Information service of the Pontifical Mission Societies since 1927
San Salvador (Agenzia Fides) – October 29-31, San Salvador will host the 18th Ibero-American Summit on “Youth and Development,” an important topic, considering the fact that there are over 150 million youth living in the ibero-american region. However, the Church is showing its concern as to the content and values that will be promoted at the Summit, in terms of their forcing nations on the continent to adopt abortion, the “right” to sexual self-determination and gender ideology, among other things. The plan has been described as “anti-life and anti-family” by many parents' associations.
Archbishop Fernando Saenz Lacalle of San Salvador has asked authorities to inform society on the issues to be addressed at the Summit, as “many of the documents that have 'leaked' out and that touch upon natural law, the nation's Constitution, and the moral principals and values that the great majority of the El Salvadorian people esteem.” He has also expressed his concern for “the lack of clarity in the aims of the upcoming Iber-American Summit on the Youth.”
The Archbishop has also launched an appeal to Ibero-American presidents, asking that they include the the topic of human values in their discussion on rights for the youth. He explains that the Summit in and of itself is a good thing, as the topic of the youth is an important one, however its effectiveness will be valued in as much as the Presidents of the nations “include the defense of human values, especially in reference to the family, in their discussion.” He also asked that “the decisions made are in favor of an authentic education and not a perversion, which is a possibility” and that “all commitments made in this field take into account the norms established by the Constitution and the legal system of each country,” which is a position that has been defended by several nations in the region, to avoid that the ideology of those who make the decisions at the Convention, do not impose themselves on the other sovereign nations.
In the meantime, five Latin American and Spanish organizations have launched a joint campaign to alert citizens and ask the leaders in the region not to sign the accords of the Ibero-American Summit and the Ibero-American Convention on the Rights of the Youth. According to these groups, the accords “maintain an 'eerie' desire to use an issue that is so broad, as is 'Youth and Development' to defend gender ideology.” “Gender ideology supports the interchangeable roles of men and women, insists on the destruction of the family, and the sexual liberation of the woman; presents motherhood as a kind of cultural structure imposed on women and introduces euphemisms such as 'termination of a pregnancy,' 'gender,' 'lifestyle,' 'free choice,' or 'rights over one's own body,' in order to avoid addressing abortion, homosexuality, and promiscuity in a direct manner,” they say. They also affirm that “many of the documents that are being used in the formation of the preliminary accords in the Summit, are based on studies with revisions of secondary sources or inquiries made with a reduced group of persons, some of whom are evidently in favor of an ideological agenda. Therefore, these studies lack true social representation and run the risk of promoting pernicious policies that go against the common values upheld by the people of the Ibero-American region.”
The campaign is supported by de Argentinosalerta.org, Estoesconmigo.org (Colombia), Familia-hoy.org (Central America), HazteOir.org (Spain), and Muevetechile.org. (RG) (Agenzia Fides 22/10/2008)
