May 2006: “That in mission countries those responsible for public institutions may promote and protect human life from conception to natural end with adequate legislation ” Missionary Prayer Intention indicated by the Holy Father comment by Cardinal Juan Sandoval Iniguez Archbishop of Guadalajara (Mexico)

Friday, 28 April 2006

Guadalajara (Fides Service) - That in mission countries… “Go therefore and teach all nations baptising them in the name of the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit ” (Mt. 28,19). The Lord’s command is ever present in the mind and heart of the Church. The Church is missionary by nature, “divinely sent to the nations of the world to be unto them "a universal sacrament of salvation,"(1) the Church, driven by the inner necessity of her own catholicity, and obeying the mandate of her Founder (cf. Mark 16:16), strives ever to proclaim the Gospel to all mankind”.(Ad gentes 1).
Missions are born in the heart of our loving God who is never resigned to the distance and abandonment of his sons and daughters. The Father’s love is love without frontiers. There are no limits of territory, culture, race or creed we are all children of God Three in One. That all may know You, the One true God.
Those responsible for public institutions… St Paul says: “ First of all, then, I ask that supplications, prayers, petitions, and thanksgivings be offered for everyone, for kings and for all in authority, that we may lead a quiet and tranquil life in all devotion and dignity.” (1Tim. 2,1-2).
The innate goal of d politics is the common good of all groups. Good political activity is the way to help people live in freedom and solidarity which human dignity demands and it is the fruit of social peace and justice.
Very clear for everyone is what is said in the Compendium of the Church’s Social Doctrine: “the authorities should ensure that restriction of freedom or any other burden imposed on the actuation of persons does not offend personal dignity and guarantees effective exercise of human rights" (Compendium of the Social Doctrine of the Church Chiesa,133)
Let us pray that in every country on earth there may be free and responsible obedience to the authorities who ensure that justice is respected, guaranteeing the common good.
Promote and protect with adequate legislation …. “The man who fears the Lord will do all this and he who possesses law also has wisdom" (Sir.15,1).
The purpose of national laws is to ensure the good of the people and to protect the weakest and most helpless. It is the duty of the state to protect the life of its citizens and the common good. No survey, majority opinion or consensus may attack the primordial good of humanity. If this happens, “any reference to common values and to a truth absolutely binding on everyone is lost, and social life ventures on to the shifting sands of complete relativism. At that point, everything is negotiable, everything is open to bargaining: even the first of the fundamental rights, the right to life" (EV 20).
The imperative character of the law aims for the good of each and all and for this reason opposes any individual opinion which attempts to arbitrate the value of his actions, robbing man of his emotional spontaneity. The universal foundation of the law should be its reference to the common good. This is a reflection of its rationality. This is why laws are born among citizens, in community life. They are the objective frame for human responsibility. Law must be seen not only as a restrictive juridical basis, it should be promoted by moral vision, therefore the basic universality of moral law and its need for social code of behaviour find their objective root in the needs of human reciprocity. Political authorities must not be seen in a purely organisational sense of social conventions or individual opinions. Political order should foster just and good forms of community life. Laws should not only prohibit and punish, they should instruct so that they may always be relevant. A law which directly or indirectly obliges people to go against life would be both an irrational and bad law. Let us pray that there may always be good laws which protect human life.
Human life from conception to natural end. “ "Let us make man in our image, after our likeness. Let them have dominion over the fish of the sea, the birds of the air, and the cattle, and over all the wild animals and all the creatures that crawl on the ground.” (Gen. 1,26-27).
The Catholic Church has always distinguished herself for protecting life and many statements have been made by the Magisterium, here for example are two very clear statements: “We must never lose sight of respect for human dignity, from the moment of conception to the final stages of illness, or serious states of loss of mental faculties. Allow me to repeat here the conviction of the Church: the human person always retains his or her value as a person because life is a gift of God … The Church’s insistence to protect all life from conception is founded on a moral need deriving from what man is” (John Paul II, Strasbourg, 8-X-1988).
“I do not hesitate to proclaim to you and to the world that every human life is sacred - from the moment of conception and in each of its stages, because human life is created in the image and likeness of God. Nothing is greater that the greatness and dignity of the human person. Human life is not only an idea or an abstraction. Human life is the concrete reality of a being who lives, acts, grows and develops; human life is the concrete reality of being able to love and to serve humanity ". (John Paul II, Rome,27-X-1980).
Let us continue to pray that life may be respected from conception to natural death. + Juan Cardinal Sandoval Iñiguez (Agenzia Fides 28/4/2006; righe 65, parole 937)


Share: