A press release delivered by major broadcasting networks on Tuesday the 16th, reported that more than 340 fetuses, from illegal abortions, were found at a Buddhist temple in Thailand. Abortion is illegal in Thailand, as in many other countries, including Brazil, except under three conditions – if a woman is raped, if the pregnancy affects her health or if the fetus is abnormal.

What’s in question isn’t the horror of seeing human fetuses wrapped in plastic and newspaper, thrown into the basement of a temple. It’s the hypocrisy found in humans, especially in those who consider themselves to be such devoted religious followers.

Regardless the religion, similar situations have happened in several other countries that have official religions. What calls our attention isn’t that this happens among people of A, B, or Z religion but the hypocritical way that these people carry out their beliefs.

Because they want to demonstrate respect or fear towards a particular god, these societies are opposed to decriminalize abortion, expressing moral concepts they’ve set for themselves, only to attribute it to the belief in what they serve. Although they’re unable to see for themselves, they’re going against the grain of what they say and believe; look at what recently happened in Thailand, they wrapped the result of their hypocrisy in paper and plastic. They practice the opposite of what they preach.

What kind of being are they calling their god or deity? One who they can conceal their “sins” from and on behalf of whom they live with false morals, creating and defending rules that prevent people from having control over their own body? Truth is, what matters most to them, is how they’re viewed by others. They don’t want to “be”, they want to “look like they are”. They’re hypocrites who only love themselves.

Inah Castro