Much of the pope’s ire is directed at the Clinton administration, which he sees as the moving force behind the U.N. conference’s pro-choice position. At the National Press Club last month, Vice President Al Gore, who will lead the U.S. delegation, insisted that “The United States has not sought, does not seek and will not seek to establish an international right to abortion.” But in an unusual personal attack last week, the pope’s chief spokesman accused the vice president of misstating the conference’s goals. “The draft document,” said Joaquin Navarro-Valls at a Vatican press conference, “which has the United States as its principal sponsor, contradicts, in reality, Mr. Gore’s statement.”
The pope is also vexed by how his delegation was treated at meetings leading up to Cairo. These preconference sessions were directed by officials of the International Planned Parenthood Federation – staunch advocates of abortion rights – and buttressed by women’s advocacy groups who view the all-male Vatican as a bastion of oppressive patriarchy. “The Vatican’s offended,” says Raymond Flynn, the U.S. ambassador to the Holy See. “Many intemperate comments were made by nongovernmental officials in the U.S. delegation during the preparatory meetings for the conference.”
Sexual issues have long been a particular concern of John Paul II. Long before he was made a cardinal, he published in Poland a book on human sexuality, complete with detailed drawings of male and female genitalia. As a papal adviser he was instrumental in Pope Paul VI’s 1968 decision to continue the church’s ban on artificial contraception. In his first decade as pope, his preoccupation with human rights in Eastern Europe overshadowed his continuing interest in issues of sexuality and reproduction. But in the last five years, the Vatican has issued a string of documents on sexual subjects, from the ethics of fetal experimentation to homosexuality to John Paul’s most recent and ponderous encyclical, “The Splendor of Truth,” which defends the notion that some acts, like abortion, are inherently evil regardless of circumstances or intention. But, says Ambassador Flynn, “No issue has affected John Paul II in a more profound way throughout his 15-year papacy than the Cairo conference.”
Abortion is not the only problem John Paul has with the Cairo document. Speaking for the pope, Navarro-Valls last week charged U.N. experts with “extremely loose and selective use of statistics” in the draft’s treatment of the relationship between population growth and economic development. More important, in a letter of his own to heads of state last March, the pope insinuated that the Cairo conference was seeking to impose “a lifestyle typical of certain fringes within developed societies . . . which are materially rich and secularized.” And, he asked: “Are countries more sensitive to the values of nature, morality and religion going to accept such a vision of man and society without protest?”
Over the summer, Vatican diplomats orchestrated the current protest, defying Western expectations by enlisting Muslim mullahs in a common cause. “It is not at all strange that other religions have similar views to that of the Holy See,” insists Navarro-Valls. But only John Paul II could have pulled it off. Despite his age – 74 – and failing health, he is still a practiced player in the game of international politics.
Is there room for compromise? This summer the pope himself praised the conference’s shift from controlling population through birth control to its emphasis on increased education, job opportunities and full civil rights for women. And, for the first time, he spoke enthusiastically of the need for family planning, if only by the rhythm method. “We are pro-women,” says Msgr. Peter Elliott, one of 16 Vatican delegates. “It is very old-fashioned feminism to say that access to the pill, to IUDs, to abortions constitutes women’s rights.”
The pope may not make many converts in Cairo. But he has an aging lion’s will to prevail. In a long life, he has outmaneuvered Nazis and communists in his native Poland. To him, sexuality is just another theater in the battle for human rights.
Births per woman (1992)
China 2.4 France 1.8 Japan 1.6 India 3.9 Iran 6.1 Isreal 2.7 Kenya 6.4 Mexico 5.6 Pakistan 3.2 Somalia 6.8 Sweden 2.1 U.S. 2.1
