Last weekend Pope Francis set aside his notes during a talk to an Italian family association and spoke from the heart about abortion. Perhaps he had been stung by suggestions that he should have intervened in last month’s referendum in Ireland and this month’s abortion debate in his homeland, Argentina. But whatever the reason, he spoke out last Saturday in the strongest terms since his election, comparing the abortion of children with disabilities to Nazi efforts to “improve” German stock. “Last century, the whole world was scandalised by what the Nazis did to purify the race,” he said. “Today, we do the same thing but with white gloves.”
His comments were picked up by newspapers across the world. Not, it must be said, because of his denunciation of abortion, but because of his reference to Nazism. He is not, however, the first pope to invoke the Third Reich when presenting the pro-life case. As early as 1951, Pope Pius XII argued that those who sought the destruction of what they considered “life without value” had the same mindset as the Nazis who eliminated those with “some physical or mental defect”. And in a letter to an American cardinal in 1997, Pope John Paul II described abortion as a “continuing holocaust of innocent human lives”.
The media reaction to Pope Francis’s comments showed that linking abortion to Nazism still has shock value. Yet this may be diminishing as the Holocaust passes from living memory. Also, the so-called reductio ad Hitlerum – however valid – is nowadays regarded as a sign of desperation.
Pope Francis did not simply equate present-day practices with Nazism. Rather, he said that society tolerated a “white glove” version of eugenics. This was an intriguing phrase, suggesting both aristocratic fastidiousness and clinical coldness.
Perhaps Francis was thinking of countries such as Iceland where people with Down’s syndrome have been almost eliminated via pre-natal testing. Or maybe he had in mind England, where eugenics flourished in the 19th century and where today abortion of disabled children is permitted up to birth. Regardless, the Pope’s words are likely to rattle consciences which, even after decades of legal abortion, remain uneasy. He has identified an unresolved tension in Western societies between the conviction that all human beings are equally valuable and an emphasis on physical perfection. Pursuing the latter, through ever more accurate pre-natal tests, undermines the former.
Even if the Church were able to persuade society that abortion on the grounds of disability was morally wrong, much work would remain. Such abortions only account for a small number of the 194,668 terminations that took place in England and Wales in 2017. According to Government records, 3,158 of those were “due to the risk that the child would be born seriously handicapped”.
But we should not despair: social attitudes can change dramatically thanks to the courage and commitment of small groups. Like Pope Francis, we should fight vigorously for a world in which disabled children are welcomed rather than rejected.
Last week the ship Aquarius, operated by the charity Doctors without Borders, picked up a group of migrants in the Mediterranean at a spot some 27 nautical miles away from Malta and 35 nautical miles from Sicily. Both the Maltese and Italian governments refused the ship permission to dock. Eventually, the Aquarius had to make the more than 900-mile journey to Spain, where the migrants were finally able to land at Valencia.
The Italian government, newly installed after lengthy negotiations, came to power promising to stem the tide of immigrants entering Italy. Its refusal to accept the Aquarius, while widely condemned as inhumane, was hardly surprising. The Italian government thought it would lose all credibility if it had let the ship dock.
Moreover, the Italians do have a point, in that they have been left to cope with more than their fair share of immigrants, and the task of integrating them, contrary to promises made by their European partners.
The Maltese government could also fairly point out that it has done its bit already and that Malta, one of the most densely populated countries on earth as well as the smallest in the European Union, has reached saturation point.
While Spain’s actions have garnered praise from many, including Pope Francis, there is one question that no one seems to be asking: why were the migrants not returned to their point of origin, namely Libya? That they were not, presumably tells us that Libya is not considered a safe country, and that we have a moral duty to help as many people as we can to leave it. But if this is so, what are the implications for those countries on the front line, like Malta and Italy?
One can blame the Italian action on its populist government, but Malta’s government is socialist, and has seemingly escaped blame so far. And the pressing question remains: how is Europe to absorb the almost limitless numbers who wish to enter?
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