Bishop punishes mom for daughter's abortion

[maeyako]

Source: http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/29531755/

Bishop punishes mom for daughter's abortion

Brazilian to excommunicate her and doctors for allowing it

RIO DE JANEIRO - A Roman Catholic archbishop says the abortion of twins carried by a 9-year-old girl who allegedly was raped by her stepfather means excommunication for the girl's mother and her doctors.Despite the nature of the case, the church had to hold its line against abortion, Archbishop Jose Cardoso Sobrinho said in an interview aired Thursday by Globo television.


"The law of God is higher than any human laws," he said. "When a human law — that is, a law enacted by human legislators — is against the law of God, that law has no value. The adults who approved, who carried out this abortion have incurred excommunication."


Health Minister Jose Gomes Temporao rebuked the archbishop, saying, "I'm shocked by two facts: by what happened to the girl and by the position of the archbishop, who in saying he defends life puts another at risk."


Abortion is generally illegal in Brazil, which is home to more Catholics than any other nation. But the procedure is allowed when the mother's life is in danger, when the fetus has no chance of survival or in rape cases where the woman has not passed her 20th week of pregnancy.


Doctors said the girl was 15 weeks pregnant when the abortion was performed Wednesday in the northeastern city of Recife, where Sobrinho is archbishop. Health officials said the life of the girl — who weighs 80 pounds — was in danger.


The pregnancy was discovered last week when the girl fell ill and her mother took her to a clinic. The child then told officials she had been abused by her stepfather, who is in police custody.

A similar case in southern Brazil surfaced Thursday. Authorities in Rio Grande do Sul state told the O Globo newspaper that an 11-year-old girl allegedly raped by her stepfather is seven months pregnant.The 51-year-old stepfather has been in jail since January while the girl is in a hospital for high risk pregnancies and apparently will not have an abortion.

[maeyako]

Clearly we know their stance of actual human life, you know the life living right now.

[SciVille]

Church higher-ups wonder why people are losing faith in it.

THIS is why, assholes!

[Adamantaimai]

According to Catholic doctrine, doesn't excommunication mean that one is doomed to hell? So this bishop is knowingly (at least according to his beliefs) condemning this girl's mother, and these doctors, to an eternity of torture and pain, just to make a statement against abortion, even though the girl would likely have died had she not had the abortion?

I wonder if the girl is being excommunicated too. They probably figure that she couldn't possibly have made the decision herself, being 9 years old.

[Kev]

I wish I was Catholic so I could do something "bad" and get excommunicated. That would be badass!

[Anduwaithe]

The more they tighten their grip, the more people will slip through their fingers. And then they'll form a Rebel Alliance and blow up Benedict XVI's Culture-of-Death Star.

[JamesRottnek]

Adamantai, I believe (though a Catholic could correct me) that excommunication can be reversed - though they will go to hell if they die before that happens (I believe).

I believe in general that abortion is wrong. Even in the case of a pregnancy resulting from rape or incest, I believe abortion is murder. However, I believe that in the case of the life of the mother, abortion is not only permissible, it is required. As far as I know (based on this article), the life of the mother was in danger, and I therefore find the abortion to be necessary.

[Anduwaithe]

By the way, does anyone else find it amusing (in a twisted sort of way) that they aren't excommunicating the stepfather who raped her?

[SciVille]

By the way, does anyone else find it amusing (in a twisted sort of way) that they aren't excommunicating the stepfather who raped her?

Fucking seriously! I was just about to post that!

No, no, we don't care that this child was raped, but if that rape gets her pregnant and she aborts, ZOMG she's a terrible sinner who must burn in hell!

[Agnapostate]

Hmmm...I thought confession and repentance was the accepted course in the Catholic Church?

I'm unsure as to my own ability to ever be excommunicated. I was baptized as a Catholic and had my First Communion, but was never confirmed...Either way, I'll try to offend the Catholic Church as much as possible.

[maeyako]

Source: http://www.cnn.com/2009/WORLD/americ...ef=mpstoryview

Excommunicated doctor hailed for abortion on child rape victim

BRASILIA, Brazil (CNN) -- A doctor excommunicated by the Catholic Church for performing an abortion on a 9-year-old rape victim received a standing ovation during a national convention on women's health, according to a local media report.

The response came during the opening ceremony of an event hosted by Brazilian Minister of Health Jose Gomes Temporao.

The newspaper O Povo reported that Temporao called on the audience to acknowledge the "brilliant" work done by a medical team in the abortion, performed in Brazil's northeastern city of Recife.

The girl was pregnant with twins after being raped, allegedly by her stepfather, police were quoted in media reports as saying. The abuse had gone on since the girl was 6, authorities said.

The abortion was performed March 4 during the fourth month of pregnancy, according to media reports
Archbishop Don Jose Cardoso Sobrinho of Recife excommunicated the doctor, the child's mother and the medical team involved in the procedure.

However, the stepfather was not excommunicated, with Sobrinho telling Globo TV that, "A graver act than (rape) is abortion, to eliminate an innocent life." (emphasis added)

The child was not excommunicated, Sobrinho said, because Catholic Church law says minors are exempt from excommunication.

