Certainty
Last year I subscribed to Bishop Vasa's e-column that sends me his weekly column in the Sentinel. Week after week he continues to write with on important moral teaching with the clarity that you rarely see. This week once again he has done the same thing on the issue of the use of Plan B in the case of rape.
...Nothing is to be done which impedes the natural
progress of a child already conceived. This principle, at least in the ideal,
is understood and practiced in Catholic hospitals. There is a huge difficulty
with Plan B. If a pregnancy is confirmed by way of a standard pregnancy test
then Plan B is neither warranted nor needed since such a readily identified
pregnancy would not be the result of a very recent sexual assault. If the
standard pregnancy test returns a negative for pregnancy then this only
proves that the woman was not pregnant prior to the assault. The critical
question, which must be answered with very great care, is whether the
assaulted woman has already conceived a child as a result of the assault.
The answer to this question may not be able to be given with certainty and I
maintain that it must be given with certainty in order to proceed with Plan
B. The utilization of Plan B without this certainty runs the unjustifiable
risk of destroying new life while ostensibly intending to prevent the assault
from engendering that life. It turns an uncaring eye to the new life which
may have already begun.
This is quite a different take than what the Connecticut Bishop's conference has said by maintaining that this type of certainty is not required.
Some would maintain that since the intention is to prevent
a pregnancy which may result from the unjust aggression of the assault it is
legitimate to use Plan B even if the remote possibility of a pregnancy has
not been absolutely eliminated. They suggest that a lesser degree of
certainty of absence of pregnancy suffices. They suggest that even if a
pregnancy does in fact exist the lack of knowledge about that pregnancy and
the sole intention to prevent a pregnancy and not destroy one eliminates
moral wrongdoing. They fail to recognize that we may not play this kind of
roulette with the existence of a human life. It is illegitimate, even with
good motives, to directly cause the death of a pre-born child. Intervention
with Plan B without ascertaining with certainty the absence of an existing
pregnancy is a direct attack on the life of that child and this is morally
illegitimate.
There is no doubt that the intention of trauma treatment is to protect the
woman who has suffered an assault but this must not extend to the destruction
of an innocent child.
There is certainly a lack of respect in our country for pre-born human life
but we in the Catholic community and our Catholic health care facilities must
not in any way condone or cooperate in that promotion of the culture of
death.
Known as 
sounds like we have a bishop
Jeff, thanks again for yet another very helpful post.
Line him up to be the next Archbishop of Hartford!
Guys: (And its men who are weighing in here!!) Think about it!
Would you want to carry, give birth to and raise a child that was the result of a rape?
One can be very pro-life but a little more thought and leeway could be given to the conscience (not convenience!) of the woman victim. Calling an ovum a potential human victim is getting way beyond the point of common sense. More work on the ethical ramifications needs to be done before the Church pontificates on these matters.
Guys: (And its men who are weighing in here!!) Think about it!
Would you want to carry, give birth to and raise a child that was the result of a rape?
It would be would be an enormous hardship no doubt, but we can't escape the truth: the human inside the womb is innocent of any crime, and so no one gets to kill her.
One can be very pro-life but a little more thought and leeway could be given to the conscience (not convenience!) of the woman victim.
This is not how conscience works, it is like an alarm. It does not dtermine or change truth: human in womb is innocent. No one gets to kill.
Calling an ovum a potential human victim is getting way beyond the point of common sense.
I don't see this argument being made. Rather the point is, "They fail to recognize that we may not play this kind of roulette with the existence of a human life. It is illegitimate, even with good motives, to directly cause the death of a pre-born child."
More work on the ethical ramifications needs to be done before the Church pontificates on these matters.
More work until what? The Church comes around and embraces killing the innocent?
"More work until what? The Church comes around and embraces killing the innocent?"
