Archbishop Stanislaw Gadecki The president of Poland’s bishops’ conference has urged critics of a landmark abortion ruling to express their opposition “in a socially acceptable way” after protesters disrupted Sunday Masses.
Archbishop Stanisław Gadecki issued the appeal on October 25, after the country’s constitutional court ruled that a law permitting abortion for foetal abnormalities was unconstitutional.
In a highly anticipated ruling, the Constitutional Tribunal in Warsaw declared that the law introduced in 1993 was incompatible with Poland’s constitution.
The ruling, which cannot be appealed, could lead to a significant reduction in the number of abortions in the country.
Videos on social media showed protesters interrupting Sunday Masses while holding signs supporting abortion.
“Profanity, violence, abusive inscriptions, and the disturbance of services and profanations that have been committed in recent days – although they may help some people to defuse their emotions – are not the right way to act in a democratic state,” the archbishop of Poznan said.
“I express my sadness that in many churches today believers have been prevented from praying and that the right to profess their Faith has been forcibly taken away.”
Archbishop Gadecki’s own cathedral was among the churches targeted by protesters.
Constitution
The archbishop emphasised that it was not the Church that decides whether laws comply with Poland’s constitution.
“For her part, the Church cannot cease to defend life, nor can she fail to proclaim that every human being must be protected from conception until natural death. On this point, the Church, as Pope Francis often says, cannot compromise, because it would be guilty of the culture of rejection that is so widespread today, always affecting the most needy and vulnerable,” he said.
The constitutional court was asked to examine the law last year by a group of 119 MPs belonging to the ruling Law and Justice Party (PiS), as well as two smaller parties.
Polish president Andrzej Duda, who is associated with PiS, welcomed the court ruling.
Abortion will continue to remain legal in cases of rape or incest and risk to the mother’s life.