Cardeal O'Malley sobre aborto, ser pró-vida e sobre adoção

 

For us, life is at the very center of our social teachings. Life is precious. It is a mystery. It must be nurtured, protected, the transmission of life is sacred. And our defense of human life is a great service to society. When the state begins to decide who is worthy of living and who isn’t, all human rights are put in jeopardy, but the voice of the church is very clear. And we’re not just saying that life is precious in the womb but life is precious when someone has Alzheimer’s when someone has AIDS when someone is poor when someone has mental illness. Their humanity is not diminished – and they have a claim on our love and on our services. So the church’s position is a very consistent one. It is a consistent life ethic. I don’t think that we are obsessed, however, when the New York Times is writing 20 articles a week about these things and make reference to the Church in half of those articles, it gives the impression. But I think in the parishes, these things are talks, in a routine way, in CCD classes, along with the rest of the Catholic doctrine but all of our teachings fit together. They’re part of a whole. There’s a consistency in our life ethic

 

 

On adoption:

 

“We need to change the culture of adoptions, too. So that people will have a different attitude towards adoption. When I was growing up, Americans all knew, had friends, relatives, classmates, who were adopted. Today, young Americans, very often, don’t know anyone who’s adopted. And if they do, it’s likely to be a Russian or a Chinese or a Guatemalan or from some other country, giving the impression that entrusting your child to another family is not something that Americans do. So we need to change that and also help the good stories about adoption to get out there. I mean, the bad stories get out there, the tragic stories, the Philomena stories get out there. We need to allow people who have adopted and loving families and are grateful for their birth mothers for making that heroic and generous decision to entrust them to another family - that has allowed them to lead a good and a happy life. Those stories need to get out there. It’s going to be solidarity and community that are going to be the real solutions to the situation of a difficult or an unwanted pregnancy. There are over a million abortions a year. There are plenty of babies but the women feel that giving their child up is abandoning their child and somehow that’s worse than having an abortion. We want to help women to see that that’s not necessarily so and that many of these people who have been entrusted to another family for an adoption have been very, very successful and had wonderful lives.”