Pope rails against "the culture of death"

Pope rails against "the culture of death"

VATICAN CITY (Reuter): Pope John Paul yesterday launched an emotional attack on abortion, condemning what he called "the culture of death".

Speaking to some 50,000 people in St Peter's Square at his weekly general audience, the Pope frequently raised his voice as he spoke in passionate defense of the rights of the family.

"We cannot accept the systematic death of the unborn," he said. "Every family must know how to resist the false sirens of the culture of death."

"We cannot go forward only with death as the foundation of our civilization -- we must do so with the culture of love, which welcomes life."

It was his second such attack in two days, following a statement on abortion and euthanasia on Tuesday in which he said democratically-elected parliaments were usurping their powers to determine who had the right to live.

The Roman Catholic Church of which the 73-year-old Pope is head, is lobbying hard against abortion ahead of a United Nations conference in Cairo next September.

Last month the Vatican summoned all ambassadors accredited to the Holy See to explain its position on population and development in an attempt to influence the conference's draft final document, now being formulated in New York.

In New York on Tuesday, Vatican spokesmen said the conference lacked ethics and a coherent moral vision, promoted contraception and tolerated abortion.

The conference is drawing up a 20-year plan to stabilize world population at 7.27 billion by the year 2050.

Programs include the right to contraception, primary health care for women and infants and primary school education for all girls.

The world's current population is 5.7 billion and could go up to 10 billion in 20 years without family planning.

Monsignor Diarmuid Martin, an Irishman, said in New York the Vatican found it unacceptable that the document linked family planning to contraception, saying "natural methods" to regulate fertility were the cheapest and avoided dangerous side effects.

The Holy See delegation was active at a similar conference 10 years ago in Mexico City, which after much fighting agreed that "in no case should abortion be promoted as a method of family planning".

The Pope said during yesterday's general audience that 1994, the UN-designated year of the family, was threatening to have precisely the opposite of its intended effect.

"It could easily become a year against the family if these projects are adopted at the Cairo conference," he said.

He said he had written to "every president in the world" including presidents of bodies such as episcopal conferences, to reflect on the issue and defend the rights of the family.