The US Catholic bishops’ orders to Catholic health care providers.
Page 20 still.
28. Each person or the person’s surrogate should have access to medical and moral information and counseling so as to be able to form his or her conscience. The free and informed health care decision of the person or the person’s surrogate is to be followed so long as it does not contradict Catholic principles.
Doesn’t that sound familiar. From the Cairo Declaration on Human Rights in Islam:
ARTICLE 16:
Everyone shall have the right to enjoy the fruits of his scientific, literary, artistic or technical production and the right to protect the moral and material interests stemming therefrom, provided that such production is not contrary to the principles of Shari’ah.…
ARTICLE 22:
(a) Everyone shall have the right to express his opinion freely in such manner as would not be contrary to the principles of the Shari’ah.(b) Everyone shall have the right to advocate what is right, and propagate what is good, and warn against what is wrong and evil according to the norms of Islamic Shari’ah
(c) Information is a vital necessity to society. It may not be exploited or misused in such a way as may violate sanctities and the dignity of Prophets, undermine moral and ethical values or disintegrate, corrupt or harm society or weaken its faith.
…
ARTICLE 24:
All the rights and freedoms stipulated in this Declaration are subject to the Islamic Shari’ah.ARTICLE 25:
The Islamic Shari’ah is the only source of reference for the explanation or clarification of any of the articles of this Declaration.
You can haz all the rights to all the things so long as it does not contradict Catholic principles/in such manner as would not be contrary to the principles of the Shari’ah. You can haz all the rights to all the things we say you can have, and no others.
Back to the bishops. Page 21.
36. Compassionate and understanding care should be given to a person who is the victim of sexual assault. Health care providers should cooperate with law enforcement officials and offer the person psychological and spiritual support as well as accurate medical information. A female who has been raped should be able to defend herself against a potential conception from the sexual assault. If, after appropriate testing, there is no evidence that conception has occurred already, she may be treated with medications that would prevent ovulation, sperm capacitation, or fertilization. It is not permissible, however, to initiate or to recommend treatments that have as their purpose or direct effect the removal, destruction, or interference with the implantation of a fertilized ovum.
Fuck you, bishops.
Page 22.
37. An ethics committee or some alternate form of ethical consultation should be available to assist by advising on particular ethical situations, by offering educational opportunities, and by reviewing and recommending policies. To these ends, there should be appropriate standards for medical ethical consultation within a particular diocese that will respect the diocesan bishop’s pastoral responsibility as well as assist members of ethics committees to be familiar with Catholic medical ethics and, in particular, these Directives.
In other words, all ethics must be Catholic “ethics” – i.e. church dogma.
Page 24.
For legitimate reasons of responsible parenthood, married couples may limit the number of their children by natural means. The Church cannot approve contraceptive interventions that “either in anticipation of the marital act, or in its accomplishment or in the development of its natural consequences, have the purpose, whether as an end or a means, to render procreation impossible.” Such interventions violate “the inseparable connection, willed by God . . . between the two meanings of the conjugal act: the unitive and procreative meaning.”
Absolutely none of your business. Butt out.
Page 25.
41. Homologous artificial fertilization (that is, any technique used to achieve conception using the gametes of the two spouses joined in marriage) is prohibited when it separates procreation from the marital act in its unitive significance (e.g., any technique used to achieve extracorporeal conception).
Oh ffs. Get over yourselves. “Ew no conception in a petri dish, ew.”
Page 26. Here we go.
45. Abortion (that is, the directly intended termination of pregnancy before viability or the directly intended destruction of a viable fetus) is never permitted. Every procedure whose sole immediate effect is the termination of pregnancy before viability is an abortion, which, in its moral context, includes the interval between conception and implantation of the embryo. Catholic health care institutions are not to provide abortion services, even based upon the principle of material cooperation. In this context, Catholic health care institutions need to be concerned about the danger of scandal in any association with abortion providers.
Then get out of the field. It’s legal. If you don’t want to do it, get out of the health care field. You shouldn’t be in it in the first place. We don’t need Catholic health care any more than we need Catholic accounting or agriculture or engineering or transportation. Your field is godbothering. Stick to that.
Listen up, any of you planning to have bad miscarriages that fail to complete.
47. Operations, treatments, and medications that have as their direct purpose the cure of a proportionately serious pathological condition of a pregnant woman are permitted when they cannot be safely postponed until the unborn child is viable, even if they will result in the death of the unborn child.
48. In case of extrauterine pregnancy, no intervention is morally licit which constitutes a direct abortion.
49. For a proportionate reason, labor may be induced after the fetus is viable.
Look at that. Look at 48 – they’re saying just leave ectopic pregnancies alone, so that the tube will burst and the woman will probably die of an infection. And 49 is Savita’s death sentence.
Fuck you all. Fuck you hideous evil monsters.
The ectopic pregnancy thing is really sick. First, the standard treatment is to wait for the tube to burst because before that apparently the woman’s life isn’t in direct danger. Second, according to that insane double effect BS it seems to be somehow ok to cut off the entire tube because destroying the embryo is only a secondary effect. But trying to remove the embryo and potentially saving half the fertility is an evil abortion. Sick, sick, sick.
The bishops should consider the words of the eminent theologian and apologist Father Guido Sarducci: “You no playa the game, you no makea the rules.”
They sat around and thought this shit out. That’s pretty fucked-up right there.
Fuck the Powp.
Whatever, I hope more and more things are exposed and harped upon. This Church, like the US Religious Right, needs to cross that point of no return and implode. These doctors, hospitals, pharmacists, and lawmakers who decide what happens to women against their interests and very lives need to be stopped, held accountable, and not forgotten.
