By Hilary White
DUBLIN, February 21, 2007 (LifeSiteNews.com) – The BBC reports that Polish President Lech Kaczynski commented during a state visit to Ireland that the human race “would disappear if homosexuality was freely promoted.” The comments acknowledged a link between natural sexual activity and the birth of children, and have aroused the ire of politicians who were quick to denounce him in the press as “homophobic.”
The president was speculating in the light of the current demographic crisis in a Europe that already has nearly total acceptance of homosexuality, contraception and abortion. “If that kind of approach to sexual life,” he said, “were to be promoted on a grand scale, the human race would disappear.”
He challenged Irish and European politicians to “imagine what grand changes would occur in mores if the traditional links between men and women were set aside.”
Senator David Norris, who founded the Campaign for Homosexual Law Reform with current President of Ireland Mary McAleese, condemned the comments calling them “ignorant, unsophisticated and a disgrace.”
Senator Mary Henry responded with puzzlement to his comments that the Irish and the Poles were very much alike. “I’m not so sure about that,” she told the Irish Independent. Poland and Ireland were until recently among the most robustly Catholic countries in Europe. In recent years, however, Ireland has followed the lead of the European secularizing trends.
The Mayor of Dublin, Vincent Jackson, said, “Those beliefs are of a bygone age.”
At Dublin Castle yesterday, President Kaczynski claimed that he is not prejudiced against homosexual persons, but that he would not allow the promotion of the homosexual lifestyle in Poland.
“Among my personal friends there are individuals affected by this different sexual orientation, or homosexuality, but they enjoy full rights, they are able to move forward in various spheres of life,” he said.
The Irish population, like that of nearly all post-Christian European countries, is shrinking and aging and coinciding with the growth of secularizing trends, is suffering a dropping birth rate. As of 2006, the total fertility rate in Ireland was 1.86 children born per woman, whereas the fertility rate for maintaining population stability is 2.1.