Although major newspapers do not talk about it, as this news too has become politically incorrect, many states have recently rejected the legalization or decriminalization of euthanasia and assisted suicide. The last ones are Maine (USA) and New South Wales (Australia).

It is very interesting to notice that, once again, the most decisive rejection came from the medical associations. Indeed, the Australian Medical Association (AMA) openly campaigned against the bill, and so did the Maine Medical Association and the Maine Osteopathic Association, which called the attempt a “very dangerous public policy”.

The position of these medical associations reflects that of the national and international associations. The World Medical Association (WMA), for example, said in 2005: “Physician-assisted suicide, like euthanasia, is unethical and must be condemned by the medical profession. Where the assistance of the physician is intentionally and deliberately directed at enabling an individual to end his or her own life, the physician acts unethically. The World Medical Association reaffirms its strong belief that euthanasia is in conflict with basic ethical principles of medical practice and strongly encourages all National Medical Associations and physicians to refrain from participating in euthanasia, even if national law allows it“. The same position is held by the Standing Committee of Doctors of the European Union .

The American Medical Association believes that “physician-assisted suicide is fundamentally incompatible with the physician’s role as healer, would be difficult or impossible to control, and would pose serious societal risks. Instead of participating in assisted suicide, physicians must aggressively respond to the needs of patients at the end of life“. The British Medical Journal has taken a very stand against the legalization of assisted suicide, in fact 80 % of British physicians oppose it.

Even the German Medical Association reiterated the strong rejection of active euthanasia (as it did in 2004) as well as “killing of the patient”, stating that “the physicians´ involvement in suicide contradicts medical ethics“. So did the New Zealand Medical Association. The Organización Colegial Medica de España believes that “the request for assisted suicide or euthanasia should be generally regarded as a call for greater attention, and you can satisfy this demand by applying the principles and practice of good palliative treatments“.

Of course even in Italy the medical associations are opposed. On the occasion of the recent lies of the Associazione Luca Coscioni, which manipulated the results of a scientific study, the Società Italiana di Anestesia Analgesia Rianimazione e Terapia Intensiva (SIAARTI) [Society of anesthesia, analgesia, resuscitation and intensive therapy] stated, through President Massimo Antonelli, that “the whole Siaarti opposes any form of euthanasia“. And again: “the decision to suspend or avoid life-support treatments should never entail the abandonment of the patient“.

The association Medicina&Persona [Medicine&Person] clearly wrote the reasons why a physician must only oppose these practices: “medicine was born from one hope: that health care and assistance are always worthwhile, till the end, because man has a dignity that is given from life itself, from the mere fact that he exists, because he has been made. Due to this recognized dignity the physician can neither create life nor give death to people (Hippocrates is our teacher). And the usefulness of medicine lies in the respect of this ontological element. Otherwise the profession is reduced to mere technique, the tomb of medicine itself, as well as the patient’s“.

The editorial staff, traslation by Vito

An article appeared on the website of the McGill University Health Centre, one of Canada’s foremost health centres, reports the results of a scientific study conducted by its researchers saying that «even with today’s technology, it still takes both a male and a female to make a baby. But is it important for both parents to raise that child? Many studies have outlined the value of a mother, but few have clearly defined the importance of a father, until now».

The research, published on the journal Cerebral Cortex, shows that the absence of a father during critical growth periods leads to impaired social and behavioural abilities as adults. «Although we used mice, the findings are extremely relevant to humans» says psychiatrist Dr. Gabriella Gobbi. «The behavioural deficits we observed are consistent with human studies of children raised without a father. These children have been shown to have an increased risk for deviant behaviour and in particular, girls have been shown to be at risk for substance abuse».

These results, concludes the McGill University Health Centre paper, should incite researchers to look more deeply into the role of fathers during critical stages of growth and suggest that both parents are important in children’s mental health development.