"The church is benevolent when it comes to minors," he told Globo TV. "As for the adults, especially those who approved it, performed this abortion, the excommunication is applicable."

"God's law is above human laws," Sobrinho said.

The case has outraged the Brazilian public and fueled a controversy reaching the highest levels of church and state in a nation whose law bans abortion except in cases of rape.

Temporao recently said doctors must put law before religion.
"The question posed is very simple. There is a Brazilian law which states that a pregnancy can be interrupted in case of rape," Temporao said.

"It is legitimate for the church to have its dogmas, but these dogmas must not be imposed on society as a whole," he added.


Earlier, a verbal spat ensued between President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva and the archbishop over the church's decision.


"As a Christian and a Catholic, I find it deeply lamentable that a bishop of the Catholic Church has such a conservative attitude," Lula said on Globo TV.

"In this case, the medical profession was more right than the church," he said.

Meanwhile, a Vatican cleric told Italy's La Stampa newspaper that he supports the Brazilian archbishop's decision to excommunicate all involved in the abortion except for the child.

Dr. Olimpio Moraes, one of the doctors involved in the procedure, said he thanked the archbishop for his excommunication because the controversy sheds light on Brazil's restrictive abortion laws. He said women in Brazil's countryside are victimized by Brazil's ban on abortion.

Some of the doctors vowed to continue attending church services, despite being expelled.

"The fact that I was excommunicated will not keep me from going to Mass, praying, conversing with God, and asking him to illuminate me and my colleagues in our medical team to help us take care of people in similar cases," one doctor said.

TV Globo reported that the child, who is from a town outside Recife, has stayed in the city to recover and to escape media coverage. Her current condition is not known.

A new report by Brazil's IPAS, a non-governmental organization that works with the health ministry, indicates that more than 1 million women undergo illegal abortions in Brazil each year. About 250,000 are treated by doctors for traumas due to botched abortions, said Beatriz Jalli, an IPAS official.
Studies at a Brazilian hospital dedicated to treating female victims of violence, the Perola Byington in Sao Paulo, indicated that more than 40 percent of the cases involved children.

"This is why the Recife case is so important for women in Brazil," Jalli said.
Jalli said the liberated "Girl from Ipanema" image that many foreigners have of Brazilian women is far from reality.

"We live in a male chauvinistic, patriarchal society with a very high rate of sexual crimes against women and minors," she said. "Our reproductive rights are constantly criminalized."

Really? Abortion is worse than rape? Fucking bastards. Let's see them get raped an impregnated THEN we'll see how they feel about getting an abortion NOW. But oh no wait they're MEN they CAN'T get pregnant.

Oh and if god's law is above human laws then WHY THE FUCK DID NOT EXCOMMUNICATE THE STEP-FATHER? HE RAPED HER?! Is raping not against gods laws now?

[JamesRottnek]

I do not necessarily think abortion is worse. I think that they are on two different planes so to speak. Rape is murder of the soul, while abortion is murder of the body (no I do not mean that if you are raped your soul dies, it is just an expression). I think they are equally horrible but in different ways.

[Got Liberty?]

Is raping not against gods laws now?

Judges 21:20-23
Numbers 31:18
Deuteronomy 20:14
Deuteronomy 22:23-29
Deuteronomy 21:10-14
Judges 5:30
Exodus 21:7-10
Zechariah 14:2

...And so on.

I guess it isn't.

[JamesRottnek]

Until you read the actual Hebrew (or a good translation of it, such as one by Orthodox Jews) as well as Talmud passages on it and other commentary on it, do not judge the Bible. The versions of the Bible that virtually every Christian reads are really screwed up.

[Agnapostate]

Well, the Masoretic Text of the book of Samuel, for instance, is really screwed up. So that certainly says something as to the Hebrew translation.

[Got Liberty?]

Until you read the actual Hebrew (or a good translation of it, such as one by Orthodox Jews) as well as Talmud passages on it and other commentary on it, do not judge the Bible. The versions of the Bible that virtually every Christian reads are really screwed up.

How do you mistranslate "take their virgins for your wives"?

[JamesRottnek]

Well, it was translated from Hebrew, to Greek, to Latin, to English. I'd say there is a strong chance that there was something lost in translation. As well, however, how the Jewish people understood this for thousands of years is very important in understanding the verse. Therefore, I believe it is important to consult with classic commentaries as well as passages of the Talmud relating to it.

[Got Liberty?]

I've just been running those verses through every English translation - some of which come straight from Hebrew - and found that, while some were, in fact, mistranslated, the best possible interpretation of other verses is "take the people of those cities as slaves".

[JamesRottnek]

Again, there is more to understanding the Hebrew Bible than just the words on the page, there are classical interpretations of these things which are vital to understanding them.

[John]

Generally why I really could not care less what a priest or catholic has to say about abortion. For me, if having an abortion makes her doomed to hell, then I'm going to hell with her, as I'm not going to let the girl deal with a child she didn't even want.