Thelma Osatohanmwen
Pope Francis has strongly criticized surrogate motherhood, describing it as a “despicable” practice that should be universally banned due to its perceived commercialization of pregnancy.
The Catholic leader made these remarks during his foreign policy address to ambassadors accredited to the Holy See, traditionally a platform for addressing global conflicts and injustices.
In his address, Pope Francis expressed his concern about surrogate motherhood, stating that an unborn child should not be treated as an “object of trafficking.”
He condemned the practice as a serious violation of the dignity of both the woman and the child, emphasizing that it exploits situations of the mother’s material needs.
“I consider despicable the practice of so-called surrogate motherhood, which represents a grave violation of the dignity of the woman and the child, based on the exploitation of situations of the mother’s material needs,” he asserted.
He further declared that a child should never be the subject of a commercial contract and called for a global ban on surrogacy to prohibit the practice universally.
In the past, he referred to surrogacy as “uterus for rent.”
While some European countries, including Spain and Italy, have already prohibited surrogacy, the Vatican’s doctrine office on church teaching clarified that homosexual parents resorting to surrogacy can have their children baptized.