From pmathur@vt.eduWed Sep 13 12:38:13 1995
Date: Tue, 12 Sep 1995 20:16:54 -0400
From: piyush mathur <pmathur@vt.edu>
Reply to: beijing-conf@tristram.edc.org
To: beijing-conf@tristram.edc.org
Subject: Mother Teresa on abortion

Mother Teresa appeals to women against abortion

    BEIJING, Sept 11 (Reuter) - Mother Teresa issued an impassioned appeal
to the world women's conference on Monday, extolling the joys of motherhood
and saying abortion was the greatest destroyer of world peace.
     "Motherhood is the gift of God to women," the Nobel Peace laureate and
nun said in a message to the United Nations Fourth World Conference on
Women. Her message was delivered by Mercedes Arzu Wilson, official delegate
from Guatemala.
     "Yet, we can destroy this gift of motherhood, especially by the evil
of abortion, but also by thinking that other things like jobs or positions
are more important than loving," said Mother Teresa, who tends the poor in
India.
     She urged delegates not to ignore what she called the beautiful
differences between men and women lest they bring division and unhappiness
to the world.
     "For example ... abortion is the greatest destroyer of peace in the
world today, and those who want to make women and men the same are all in
favour of abortion," she said.
     However, the devout Catholic nun suffered a setback on Monday, when
the United Nations announced that delegates working in closed-door sessions
on the conference's draft Platform for Action had reached agreement against
penalising abortion in countries where it is illegal.
     Mother Teresa's speech was even more conservative than remarks by the
delegation sent to the conference by Pope John Paul II.
     "Anything that destroys God's gift of motherhood destroys His most
precious gift to women, the ability to love as a woman," she said.
     She emphasised the family, also a mainstay in the agenda of the
delegation of the Holy See.
     "A country where many families have been destroyed ... will have many
problems. I have often seen, especially in rich countries, how children
turn to drugs or other things to escape feeling unloved and rejected," she
said.
     She appealed to the conference to ensure strong and united families.

(forwarded by Piyush Mathur:  my views do not coincide with Mother Teresa's)