If Francis were authentically pro-life, he would condemn the murderous Castro regime

Carlos Eire notes how Francis is once again exposing himself as a hypocrite. He writes: "Once again, Papa Che has come out swinging against an evil, heartless capitalist figure.

Yet, he remains totally silent on evil, heartless socialist and communist dictators.

Papa Che has condemned the Trumpinator for his elimination of the DACA carte blanche to illegal immigrant children.

Granted, he is constantly probed by the left-leaning press on issues such as this, so he can make pronouncements against those who don’t lean left.

In other words, he is provided with more opportunities to criticize capitalist democracies than leftist tyrannies.

So, journalists are partly responsible for prompting and reporting Papa Che’s swipes at capitalist democracies.

Yet, when he visits countries where there is plenty of heartless un-Christian totalitarian abuse of power going on, he says nothing, nada, nichts, zero, null, rien, niente…"

Mr. Eire cites The Daily Mail:


"Pope picks a fight with Trump saying president can’t be pro-life life if he ended DACA

Pope Francis has gone after President Trump over yet another controversial immigration issue, saying if the president is ‘pro-life’ then he should reconsider his order to rescind DACA."

No one can accuse Francis of being a scholar.  But even this dim light should be capable of understanding No. 2273 of The Catechism of the Catholic Church:

"The inalienable right to life of every innocent human individual is a constitutive element of a civil society and its legislation:

"The inalienable rights of the person must be recognized and respected by civil society and the political authority. These human rights depend neither on single individuals nor on parents; nor do they represent a concession made by society and the state; they belong to human nature and are inherent in the person by virtue of the creative act from which the person took his origin. Among such fundamental rights one should mention in this regard every human being's right to life and physical integrity from the moment of conception until death."

"The moment a positive law deprives a category of human beings of the protection which civil legislation ought to accord them, the state is denying the equality of all before the law. When the state does not place its power at the service of the rights of each citizen, and in particular of the more vulnerable, the very foundations of a state based on law are undermined. . . ."

If Francis were authentically pro-life, he would condemn the murderous Castro regime.  Not only has he failed to do so, but this Pharisee has welcomed Raul Castro at the Vatican with open arms. See here.

Is Francis authentically pro-life?

Is Francis authentically pro-life or does he tacitly promote the Culture of Death? At the Catholic Monitor, this question is examined.  See here.

In the Encyclical Pacem in Terris, John XXIII pointed out that "it is generally accepted today that the common good is best safeguarded when personal rights and duties are guaranteed. The chief concern of civil authorities must therefore be to ensure that these rights are recognized, respected, co-ordinated, defended and promoted, and that each individual is enabled to perform his duties more easily. For to safeguard the inviolable rights of the human person, and to facilitate the performance of his duties, is the principal duty of every public authority'. Thus any government which refused to recognize human rights or acted in violation of them, would not only fail in its duty; its decrees would be wholly lacking in binding force".

The doctrine on the necessary conformity of civil law with the moral law is in continuity with the whole tradition of the Church. This is clear once more from John XXIII's Encyclical: "Authority is a postulate of the moral order and derives from God. Consequently, laws and decrees enacted in contravention of the moral order, and hence of the divine will, can have no binding force in conscience...; indeed, the passing of such laws undermines the very nature of authority and results in shameful abuse".

This is the clear teaching of Saint Thomas Aquinas, who writes that "human law is law inasmuch as it is in conformity with right reason and thus derives from the eternal law. But when a law is contrary to reason, it is called an unjust law; but in this case it ceases to be a law and becomes instead an act of violence". And again: "Every law made by man can be called a law insofar as it derives from the natural law. But if it is somehow opposed to the natural law, then it is not really a law but rather a corruption of the law".

