28 September 2021

Bad News All Around!

Swiss voters back same-sex marriage and San Marino votes to legalize abortion. The hits just keep coming. I beginning to think that God owes Sodom and Gomorrha an apology!

From Catholic World Report

Swiss Voters Back Same-Sex Marriage

By CNA Staff

Bern, Switzerland, Sep 27, 2021 / 05:00 am (CNA).

Switzerland voted Sunday to legalize same-sex marriage.

Around 64% of voters backed the measure in a referendum on Sept. 26, making Switzerland the world’s 30th country to approve gay marriage.

The country bordering Italy, France, Germany, Austria, and Liechtenstein has recognized civil unions for same-sex couples since 2007, following a 2005 referendum.

In December 2020, the Swiss parliament approved a bill, called “Marriage for All,” legalizing same-sex marriage and introduced it into the Swiss Civil Code.

In April this year, Campaigners gathered enough signatures to secure a referendum. More than 61,000 valid signatures were submitted in favor of giving the country’s 8.5 million population a final say on the law.

CNA Deutsch, CNA’s German-language news partner, reported that the referendum result was tight in some areas of Switzerland, a federal republic officially known as the Swiss Confederation.

In the canton of Appenzell Innerrhoden, which is traditionally Catholic, 50.8% of voters backed the proposal, which will come into effect from July 2022.

CNA Deutsch said that Simone Curau-Aepli, president of the Swiss Catholic Women’s Federation (SKF), welcomed the referendum result.

“I am really happy that everyone has said yes to marriage for all. For us this is a highly emotional moment,” she commented.

“We at the Swiss Catholic Women’s Association have been fighting for this for 20 years and stand for equal dignity and equal rights.”

Switzerland’s Catholic bishops said in December that legalizing same-sex marriage was “fraught with numerous administrative, legal and ethical difficulties.”

“[T]he Catholic Church is primarily entrusted with the sacrament of marriage. She celebrates before God the union of man and woman as a common, stable, and reproductive life laid out in love,” the Swiss bishops’ conference said in a Dec. 4 statement.

“This is why [we are] convinced, also with regard to civil marriage, that the use of the term ‘marriage’ should not be extended to any connection between two people regardless of their gender. Such a use of the term would bring about an equality that, in [our] opinion, cannot exist.”

San Marino Votes To Legalize Abortion

By Courtney Mares for CNA

Rome Newsroom, Sep 27, 2021 / 04:00 am (CNA).

The Republic of San Marino voted Sunday to legalize abortion up to 12 weeks of pregnancy.

The referendum vote on Sept. 26 ended the country’s ban on abortion, which had been in place since 1865.

More than 77% of voters approved the motion to allow abortion in the first trimester of pregnancy, as well as after the 12-week mark if there are “are anomalies and malformations of the fetus that involve a serious risk for the physical or psychological health of the woman.”

San Marino is a republic with a population of 35,000 people — a third of which live outside of its borders. The tiny nation’s birth rate is about 1.2 children per woman.

The bishop of San Marino released a statement on Sept. 26 saying that pregnant women must be supported so that “no stone is left unturned in seeking alternatives” to abortion.

“We must ensure that never again does a life not blossom because of insecurity, distrust, loneliness, lack of custody and protection or for economic reasons,” Bishop Andrea Turazzi said.

“Today, with the progress of science, with the means at our disposal, with the growth of social consciousness, we can do so much to welcome unborn life,” the bishop of San Marino-Montefeltro said.

“The growth rate of a society, we believe, is not measured so much by economics, but by respect for the rights of all, starting with the fragile, defenseless and unborn.”

According to tradition, a Christian named Marinus established a Christian community in the fourth century that eventually became the city-state of San Marino.

Italy, which geographically surrounds San Marino, legalized abortion in 1978. Other majority Catholic countries, notably Ireland, have liberalized their abortion laws in recent years by referendum.

The people of Gibraltar, a British Overseas Territory located at the southern tip of the Iberian Peninsula, voted in a referendum in June to approve a bill legalizing abortion.

Following the vote, Bishop Turazzi said that the diocese of San Marino would commit itself to “witness to the Gospel of life, for a culture and a policy favorable to the family, for a boost of awareness and responsibility.”

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