Baudouin’s opposition to abortion, a plus for his beatification?

Pope Francis’ visit to the royal crypt of the Notre-Dame church in Laeken was not to be made public. But an official statement from the Vatican revealed it, and provoked strong reactions in the country. Saturday, late in the morning, the 87-year-old pope joined the neo-Gothic church located less than five kilometers from the immense Koekelberg basilica where he had just addressed the leaders of the Belgian Catholic Church. Built at the initiative of Leopold I to receive the remains of his wife, the crypt has since served as a necropolis for the Belgian royal family. Pope Francis met King Philippe and Queen Mathilde there who had welcomed him on the tarmac of the rain-beaten airport upon his arrival in Belgium on Thursday evening. The next day, they met at Laeken Castle where the pope, in a speech to the authorities, spoke of the shame of the Church for the sexual abuse committed by clerics, a drama that the king himself had mentioned in his speech.

But this Saturday morning, it was in an intimate and family atmosphere that the pontiff and part of the royal family met. In the crypt accessible by a double staircase and which brings together the tombs of all the Belgian monarchs, they paid homage to King Baudouin. In a photo published by the Vatican, we can see the pontiff, seated in his wheelchair, collected in front of the tomb of the sovereign who reigned for 42 years, from 1951 to his sudden death from a heart attack in 1993, while he was only 63 years old. Alongside the Pope, King Philippe and Queen Mathilde but also the former King Albert II, who had succeeded his brother Baudouin because he had died without descendants, and his wife Queen Paola. The young archbishop of Mechelen-Brussels, Mgr Luc Terlinden, was also present.

The story could have ended there. But an explanatory note from the Vatican sent to journalists would shake things up: the Pope salutes “the courage” of Baudouin, this king who had left his post “so as not to sign a murderous law”. An allusion to an astonishing episode in the history of the Belgian monarchy. For 36 hours, in 1990, the king had in fact used a legal formula establishing his own “impediment” in order not to associate his signature with this law which he could neither approve nor reject, unless it provoked a regime crisis. . This approach had divided constitutional law specialists and political leaders, but it had not diminished the Belgian people’s attachment to their king.

The Holy See also indicates, with very unusual frankness, that the Pope wishes the beatification of the former sovereign, and invites “the Belgians to turn to him at this time when criminal laws are being drawn up”. A probable allusion to the gradual extension of the possibilities of resorting to euthanasia. As soon as the news spread, a strong press release from the Secular Action Center denounced “staggering remarks”, seeing them as a “provocation” on the very day of the international day for the right to abortion. Embarrassed by the diffusion of the news, which risks weakening the position of constitutional arbiter that the King of the Belgians is supposed to play, the Royal Palace in turn sent a press release to recall the “strictly private” nature of this trip.

Some sources are pleased to see the pope express a clear and free position, without allowing himself to be restrained by local political conditioning. Pope Francis has often had strong words about abortion, calling doctors who perform it “hit men.” From the start of his pontificate, he challenged the expectations of those who hoped for a change in the doctrine of the Catholic Church on abortion: for Francis this is a non-negotiable point, and it is possible that his legalization in his own native country, Argentina, may have played a role in his refusal to travel there in recent years.

But it is perhaps also in Argentina that one of the reasons for the personal affection of the Pope for the former king of the Belgians is located. In the 1970s, as provincial of the Jesuits of Argentina, then-Father Jorge Mario Bergoglio frequently visited Belgium to thank the benefactors of the University of Cordoba, of which he was chancellor. However, since 1961, the clinic of this Jesuit university has been called “Clinica Reina Fabiola”, named after the wife of King Baudouin. The following year, the king’s father, the former deposed sovereign Leopold III, discreetly visited it, before Baudouin and Fabiola themselves went there in 1964. The pope’s personal affection for the former monarch can therefore be partly rooted in its support for this Jesuit institution.

In any case, by speaking openly in favor of the beatification of King Baudouin, Pope Francis has taken a step that his predecessor Benedict XVI had not dared to take, although he admitted to being personally in favor of it by receiving Belgian visitors in private. If the file is successful, King Baudouin would be the first European monarch proposed for the veneration of the faithful since the last emperor of Austria-Hungary, Charles I (1916-1918), who died in 1922 and beatified by John Paul II in 2004. His wife Zita, who died only in 1989 after a very long widowhood of almost seven decades, is also currently the subject of a beatification procedure.