New York Times
By Jim Yardley
February 18, 2016
Inserting
himself into the Republican presidential race, Pope Francis on
Wednesday suggested that Donald J. Trump “is not Christian” because of
the harshness of his campaign
promises to deport more immigrants and force Mexico to pay for a wall
along the border.
“A
person who thinks only about building walls, wherever they may be, and
not building bridges, is not Christian,” Francis said when a reporter
asked him about Mr. Trump
on the papal airliner as he returned to Rome after his six-day visit to
Mexico.
The
pope’s remarks came during a wide-ranging, midair news conference in
which he also waded into the question of whether the Roman Catholic
Church should grant an exception
to its prohibitions on abortion and birth control in regions where the
Zika virus is causing a public health emergency, including in much of
Catholic-dominated Latin America.
In
answering the question, Francis made a distinction between abortion and
birth control. He flatly ruled out condoning abortion, which he
described as “a crime, an absolute
evil.” But he seemed more open to making an exception for
contraception, citing Pope Paul VI’s decision in the 1960s to make an
emergency exception and permit nuns in the Belgian Congo to use
contraceptives because they were in danger of rape.
“Avoiding
pregnancy is not an absolute evil,” Francis said. “In certain cases, as
in this one, as in that one I mentioned of Blessed Paul VI, it was
clear. I would also
urge doctors to do their utmost to find vaccines against these
mosquitoes that carry this disease.”
Francis’
comments on Mr. Trump and the possibility of using contraceptives to
prevent the spread of the Zika virus are certain to garner strong
reactions. On Thursday,
the World Health Organization advised the sexual partners of pregnant
women to use condoms or abstain from sex if they live in Zika-affected
areas or are returning from them.
The
church has long opposed the use of artificial contraceptives, a ban
reaffirmed by Paul VI in his 1968 papal encyclical, Humanae Vitae. Many
Catholics across Latin
America and elsewhere ignore the edict, however.
Francis
made his remarks about Mr. Trump barely three hours after he had
concluded his Mexico trip by presiding over a huge Mass in the border
city of Ciudad Juárez. He
first walked to the edge of the Rio Grande — as American security
officers watched from the other side — to lay flowers at a new memorial
commemorating those who have died trying to cross the border.
Francis
then celebrated Mass, as a crowd of more than 200,000 people stood
barely a stone’s throw from the border and listened to the pope call for
compassion for immigrants
fleeing chaos, poverty and war.
Mr.
Trump has staked out controversial positions on immigration, vowing to
force Mexico to build a wall and also increase deportations. He has also
made inflammatory comments
accusing Mexican immigrants of being rapists and criminals.
Asked
whether he would try to influence Catholics in how they vote in the
presidential election, Francis said he “was not going to get involved in
that” but then repeated
his criticism of Mr. Trump, with a caveat.
“I
say only that this man is not Christian if he has said things like
that,” Francis said. “We must see if he said things in that way and in
this I give the benefit of
the doubt.”
Mr.
Trump responded immediately at a campaign rally in Kiawah Island, S.C.
Discussing the Islamic State, “their primary goal is to get to the
Vatican.”
“If
and when the Vatican is attacked,” he said, “the pope would only wish
and have prayed that Donald Trump would have been elected president.”
Earlier in his remarks, he said, “I like the pope.”
In
the days before Francis arrived at the border, Mr. Trump criticized the
visit, calling the pope a political person and accusing him of acting
at the behest of the Mexican
government. “I think that the pope is a very political person,” he
said.
Mr.
Trump, in an interview with Fox Business Network, said: “I don’t think
he understands the danger of the open border that we have with Mexico. I
think Mexico got him
to do it because they want to keep the border just the way it is.
They’re making a fortune, and we’re losing.”
Mr.
Trump is a Presbyterian and has been trying to make inroads among
evangelical voters as he seeks to win the coming set of Southern
primaries.
Asked
about the comments, Francis laughed. “Thank God he said I was a
politician because Aristotle defined the human person as ‘animal
politicus,’ ” he said.
“So
at least I am a human person,” the pope said. “As to whether I am a
pawn, well, maybe, I don’t know. I’ll leave that up to your judgment and
that of the people.”
Francis also took questions on a handful of other issues.
Throughout
his appearances, he spoke repeatedly about the human costs of Mexico’s
drug violence, yet he never met with the families of the 43 students who
disappeared
in Guerrero State, a case that has caused deep embarrassment for the
government. Francis said that he had wanted to meet the families in
Juárez, but that practicality and dissension among the families
prevented a meeting from happening. Mexico’s drug violence,
he said, is “a great pain that I’m taking with me, because this country
doesn’t deserve this drama.”
Asked
about the continuing problem of clerical sexual abuse, Francis defended
his record despite criticism that he is not sufficiently focused on the
issue. He listed
the things he has done to speed up prosecution of cases in the
Vatican’s judicial system, but agreed that “we need to work faster,
because we’re behind with the cases.”
The
pope made no mention of the recent controversy that erupted after an
outspoken member was suspended from his duties on the special commission
Francis appointed for
the protection of minors. But he described clerical sex abuse as “a
monstrosity” and said bishops who transferred abusive priests to protect
them should resign.
Francis
noted that as soon as next month he is expected to release his
much-awaited document on the theme of family, in which one topic on the
table is whether divorced
and civilly remarried Catholics should be allowed to receive communion.
It is an acutely delicate subject within the church, and the pope
ducked a direct answer. When pressed, he said that “all doors are open”
but that the church could not simply say “from
here on, they can have communion.”
Finally,
Francis was asked about recent reports about newly disclosed letters
revealing the closeness of the relationship between Pope John Paul II
and Anna-Teresa Tymieniecka,
a philosopher and author who collaborated with John Paul. Francis
argued that a close friendship between a man and woman “is not a sin,
it’s a friendship. A romantic relationship with a woman who is not your
wife — that is a sin. Understand?”
He
said that popes were men but that they needed advice and friendship
from women. Such relationships need not stir suspicions, he said. “The
pope, too, has a heart that
can have a healthy, holy friendship with a woman,” he said.
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