ABSTRACT: By way of the Concordat the dignitaries of the Church delegate to Caesar the solution to the problem of clandestine abortion. If necessary, the Radicals will defend the right of the Church to remind its faithful that abortion is always the worst of evils. But they must affirm the duty of society and the state to take the inspiration for its legislation from tolerance and civilian and lay values against the claim to abortion as a crime in the wake of adultery, science, and Italian unity as crimes. The Radicals demand the abrogation of the Concordat in the fight against the claim of the Church to dictate laws while Italian officialdom keeps silent.

The Church has the sacrosanct right and duty at all times to remind its faithful and society as a whole of its religious principles and to demand that the State places no obstacles on the profession, the respect and the execution of these.

Its dignitaries certainly were at fault in keeping silent for decades about the curse of clandestine abortion. They have traditionally delegated to Caesar the solution to the problem on all levels, including that which regards the conscience of every individual or, if one prefers, God.

As long as the threat of laws, of moral and physical lynching, forced women (which is to say tens of millions of people, our mothers, sisters, companions, daughters) to abort, risking death and mental illness or terrible suffering, Church and State did little, except for "the right to life" of embryos and foetuses, not to speak of the infants consigned to "public charities". At most they have spent their time attacking or blocking information on sex and contraceptives.

They screamed sacrilege when a few dozen of us Radicals among tens of thousands of believers went down to St. Peter's square on Easter of 1966 carrying our posters on which was written: "No to abortion, yes to the pill". They answered by arresting us and the report of a few policemen and, afterwards, with "Humanae vitae" (1).

The Pope, "Famiglia Cristiana", "L'Avvenire", the CEI, (2) at that time where concerned with another "scourge" that they had discovered. Full of love for "the family" (but which one?), they accused us "pro-divorce" people of "murdering conscience, sacraments, faith, love", worse than anyone whose mind "darkened by a moment of folly, may snuff out the life of only one of his fellows". But until we proposed a responsible solution for divorce (the Fortuna law), none of them took on the problem of the crisis in the family, of class divorce, of the tragedy of the matrimonial out-laws.

Therefore we will, if necessary, defend to the bitter end the right of the Church to remind those who still believe in it as the historical and institutional incarnation of God that abortion is always the worst of evils, that it is always (for this religious confession) murder and that the women are wretched murderers who in the past and in the future have and will abort from personal choice. But we must assert the duty of the State to take inspiration for its legislation from tolerance and lay, civilian, and Christian values. We defend it against the claim to impose again abortion as a crime in the wake of adultery, science, Italian unity and open dissent as crimes.

It is something quite different which is being tolerated by our home-grown "laity", the "sages" of this chaotic regime, and our parties - even those of the left. The Church, the clerics, once again literally lay claim to "dictate laws", to dictate legal articles, amendments, penalties and attenuating factors to Parliament to the disgrace of the Concordat itself, with all the power of its privileges. They do this with uncivil aggressiveness, shamelessly, and shouting the anathema of "Nazism" to the republican parliament if it should take abortion off the list of crimes, or to the entire populace if it should do so with an abrogating referendum.

Italian officialdom swallows all this whole, making an appeal at best to its traditional, compact, "historical" respect for the clergy. No word is heard from the president of the republic, the presidents of the houses of parliament, the government, the ministry of justice, the press, or the official parties.

The RAI-TV goes along with it by amputating its information services, debates, reports of dissent, alternatives. In the press only little space remains among so many spreading censures of the regime, for which reason it would appear that the Referendum Committee, the Lega 13 Maggio [13th of May League], the Movimento per la Liberazione della Donna [Women's Liberation Movement], the Radical Party, the liberal Socialists - like the LID [Italian Divorce League] in its time - have been abrogated. (But this time too they are winning thanks to a basically honest, worthy, clean country). We don't intend to stand idly by and watch this havoc. We are girding ourselves again to demand the definitive and total abrogation of the Concordat. We will go to the referendum, to the elections, early ones or otherwise.

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TRANSLATOR'S NOTES

1) Humanae vitae - A papal encyclical.

2) Famiglia Cristiana - A popular Catholic magazine.

L'Avvenire - A Catholic daily.

CEI - Conferenza Episcopale Italiana - Italian Episcopal

Conference.