I'm seriously beginning to wonder whether there ought to be a gagging order on the Bishops of England & Wales. Either that, or they should refuse to give interviews, instead submitting written statements which have been given both an imprimator and nihil obstat from someone in the Vatican... preferably the Holy Father...What is the ONE major argument against embryo experimentation (and abortion, come to that) ?
That's right. The embryo is a human person, with all the God-given dignity that entails... including the right to life. The embryo is not an "object" which can be disposed of, used for spare parts, or used for experiments.
It isn't rocket science.
I'm sure Archbishop Vincent Nichols probably didn't mean to say what he did. I'm being charitable here. Unfortunately, get any Bishop (or Archbishop... or even a Cardinal) in front of a microphone, and he seems to open his mouth, simultaneously to change feet and also to drop enough bricks to build a Cathedral.
John Smeaton quotes the Archbishop of Birmingham as saying, "…What we’ve been trying to say all along is ‘What is the value that we give to human life in its first beginnings?’ Now clearly it’s not the same as we would give to another adult sitting next to me…"
Presumably this is because any adult sitting next to the Archbishop has a greater right to life than a child sitting next to him... which in turn has a greater right to life than an unborn child in the womb of a woman sitting next to him...???
One of those classic Homer Simpson "D'oh!" moments... only far less funny.
And this chap is favourite for Cardinal of Westminster?
D'oh!
7 comments:
Whilst recognising the difficulty created by Archbishop Nichols' remarks, I do have some sympathy for the situation in which he found himself. He was preceded on "The World at One" by a long and moving interview with an anonymous doctor, in which the said doctor described why he wanted a "saviour sibling" for his child. It was almost impossible for Archbishop Nichols to produce a response that was going to be successful in media terms ... It took me about half an hour to work out what I felt should have been said in response; Archbishop Nichols will have had just seconds.
Though the first rule of a being interviewed in the news media is to have decided what you want to say, and to say it, whatever you are actually asked.
Yes, but for heaven sake, please make sure the man does NOT issue a "clarification".
The last thing in the world we need is to understand that man's thought 'more fully'. Enough damage has already been done.
OW. OW. OW.
I'm trying to find a charitable spin to put on this...
Maybe he meant (for example) that he wouldn't run into a burning building to rescue a zygote in a petri dish, but he would run into a burning building to rescue an adult?
Even if so, that's a really big D'OH...your bishops may actually be verbally clumsier than ours. (Don't worry. Ours beat the liturgy to death with blunt objects, so...)
You know what our problem is, we are not praying for our Bishops, anyone reading this Blog should say one Our Father daily for our Bishops.
What a change there would be.
Speak for yourself, Elizabeth. Some of us even fast for them.
That's not true, Elizabeth. Some people even stood in Eccleston Square praying the (abolished) novena of Pentecost for them.
I'm trying really hard to summon up sympathy for His Lordship over this. True, the BBC's approach to this issue falls some way short of what the proverbial reasonable person might expect of a public service broadcaster, but Archbishop Nichols is hardly a media novice, and it was fairly predictable that such a question would be bowled at him.
All it needed was an average ability to articulate in public what the Church teaches and why she teaches it.
Actually, the only things that work, are prayer and fasting, and we all need to do far more of these to really help our Bishops.
They need our help now, as never before.
I suspect that the vast majority of Catholics never think of praying, daily for their Priests and Bishops, yet we have high expectations of them.I agree that Archbishop Nichols made a blunder, and accuse myself of not praying half enough for him, and other Bishops.
Post a Comment