Catholic bishops in Spain slammed their country’s constitutional court this week for upholding a law allowing abortions for any reason up to 14 weeks, saying the ruling makes an unborn baby a “true undocumented person.”
The Catholic News Agency reports the bishops responded to the May 9 ruling by reminding the public that babies in the womb are human beings who have rights.
They said the Spanish high court ruling supports “an ideological, unscientific law that promotes inequality” and makes the unborn child “a true ‘undocumented’ candidate for expulsion from the mother’s womb.”
“Classifying the voluntary elimination of the life of an innocent human being as a right is always morally wrong,” the Catholic leaders continued.
The ruling upheld a 2010 law that allows unborn babies to be aborted for any reason up to 14 weeks in Spain.
According to CNA:
The same year that the law was passed, 20 legislators challenged its constitutionality in an appeal to the TC on the basis of Article 15 of the Spanish Constitution, which states that “everyone has the right to life and physical and moral integrity.” …
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In a May 9 press release, the [constitutional court] said its decision was based on the fact that “there is a gradual limitation of the constitutional rights of women depending on the progress of the pregnancy and the physiological-vital development of the fetus.”
But the Catholic bishops said the only way a “right to abortion” makes sense is if “the embryo or fetus were nothing; but the unborn child is not a thing, he is a human being.”
They also raised concerned about fathers who do not want their unborn children to be aborted, saying the ruling “infringes” on their rights and obligations to their children.
At the same time, the bishops also expressed sympathy and offered support to struggling mothers, reminding them of the church’s “unconditional support for women who suffer the consequences of an unwanted pregnancy.”
The bishops had a message for medical workers, too. They encouraged doctors and nurses to “exercise their right to conscientious and scientific objection” and refuse to participate in killing unborn babies.
And to the whole of society, the bishops called on everyone “to reject any attack on life and to continue working with courage and creativity to establish the much-needed culture of life.”
“It would be very serious to sit idly by thinking that nothing can be done anymore,” they said.
Abortions destroy tens of millions of unborn babies’ lives every year across the world. Estimates vary, but one report puts the number of abortions in 2022 at 44 million worldwide.
Assisted suicide and euthanasia that kill the elderly and people with disabilities also are growing problems across the world. Spain legalized euthanasia in 2021.
