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Europe|Pope Says Both Trump and Harris Are ‘Against Life’
https://www.nytimes.com/2024/09/13/world/europe/pope-us-election-abortion-immigration.html
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He said American Catholic voters had to choose the “lesser of two evils” because of Donald Trump’s cruelty toward immigrants, and Kamala Harris’s support of abortion rights.
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Sept. 13, 2024
Asked his advice to Catholic voters in the coming U.S. presidential election, Pope Francis said they must choose the “lesser of two evils” because “both are against life” — Kamala Harris for her support for abortion rights, and Donald Trump for closing the door to immigrants.
“Sending migrants away, not allowing them to grow, not letting them have life is something wrong; it is cruelty,” Francis said in a news conference on the plane as he returned to Rome after his long trip to Southeast Asia and Oceania. “Sending a child away from the womb of the mother is murder because there is life. And we must speak clearly about these things.”
The remarks came as Francis, 87, concluded a grueling 11-day tour of the Asia-Pacific region that included stops in Jakarta, East Timor and Singapore, showcasing his commitment to reach out to the faithful in what he calls “the peripheries” and to build a less Eurocentric church that looks to Asia.
His stance on the American presidential race reflects the divide among Catholic voters in the United States, who in previous elections have been just as split between the parties as the larger electorate. The American bishops’ conference similarly advises Catholics to take the array of church teaching into account in the voting booth and does not endorse candidates — although some bishops weigh in more explicitly.
Francis described the rejection of migrants as a “grave sin” and “cruelty,” and abortion as “murder.” He said that both “are against life” and clearly wrong.
But when asked whether it would be morally admissible to vote for someone who favored the right to abortion, he responded: “One must vote. And one must choose the lesser evil. Which is the lesser evil? That lady or that gentleman? I don’t know. Each person must think and decide according to his or her own conscience.”