Another blow then, for the supporters of same-sex adoptions or children’s well-being in mono-parental families. As far as same-sex relationships are concerned, a woman cannot take the role of a man and even less of a father. More research shows that differences between men and women (and therefore fathers and mothers) are not just cultural, but are grounded on biological and neurological causes. A man and a woman, independently of their feelings and desires of being something they are not, will always be defined by their biological identity. Other studies, collected in our dedicated dossier, show that a baby needs to grow within a balanced environment which is only guaranteed by the presence of both parents, as nature intended.

The Editorial Staff

The Old Testament contains some violent expressions, not so pleasant, and sometimes shocking. God appears in his rage, angry, indignant until menacing destruction, death, and the annihilation of who goes against his will and laws. How can we give an explanation to all this?

We need to as a first thing observe that God has always two aspects: justice  and forgiveness. In the old testament, how the commiserate card. Carlo Maria Martini explained:  «God takes by hand his people, He corrects them, He educates them and he puts them again in his primary project of joyousness». His work is «a work of education […]. Only the human’s evil brings Him to rage. So then He becomes a warrior  (Is.42,13) and fights with invincible strength, using even the forces of nature (Ger 30,23; 51,1) or human armies which become his battle instruments (Is 10,5; 13,3-5). But his objective is never a definitive extermination, how already the  Great Flood shows, with Noah and his family that survive (Gn 6,5-9,17). His actions even if sometimes very severe for the hardness of mind and heart of humans, are actions of punishment and correction, in order that humans can understand their mistakes, so that they cannot  play around with Him, and return humbly to Him, always ready to forgive (Is 10,24-25; 16-18)» (“Guida alla lettura della Bibbia” p. 14,75).

Sometimes a loving father and sometimes a severe educator who wants to mold the people of Israel, “Stiff-necked people”. An example: God asks Abraham the not understandable sacrifice of his son Isaac, but when he is about to kill him, God blocks the happening: this is a challenge to faith, it’s a method of education, it’s not sadism. So if in this way we can explain the severe act of God which sometimes we can observe in the Old Testament, the perplexity in front of some Psalms and canticles, in which evil is demanded, cursing their enemies of God’s enemies, asking for their destruction, annihilation, disappearance. Various examples are in the Psalter and they are called “imprecatory psalms”.  A discontinuity with the evangelical message of the New Testament.

A reflection on this argument was very interesting on the “Avvenire”, of the theologian Enzo Bianchi, prior of Comunità monastica di Bose. For the first thing he exposed that even after the gained scandal, the Church «has never allowed to separate the two Testaments, It has condemned who lacerates the Scriptures, It has always proclaimed that God’s word is contained in the Scriptures of Israel and in the Scriptures of Christians in an absolutely non separable way». But it is still understandable that «a Christian who hasn’t gained the entire maturity of Faith has difficulties to conciliate these biblical expressions of violence with his faith and prayers».

But he even has explained, what is so contradictory? Why get scandalized? Why being hypocrites, like who says that reading the Bible gets you far from faith? Prayers aren’t only being thankful, prayers aren’t only requests. «Towards God»,  says Bianchi, «we shout, we yell in the moments of anguish, of desperation,  we cry out for the violence received (Jesus that cries on the cross!)». «Prayers are a power which acts in history, a strength to oppose to the enormous strength of evil and of evil people […], praying against the oppressor is praying with the oppressed, it’s demanding and announcing the judgment of God in history and on history. We can find in this a “partiality” that disturbs our  internal goodness: in reality we pray in history and not out of it, and history isn’t already redeemed, or not all sainted, but it needs judgment, opinion, discernment».

Prayers he even said, «are choosing to stay on the side of the victim or the side of the executioner;  they are choosing to be the victim or his tormentor. In the Psalter these expressions are very common in the mouth of who is suffering, in front of the enemies, personal  enemies, enemies of Israel, or God’s enemies: those enemies who torment him, who torture him, who want his death. But, it’s important to never forget, these are imprecations present in supplication psalms, however always  directed to God or confessed in front of Him […]. They are groans, cries, begs formulated in situations of desperation. Certainly they are sometimes excessive supplications; but who can ever measure them or condemn them if he had never found himself in the same situation of violence in his own person? What would we shout in similar situations? And the most important thing: would we shout staying in front of God, invoking Him?».

