Bishops reiterate doctrine about disability and sin before the government’s complaint

The disability area of ​​the Spanish Episcopal Conference (EEC) reiterates the Catholic doctrine on the relationship between disability and sin against a government complaint against Mons. Juan Antonio Reig Pla for preaching it.

The Bishop Emeritus of Alcalá de Henares, said during a recent homily in which he spoke of the human dignity that is born from the creative act of God: “You are not a failure, or from the origin. Also for children born with physical, intellectual or psychic disabilities. (…) Disability is inheritance of sin and the disorder of nature that have not been called by God. The whole foundation of its existence in God, which is origin, foundation and is goal. ”

This words, or an interpretation of them, caused the protest of some people and the complaint by the Ministry of Social Rights and Consumption before the Attorney General and the Ombudsman for an alleged crime of humiliation or contempt for persons with disabilities regulated in article 510.2 of the Criminal Code.

The theological response to evil and suffering in the world is the original sin

The department dependent on the Episcopal Commission for Evangelization, Catechesis and Catechumenate of the EEC published A statement A few hours after knowing this complaint, although without mentioning the case.

In it, remember that “the Church, in the light of Christian revelation, reaffirms and confirms absolutely the ontological dignity of each man and of each woman” from which “the conviction that every human being has a unique value, which must be recognized, respected, protected and promoted in any circumstance in which it can be found” is born.

Secondly, he appreciates progressive awareness in society on “the centrality of human dignity”, which translates into an “effective commitment to care for the most fragile and those who experience a disability that makes them especially vulnerable.”

Sitting these bases, the area of ​​disability of the EEC also exposes how Christianity responds to the “situation of native and congenital weakness in which the human being is.”

In this sense, remember that the theological response to evil and suffering in the world “is the ‘original sin’, whereby human nature was weakened, subject to ignorance, suffering, dominated by death and inclined to evil.”

This reflection is origin, the text continues, of “the association of the disease with sin, especially in the Old Testament, and that Jesus, as a sign of the presence of the kingdom of God among us, cured all ailment while forgiving sins, offering an integral salvation.”

“Only from this perspective can the disease be linked to sin, while it existentially affects every human being and opens our lives to the love of Jesus Christ, in whom we are healed and saved,” adds the statement.

These statements coincide with the above The statement Published by the Diocese of Alcalá de Henares after knowing the government’s complaint against Mons. Reig Pla in which numbers 418, 1448 and 1264 of the Catechism of the Catholic Church that expose this doctrine are cited.