When reflecting on the EU Constitution, the pre-eminent intellectual giant, Joseph Ratzinger, later Pope Benedict XVI, insisted on the three elements that must be included if we are to guarantee a wholesome future that respects the great imperatives of its history. These apply to Malta, as it tinkers with changes to its Constitution.
Firstly, that human dignity and human rights must be affirmed absolutely. These core values are non-negotiable and exist in virtue of their own intrinsic worth. Their reaffirmation demand an awakening of a moral consciousness. They lie above the manipulation of cheap political manoeuvring.
Only the blind cannot see the evil being unleashed by so-called medical progress without an ethical compass. Locally, the scrapping of the Embryo Protection Act and the introduction of in-vitro fertilisation to single people deliberately treats life as a commodity and creates orphans.
We should also be aware of an economic model that condones modern slavery.
The poor and vulnerable in the construction pandemic and human trafficking in the sex trade stare us in the face.
Secondly, that conjugal marriage is a timeless concept and the need to restore the family. The indissolubility of lifelong commitment has been and is being dissolved into insignificance. Not only the couples concerned, but future generations, will bear the brunt of the chaos resulting from loose commitments.
Worse still, when the state stops recognising the conjugal concept of marriage and the biological relationship of man and woman, it places any emotional relationship on a par with marriage. It thus alters and denatures the meaning of marriage. The introduction of gay marriage has denied children their fundamental right to rightful parenthood. Now, even religious freedom is in jeopardy.
Thirdly, society has to recognise the inherent limit of freedom of opinion and address the increasing pathological hatred of anything linked with our Christian history and heritage. We should respect and revere other people and cultures, but not at the expense of denying, dismantling and mocking our own.
Ratzinger’s appeal needs revisiting as we are bitterly realising that democracy and the democratic process alone are no guarantee of inevitable positive progress. No democracy can thrive for long unless it vigorously upholds the unchangeable values that are intrinsic to our God-given human nature.
History is a great teacher. The communist ideology that subordinated these values and the traditional concept of morality on the altar of the inexorable progress of their ideological experiment should be a wake-up call for those who persist in evading the truth.
Sadly, in Malta, there is no sign of moral renewal. We now face renewed aggressive lobbying for abortion that is being promoted under the guise of reproductive health. There is even a concerted effort to entrench gender ideology in the prospective equality bill.
In the name of progress, sophistry will be used to conceal the real aims of this agenda that will eventually lead, as happened elsewhere, to the suppression of freedom of conscience. Yet, as people of good will, especially as Christians, we are obliged to take a stand to restore the intellectual foundations that are the bedrock of a sound society.