Great comment Scott. Rape is horrendous, but the damage done to the victim through this violent act is only multiplied when she turns around and commits her very own violent act and kills her own flesh and blood. It's amazing that we have not yet all choked to death from the fumes of sin that surround us every day in regard to abortion. We must STOP KILLING BABIES for our country/our families/our relationships to once again become alive and thrive. God help us all to help the babies. God warm the hearts who do not see.
"Calling an ovum a potential human victim is getting way beyond the point of common sense."
A fertilized ovum is no longer a "potential" human. A fertilized ovum is a zygote, at very least, or an embryo once division has taken place. That makes it a human life in the eyes of the Church.
"More work on the ethical ramifications needs to be done before the Church pontificates on these matters."
Because, of course, the Church has no experience in addressing ethical matters. Is that your claim? That is absurd. The ethical ramifications are quite clear. It's a matter of whether you put a priority on human choice above human life.
Carry the 'product' of a rape? Well, yes. Ask Rosemary from my parish who did just that. Her son Peter is the delight of her life. He is grown and married now. She never married but she is as holy and as giving a person as I have known.
We simply refuse to trust God who does see the whole picture. No matter the source, innocent life is not to be sacrificed for our convenience.
The CT bishops are terribly mistaken and wrong.
We've been so conditioned to dislike kids, to dislike the hardship and inconvenience that come with them (that come with anything worth having) that we will only accept children under the best or at least moderately tolerable of conditions. But we were made for this -- to love God and humanity. Children are a blessing... always. If God lets an ovum become fertilized as a result of rape (the crime is rape, being conceived is not the crime) then that child is a blessing. Easy for the woman? Not at first, for some maybe never. Easy for her father? husband? Not at first, but with God all good things are possible. Who are we to tell a child, innocent bystander, we tried all we could to prevent his/her conception -- but alas, we shall have to make do with his/her existence? That he is a mistake, perpetrated by a violent criminal? If our attitude is to prevent what good God may desire to bring from a horrible situation solely because it started as a horrible situation, then the child will know that his/her existence is fundamentally merely tolerated.
There is no such thing as a "rape" baby. If a woman is pregnant, then she is pregnant with a person who is precious to God, no matter the circumstances of conception. Nothing can "erase" the rape; abortion, by any means, is a second rape to the rape victim.
Ask those who say abortion should be legal in cases of rape and incest if they would agree to executing the "alleged" rapist without trial and they get scandalized. Yet they are asking for exactly that sentence to be imposed on an innocent person.
Plan B, containing high doses of birth control pills, usually PREVENTS pregnancy if taken within 72 hours. I believe that under circumstances involving rape (a violent, abusive crime that, like sex abuse, could lead to a life time of emotional and associated trauma) is a compassionate option for a woman in crisis.
The bishops of Connecticut agree that the teaching of the Church has not definitively resolved the matter.
Can Plan B be called abortion within the first few days? I don't think so - but am open to what the Church teaches about 'the lesser of two evils'.
(Sorry, my English is not so good, but let me try)If it is about preventing furhter damage, where are the womens shelter, social workers and psycologist, who would help those women and there families thougth the situation?
Not one week without statements about abortion from church leaders.
We spend many word on this, do we spend as much money on this?
It is easy to promise a woman help, but do we act on this promise acurrat ly? Not so sure.
The church should be a guard for life, right?
But how often this life guard remains on the beach only shout to the drowning:” Come on, swim. Move your arms. It is easy, belive me!”, instead of jumping in the water?
"Can Plan B be called abortion within the first few days? I don't think so - but am open to what the Church teaches about 'the lesser of two evils'."
The church teaches that you may NEVER do evil so that good may come of it. If I throw a grenade into a room without knowing whether or not anyone is in there, am I culpable if in fact someone is killed by it? Of course I am! Unless we can know FOR SURE whether or not conception has occurred, we should assume a child is present, and the abortifacient-acting Plan B is unacceptable.
I don't know about you, but in our diocese (Providence) there are people who work continually to answer every sort of need. There are also women's resource and crisis pregnancy centers just waiting for a phone call or a knock on the door. The problem here isn't in having resources available,but in conveying their availability in the face of those (especially Planned Parenthood & friends, & the either unsympathetic or uninformed media) who WARN women against every service offered by deluging them with false information.
