Cardinal Ouellet: Accompanying women with compassion and solidarity
It was another busy day at the Archdiocesan Office in Quebec City as the Cardinal was about to address the media and answer their questions on abortion. This happened less than two weeks after Cardinal Marc Ouellet’s words, as reported in the media, caused a firestorm of critiques and personal attacks in la belle province. Today came a clarification, with a decidedly pastoral tone. And this time the Archbishop of Quebec was accompanied by the Archbishop of Ottawa Terrence Prendergast.
We publish here the full statements of both prelates. What remains to be seen is the reception these two declarations will receive inside and outside the Church. Will they lead to more criticism? Or can Canada, in the words of Cardinal Ouellet, finally “face up to the injustice our country condones in offering no legal protection for a child in its mother’s womb”? One hopes, at the very least, for a more reasoned discussion than the country has witnessed these past few weeks, for, as the Cardinal Ouellet boldly states, “there is debate, and there must be debate.”
The abortion debate is on and we must not be afraid of it. Canada’s abortion rate, 100,000 abortions per year nationwide, more than 25,000 in Quebec, is much too high. The number could be reduced by half if only women in distress because of an unexpected pregnancy were welcomed, informed and accompanied in their choice with compassion and solidarity.
My interventions on behalf of a culture of life have been the subject of every sort of interpretation in Canada’s English and French media in the past ten days. That is why I wish to clarify the sense of my engagement in the current abortion debate. Thank you for accepting my invitation and allowing me to re-focus the debate on what is essential. The very exceptional cases must not prevent us from seeing the sad reality of abortion that has become too widespread.
I wish to thank Ottawa’s Archbishop Terrence Prendergast who joins me in launching an appeal for solidarity with the most helpless in our society: the unborn child and the woman who is forced to resort to abortion.
From the outset, I want to emphasize that my comment in defence of the innocent child, even in cases of rape, was motivated by the desire to call to mind the dignity of women in all circumstances, and the respect due to all new human life. I note that only part of my message has been received and interpreted. I wish to draw attention to the other part, in the hope of raising public awareness of the true issue in this debate: support for the pregnant woman by the father of the child, her family and society.
Nowhere did I state that I condemn a woman who has resorted to abortion. I have even asserted the opposite when speaking directly to one of these women during a television program. I have never declared that a woman who has undergone an abortion is a criminal. I am fully aware that the ultimate responsibility for this moral decision is a matter of personal conscience which acts on the basis of various factors, including the individual’s intentions and the circumstances. Only God can judge each person because He alone can assess all the elements of each case.
