Appendix - Loreto, the Sanctuary of “Non-negotiable Principles”

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Loreto is a sanctuary that can serve as a spiritual “lung,” especially for those who struggle to defend non-negotiable principles (right to life, defense of the natural family, right of parents to educate their children).

The events that took place in the Holy House, of really great importance for the history of humanity, and all the more for those who profess the Christian religion, leave no room for doubt.123

Our Redemption began among those sacred walls. Not only was Our Lord Jesus Christ conceived there; it was also the place of Mary’s Immaculate Conception and birth. Within those walls, the Word became flesh and came to dwell among men. How can we not then think of the intrinsic dignity of human beings from the moment of conception? Jesus himself, the Savior, assumed the human condition right from the beginning. Our Lord was an embryo and a fetus and lived for nine months in the virginal womb of Mary Most Holy.

Therefore, Loreto should become the spiritual point of reference for all those who work to defend the right to life of unborn children. Because there is no dif-

123 Cf. Benedict XVI, Discorso ai partecipanti al convegno promosso dal Partito

Popolare Europeo, March 30, 2006, in https://w2.vatican.va/content/benedictxvi/it/speeches/2006/march/documents/hf_ben-xvi_spe_20060330_euparliamentarians.html.

ference in dignity and sacredness between an unborn person and another already born, just as there is no difference between a young person and an elderly one, a male or female. A human being is always human in every phase of existence. For this reason, opposition to genetic manipulation, the artificial production of children, and the crime of abortion must be clear and radical. Any law that admits the murder of children or their reduction to objects is inherently iniquitous and must be rejected and repealed. The same obviously applies to the barbarous practice of the commodification of the womb or surrogate motherhood, which some blasphemously associate with the Annunciation that took place in the Holy House. This comparison clearly makes no sense if only because Our Lady did not ask to become the Mother of God, but just accepted it by saying “Yes” to the divine will; a “yes” open to life, which today, too many refuse with contraception and unbridled hedonism.

Let us not forget that, according to tradition, St. Joseph died in the Holy House of Nazareth, assisted by Mary Most Holy and by Our Lord. For this reason, the glorious patriarch became the patron saint of the dying. No one in the world had such great grace—passing from this life to the next in the arms of Our Lady and Jesus. St. Joseph’s was a blessed death, crowning a life entirely spent at the service of God, of whom he voluntarily made himself a docile instrument.

Well then, for Catholics, Loreto can become the spiritual point of reference for the struggle against any legislation aiming to introduce euthanasia, often disguised with expressions such as “assisted suicide” or living will (in the name of false mercy). Attacks on life

in its terminal phase are very dangerous because they seek to recognize only viable and healthy lives as having human dignity. But human beings always preserve their nobility in every condition and situation, no matter how painful and tragic it may be. The sick need to not be killed, but rather assisted by their loved ones and receive care that alleviates suffering, just as happened with St. Joseph. Eliminating the sick is not a gesture of love but selfishness, which hides many economic interests and above all the agenda of the “culture of death.”

The Holy House of Nazareth is the place where the Holy Family, the model of all families, lived. Therefore, Loreto is the privileged place to pray for the institution of the family, now threatened inside and outside the Church. Today we must engage the decisive battle, both in the temporal and spiritual spheres, to defend the indissolubility of marriage and the only true family, composed of a man and a woman. Facing the rising tide of dominant fashions, the Holy House of Loreto must become the center from which one should draw strength to reaffirm a clear “No” to divorce, to out-of-wedlock cohabitation, feminism, transgenderism, and homosexual unions, sins that destroy the fundamental building block of society, which is a stable and united family. And considering that the Holy Family owned the Holy House, one must fight for true social justice, which requires the recognition and protection of the right of private property, with a consequent family-friendly economy that supports the birth rate.

In the Holy House, Our Lord Jesus Christ grew and was educated by his Mother and by St. Joseph. Jesus

lived with his parents up to the age of thirty, a whole existence made of prayer and work, obedience and sacrifice, sobriety and purity. Among those walls, Our Lady herself was raised and educated by her parents, Joachim and Anna. Loreto is, therefore, the point of reference also on this topic, so trampled upon today. Faced with state-controlled secular public schools that instill religious indifferentism and anti-Christian values, and the imposition of gender ideology, which aims to dissolve human nature itself, it is more necessary than ever to reiterate the primordial right of parents to educate their children based on the principles they believe in. Hence, there is also a need to create authentically Catholic parental schools free from state constraints. No power may snatch children from their families and indoctrinate them against the will of their parents.

The Holy House welcomed a special, entirely holy family characterized by perpetual virginity. Jesus, Mary, and Joseph preserved integral purity and chastity throughout their lives, in body and spirit. For many people today, even Catholics, living in continence before marriage, during the marriage, or throughout life seems an impossible undertaking. Meanwhile, pornography has become as rampant and unrestrained as contraception. People have lost the sense of sacrifice and purity to the point that every whim and pleasure seems to have to become a legally recognized, protected, and even required right. Conversely, the Holy Family lived in complete purity as a single great offering to God, truly becoming an example for everyone – children, young people, adults, and elderly – today increasingly crushed by the all-pervasive sexual revolution.