All across the Iberian peninsula, people have been taking to the streets to show the wide public support that exists for the legal protection of tiny embryos and care for the sick and elderly.
On March 12th, approximately 50,000 people flooded the heart of Madrid for the Marcha Sí a la Vida (‘yes to life’ march), according to media reports.
In Portugal, marches in cities across the country are planned for March 18th.
“Right now, in the centre of Madrid, I see baby carriages, children holding their parents’ hands, and other youngsters running around,” reported José Luis Concejero, editor of COPE, about the recent march.
Some 500 associations participated.
“We want, with this march, to say a strong ‘Yes to life’ because it reminds the world that all life is valuable, unrepeatable, and irretrievable,” the spokesperson for the ‘Yes to Life’ Platform and president of the Spanish Federation of Pro-Life Associations, Alicia Latorre, told COPE.
Laws, she added, “do not determine what is right or wrong.”
Over the last three years, the current government has decriminalised euthanasia, liberalised abortion, and allowed the legal self-determination of gender.
The Spanish marchers gathered under a nine-point manifesto that called for medical care for all and a rejection of “the businesses and ideologies that sustain” laws and practices harmful to human life.
“We want to show the greatness of the culture of life and its fruits, a culture that is generous, welcoming, constructive, joyful, that heals wounds, that does not give up,” the manifesto read.
The large turnout for the march shows that the Iberian pro-life movement is in fact gaining steam.
