Life has won” “

“I have been positively impressed by the maturity of the Italian people”, declared Cardinal CAMILLO RUINI, president of the Italian Bishops’ Conference (CEI), on 13 June, in commenting on the failure of the referendum aimed at abrogating some of the provisions of the law on medically assisted procreation, held in Italy on 12 and 13 June. Voter turnout was only 25.9%. So the necessary quorum (50% plus 1 of the electors) for the validity of the referendum was not reached, and consequently the law that regulates artificial fertility, approved in February 2004, remains unvaried. “It was a result that perhaps exceeded our expectations – continued Cardinal Ruini referring to the very high rate of abstentions (74.1%) -. But I don’t feel like a winner. I feel like a person and a bishop who tried to do his own duty and who gave voice to his own conscience as a believer, as a man and as a citizen”. “We fought against nobody – he concluded –. Rather we promoted the interests of man”. BENEDICT XVI. In the months that preceded the referendum, the president of the CEI and the Italian Catholic Church, the associations and movements, and various exponents of the cultural and political worlds, who declared themselves “non-believers”, but who said they were convinced that the law should not undergo detrimental reforms, were in the front line in the defence of a law that, while it does not correspond “to the ethical teaching of the Church”, as Cardinal Ruini put it last January, did “have the merit of safeguarding some essential principles and criteria” in a field in which the dignity “of human life and the person” is at stake. On 30 May. on the occasion of the CEI general assembly, BENEDICT XVI declared his solidarity “in word and prayer” with the Italian bishops “dedicated to illuminating and motivating the decisions of Catholics and of all citizens with regard to the law on medically assisted procreation”. CONSCIENTIOUS ABSTENTION. A Committee called “Science & Life” was set up in recent months in support of the option of abstention, which is accepted as a valid electoral response by the Italian Constitution in the field of referenda. Formed of authoritative personalities in the cultural, scientific, professional, political and associative worlds, believers and non-believers, the members of Science & Life signed a “Manifesto” in defence of human life and pledged their support for the “non vote”: in other words, the option of a conscientious, lucid and argued abstention in the referendum. Asking for the abrogation of some parts of the law, the referendum proposed, in essence, to eliminate the reference to the rights of the embryo, no longer placed on a par with other subjects involved in the procedure; to admit research and experimentation on embryos, their cloning and freezing; and to revive heterologous fertilization, i.e. the use of gametes extraneous to the couple. ITALIAN CHURCH. According to the archbishop of Genoa, Cardinal TARCISIO BERTONE, “once again the Church has been able to perfectly interpret the popular conscience and re-propose values that are widely shared, especially the defence of life in the womb”. According to Archbishop COSMO FRANCESCO RUPPI of Lecce, “the Italian people have demonstrated more wisdom that could have been imagined” and “the unity of the Catholic world confirms that Catholicism cannot be consigned to the margins of public life”. “The majority of electors do not wish for any change to the law – observed the bishop of Bolzano-Bressanone, Msgr. WILHELM EMIL EGGER -. The task of promoting respect for the dignity of life and of the person is now incumbent on the community of believers”. “The values of life won”: according to Archbishop PIETRO BROLLO of Udine, the failure to reach a quorum gave voice to the “will of the people”, which indicated thereby that “the value of human life cannot be put to the vote”. ASSOCIATIONS AND MOVEMENTS. “The referendum gave voice to the will of the people: it is not by means of a referendum that decisions can be taken on human life” comments ITALIAN CATHOLIC ACTION, engaged with all other Catholic associations in a national campaign of information/formation on the issues at stake in the referendum. According to the ST. EGIDIO COMMUNITY, “it’s a victory not of Catholics, but of common sense”. RENEWAL OF THE SPIRIT considers that the result of the referendum was “prefigured in the days of great commitment and awareness-raising” which involved “tens of thousands of volunteers”. The ACLI ask “that the law be experimented for an appropriate period of time so that its efficacy can be assessed with honesty and scrupulousness and its limitations if possible overcome”. A fundamental role was played by the commitment of the Catholic media (Avvenire, Sat2000, Famiglia Cristiana…), including the 150 local Catholic weeklies (total sales: 900,000) that form part of the FISC, which continued to publish features to help Catholics to better understand what was at stake.