Abortion Campaign Finds Unusual Supporters
http://www.lifesitenews.com/ldn/2008/jan/08012802.html
Back to TopLatest Headlines
- Cardinal Rigali: You Can't Claim to be "Reducing Abortions" but Publicly Funding them in D.C.
- General Electric to Use Embryonic Stem Cells for Testing, Phase out Lab Rats
- Ohio Supreme Court Allows Planned Parenthood to Conceal Abortion Records in Sexual Abuse Case
- LifeSiteNews Canada Day and Independence Day Message. Taking a few days off. LSN returns Monday July 6
- Heroically Pro-Life Brazilian Archbishop's Resignation Accepted Under Cloud of Vatican Newspaper Misrepresentation
- Pro-Life Groups Announce New Colorado Personhood Initiative
- Judge Puts Kibosh on DC Gay "Marriage" Referendum
- Al Franken Win Hands Supermajority to Senate Democrats
- Group Funded by Canadian Bishops' D&P Joins with Others to Denounce the "Natural Family" and "Family Rights"
- Financially Troubled Planned Parenthood of El Paso Closes Doors
- Abortion Linked to Subsequent Pre-Term Births, New Research Again Confirms
- New Orleans Homosexual Couple Ask Fed. Court to Overturn Marriage Amendment
- Slim Hope Of New Ontario Progressive Conservative Party Leader Promoting Pro-Life, Pro-Family Issues
- Pope Accepts Resignation of Bishop Caught Involved in Homosexual Encounters
- Young Children Removed from UK Schools for "Inappropriate Sexual Behaviour"
- Northern Ireland Politician Cleared of Wrongdoing after Reiterating Christian Teaching on Homosexual Acts
- UK Conservative Leader Speaks at Gay Pride Fundraiser
- More Letters to the Editor on Canadian Catholic Development and Peace Scandal (July 1)
- Letters to the Editor - Readers Respond to Development and Peace Scandal
- Watch This Dramatic New Video on Catholic Bishops Conference Funding of Pro-Abortion Groups
Most Read this Week
- Homosexual Duke U. Director Charged with Offering Adopted 5-Year-Old for Sex
- Famed Fr. Corapi Calls Canadian Bishops' Dissent from Humanae Vitae "Catastrophic"
- Pope: It is a Childish Faith to Oppose the Church Teaching on Life and Family
- Heroically Pro-Life Brazilian Archbishop's Resignation Accepted Under Cloud of Vatican Newspaper Misrepresentation
- LifeSiteNews Detailed Response to Canadian Bishops' Whitewash Report on Development and Peace
- General Electric to Use Embryonic Stem Cells for Testing, Phase Out Lab Rats
- Young Children Removed from UK Schools for "Inappropriate Sexual Behaviour"
- Is Pro-Choice the New Pro-Life?
- Swedish Parents Won't Tell if Child is Boy or Girl as Gender Experiment
- Cardinal Rigali: You Can't Claim to be "Reducing Abortions" but Publicly Funding them in D.C.
MORE NEWS: 
LifeSiteNews.com Home Page Last 10 Days Archives Special Reports
Copyright © LifeSiteNews.com. This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-No Derivatives License. You may republish this article or portions of it without request provided the content is not altered and it is clearly attributed to "LifeSiteNews.com". Any website publishing of complete or large portions of original LifeSiteNews articles MUST additionally include a live link to www.LifeSiteNews.com. The link is not required for excerpts. Republishing of articles on LifeSiteNews.com from other sources as noted is subject to the conditions of those sources.