Roman Catholic Church Excommunicates Family Of Girl For Allowing An Abortion

[JamesG]

Nine-Year-Old's Abortion Outrages Brazil's Catholic Church
By Andrew Downie / São Paulo Friday, Mar. 06, 2009


The case of the pregnant 9-year-old was shocking enough. But it was the response of the Catholic Church that infuriated many Brazilians. Archibishop Jose Cardoso Sobrinho of the coastal city of Recife announced that the Vatican was excommunicating the family of a local girl who had been raped and impregnated with twins by her stepfather, because they had chosen to have the girl undergo an abortion. The Church excommunicated the doctors who performed the procedure as well. "God's laws," said the archbishop, dictate that abortion is a sin and that transgressors are no longer welcome in the Roman Catholic Church. "They took the life of an innocent," Sobrinho told TIME in a telephone interview. "Abortion is much more serious than killing an adult. An adult may or may not be an innocent, but an unborn child is most definitely innocent. Taking that life cannot be ignored."



The case has caused a furor. Abortion is illegal in Brazil except in cases of rape or when the mother's life is in danger, both of which apply in this case. (The girl's immature hips would have made labor dangerous; the Catholic opinion was that she could have had a cesarean section.) When the incident came to light in local newspapers, the Church first asked a judge to halt the process and then condemned those involved, including the 9-year-old's distraught mother. Even Catholic Brazilians were shocked at the harshness of the archbishop's actions. "In this case, most people support the doctors and the family. Everything they did was legal and correct," says Beatriz Galli, the policy associate for Ipas Brasil, an NGO that fights to give women more say over their health and reproductive rights. "But the Church takes these positions that are so rigid that it ends up weakened. It is very intolerant, and that intolerance is going to scare off more and more followers."



Brazilian devotion to the Catholic Church has declined over the past several years. Whereas Brazil was once an almost entirely Catholic nation, only 74% of Brazilians today admit allegiance to Rome, with large numbers, especially the urban poor, having defected to Protestant Evangelical sects. Many more water down their Catholicism with dashes of African religions such as Candomble or spiritist beliefs such as Kardecism. Only recently has the decrease in Catholic affiliation seemingly leveled off.



Evangelicals have not projected a united pro-life platform in Brazil, certainly not one as monolithic as the Catholic Church's. But at least one major sect, the Universal Church of the Kingdom of God, has taken a stance that showcases its differences with its Catholic rival. The Universal Church's television channel TV Record recently aired spots featuring a woman declaring, "I decided who to marry. I decided to use the pill. With my vote I decided who'd be elected President. I decided to work so that I won't be discriminated against. Why can't I decide what to do with my own body? Women should be able to decide for themselves what's important."



The public-relations campaigns of the Catholic Church's rivals do not impress Archbishop Cardoso Sobrinho. He told TIME that the Vatican rejects believers who pick and choose their issues. Rome "is not going to open the door to anyone just to get more members," he said after comparing abortion to the Holocaust. "We know that people have other ideas, but if they do, then they are not Catholics. We want people who adhere to God's laws."



In Brazil, that hard line carries over into public life and government policy. While equally devout neighbors Mexico, Colombia and Uruguay have taken steps to give women more of a say in the matter of terminating pregnancies, Brazilian public opinion supports the status quo, and the country's Congress last year voted overwhelmingly to reject a modest attempt at decriminalizing abortion. The advances that have taken place are mostly local initiatives carried out almost surreptitiously, such as the move by São Paulo states to offer the morning-after pill and heavily discounted contraceptive pills at state-run pharmacies.



President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva did make a halfhearted attempt to spur a national debate last year, calling abortion a public-health issue — even as he declared himself steadfastly against it. But with the Church quick to stifle such talk and the general public not sufficiently engaged to demand action, the debate never took off. In truth, abortions and unwanted pregnancies are a sad constant in Brazil. Although abortion is illegal, an estimated 1 million women each year have one. The poor are forced into clandestine clinics or take medication, while the better-off are treated by qualified physicians at well-appointed surgeries known to anyone with money and overlooked by colluding authorities.




That secrecy has a price. More than 200,000 women each year are treated in public hospitals for complications arising from illegal abortions, according to Health Ministry figures. Those who don't have the courage or the money to be treated take the pregnancy to term. Although the fertility rate has fallen considerably in Brazil (from 6.1 children in 1960 to about 2 today), 1 in 3 pregnancies is unwanted, according to Dr. Jefferson Drezett, head of the Hospital Perola Byington, Latin America's largest women's health clinic. Meanwhile, 1 in 7 Brazilian women between the ages of 15 and 19 is a mother, and the average age at which women have their first child has fallen to 21, from 22.4 in 1996, according to a government-funded study. (See pictures of America's purity ball.)




Those numbers shock the Catholic Church. But the Church's response to the Recife rape and abortion has shocked public opinion. Some Brazilians hope the controversy may compel the country to deal seriously with an issue that affects so many of its citizens. "Brazil wants to be a world leader, but the government can't guarantee equality for women," says Galli. "This is not a topic that anyone wants to debate."


http://www.time.com/time/world/artic...883598,00.html

[Hollow]

churches annoy me. as much as i oppose abortion, that's taking it too far.

[MonarC]

That poor little girl. That is so sad.

[JamesG]

I say "who needs the Church?" after I heard of this story...

What seems to amaze me is how they say the girl's family and their doctors are the bad guys but they didn't seem to give any statements against the step-father for the abhorrent rape of his 9-year-old step daughter.

[James"Thunder"Early]

Blaming the victim is always ugly and that's exactly what this is. Exactly what is the clergy thinking? They are pretty warped if they expected this girl to keep this child, she's a nine-year-old that was assaulted. I don't get the logic here.

[LuLu Rogers]

What they did was horrible, but most churches are opposed to abortion. I'm certainly not condoning what they did, I'm just saying that it's not accepted in most churches.

[ekkostar]

9 year olds shouldn't be having babies in the first place, their bodies are undeveloped. I'd be more worried that the last trimester and labor would kill her.

[Lee]

I agree with one thing that archbishop said:abortion is a sin and those who
practice it sin against god. In this case though, I feel that the abortion was
necessary because a girl who is only 9 years old does not have a body
that is developed enough to withstand the physical demands of pregnancy.

In this case, though I am personally against abortion, it was the right thing
to do because it was a matter of this young mothers life. The person I really
feel anger towards is this girl's stepfather for what he did to this 9-year old
girl. I hope he goes to prison for what he has done.

I do believe, however, that this archbishop is a jerk and an idiot and other
names I cannot really utter because of my christian beliefs for the way he
is so absolutely inflexible and for his opinion that its "Romes way or the
highway!

I wonder what the German pope himself, Joseph Ratzinger, has to say about this.

[ABlairican Pie]

Originally Posted by Lee

I do believe, however, that this archbishop is a jerk and an idiot and other
names I cannot really utter because of my christian beliefs for the way he
is so absolutely inflexible and for his opinion that its "Romes way or the
highway!

I'll utter them, then.

[Chocoholic]

I'm Catholic and pro-life, and even I would have supported abortion in this case. I hope that innocent little girl gets some good counseling and that miserable excuse for a human being stepfather gets locked away for life. He's the only one who should be excommunicated here.