"Nothing has Changed’ Right to Life is Still the Foundational Issue, says Philly Archbishop

by Patrick B. Craine

PHILADELPHIA, October 24, 2013 (LifeSiteNews.com) - Amidst confusion about the Church’s teaching on how to engage issues like abortion, contraception, and same-sex “marriage” following recent interviews by Pope Francis, Philadelphia’s Archbishop has stressed that “nothing has changed” and the right to life remains the “foundational” issue facing the culture.

The right to life “is not merely one among many urgent issues, but rather the foundational one. It provides the cornerstone for a whole architecture of human dignity,” Archbishop Charles Chaput wrote in a column for Catholic Philly, the archdiocesan newspaper, on October 18.

“Nothing has changed in recent months or years in Catholic thinking about the sanctity of human life. Nor can it,” he added.

Archbishop Chaput framed his column as a reflection on the USCCB’s 1998 pastoral letter Living the Gospel of Life, which he called “the best document ever issued by the U.S. bishops on the priorities of Catholic engagement in our nation’s public life.” The bishops’ purpose, he says, was to apply Pope John Paul II’s 1995 encyclical Evangelium Vitae to the U.S. context.

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