From page 26: Can anyone explain the bit about “Catholic health care institutions are not to provide abortion services, even based upon the principle of material cooperation. In this context, Catholic health care institutions need to be concerned about the danger of scandal in any association with abortion providers.”? The bolded portion is the part that’s not really clear.
@freemage: google “material cooperation w evil” that will get you tons of results, here’s one from a Catholic hosp in washington DC:
http://www.ascensionhealth.org/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=82:principles-of-formal-and-material-cooperation&Itemid=171
it explains why they cant just transfer a patnt or refer to drs who will do treatment,
“To intend the wrongdoing of others is called formal cooperation. As applied to Catholic health care organizations, formal cooperation in evil occurs when the organization freely and directly participates in the objectionable action of another agent and/or shares in the object of that agent’s intention, either for its own sake or as a means to some other goal. Implicit formal cooperation occurs when the organization denies intending the wrongdoing of the principal agent, but participates in the action directly and in such a way that it could not be done without this participation. Catholic organizations are not permitted to engage in either implicit formal or formal cooperation in evil.
Formal cooperation is to be distinguished from material cooperation, principally in the matter of intention. As applied to Catholic health care, material cooperation occurs when the Catholic organization does not intend the immoral object of the principal agent’s act, yet is involved in circumstances that materially contribute to the immoral action in some causal way. Whether material cooperation would be permissible depends on further distinctions, following below.”
….then they get into the hair splitting & gray areas….
“Immediate material cooperation occurs when the organization provides for, contributes to or participates in specific circumstances that are essential to, or are an essential condition for, the principal agent to carry out a specific objectionable action. Directive n. 70 of the Ethical and Religious Directives specifically forbids Catholic health care organizations from engaging in immediate material cooperation in acts judged by the Church to be intrinsically immoral, “such as abortion, euthanasia, assisted suicide and direct sterilization.” These actions are considered “intrinsically immoral” inasmuch as they are evaluated to be essentially not good for the human person, regardless of circumstances or personal intentions. But under Church teaching, their gravity is not considered equal—e.g., direct killing of innocent human life is worse or more grave than direct sterilization, even though Church teaching evaluates both as intrinsically immoral. This matter of gravity is important for determining whether there is a proportionate enough reason to justify mediate material cooperation under the circumstances.
Mediate material cooperation occurs when the Catholic organization provides for, contributes to or participates in circumstances that are not essential to a principal agent’s specific wrongful action. Proximate mediate material cooperation makes a causal contribution to the principal agent’s act, which is directly ordered to the act. An example would be leasing space to an independent, self-insured family practice group, which in the course of practice writes some contraceptive prescriptions, but where the Catholic lessor neither condones such activity nor contributes anything essential to a contraceptive act itself. Remote mediate material cooperation makes a causal contribution to the principal agent’s act, which is indirectly ordered to the act. An example would be a Catholic hospital informally affiliating with a family practice group for some medical education and for preferred partner status. Some physicians in the group engage in some contraceptive practices in their own facility or at other facilities. The Catholic party does not contribute anything essential to that activity, but the physician practice indirectly benefits from the affiliation through increased patient volume, which in turn indirectly contributes to the writing of more contraceptive prescriptions.
Whether a particular form of mediate material cooperation can be properly characterized as “proximate” or “remote” is not always self-evident, and often depends on one’s understanding of the facts, or from which perspective one is examining the case. This is why ethical decisions on these matters ought not to be made in a vacuum or in isolation from multiple perspectives. Either form of mediate material cooperation may be permissible for the Catholic organization under certain conditions:
* when there is a proportionately serious reason for the cooperation (increasing access to morally appropriate services for the poor and underserved, decreasing infant mortality, stewardship of limited resources, and securing Catholic health care presence in the community, are just a few examples of serious reasons why an organization might want to consider cooperating with another provider, and which may very well justify the cooperation);
* the moral distance of the cooperator must be proportionate to the gravity of the wrongdoing (for example, mediate material cooperation in contraceptive counseling would not require as great a moral or causal distance as mediate material cooperation in direct sterilizations);
* proximate mediate material cooperation requires a more serious reason for cooperation than remote mediate material cooperation (i.e., a causal contribution that is directly ordered to an objectionable act requires greater justification than a causal contribution that is indirectly ordered to an objectionable act); and
* the danger of scandal must be sufficiently avoided. According to the Ethical and Religious Directives, n. 71: “The possibility of scandal must be considered when applying the principles governing cooperation. Cooperation, which in all other respects is morally licit, may need to be refused because of the scandal that might be caused. Scandal can sometimes be avoided by an appropriate explanation of what is in fact being done at the health care facility under Catholic auspices. The diocesan bishop has final responsibility for assessing and addressing issues of scandal, considering not only the circumstances in his local diocese but also the regional and national implications of his decision.””
….and scandal doesnt mean what you think it does, in context, it has a different meaning in theology,
http://www.ascensionhealth.org/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=106&Itemid=172
“In Catholic theological usage, a wrongful or seemingly wrongful word, action, or omission that tends to incite or tempt another to commit a morally wrongful act. As delineated in the Catechism of the Catholic Church scandal is, “…an attitude or behavior which leads another to do evil…. Scandal is a grave offense if by deed or omission another is deliberately led into a grave offense” (cf. Catechism, Part Three, Section Two, Chapter Two, Article 5, n. 2284). In the context of healthcare, the provision or omission of some services might be scandalous in so far as they generate confusion about Catholic moral teaching. Such scandal is of particular concern for sponsors of Catholic health care services. [Sources: Healy, EF, Medical Ethics (Chicago: Loyola University Press, 1956); Ethical and Religious Directives, Part Six, n. 70.] “