By Hilary White
LISBON, January 24, 2007 (LifeSiteNews.com) – Portugal’s Conference of Catholic Bishops, while issuing a “pastoral note” to encourage a “no” vote, has refrained from directly instructing priests to preach against the coming push to legalise abortion. With a socialist-led referendum looming February 11, however, various lay groups and individual priests and bishops are taking up the challenge nonetheless.
On Jan. 10, the Portugal Bishops’ Conference said it was up to individual bishops to “review the best way to proceed.” The bishops’ pastoral note gives “five reasons to defend life and a basic document during this phase when people will clear their conscience.”
Portugal’s next abortion referendum question reads: “Do you agree that abortions, carried out in the first 10 weeks of pregnancy, with the woman’s consent, in a legal medical establishment, should no longer be illegal?”
To change the current law, the vote must be at least 50 per cent in favour and have 50 per cent voter turnout. The 1998 referendum maintained the abortion restrictions by only 2 per cent but the vote was rendered void when only 32 per cent of the country’s voters participated.
Employing the US abortion movement’s customary slogans, socialist Prime Minister Jose Socrates said the government sought to legalise abortion to “bring an end to the persecution of women” and “the prevalence of back-alley abortions.”
Agence France-Presse (AFP) reports that the political space left by the Episcopal Conference is being filled by lay groups and some individual bishops and priests have not hesitated to use their authority to encourage a “no” vote.
Last week the patriarch of Lisbon Patriarch, Cardinal Jose da Cruz Policarpo, called abortion, “an attack on civilization.” Another, the bishop of Guarda, called abortion an “abominable crime.”
The Catholic Family group distributed a letter into 2 million mailboxes that called on Portuguese devotion to the Virgin of Fatima, saying, “The Virgin cries for the thousands of innocents who lose their lives before even their first wail.” Human Life International is aiding local pro-life groups to increase public awareness of the dangers with television and billboard ads.
AFP quotes Canon Tarcissio Fernandes Alves, pastor of Castelo de Vide parish, who said in the parish bulletin, “Christians who vote ‘yes’ expose themselves automatically to an excommunication.”
“Those who abstain from the vote are committing the very greatest of mortal sins which will forbid them from mass.”
While Portugal remains on paper a strongly Catholic country with approximately 94 per cent of its population claiming adherence to the Church, in practice only about 1/3 of the Catholic population attends Mass regularly. Anticlericalism and Marxism have been significant forces in Portuguese politics throughout the 20th century and since the 1974 revolution Portugal’s Catholic bishops have largely refrained from taking a robust political role or making serious political demands of their flock.
With the decline of Catholic influence in politics and social life it has been easier for international abortion promoting organizations to disseminate pro-abortion propaganda uncontested.
One British umbrella group, Abortion Rights UK, issued a press release today saying it has disseminated “pro-choice” material to Portuguese media urging a change in the law and using language that matches that of Prime Minister Socrates.
Despite all this, a recent poll published in Correio da Manha showed that support for further liberalisation of abortion restrictions is dropping. 57 per cent of respondents said they would vote to allow abortion in the first 10 weeks of pregnancy, down from 64.1 per cent since December 7.
At the moment, abortion is only allowed in Portugal in cases of rape and serious medical concerns for the mother or in cases of foetal disability. Like most post-Christian European countries, Portugal is suffering from a birth rate of 1.47% children born per woman, well below that required to maintain its population.
Read previous LifeSiteNews.com coverage:
Majority of Portuguese (64%) Support Lifting Ban on Abortion, New Poll Shows
https://www.lifesitenews.com/ldn/2007/jan/07010810.html