Rapid advancement of social leftist goals such as same-sex marriage, greater access and full funding of abortion, legalized euthanasia, religious persecution, and much more would likely occur with a leftist win.
PARIS, France, May 1, 2012 (LifeSiteNews.com) – The French presidential election next Sunday could result is a dramatic political realignment of French political control to the left. Rapid advancement of social leftist goals such as same-sex marriage, greater access and full funding of abortion, legalized euthanasia, suppression of parental rights regarding education of their children and religious persecution would likely occur with a leftist win.
The election designates the country’s president for the next five years. The second round will oppose Nicolas Sarkozy, the incumbent head of State, runner-up – with 27.18% of the vote – to socialist candidate François Hollande in the first round. Hollande was 1.5 points ahead, with 28.63% of the vote.
While a large proportion of France’s laws and regulations are now made in Brussels in the name of the European Union – and interfere with practically everything, from the size of septic tanks for houses located in the countryside, to immigration and asylum policies or changes to value added tax – societal affairs such as abortion, euthanasia, schooling and marriage law remain largely within the competence of the member States. As do labor legislation, fiscal law, family policy and other domains to which pro-life and pro-family electors are sensitive.
The result of next Sunday’s vote is still quite open, given the uncertainty on the transfer of votes from electors who favored one of the other eight candidates in the first round.
On the left, Jean-Luc Mélenchon – 11.1% in the first round, with a largely communist and revolutionary rhetoric – has openly called on his electors to vote for François Hollande and although he is not officially asking for anything in exchange, the sheer weight of his first-round result is expected to induce Hollande into radicalizing his left-wing stance if he is elected.
Mélenchon is a self-proclaimed admirer of Robespierre who personally organized and watched over the genocide of the “Vendéens”, catholic peasants in the West of France who rose up in arms to defend persecuted priests, their local rights and the traditional political order during the French Revolution and its secularist dictatorship.
Mélenchon is not so far removed from Hollande himself who has promised to inscribe the law of separation of State and Church of 1905 into the French Constitution, should he be elected to the presidency. The beginning of the XXth century in France saw the exile of religious orders, the confiscation of church buildings and assets, the tracking of Catholic officers in the French army and other restrictions on religious liberty which declined in the common effort of World War I. Enshrining the largely unapplied law of 1905 in the Constitution is seen by many as a declaration of open hostility to Catholic and Christian rights, in the name of securalism.
Apart from heavy taxation, massive State spending and extended rights for the non-European immigrant population – including voting rights for those immigrants in local elections and political overtures to the Muslim population – François Hollande’s program contains many unacceptable promises from the pro-life viewpoint.
He has promised the legalization of assisted suicide and euthanasia, albeit in guarded tones. The French senate can be expected to vote for such a measure since the socialists gained a majority there last September. The National Assembly is expected to follow suit in the legislative elections next June if François Hollande wins on Sunday.
All of these potential developments would create a dramatically dangerous new political situation for France since, until now, the Senate acted as a brake on leftwing policies even under socialist presidents with a majority in the National Assembly.
François Hollande has also promised to make abortion more widely available and to create abortion centers in all State hospitals. 80% of abortion costs are paid for by the State budget; he has promised to drive up that figure to 100%. He wants to make contraception free and anonymous for minors. He has promised to legalize embryo research, homosexual “marriage” and homosexual adoption.
Hollande also wants to make schooling compulsory at three years of age (against the currently age six) and has committed himself to reducing State funding of Catholic schools and reversing legislation that allows parents to choose a State school outside their particular territory.
Attempts by socialist representatives to put an end to tax deductions for donators to independent school funds (a growing number of schools which receive no public subsidy whatsoever) are expected to be implemented and, under socialist governance, to succeed.
Fearing such threatening, radical developments, pro-life and Christian voters are expected to pronounce themselves “against” Hollande next Sunday with a “Sarkozy” vote, even though the incumbent president is far from an ideal candidate from their point of view.
Sarkozy has sent out signs of sympathy to the homosexual lobby during his campaign, promising to transform the current civil union contract (“PACS”) into a more marriage-like commitment to be concluded in the townhouse. But – under growing pressure from the conservative population – he has promised not to legalize homosexual “marriage” and has spoken out clearly against same-sex parenting and adoption. He has also committed himself against euthanasia, promising not to modify the largely acceptable “End of Life” act voted into law in 2005, which includes some room for “euthanasia by omission” in allowing withdrawal of feeding tubes (but not of hydration).
Sarkozy, a liberal, is not expected to thwart freedom of education in France more than it already is.
The “Sarkozy vote” is being promoted by Catholic groups and the small but active conservative press as the lesser of two evils, or even the lesser of two “worses”, experience having shown that under Sarkozy’s first period of office the right to life and the stability of natural marriage neither progressed nor receded.
What has changed, though, is the increased pressure from traditional values forces on Sarkozy who cannot hope to be re-elected without a massive transfer of votes from the electors of Marine Le Pen of the Front national.
Le Pen’s unprecedented score of 17.9% on April 22nd has spurred Sarkozy to speak about patriotism, the French identity, family values, national frontiers and other themes which he already brought to the fore during his campaign to try to limit Marine Le Pen’s vote. During his major rally at the Trocadéro in Paris today, Sarkozy even proclaimed the “Christian identity of France” – receiving wild applause.
Marine Le Pen is the only candidate who has promised more support for French families and stay-at-home parents, a partial stop to public funding of abortions – although she does claim to favor the “right to abortion” – and to move out of the European Union which promotes and imposes hate-crime laws, anti-discrimination laws and a homosexualist agenda which heavily influence French law-making.
Pro-lifers and promoters of traditional values have had no real champion during these presidential elections, but on the positive side some of their themes have gained public visibility and recognition.
Responding to the BBC ‘This World’ programme entitled ‘The Shame of the Catholic Church’, broadcast on 1 May 2012, Cardinal Seán Brady [Archbishop of Armagh Ireland] has issued the following statement:
