Homily by Cardinal Gerhard Müller at the Eucharistic Adoration for Life

Two days before this year's March for Life in Rome, the Eucharistic Adoration for Life took place, at which Cardinal Gerhard Müller preached a homily.

On the occasion of the Eucharistic Adoration for Life, which takes place every year just before the anniversary of the passage of the infamous law 194 that allowed abortion in Italy on May 22, 1978, Cardinal Gerhard Müller presided over the solemn ceremony in the Roman parish of San Giovanni dei Fiorentini. 

This year's March for Life in Rome took place on May 22nd. Cardinal Müller delivered a sermon which we reproduce below:

Recently, the Holy Father has pointed out the drastic demographic decline that threatens the future of Europe and America, and it is not just a question of mere utilitarian thinking so that business and government can continue with future consumers, customers and taxpayers. The reason for this question is theological in nature:

“Man is the only creature that God willed for himself” (Second Vatican Council, Gaudium et Spes , 24), for every human being is predestined by God (as far as his present existence on earth is concerned) “in beings and form of his Son, that he may be the firstborn of many brethren" (Romans 8:29).

Every human being is embraced by God's salvific will from the moment of conception to the moment of his last breath. Therefore, any act of injustice against the life and integrity of another human being, especially the killing of a child in the womb (or even in the test tube [in vitro] or incubator) is a “despicable crime” ( Gaudium et Spes, 51). For life is sacred and protected by God Himself, as the fifth commandment of the Decalogue states: 

"Thou shalt not kill" (Deut 5:17).

The legal order in all societies and states is aimed at human coexistence on the basis of morality; Morality means directing our actions towards good, based on the recognition of the fundamental dignity and rights of human beings, inherent in their nature and guaranteed by God. As human beings and Christians, we are convinced that the real (and not just abstractly theorized) physical man never exists as a purpose and instrument for something else or for the interests of others. This is the basis of our image of man and the criterion of all ethics.

On the other hand, the opposite of this is the starting point of all crimes against humanity and cynical contempt for human beings, with which Josef Stalin declared that Gulag prisoners only had a right to life because they were useful for the construction of the White Sea Canal. One Heinrich Himmler, commander of the notorious SS, said of his boss Hitler that he was "interested in the lives of a thousand Russian women only until they have dug an anti-tank trench for the Wehrmacht". And these are just two particularly drastic examples of the depths of human contempt in the political ideologies of a not too distant time. If one believes that there is overpopulation on our planet that consumes resources or negatively affects the climate, one cannot, however, propagate and justify the killing of life in the womb without revealing oneself as a diabolical misanthrope. Pope Francis, to whom some proponents of “reproductive health” (ie, abortion) invoke, says this in a very blunt way.

The materialists in power in the Western capitalist states and international organizations, as well as the communist dictators in China and its allied states, reject the doctrine of the creation of man in the image of God because they do not believe in God as believe our Creator and Judge. On the contrary, they claim to put themselves in the place of God and in their foolish arrogance are not even able to defeat the tiny coronavirus. Someone recently said: The oligarchs in Russia are mafiosi and in the West they call themselves philanthropists, so beware of those who pose as the saviors of humanity when they are only pursuing their own interests.

While the pandemic crisis and the measures taken to combat it have left millions of people in hardship and poverty, the world's ten richest people have simultaneously added hundreds of billions to their fortunes.

The dominant ideological current in politics, economy and communication thinks in a Darwinian-socialist perspective. This means that whoever asserts himself in the struggle for power, money and propaganda also has the law on his side, which is why only the powerful have the right to determine who is allowed to live and who must die based on their interests. They claim to determine which life is worth living and which life is not. Others even consider it a higher form of humanity to guarantee life only if born healthy, while it must be eliminated if born ill or in old age, in order to avoid present and future suffering. Or in the case of multiple pregnancies, only the child that the parents like according to their needs and preferences should survive; for example, China implemented the brutal and inhumane one-child policy for decades and forced women to kill their children. But whoever thinks in terms of the fundamental rights inscribed in man's spiritual and moral nature, or who invokes revelation in the Word of God as the ultimate criterion for man's image, can never find a just reason for killing an innocent human being.

We are in a “war against the saints” ( Rev 13:7), not only in the inhumane war against the Ukrainian people but also in the West, which is radically denying its Christian roots. Behind those responsible for all the suffering is “the beast that came up out of the earth', the epitome of wickedness and ungodliness unleashed by the life and death struggle of God's followers and against Christ the Lamb of God. Anyone who takes a pro-life position in Europe or America today is insulted, persecuted, discriminated against and marginalized. US Supreme Court justices who oppose abortion rights face death threats and their families' safety is threatened. Mobs fueled by the neo-Marxist media are burning Catholic churches in a country that prides itself on freedom of religion, expression and conscience. In Germany, as in all of Europe, where a campaign of annihilation against life, marriage and the family is underway,

In the pastoral constitution Gaudium et Spes, the Second Vatican Council addressed not only believers in Christ, but all people, as Magna Carta Pro Vita on the basis of inalienable human rights:

“Furthermore, which is contrary to life itself, like every kind of murder, genocide, abortion, euthanasia, and also voluntary suicide; whatever violates the sanctity of the human person, such as mutilation, physical or mental torture, and attempts at psychological coercion; whateverI offends human dignity, such as inhumane living conditions, arbitrary detention, deportation, slavery, prostitution, trafficking in women and young people, then also substandard working conditions in which the worker is treated as a mere means of subsistence and not as a free and responsible person: all these and other similar acts are in themselves a disgrace; they are a decomposition of human culture, degrade those who do wrong far more than those who suffer it. At the same time, they are supremely contrary to the Creator's honor” (Gaudium et Spes, 27).

In this hour of struggle for life and against death in the unborn, for the dignity of the seriously ill, but also for those at risk of suicide, if one wants to convince them that death (disguised as mercy) is their right, we Christians must remind them:

"Open your mouth for the sake of the mute, for the rights of all who are weak" (Proverbs 31:8).

 

Translation: Giuseppe Nardi
Image : Corrispondenza Romana

Trans: Tancred vekron99@hotmail.com

AMDG