Abortion to avoid birth defects is like Nazi eugenics: Pope

Pope Francis on Saturday called the practice of having an abortion after pre-natal tests have discovered possible birth defects a version of Nazi attempts to create a pure race by eliminating the weakest.

Francis made the comparison in a long, off-the-cuff address to a members of a confederation of Italian family associations.

"Children should be accepted as they come, as God sends them, as God allows, even if at times they are sick," he said.

Francis then spoke of pre-natal tests to determine if a foetus has any illnesses or malformations.

"The first proposal, in that case, is 'Should we get rid of it'? The killing of children. And to have a more tranquil life, an innocent is done away with," he said.

"I say it with pain. In the last century the whole world was scandalised by what the Nazis did to pursue the pureness of the race. Today, we are doing the same thing, with white gloves."

Francis’ home country of Argentina voted Thursdayfor a proposal that legalizes abortion in that country. Last month, Ireland, one of the most Catholic countries in Europe, voted to overturn a national ban on abortion. A similar law is in the works in Catholic Northern Ireland, the only part of the United Kingdom where abortion is illegal.

The Vatican also attracted fire when it invited high-profile anti-abortion figures – including United Nations advisor and economist Jeffrey Sachs – to a conference organized by the Pontifical Academy of Sciences last November about population growth and sustainable development.

Francis has long railed against what he called the “throw-away culture” in terms of the way the elderly and unborn children are sometimes seen as less worthy of protection, as well as in terms of material things used briefly and then discarded.