To mutilate these scriptures «means to become poorer of those depositions in “flash and blood” that we find in the Bible. In response  to the action of evil in the history the  “against prayers”, the invectives contained in the psalms of supplication are an instrument of praying for the poor, the oppressed, the good people who are persecuted:  they react with their shouts, because  for them in history there isn’t any space!». Besides it’s very due to notice that in front of an injustice, the believer obliges him self to not make justice on his own, and he does not fall in to the temptation to react at evil with evil, at violence with violence, but he leaves making  justice to God.

In the Old Testament, Enzo Bianchi concluded, these imprecatory psalms «establish a radical overcoming to the eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth law». These scriptures, if read in truth, «will not lead us to scandals but they are going to give us a big lesson:  these speakers show great patience. These people don’t make justice by themselves, they don’t use war, rather they block their instinct of violence and they trust only in God. This is their faith: here is where their cry to God arises». 

The editorial staff

Belgium has approved in the first instance the bill that extends the possibility of euthanasia to terminally ill minors, if they have requested it and provided that a psychologist has certified the “capacity of judgment” of the underage applicants.

As many have already pointed out, pro-pedophilia people should rejoice in it as, if a psychologist were really enough to certify minors’ “capacity of judgment” about their suicide, why should not the same be applied also to give the green light to sexual intercourse with adults?

Euthanasia for minors has been approved eleven years after the full approval for adults (with a 500% increase of the deaths by euthanasia between 2003 and 2012) and this proves the inevitable inclined plane, at the beginning it was legalized only for terminally ill adults and from then on it was impossible to stop: it was the turn of non-terminal patients, then of those who suffer at a psychological level, then of elderly people even with no disease until today, when it has been authorized for children in terminal phase. And the plane remains inclined towards further extension. “When Belgium legalized euthanasia”, said Tom Mortier on “National Post”, “there were assurances that it would be tightly controlled and limited to exceptional cases. But the number of cases rises every year – reaching nearly 2% of total deaths in 2012 — and the definition of what is acceptable is expanding”. Moreover, euthanasia was often practiced on healthy people and without their consent, as happened to the mother of Marcel Ceuleneur.

The European Parliament held a debate about the new Belgian law which was attended by Professor Etienne Vermeersch, the father of the abortion and euthanasia laws in Belgium, who explained that the amendment to the law in force since 2002 is required “to allow euthanasia on disabled people”, both adults and children. “Il Foglio” has revealed that Vermeersch entered the Jesuit order in 1953 but in 1958 he broke with the Catholic faith and became a skeptic and an atheist activist, a “humanist” (author of “Why the Christian God cannot exist”). In 1979 he advocated the decriminalization of pedophilia and his name is especially known for the theory of overpopulation as a major threat to humanity. He argues that governments should intervene to restrict fertility rates to a single child per couple, supporting the inhumane one-child policy in China.

Fortunately, the rejection of this Belgian law has been almost unanimous in the medical-scientific, religious and political world, with the exception of the Italian Radicals. All of the major medical associations in the Western world are opposed to all forms of euthanasia and assisted suicide, in Italy notable critics include the National Bioethics Committee (NBC), the National Council of Psychologists and the National Federation of Medical Associations (Fnomceo), whose president Amedeo Bianco has rightly pointed out: “euthanasia is absolutely forbidden by our Criminal Code and also by the Physicians’ Code of Ethics” and it must also be added that today “there are some effective anti-pain therapies which can alleviate even the worst suffering situations”.

He continued: “It’s hard, with the progress made by analgesic therapies against pain, to imagine that today there may be some suffering conditions on which no action can be taken and which cannot be alleviated. This is true even if you foresee and know that the use of such pharmacological techniques may still lead to an acceleration of the dying process. It should be stressed, however, that today there are the tools to relieve pain and suffering, which are the elements that can determine the choice of euthanasia. Rather, it seems to me that this proposal concerns a culture, the Belgian one, which is deeply different from ours, both from the legal and the bioethical point of view”.

