Pope Benedict XVI, wisely and correctly, speaking on why natural law must guide positive law:
"... only those laws are equitable that protect the sanctity of human life and reject the legalization of abortion, euthanasia and limitless genetic experimentation, those laws that respect the dignity of matrimony between a man and a woman, that are inspired in a correct secularity of state -- secularity that always includes the protection of religious liberty -- and that pursue subsidiarity and solidarity at the national and international level.
If not, what John of Salisbury calls the 'tyranny of the sovereign' or, what we would call 'the dictatorship of relativism,' ends up taking over -- a relativism that, as I recalled some years ago, 'recognizes nothing as definitive and that has as its measure only the self and its desires' (Misa pro eligendo Romano Pontifice, homily, April 19, 2005)".
For a full text of the translation of the address Pope Benedict XVI gave last 16 December 2009 at the general audience in Paul VI Hall click here.
