We are witnessing a new form of ‘feminism’ in the name of emancipating women: the ‘right’ of a pregnant woman to carry out an abortion.

Without beating round the bush, without resorting to any euphemism, we must call this so-called ‘right’ what it actually is: the killing of life conceived in her womb. They are placing in a tug-of-war the pseudo-emancipation of women and the right to life of the person not yet born.

We have to suffer hearing the words of a number of today’s false prophets, misleading contemporary activists, militant and eager to promote powerful propaganda advocating abortion and placing huge pressure on governments to legislate this type of killing.

Among them I mention the multi-millionaire George Soros, who is spending enormous amounts of money in pro-abortion propaganda, and Nils Muiznieks, who ironically is the Human Rights Commissioner of the Council of Europe.

In his writings, Muiznieks reiterated that: “Particular attention should be paid to the most vulnerable groups of people, such as children.” It seems that the child in the mother’s womb, according to him, does not belong to the category of the “most vulnerable groups of people” and children.

Today, we talk about what is termed peer pressure: the influence exerted, for example, by young people’s friends being more influential than that of their parents.

I will explain myself. When The Netherlands introduced ‘gay marriage’ it was presented as a sign of being an emancipated country. After The Netherlands, other countries were encouraged to do so (not to look less emancipated than neighbouring countries). The same thing happens in the case of the legalisation of abortion.

First, they portray as retrograde a country that does not accept abortion. Then, it is accepted in “extreme” and “exceptional” cases. Then, the door is always opened even further for other cases.

It is an undisputed fact that life starts at fertilisation. Therefore, when discussing abortion, the question is between the so-called right of the pregnant woman for her personal autonomy and the right to life of the unborn child.

Countries that legalise abortion establish certain limits: till what stage of the pregnancy is abortion legalised? In Albania, it is permitted up to the 12th week of pregnancy. Other countries accept abortion later in the pregnancy and others earlier.

However, it is here that we notice the absurdity of abortion legislation.

If it is not allowed after that time frame, why is it allowed before? Maybe because the foetus is small?

Does that mean that because the foetus is small it has no right to life? Or does it mean that, because it is small, it is less of a human being than an adolescent human being?

Does this imply that the right to life depends on how old one is?

Is it, thus, that an old man has greater right than an adult, an adult more than a youth, a youth more than a boy, a boy more than a baby, and a baby more than a foetus and a foetus of a few months more than a foetus of a few days?

When, the media showed us the lifeless body of a boy less than two years old lying on the sand on a beach of an island near Greece, everyone pitied him.

And when people drown in the Mediterranean Sea and the media tells us with great prominence how many children were among them, no one says: “It does not matter! Those are children!” On the contrary, we pity them even more.

Why is this? Is it because we felt they had a future ahead of them and they have now lost it? And why do we not say the same thing for the foetus who is being targeted for abortion?

Why do we not say: he has a future ahead of him, let us not rob him of his life?

The sin of the Pharisee was that he did not realise he was a sinner.

The sin of today’s society is that it does not want to be aware of its sinfulness when it opens the door for the elimination of lives yet unborn.

After the barbaric killing of a two-year-old by two children aged 10 in Liverpool in 1993, the late Cardinal Basil Hume and Rabbi Jonathan Sacks suggested the setting up of a royal commission to investigate the causes of increased criminality in their country. However, their request went unheeded.

In an interview to the English newspaper The Independent, Cardinal Hume said: “When a society looks at the mirror and does not like what it sees, it either shrugs its shoulders and walks away or pauses and asks: ‘why.”

This is the sin of today’s society; it refuses to open its eyes to wrongs and even when it recognises it is in the wrong, it is not prepared to ask why.

Mgr Ġorġ Frendo is Bishop of Tirana, Albania.