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Thou Shalt Not Give to Abortion Supporters

Vatican Tells Catholics to Stop Donations to Amnesty

The Vatican has called for Catholics to stop donating money to Amnesty International over the human rights organization's stance on abortion. Amnesty had responded by saying the Church is putting its work "in peril."

The Catholic Church and human rights organization Amnesty International seem at first sight to be natural bedfellows. The two institutions share common ground on issues such as the death penalty and world poverty. Catholic priests around the world fight for human rights -- often at great personal danger -- while Amnesty campaigns on behalf of imprisoned priests such as the pro-democracy activist Father Nguyen Van Ly in Vietnam.

So it is a sign of the uncompromising hard line that the Catholic Church takes on abortion that a Vatican cardinal Wednesday urged Catholics to stop donating money to Amnesty over its stance on abortion. In April, Amnesty adopted a new policy on abortion, urging government to ensure access to abortion services for women in the case of rape, incest or when pregnancy puts the mother's health at risk. Previously the London-based organization, which won the 1977 Nobel Peace Prize for its work on human rights, had taken a neutral stance on abortion.

Cardinal Renato Martino, who heads the Vatican's justice and peace department, Wednesday criticized the policy, saying it betrayed Amnesty's goals of campaigning for human rights around the world, and called for Catholic organizations and individuals to withdraw their support for the group. "The inevitable consequence of this decision, according to the cardinal, will be the suspension of any financing to Amnesty on the part of Catholic organizations and also individual Catholics," according to a statement from Martino's office, issued to expand on comments the cardinal had made to an American Catholic newspaper.

Amnesty responded by saying it had never received any financing from the Vatican or from official Roman Catholic organizations. Amnesty spokesman Riccardo Nourey said that, although the group may have received financing from "Catholic-inspired" groups as well as individuals, it has not received aid from organizations which are officially part of the Catholic Church. Amnesty is staunchly independent of any government or political or religious groups.

Amnesty's revised stance on abortion is related to its new global campaign to stop violence against women. The group said it recognized that women and girls around the world bore the consequences of "the abuse of their sexual and reproductive rights."

Amnesty's deputy secretary Kate Gilmore strongly criticized the Vatican's move. "The Catholic Church, through a misrepresented account of our position on selective aspects of abortion, is placing in peril work on human rights," Gilmore said in an interview with Reuters.

She stressed that Amnesty was not promoting abortion as a universal right. Instead, the organization believes women have a right to choose abortion when their human rights have been violated, particularly in cases of rape and incest. "We are saying broadly that to criminalize women's management of their sexual reproductive rights is the wrong answer," she said.

According to data from the World Health Organization, around 45 million unintended pregnancies are terminated around the world annually, with an estimated 19 million being carried out unsafely. The organization estimates that around 68,000 women die each year from unsafe abortions.

dgs/ap/reuters