The statements of Bianco, president of the National Federation of Medical Associations, are compelling secular reasons against pro-death theorists, and it is right for us as Catholics to address the bioethical debate this way, not only by promoting ethical-religious motivations.

The editorial staff, transaltion by Vito

The reductionist-naturalist dogma “we are our genes” has now been abandoned, as it’s been replaced for a while by another dogmatic belief: “we are our brains”. After the failure of geneticists, now it’s neuroscientists’ turn to argue that free will is an illusion, that consciousness is an epiphenomenon of our brain, and that morality is a mere product of neurons. All of course to avoid attributing to human beings an exceptionality which may be really annoying for those who deny the Creator.

In this new venture, there are not just neuroscientists, but also ethologists such as Frans De Waal who obviously has an interest in claiming that “morality is not born with religion but is innate“, which means it is held by animals and especially primates, which even “distinguish between good and evil and react to injustice“. An exaggeration, thankfully downsized right below: “I’m not saying that chimpanzees or bonobos are moral beings, rather they have all the basic ingredients without which we humans cannot have any morality.” The more the interview goes on the more his statements lose self-confidence: “We cannot know what animals feel “, he rectifies for the third time. ” What we can do is to measure how they react in some situations“.

This means they interpret (often arbitrarily) the animals’ reactions from a human point of view, that is anthropomorphism. A simple game of probabilistic deductions which have nothing to do with the scientific method, just like a chat with his ​​kitten because “it understands me“. Almost at the end there is another clarification: “Human morality is not just about you and me or the people we know, but it applies to everyone the same way. This requires a certain level of abstraction, some generalized rules. In this sense, human morality is special: we discuss the principles of our ethical system and try to justify them, while apes don’t do that“, always assuming that they have and follow an ethical system. There is also a critique of Richard Dawkins and his “selfish gene” which is considered by De Wall even as “an anti-Darwinian message“.

In practice, the Dutch ethologist reduces human morality to empathy, cooperation and caring about the others. Therefore it’s obvious that he concludes: “cooperation and social harmony have always been an advantage for our species, long before modern religions were born, namely two thousand years ago“. Thus, religion just “reinforced the system”. Beyond its scientific validity, even if we accept De Waal’s point of view, it should be noted this is an original interpretation of human history which confirms that in humans there is a natural inclination to good, relationship and cooperation, and that religion, particularly Christianity, has enhanced it by explaining its origin: we are all brothers and sisters, Jesus Christ told us, as we are children of one God. However, he added a unique teaching: “You have heard that it was said, ‘You shall love your neighbour and hate your enemy”. This was taught even by the ancient Greeks. But Jesus adds: “I ​​tell you: love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you, so that you may be children of your Father who is in Heaven. For he makes his sun rise on the evil and on the good, and sends rain on the just and on the unjust. For if you love those who love you, what reward do you have? Do not even the tax collectors do the same? And if you greet only your brothers and sisters, what more are you doing than others? Do not even the Gentiles do the same? You therefore must be perfect, as your Heavenly Father is perfect” (Mt 5, 43-48 ).

There is no animal species that loves its enemies, or that has a concept of true generosity. Cooperation and care towards their offspring mentioned by De Waal have a sense in evolution and genetic conservation, but when this behaviour is directed towards strangers it is called grooming: I do this for you so you will do this for me. It’s always individual advantage (as it was found in ants) that moves animals and it could not be otherwise, as “moral behaviour as such does not even exist in any original form in non-human beings ” (F. Ayala, “L’evoluzione”, [Evolution], Jaca Book 2009 , page 157). Actually, what looks like altruism is always a form of selfishness. In fact, an important school of evolutionary biologists, led also by Marc Hauser, claims that it is more interesting to note the differences between animals and humans than point out the (few) similarities.

