HUMAN RIGHTS DO NOT DEPEND ON MAJORITY CONSENT

VATICAN CITY, FEB 28, 2002 (VIS) - Yesterday evening, the Pope received members of the Pontifical Academy for Life who have been participating in their eighth plenary assembly on the theme: "Nature and dignity of the human being as a foundation for the right to life. The challenges of the contemporary cultural context."

The Pope affirmed the importance of recovering "the anthropological and ethical significance of natural law and of the associated concept of natural rights. Indeed, it is a question of demonstrating if and how it is possible to 'recognize' the particular traits of all human beings, in terms of their nature and dignity, as a foundation for the right to life. ... Only on this basis is it possible for there to be true dialogue and authentic collaboration between believers and non-believers."

"It is important," he went on, "to help our contemporaries to understand the positive and humanizing value of natural moral law, correcting a series of misunderstandings and erroneous interpretations. The first mistake that must be eliminated is the 'supposed conflict between freedom and nature'." Another point "is the presumed static and immobile character attributed to the notion of natural moral law, this perhaps arises through an erroneous analogy with the concept of the natural properties of the physical world."

John Paul II recalled that "the Church's Magisterium invokes the universality and the dynamic and perfective character of natural law with reference to the transmission of life, both in order to maintain the fullness of marital union in the procreative act and to conserve openness to life in conjugal love. The Magisterium makes a similar invocation on the theme of respect for innocent human life: here our thoughts go to abortion, to euthanasia, and to the destructive suppression and experimentation with human embryos and fetuses."

"The rights of man," he stressed, "must refer to what man is by his nature and by reason of his dignity and not ... to the subjective choices of those who enjoy the power to participate in social life or who manage to obtain the consensus of the majority. ... This false interpretation of the rights of man ... can also lead democratic regimes to a form of substantial totalitarianism."

The Holy Father concluded by emphasizing that "the Church affirms each innocent human being's right to life, in each moment of his existence. The distinction sometimes proposed in some international documents between 'human being' and 'human person,' to then recognize the right to life and physical integrity only for people already born, is an artificial distinction with no scientific or philosophical foundation."

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