Now the first and most immediate application of this teaching concerns a human law which disregards the fundamental right and source of all other rights which is the right to life, a right belonging to every individual. Consequently, laws which legitimize the direct killing of innocent human beings through abortion or euthanasia are in complete opposition to the inviolable right to life proper to every individual; they thus deny the equality of everyone before the law. It might be objected that such is not the case in euthanasia, when it is requested with full awareness by the person involved. But any State which made such a request legitimate and authorized it to be carried out would be legalizing a case of suicide-murder, contrary to the fundamental principles of absolute respect for life and of the protection of every innocent life.

In this way the State contributes to lessening respect for life and opens the door to ways of acting which are destructive of trust in relations between people. Laws which authorize and promote abortion and euthanasia are therefore radically opposed not only to the good of the individual but also to the common good; as such they are completely lacking in authentic juridical validity. Disregard for the right to life, precisely because it leads to the killing of the person whom society exists to serve, is what most directly conflicts with the possibility of achieving the common good. Consequently, a civil law authorizing abortion or euthanasia ceases by that very fact to be a true, morally binding civil law.

Abortion and euthanasia are thus crimes which no human law can claim to legitimize. There is no obligation in conscience to obey such laws; instead there is a grave and clear obligation to oppose them by conscientious objection*. From the very beginnings of the Church, the apostolic preaching reminded Christians of their duty to obey legitimately constituted public authorities (cf. Rom 13:1-7; 1 Pet 2:13-14), but at the same time it firmly warned that "we must obey God rather than men" (Acts 5:29)."

We must obey God rather than men. Does Francis believe this?  Such would not appear to be the case.

*  See here.

Mr. Jerry Benitz has forgotten this truth

Mr. Jerry Benitz, an individual who leaves many comments at the Bryan Hehir Exposed Blog, and who has been critical of Pope Benedict XVI at that very same forum, has suggested that Professor Fakhri Maluf was some sort of dry martyr who was persecuted by the Church for defending the dogma "Outside the Church there is no salvation."  He writes, "Br. Francis was one of the four Boston College professors who brought the charge of heresy against the school for teaching salvation outside the Church, the famous 'Boston Heresy Case.'  Brother (Prof. Maluf) suffered for his courage." (See here).

This is, of course, sheer nonsense.  Professor Maluf ran into trouble with Boston College and with the Church for insisting that the Church's interpretation of "Outside the Church there is no salvation" - Extra ecclesiam nulla salus - is incorrect and that Father Leonard Feeney's interpretation of this dogma is the correct one.

In a letter of the Holy Office to Archbishop Cushing of Boston dated August 8, 1949, the Holy Office explained that the Catholic Church is necessary for salvation because of the command of Christ and also because the Church is a necessary means for salvation. However, it was explained that since the Church is such a means only by divine institution and not by intrinsic necessity, that formal membership in the Church is not required of all men under all circumstances: "The infallible dictum which teaches us that outside the Church there is no salvation, is among the truths that the Church has always taught and will always teach. But this dogma is to be understood as the Church itself understands it. For Our Savior did not leave it to private judgment to explain what is contained in the deposit of faith, but to the doctrinal authority of the Church....Of those helps to salvation that are ordered to the last end only by divine decree, not by intrinsic necessity, God, in his infinite mercy, willed that such effects of those helps as are necessary to salvation can, in certain circumstances, be obtained when the helps are used only in desire or longing. We see this clearly stated in the Council of Trent about the sacrament of regeneration and about the sacrament of penance."

This is the teaching of the Catechism of the Catholic Church, which tells us that: "God has bound salvation to the sacrament of Baptism, but he himself is not bound by his sacraments." (CCC, 1257).

Mr. Benitz has forgotten this truth: "..the task of authentically interpreting the Word of God, whether written or handed on, has been entrusted exclusively to the living teaching office of the Church, whose authority is exercised in the name of Jesus Christ." (Dogmatic Constitution on Divine Revelation (Dei Verbum) No. 10.

More on Professor Maluf's legacy here.

More on the Saint Benedict Center in Richmond, New Hampshire and Holocaust denial here.