Fourth report on the social doctrine of the church in the world
The “Fourth Report on the Social Doctrine of the Church in the World” (Eds. Cantagalli 2012), edited by the Observatory Cardinal Van Thuan on the Social Doctrine of the Church, was recently presented; this year the focus is on “The Colonization of Human Nature”. The Centre, in collaboration with five other research centers, takes stock of the Social Doctrine of the Church on all five continents, indicating the new facts, the emerging challenges and the most important teachings of the Magisterium. Archbishop Giampaolo Crepaldi, Bishop of Trieste, is the President of the Observatory and the chief director of the Report project. The “colonization of human nature” signifies the immense international pressure being put on governments to change their traditional laws on fertility, family and life. This is, according to Msgr. Giampaolo Crepaldi, the “new data” that emerges from the report. The attack is directed mainly to the Latin American countries, says the archbishop, who reports as representative for all the case of Argentina: “In the space of just one year –2011– that great country with a Christian tradition has gotten a law on artificial procreation which denaturalizes procreation, a law on “gender identity” that has denaturalized the family, and an amendment to the civil Code that allows “surrogate mothers” thus denaturalizing parenthood. In the course of just one year, the foundation of the entire society in Argentina has been revolutionized, has the notion of “human nature” has been excluded, and the inspiration of the Catholic faith for the construction of society has been pushed aside.”