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Santiago, Chile, Aug 4, 2017 / 04:13 pm (CNA/EWTN News).- Late Wednesday, Chilean lawmakers approved legislation that would allow for abortions under certain circumstances, ending the country’s longstanding wholesale ban on the practice.

The new law would permit abortion in the cases of rape, endangerment of a mother’s life, or in cases when the fetus has a life-threatening birth defect. It would allow for objecting doctors to refuse to perform abortions, except in cases when the mother’s life is in danger and there are no other available physicians.

The legislation has drawn harsh criticism after a year’s-long heated debate from many in the majority-Catholic country, including many of the country’s bishops who have expressed their dismay at the lifting of the ban.

Bishop Fernando Chomali of Concepción told CNA he “deeply regretted” that the law had thus far been approved, noting that it wouldn’t help women in need and that it goes against the country’s constitution.

“I deeply regret that the bill has been approved. It seems to me that it does not help women in difficult situations and opens the door to free abortion, as it has happened in many parts of the world,” he said.

The new law will go into effect if Chile’s Constitutional Tribunal approves it in the coming days, which would end a blanket ban on the procedure that has been in place in the country for nearly 30 years.

However, it also needs to survive an appeal to the Constitutional Court which seeks to declare the abortion bill unconstitutional. The appeal was filed by 11 senators from Chile Vamos, a coalition opposed to the government of President Michelle Bachelet.

While abortion was allowed for in some circumstances in Chile starting in 1931, it was strictly outlawed in all circumstances by dictator Augusto Pinochet’s regime in 1989, and punishable by up to five years in prison.

Bachelet has made relaxing abortion restrictions a priority of her administration, and celebrated the approval of the legislation on Twitter.

Bishop Chomali called on the Constitutional Court “to act with knowledge and conscience in the light of the Constitution of the country that protects the life of the unborn. I have great hope that those who compose it will think about the common good and the weakest,” he told CNA.

Bishop Juan Ignacio González of San Bernardo said the law violates the truth of the human person, according to local newspaper El Mercurio.

“Democracy can not give up an essential core of ethical truth, which allows it to affirm the full validity of the rights of all members of the human race,” unless it embraces a “false pluralism or tolerance,” he said.

Giselle Vargas contributed to this report.

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ACI Prensa Staff, Jul 24, 2023 / 16:20 pm (CNA).
The leader of the Referendum for Life initiative, Sara Castellanos, said the initiative already has the necessary signatures to request a popular consultati… […]

Acapulco, Mexico, Feb 8, 2018 / 07:00 pm (CNA).- The Bishop of Chilpancingo-Chilapa, Mexico denied that Fr.  Germain Muñiz Garcia, who was murdered on a Mexican highway Feb. 5 along with Fr. Iván Añorve Jaimes, had any connection to organized crime, as the Guerrero State Prosecutor’s Office has recently claimed.

In a statement released Feb 7, Bishop Salvador Rangel Mendoza said that Fr.  Muñiz Garcia “was never connected to any criminal gang.”

However, he said that the deceased priest “had knowledge, by the very nature of his pastoral work, of  some gangs operating in that area, since being a pastor and a public person he had to travel through the area where those gangs were based in order to to serve the different communities.”

The Mexican bishop responded in his statement to the accusations lodged by the Guerrero State Prosecutor’s Office, which claimed that the murdered priest belonged to “a criminal gang, by reason of the photographs and notes that circulated on the priest’s social media,” posted months prior, where he is seen with a rifle alongside masked criminals.  

According to the authorities, both priests were traveling to the town of Taxco de Alarcón to attend a party. According to the State Prosecutor’s Office, “it is known that many people belonging to different criminal gangs went there from Guerrero State as well as Morelos and Mexico States.”

“At said party there was no municipal, state or federal security, since preventative security support for  the party was not requested from any authority by the organizers.”

According to the Prosecutor’s Office, a conflict during the party “triggered the armed attack” which ended the lives of the Mexican priests.

Four people who survived the attack were also traveling in the vehicle in which the priests died,  including Fr. Germain’s sister.

Bishop Rangel Mendoza noted there are serious inconsistencies with the Prosecutor’s Office’s version of what happened.

“The Prosecutor’s statement seems strange to us, in that in the same place, Juliantla, in Guerrero, ‘members of criminal gangs from Morelos, Mexico and Guerrero States would have gotten together,’ without any reports of any confrontations between them or participants in the event. We also note the absence of municipal or state law enforcement, knowing the presence of the stated gangs,” the prelate stated.

The neighboring Archdiocese of Acapulco also expressed their criticism of the Prosecutor’s Office in a statement.

“It seems strange to us that people belonging to different criminal gangs, carrying weapons, could have gotten along with each other at the dance, without any incident. This does not seem to be their ordinary conduct,” they said.

In addition, they pointed out, the four survivors of the attack maintained “that there was no conflict at where the dance was held.”

“These four survivors report that coming back to Taxco they passed the assailants’ car which went after them, caught up with them, blocked their way and shot them,” the Archdiocese of Acapulco stated.

Regarding the photograph of the priest carrying a firearm alongside criminals, Bishop Rangel Mendoza told the press that although “it was extremely imprudent,” of him, and that he reprimanded the priest at the time, Fr. Muñiz Garcia “had to pass through the drug traffickers’ territories,” and he had to “greet them, he had to dialogue with them, he had to do it, because he had to pass through their territory, how else was he going to get through?”

The bishop said the priests went to the party “to offer their music and see if they would let them sing a few songs.”

In his statement, the prelate asked that “the investigations be objective, truthful and adhering to the law and the truth of the facts,” and that if the Prosecutor’s Office claims that the priest belonged to some criminal gang, “(I) urge them to specifically determine to which criminal gang he belonged to and not to limit themselves to making simple accusations.”

In addition, he demanded from the Guerrero State Prosecutor’s Office “a complete and certified copy of the file on the investigation that supports the said statements, since as the Prosecutor has the obligation to determine what actually happened, supporting the findings with reliable and truthful evidence.”  

This article was originally published by our sister agency, ACI Prensa. It has been translated and adapted by CNA.

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