Fr Tom Euteneuer addressed the "how" of emergency contraception as abortifacient in his plea to CT:
"The truth is that there is absolutely no doubt about how the Plan B pills work. Just ask the manufacturer, Barr Pharmaceuticals, whose product insert states: “This product works mainly by preventing ovulation (egg release). It may also prevent fertilization of a released egg (joining of sperm and egg) or attachment of a fertilized egg to the uterus (implantation).” (My italics.) It’s that third item that makes Plan B an abortion-causing drug. The same can be said for every chemical contraceptive."
Later in his letter he states that we are knowingly using a drug that only prevents ovulation 50% of the time. When it fails, chemical abortion can result."
If all of that is true, it's pretty clear where we should be standing on this issue.
But how often this life guard remains on the beach only shout to the drowning:” Come on, swim. Move your arms. It is easy, belive me!”, instead of jumping in the water?
One of the footballs of lies that the pro-abortion movement has been trying to gain yards with is that pro-lifers only care about the fetus and not the mother. That's dingo doo-doo. See: http://www.gabrielproject.com/
Actually, apparently that should be http://www.gabrielproject.org/
I agree that we need to get the word out about how much pro-lifers help women after they give birth.
A woman checking in here, JM. There is no crime in which the perpetrator is sentenced to incarceration but an innocent third party is executed - except rape. In any other situation, it would be illegal for a victim of a crime to kill or injure a relative of the criminal.
So what gives? Well, if you look at historical infanticide and abortion as a way of disposing of the "products of rape" aka babies - it's about hiding the crime so that the woman isn't seen as soiled or used. Often it was the rapist who wanted the baby killed; e.g. the case of incest. In my opinion, the idea of rape being a good reason to kill one's child is just a throwback to the earlier idea that a woman brings a rape on herself.
Incidentally, I used to be somewhat sympathetic to rape victims getting abortions until '88, when I met a young woman who had been raped and decided not to abort. Her POV was that after all the rapist did to her, there was no way she'd let that rotten $&*# be the reason to kill her child.
sn, the Church is not just the bishops or priests. It's every one of us. In my area, we have counsellors and prenatal care for women, including houses that are for women whose families kick them out because they're pregnant. Some volunteer to babysit children. Some buy diapers and formula.
Recently in a nearby community, a young woman gave birth to triplets. She has no place to live because her family is homeless. Her story is in the papers and people are distressed for her. Even people who have lost their jobs are trying to help her and the children, doing what they can.
But it is hard work, SN, and it's so easy to ask, "Can someone else will do it?" The answer is to ask, "What can I do?"
Guys: (And its men who are weighing in here!!) Think about it!
Would you want to carry, give birth to and raise a child that was the result of a rape?
I went to college with a gal who was raped and concieved from that rape. She had an abortion, and later told us the abortion was worse than the rape. Her child recieved capital punishment because the father was a criminal...
Ever hear of giving birth and giving up for adoption? There are countless couples who would take a child especially from a mother who did not want to reclaim the child when the child was grown up as the birth mother as many parents who adopt fear, and raise the child as their own
Instead they are going to china and the blackmarket
More brainwashing by the liberals
MissJean,
if I see that our Diozoese in 2001 had a 79 Mio(church tax) budget, but only 0.5 millions were spent on pregnancy consultation, I ask myself if this is correct so.
SN, I don't know where you live, but around here there are many Christians who are Pro-Life and they tend to work together on such projects. So I'm not sure it would show very much in our archdiocese budget, either. Donations to the St. Vincent de Paul Society is similar: we have a yearly special offering at Mass, but most people donate outside of (and in addition to) the monies they give through the Church.
Perhaps you could ask your parish office for information about the services that are available for crisis pregnancy counselling and relief after the birth. Ask in what way you can help to care for such women, and I'm sure you'll learn more.