Polish cardinal Criticizes Plans to Legalize Abortion, Gay Partnerships

WARSAW, October 22, 2003 (CWNews.com/LifeSiteNews.com) – Cardinal Jozef Glemp of Warsaw, primate of Poland, this week criticized government plans to grant legal recognition to homosexual relationships and to weaken the country’s abortion laws. He was commenting on announced plans by ruling parties to introduce the bills in the parliament.  Prime Minister Leszek Miller’s Democratic Left Alliance (SLD) pledged to grant special rights to homosexuals and allow more abortions in new laws after the 2001 general election. But those plans were shelved in order to win the Catholic Church’s backing for Poland’s accession to the European Union.  But now a group of SLD lawmakers want to make good on their election promises, although it is unclear whether they have the backing of the party leadership. The European Union has already put pressure on Poland to legalize abortion.  Before a meeting of Polish bishops last week, Cardinal Glemp commented on the drive to grant legal rights to gay couples. “It is something very depressing for me, as it is something incompatible with human nature,” Cardinal Glemp said. “I just can’t stand men kissing. Maybe I’m old-fashioned.”  Pro-abortion SLD deputy Izabela Sierakowska retorted, “If the Primate has anything against men who like kissing each other, I could ask maliciously: ‘Why did God create them that way?”’  In 1993, Poland outlawed abortion on demand, which had been legal under Communism. It is now allowed when a pregnancy threatens the health or life of the mother, when it results from rape or incest, or when the unborn child is developmentally impaired.