Pope Francis: Abortion Activists Follow ‘Code of the Mafia’

In a recent meeting with sick children and their parents, Pope Francis once more thundered against abortion, this time comparing the abortion mentality to the code of the Mafia, who “take out” a person when he gets in their way.

In a private meeting in the chapel of his Santa Marta residence on Friday evening, the Pope praised the parents of the sick children, expressing his admiration for their fortitude and courage. Francis also repeated the testimony of one of the dads present, who said he and his wife had been advised to abort their child once doctors realized he would be born handicapped.

“And you said: ‘No, let him come, he has the right to live.’”

“No problem is solved by taking out a person. Never, ever. That is the code of the Mafia: ‘There’s a problem, let’s take this guy out.’ Never,” Francis said.

The Pope has been hammering home a pro-life message in address after address, calling abortion a “scourge” on society and insisting that “a just society recognizes the primacy of the right to life from conception to natural death.”

“The degree of progress of a civilization is measured by its ability to protect life, especially in its most fragile stages,” he said in an address Saturday.

Despite Francis’s repeated denunciations of gay marriage and abortion, the Italian media have been remarkably silent concerning the Pope’s words on these topics, choosing to report on other messages while gingerly sidestepping those that do not seem to fit their narrative for this Pope.

In his opening address for the general assembly of the Italian Bishops Conference (CEI), Cardinal Angelo Bagnasco, the conference president, accused the media of culpable negligence for failing to report on papal speeches concerning gender, abortion, gay marriage, and other hot button issues.

Sometimes it seems that certain of the Pope’s words that are not politically correct, he said, “are covered over by those who want to get a different message across to the public.”

One commentator noted that whenever the Pope speaks against the Mafia, he makes front page headlines. When he compares abortionists to the Mafia, however, his words are somehow lost.

Follow Thomas D. Williams on Twitter @tdwilliamsrome.