By John-Henry Westen
CORNWALL, ON, October 18, 2006 (LifeSiteNews.com) – In an interview with LifeSiteNews.com today, Bishop Ronald Fabbro of London, spoke about the deliberations of the Canadian bishops currently meeting in Cornwall for their annual plenary session.Â
Bishop Fabbro, who is President of the Catholic Organization for Life and Family (COLF) told LifeSiteNews.com that the Pope had encouraged the Canadian bishops, in their recent ‘ad limina’ visits with him, to speak out on issues of life and family, and to refuse to be silenced.“We as bishops have been encouraged in our ad limina visits not to be sidelined on this and that we need to be speaking up,” he said.
The bishops addressed matters of life and family and Catholics in political life, but, said the bishop, it was a matter of pastoral discussion of issues rather than making resolutions.Â
Asked if the Canadian Bishops would be taking action on Rome’s direction to refuse communion to obstinately pro-abortion Catholic politicians, Bishop Fabbro said “no, we haven’t made a decision to do that.” He explained that in the area of life and family and politics, “we didn’t have any specific resolutions, it was to deepen our understanding and have an opportunity as bishops to talk pastorally about the issues that we have been facing.”
“What we discussed as bishops was the role that we have in formation of conscience,” he said. Asked about some Catholic politicians and lay people who try to justify support for abortion by appeals to conscience, the Bishop dismissed these as not being intellectually honest. “The pope talks about how reason becomes blind, and I think we experience that in our society,” said Bishop Fabbro.“People are taking a very secular mentality, they’re formed by the culture and that’s how [they develop] their opinions about different ethical issues. That is not what the Church talks about when she talks about formation of conscience – genuinely searching the depths of our being to see how God is enlightening us about those authentically human values.”
“I think the role of our church is to help people truly form their conscience correctly,” said the COLF President. “I think we have to be careful when forming conscience,” he concluded.
LifeSiteNews.com asked about distinctions some Catholics make with regard to election issues suggesting that concerns such as engagement in war and the death penalty are on par with abortion and euthanasia, in terms of priority in political decision making.Â
The Bishop disagreed with such an approach saying, when it comes to “abortion and euthanasia, we have to see those as fundamental human rights that need to take precedence in our formation of conscience – because all of our other rights are based on the right to life. So I think we do have to be careful about indicating a priority there – a priority when voting.”
The bishop’s comments in that regard echo the sentiments of now-Pope Benedict XVI. Prior to his election, then-Cardinal Ratzinger intervened into the US Bishops Conference task force on Catholics in political life with a document saying: “There may be a legitimate diversity of opinion even among Catholics about waging war and applying the death penalty, but not however with regard to abortion and euthanasia.” (see the full documents here: https://www.lifesitenews.com/ldn/2005/apr/050419a.html )
Bishop Fabbro concluded the interview stressing the need for close relationships between bishops and the pro-life movement.“We do have important partners in the pro-life movement we need to be working with,” he said.