THE RIGHT TO LIFE CANNOT BE CONCEDED BY THE AUTHORITIES

VATICAN CITY, FEB 26, 2002 (VIS) - Yesterday, in the Vatican's Old Synod Hall, the eighth plenary assembly of the Pontifical Academy for Life was held. The theme of this year's gathering is: "Nature and dignity of the human being as a foundation for the right to life. The challenges of the contemporary cultural context."

The first work session was inaugurated by Archbishop Julian Herranz, president of the Pontifical Council for Legislative Texts. In his address he affirmed that the primary right to life cannot "be understood either as a concession by the authorities, nor can it be dispensed by them, because its foundation lies in the very nature and dignity of the human being."

The second address was given by Andrzej Szostek, professor of ethics at the Catholic University of Lublin, Poland. He highlighted that evolutionism and liberalism are "insufficient for a full understanding of man, for whom they deny the existence of an absolute truth."

For his part, the Austrian professor, W. Waldstein, emeritus of the Lateran University in Rome, spoke on "the capacity of the human mind to know natural law."

During the afternoon session there were addresses from Sergio Belardinelli, professor of the sociology of communication processes at the University of Bologna, Italy, who spoke on "nature in the cosmological, biological, anthropological and ecological sense;" and from John Finnis, professor of law and the philosophy of law at the University of Oxford, England, who spoke on "nature and natural law in the present philosophical and theological debate."

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