PATTI SMITH, THE HOLY FATHER AND THE SHORT MEMORY OF THE CATHOLICISM

In Italy the law that legalized in 1978 voluntary termination of pregnancy, it was not signed by Patti Smith, but by the President of the Republic Giovanni Leone, Christian Democrat, countersigned by the Prime Minister Giulio Andreotti, by the Minister of Health Tina Anselmi, by the Keeper of the Seals Francesco Bonifacio and by the ministers Tommaso Morlino and Filippo Maria Pandolfi, everyone, without exception, Christian Democrats and very Catholics

- Church news -

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Author
Ivano Liguori, Ofm. Cap.

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The 31 last July the Supreme Pontiff Leo XIV received Patti Smith — the “priestess of rock” — in a private audience, singer-songwriter and poet, about to turn eighty next December — in a forty-minute meeting in the Library of the Apostolic Palace.

Some sites that improperly define themselves as traditionalist, in Italy and abroad they were immediately outraged, remembering that the artist would be in favor of abortion.

We do not intend to enter into controversy with these environments: it would be a sterile battle, as well as lost from the start. We limit ourselves to refreshing the short memory of those who forget, as in Italy, the law that legalized in 1978 the voluntary termination of pregnancy was not signed by Patti Smith, but by the President of the Republic Giovanni Leone, Christian Democrat, countersigned by the Prime Minister Giulio Andreotti, by the Minister of Health Tina Anselmi, by the Keeper of the Seals Francesco Bonifacio and by the ministers Tommaso Morlino and Filippo Maria Pandolfi. Everyone, without exception, Christian Democrats and very Catholics, accustomed to spending their lives "kissing the piles" of holy water. And all these devotees hid behind the finger of the institutional act due.

It hits, But, an asymmetry: the Church has always firmly reiterated excommunication lat the same time (can. 1397 §2) for those who procure an actual abortion. John Paul II, in the encyclical Gospel of Life (NN. 73-74), it went beyond the single case, affirming the serious moral responsibility of those who, with your vote, contributes to promulgating laws that allow and favor abortion, a burden of conscience which for a professing Catholic should not be less serious just because it does not translate into an automatic canonical sanction. You might ask then, without any irreverence, What voice did this moral responsibility ever have for the army of very Catholic Christian Democrats who wrote and signed that law?, while in the sacred palaces there was indignation about one-way traffic: maximum indignation towards the radicals of Marco Pannella and Emma Bonino who had promoted the referendum for the legalization of abortion, but not towards those who promulgated that law, as they had to submit to a due act, poor holy victims!

Regarding the due act it would be enough to remember how things went differently in Belgium. King Baldwin I, Catholic seriously, in order not to sign the law except in 1990 decriminalized abortion, invoked the article 82 of the Constitution and temporarily abdicated. From the 3 al 5 April of that year the government exercised royal powers in his place, he promulgated the law and Parliament reinstated him on the throne just thirty-six hours later. The law passed anyway, but not from his hand. An extraordinary figure, that of the Belgian sovereign, for whom the Dicastery for the Causes of Saints has started the beatification process on 21 December 2024, after the announcement made by Pope Francis during his trip to Belgium (cf.. Vatican News).

This is the difference between those who really believe in what they profess and who, while professing it in words, he adapts with ease to the conveniences of power. As for the Supreme Pontiffs, it is good to remember that they have always received everyone, including bloodthirsty dictators and autocrats of all persuasions. Remember, among many, the president of the Islamic Republic of Iran, received both by John Paul II (Khatami, In the 1999) both by Francesco (Spiritual, In the 2016). And they did well, because receiving someone does not mean sharing their thoughts or politics, if anything it means believing that no meeting is ever completely useless, at least for whom, like us, he believes in the graceful action of the three theological virtues: faith, hope, charity (1Color 13,13). Anyone today who is scandalized by a forty-minute audience granted to a very talented artist should perhaps be indignant, with more knowledge of the facts, looking closer to home and further back in time.

Abortion is such a serious tragedy and crime that using them for similar polemical squabbles is offensive first and foremost towards the creatures killed every day. The Holy Father Francis himself expressed it bluntly, in the general audience of 10 October 2018, with a severity that not even John Paul II dared reach:

«I ask you: it is right to "take out" a human life to solve a problem? It's okay to hire a hitman to solve a problem? Can not be done, it is not right to "kill" a human being, albeit small, to solve a problem. It's like hiring a hitman to solve a problem". (cf.. who).

On this, not on a Vatican audience, those who say they really care about life should focus: the drama of hitmen hired every day to kill innocent angels. And in Italy, let's remember it again at the end because it is history: the hand of the assassins was armed by the very Catholic Christian Democrats, everyone lined up to kiss the holy water stacks the day after the law on the legalization of hitmen was passed.

Cagliari, 8 August 2026

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The books of Ivano Liguori, to access the book shop click on the cover

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