Ethologist De Wall acknowledges the failure of modern atheism as it has been mainly characterized by aggression against believers and religion. “With their claim to be rational“, he accused, “their contempt for the historically strict relationship between science and religion and their willingness to alienate even moderate believers, neo-atheists end up falling into the dogmatic part of the spectrum. Their position has particularly damaged the debate on evolution. Who will ever listen to the biologists who argue how well-documented evolution is if the first words that come out of their mouths are: “you’re an idiot”? Moreover, atheism is an empty position. All it claims is that God does not exist, while it cannot answer questions such as: what should we do with our lives, where can we find its meaning, why are we here and how can we communicate with human society as a whole“. Rather, his approach is softer: focusing on the positive aspects to make religion useless: “Atheism”, he wrote in his recent book “The bonobo and the atheist“, “must be combined with something else, something more constructive than its opposition to religion, in order to be relevant to our lives. The only option is to think morality as a natural feature of our species“.

His last words reveal that the reductionist attempt to conceive human morality as a purely natural factor serves the atheist stance rather than the scientific cause. Once again, people misuse science in order to deny God. An attempt against science and against Charles Darwin himself, who, on the other hand, wrote: “a moral being is one who is capable of comparing his past and future actions or motives, and of approving or disapproving of them. We have no reason to suppose that any of the lower animals have this capacity ” (C. Darwin, “L’origine dell’uomo e la selezione naturale” [“The Descent of Man”] Newton Compton in 2007, page 88).

The Editorial Staff, translation by Vito

We have already dealt with the last book of intolerant philosopher Paolo Flores d’Arcais, editor-in-chief of “Micromega“, entitled “La democrazia ha bisogno di Dio? Falso! [“Does democracy need God? False!”] (Yale University Press, 2013). It argues that “every public role of religion should be radically and systematically denied in democracy, because any public role threats and undermines some essential elements of the democratic system“.

Only atheists can participate in public life because “democracy is atheist, inescapably“, says Flores d’Arcais. Believers, if they want to participate as well, must accept “the golden exile in the private sphere” of God. The author has the stated aim to refute the position of famous German philosopher Jürgen Habermas, for whom, on the other hand, democracy needs a religious assumption. However, reading the words of Salvatore Veca, philosopher, university professor and deputy director of the IUSS – School for Advanced Studies of Pavia, it seems that he didn’t reach his purpose at all.

As for the question about the choice between those who appreciate the role of religion in the public space, such as Jürgen Habermas, and those who identify democracy with atheism, such as Paolo Flores d’Arcais, professor Veca is clear: “If the public space means the agora, a social context where you take sides, try to convert the others and evaluate alternative proposals, Habermas is right. Here faiths have full citizenship: everyone must be taken seriously and no must not be forced to withdraw their loyalties. After all, democratic freedom was born when, after the tragedy of religious wars, all the people were given the right to worship God as they pleased. But this entails precisely the secular state, the prohibition to use coercive power to promote a single creed“.

Salvatore Veca has just published the book “Un’idea di laicità” [“An idea of secularism”] (Mulino2013) and in an interview on “Avvenire” he explained: “Contrary to what is usually thought, religious freedom does not come from the set of political rights, rather it generates and establishes them, thanks to a variety of historical and conceptual reasons”. Religions can either limit themselves to mutual indifference, or have the “attitude that is testified by Francis in his own words and actions: not indifference, rather an attention, a curiosity towards the other that becomes openness, passion, willingness to learn. Always in the context of secularism and never giving up one’s beliefs“.

“Secularism“, continued the philosopher, “as it is understood in its actual meaning, belongs to Christianity in an essential and constitutive way. To realize them you can listen to the experience of many pastors and priests, who are close to the people in their tragedies and deepest needs. It is just the example provided by Francis: do not explain to the others the demonstration of the reasons why it is legitimate or sensible to believe, but show that there is a life that is spent and lived, in practice, on the reasons of faith”. “The insistence of Pope Francis on the truth”, he concluded, ”lived as a relationship and not imposed as an abstraction, leads to this horizon of seriousness, as well as conceptual precision. In fact, this is exactly Francis’ style, the secularist style”.

