VATICAN CITY (CNS): Widespread acceptance of artificial birth control, divorce and legal recognition of same-sex unions have eroded individual and societal commitments to supporting traditional families, said speakers during a Vatican video conference.
The conference, sponsored by the Congregation for Clergy and broadcast on the Internet on November 28, emphasised the role Catholic priests must play in educating Catholics about the importance of marriage and family life.
“The family, since it is not humankind’s invention or the result of an ideology, cannot be modified in its nature by any authority on earth,” said prefect of the clergy congregation, Cardinal Dario Castrillon Hoyos.
“Unfortunately, numerous political doctrines and schools of thought continue to instigate a culture that wounds human dignity, ignoring or jeopardising to various degrees the truth about marriage and the family,” he said.
Several of the conference speakers said laws permitting divorce, sterilisation, abortion or same-sex unions may begin by professing that they should be allowed in exceptional circumstances, but they end up promoting general acceptance of the practices.
