At St. Joseph's Hospital and Medical Center (Phoenix), a young woman, 11 weeks pregnant, was suffering from a life-threatening condition that likely would have caused her death if she hadn't had an abortion. A nun and administrator at the hospital, Sister Margaret McBride, who served on an ethics committee with the woman's doctors agreed to permit an abortion to save the young woman's life.
In spite of the fact that he has no authority at the hospital, Bishop Olmsted informed Sister McBride that she was automatically excommunicated from the Catholic Church, and then demoted and reassigned.
Apparently Bishop Olmsted would choose the death of the young woman with the resultant death of the 11-week fetus rather than saving at least one life. What kind of "pro-life" policy is that? I suspect most caring Christians would have agreed with the decision of Sister McBride and the hospital's ethics committee.
The obsession of some of the Church's hierarchy with the issue of abortion seems to have distorted their common sense and the teachings of Jesus. What would Jesus have decided had He been at St. Joseph's Hospital and Medical Center? The Man from Nazareth did not attempt to tell us that life begins at conception. I suspect, if He had been asked, Jesus or any of his disciples would have said life begins when the new-born child draws its first breath.
And the other irony is that the abortion-obsessed bishops who are so quick to excommunicate people like Sister McBride are the same ones who for years tried to cover up the problem of pedophile priests.
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