The editorial staff, translation by Vito

We often assert and show that supporting abortion means standing against female health, as well as obviously against an innocent humans life.

Several associations document innumerable deaths of women happening within abortion clinics in the U.S. behind a wall of silence. Regardless of religious differences, there are many secular associations against abortion like ‘Secular Pro Life’. All what matters is to be intellectually honest, to examine one’s conscience, and the ability to think freely.

Once again scientific evidence shows that induced abortion is significantly associated with an increased risk of breast cancer (among women). The study has been recently published in “Cancer Causes & Control” and was conducted in China.

This was a meta-analysis, a review combining the results of a series of existing relevant studies. In this case the study included 36 articles covering 14 provinces in China, showing that the risk of breast cancer increased by 44%, 76% and 89% for women who had one, two, and three induced abortions, respectively.

We remind you that it is possible to access our report on the correlation between induced abortion and breast cancer, where we list a number of scientific studies – conducted worldwide – that demonstrate such link.

The Editorial Staff

In order to deny God it is necessary to deny the human being and his singularity. This is, as we already pointed out, a dogma of the modern atheism which still persists although the scientistic positivism failure. The man is described as “nothing else but”, because the acknowledgement of his singularity and of the qualitative and ontological diversity compared to the rest of nature would require a not so well-accepted justification by those who deny that the human being is the result of a Rational Thought.

Thus far darwinists and neo-darwinists, like Richard Dawkins, were those who made this attempt, whereas nowadays it is a neuroscientists duty. The Evolution and Darwin’s theory, if not exploited, are not in conflict with the subjects of christian faith, or rather they prove to be in conflict with the naturalism. For this reason nowadays the anti-theists rely on neuroscientists: it’s their task to demonstrate that free will is an illusion, that conscience is just a brain epiphenomenon and that the mind is simply (typical term of reducionism) a “bundle of neurons”, according to Francic Crick’s assertion.

Sergio Barbieri, neurologist and director of “U. O. Neurofisiopatologia” at Milano Policlinico Hospital, has affirmed: «Those who reckon, reductionistically, that the brain only generates elettrochemical impulses which automatically are translated to executive decisions, are inclined to believe that freedom does not exist as everything is predetermined. Actually recently even this approach has been quite criticized, fortunately». According to Mauro Cerroni, Neurology research professor at University of Pavia, the assertion that the man is his own brain «has no scientific clue». It’s obvious that «nothing without physiological basis, nothing without attivation of nervous circuits can happen within me, but that doesn’t mean everything is ascribable to the brain».

The daily “La Stampa” has recently interviewed Timothy Shallice, mathematician, professor of Neuropsychology and coordinator of cognitive neuroscience at “Scuola internazionale superiore di studi Avanzati (Sissa)” in Trieste, and winner of the price “Mente e Cervello 2013”, assigned by the dean of University of Turin. He explained: «Cognitive neuroscience allow to inquire beyond organic matter, there where the mind – so anything tangible as a neurons product – produces effects from the body and over the body in a complex game made up of circuits and paths, spreading upon the “theatres” where deseases plot performs». Studying lesions and finding the causes does not mean understanding the origin of these “functions”, «we have only a partial picture of the cause. The problem is not always simply a mechanical cause, but it’s due to much more complex and dynamic systems that manage the memory, but that are not only organic type: there are mental operations that machines still do not draw». And «this machine computational called brain is different from person to person».

Last month Massimo Gandolfini, head physician neurosurgeon, in his book “I Volti della coscienza” (Cantagalli 2013) analysed the problem brain/mind according to the most recent scientific knowledge about it, well bearing in mind the ancient philosophical and theological debate. In these days Mauro Ceroni, a neurologist, Faustino Savoldi and Luca Vanzago, neuroscientists, have pubblished “La Coscienza” (Ares 2013), a book which is the outcome of the last 30 years pubblications regarding this subject, plus it denotes a wide familiarity with the philosophical thinking about the theme; the essay defends the man from «the reduction of his own essence»

Editorial staff