A reader asks:
What is the Church’s position on legal abortion in the case of AIDS?
Response:
Dear Sir:
Abortion, whatever the circumstances in which the fetus finds itself and whatever its state of health, is always an aggravated homicide.
In Pope John Paul II’s Encyclical Evangelium vitae, you can read (no. 58): “Procured abortion is the deliberate and direct killing, by whatever means it is carried out, of a human being in the initial phase of his or her existence, extending from conception to birth. The moral gravity of procured abortion is apparent in all its truth if we recognize that we are dealing with murder and, in particular, when we consider the specific elements involved.
1º The one eliminated is a human being at the very beginning of life. No one more absolutely innocent could be imagined. In no way could this human being ever be considered an aggressor, much less an unjust aggressor!
2º He or she is weak, defenceless, even to the point of lacking that minimal form of defence consisting in the poignant power of a newborn baby’s cries and tears.
3º The unborn child is totally entrusted to the protection and care of the woman carrying him or her in the womb. And yet sometimes it is precisely the mother herself who makes the decision and asks for the child to be eliminated, and who then goes about having it done.
It is true that the decision to have an abortion is often tragic and painful for the mother, insofar as the decision to rid herself of the fruit of conception is not made for purely selfish reasons or out of convenience, but out of a desire to protect certain important values such as her own health or a decent standard of living for the other members of the family. Sometimes it is feared that the child to be born would live in such conditions that it would be better if the birth did not take place. Nevertheless, these reasons and others like them, however serious and tragic, can never justify the deliberate killing of an innocent human being.”
This last sentence, concerning the possible poor health conditions of the unborn child, answers your question.
As for legislation that approves abortion in certain cases (for example, in the case of a child with AIDS or of parents with AIDS), I remind you of what the Declaration on Procured Abortion of the Sacred Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith states, no. 22: “It must be quite clear that a Christian can never conform to a law that is immoral in itself; such is the case of a law that would admit in principle the liceity of abortion. A Christian can neither take part in a campaign of opinion in favour of such a law, nor give it his vote, nor collaborate in its application.” That is why John Paul II has said: “a law which violates an innocent person’s natural right to life is unjust and, as such, is not valid as a law” (Evangelium vitae, 90).
Author: Fr. Miguel Ángel Fuentes
Source: The Theologian Responds
