The hardening of attitudes in our political culture has reached our Catholic hospitals.
Relationships between the hospitals and the increasingly hardline US bishops have become so explosive in recent months they're making national news.
In December the staff of Saint Joseph’s Hospital and Medical Center in Phoenix saw a dispute with their bishop escalate to the point where they were ultimately stripped of their affiliation.
"Saint Joseph's Hospital and Medical Center in Phoenix can no longer identify itself as Catholic," Bishop Thomas J. Olmsted announced during a news conference in Phoenix on December 21, just in time for Christmas.
The hospital was stripped of it's affiliation because it had conducted an abortion to save a mother’s life. The 27 year old woman would have died otherwise, the hospital said.
But the retribution for their fateful decision was as swift as it was unbending. Bishop Olmsted first excommunicated a nun, Sister Margaret McBride, who served on the hospitals ethics committee.
Olmstead's shocking move was seen as an attempt to intimidate the hospital from ever making a similar judgement. But of course it failed. So that led Bishop Olmsted to press the nuclear button: in effect he has excommunicated the entire hospital - because they dared to make a wrenchingly difficult decision that the rest of us can only hope we never have to confront.
But two distinct things are happening here. Bishop Olmstead is protecting the Church's doctrine; Sister McBride is protecting the patients life.
Should theologians be making medical decisions? Should faith interrogate science? Is the doctrine of the Church worth more than the life of an individual? Those are significant schisms that have opened up; they have been everywhere in Catholicism for decades now. It's past time we confronted them.
You might think, given its recent history, that the conservative forces within the Church would have learned by now that the impulse to protect Church doctrine and the Church itself from scandal can quickly backfire (but you'd be quite wrong about that).
It's not hard to see why. Shining moral absolutes are very hard to give up. Shining moral absolutes stand firm and unbending against the tide of history and the general murkiness of life. They clarify, they stand for something, and they stand against something. In that sense they're just like the Catholic Church itself.
Moral absolutes create a world of black and white. Just like words on a page, just like the words in the bible, they spell things out for you, they give you a framework, and you can learn to overlook their shortcomings, and in fact you'll have to. Because in a world of color, which is where we all live after all, they can quickly run aground.
So the clash we're witnessing is between a conservative mindset that values rules, dogma, sanctity and moral absolutes - and a much more compassionate outlook that refrains from quick judgment and takes the sometimes brutal contradictions of life into careful consideration.
At the moment it looks like there can only be one solution: every Catholic hospital in the United States will lose it's affiliation. It's the only way to protect unbending doctrine from the decisions sometimes taken in American hospitals.
Federal laws protect a patient’s right to receive emergency care, including terminations where they are warranted, and Catholic hospitals cannot invoke their religious status if it jeopardizes the lives of pregnant women. The need to adhere to religious doctrine does not give health providers cover or license to risk someone's life.
So since the rules of this conflict have already been written, there can be no ultimate winner. To protect the Church the bishops must double down, and it looks like they intend to. They will do what they think is best: stand firm and unbending against the tide of history and the general murkiness of life.
But standing on principal can also be a cop out. It can simply mean you haven't bothered getting your hands dirty. You can survey all the sin and suffering in the world, and heave a big sigh, and you can retreat to your ivory tower. In protecting Christ's message you can forget his example. That's dissonance is exactly what so many former Catholics mean when the say the Church left me, I didn't leave it.
In this world it's much easier to be a saint than a sinner, after all. The rule book is mercifully short. You just have to say no and keep saying no. No to complexity, no to the drunkenness of things being various, no to other people's suffering, and ironically enough, no to life.
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Switch to the desktop site to post a comment.thinkingartist | Jan 31, 2011, 04:29 AM EST
All hospitals that use Federal funds (Medicare),including Catholic ones must follow Federal laws. These laws demand that the lives of pregnant women be protected over and above the unborn.This means that at times, direct abortions must be performed to save the lives of the mother regardless of whether the hospital is secular or Catholic. This conflicts with Catholic Directives. Catholic hospitals could stop taking Federal Medicare funds and would then be free to follow their Directives to the letter. Why don't they do this? Because they could not stay in business- they need the business of non-Catholics and taxpayer money which comes mostly from non-Catholics. Why should we non-Catholics support the medieval stupidity and immorality of the Catholic Directives which give sub-standard medical care and risk the lives of women? BTW,Catholic women are 25% of the female population and also get 25% of the abortions in the U.S. Also there is no statistical difference between the % of Catholics who use artificial birth control and % of non-Catholics that use artificial birth control. Interestingly, the group that most disapproves of abortion is gay males (I presume this would include pedophile priests).
seanomelbourne | Jan 30, 2011, 05:39 PM EST
The Catholic church is run by the Christano-fascist Opus Dei. Doe's that make the Vatican a Fascist state?
jamthecat | Jan 30, 2011, 02:32 PM EST
The Catholic Church lost the right to tell anyone what is moral and correct the first time it helped a priest get away with raping a child. And if the Catholic hospital system truly believed there should be no abortions in any way, form or fashion, they should stop talking money from insurance companies that offer a provision for it...but they won't; money trumps everything, even in the "holy see."
seanomelbourne | Jan 29, 2011, 06:10 PM EST
2bornot2b should try to differentiate between pro-choice and pro-abortion as many pro-choice do not believe in abortions in most cases. Quoting Catholic ethicist to justify the Vatican's position is meaningless. The decision to have an abortion is a personal and daunting one and we should mind our own business. The right cannot make rules or change laws to suit their agenda(or the liberals for that matter).Democracy means respect for all positions.
thinkingartist | Jan 29, 2011, 05:22 PM EST
Apparently it's 2Bore&More who isn't into reading. He gets his info from YouTube and the radio!His ''experts''- Dr.s Pacholczyk and Nadal are not M.D.s. Does he even know the difference between Dr. and M.D.? Maybe someone can point him towards a YouTube video which explains the difference. Pacholcyzk and Nadal are R.C. priests, probably virgins like 2Bore.Still no word from 2Bore as to his source for his ''testimony from doctors'' that the woman's life was ''never in danger''.You are full of it, 2Bore! And nobody gives a d*mn about your little Catholic boy treatise on St. Joseph,either.
thinkingartist | Jan 29, 2011, 12:17 PM EST
The Catholic Church,unlike all the other religions,makes no distinction between the born and unborn. So because of this obvious stupidity they have these dilemmas regarding pregnant women about to die unless the embryo/fetus is killed/removed. What's supposed to happen in these R.C.C.-made dilemmas, is that the ''faithful'' are supposed to make no effort to save mother or fetus,everyone is supposed to pray like crazy,and then God is supposed to waft in on the good Bishop's next gaseous emmission and save both mother and fetus. Or not, and escort both ''souls'' to Heaven.Either way - to the ''faithful'',this would be a job well done by ''God''. Unbelievable!
KAnderson | Jan 29, 2011, 08:48 AM EST
Also on the question "Should faith interrogate science?"... sure. As long as science is first allowed to judge whether beings worshiped by religion have any reality to them or not, to determine if religious opinion has any worth.
KAnderson | Jan 29, 2011, 08:36 AM EST
In nature both would have naturally died, which the religiously inclined would then say was God's will. Science and medicine being an artificial construct of man, therefore against God's natural will, allows us to save one or the other un-naturally. So it technically doesn't matter which you save. By nature they both would have died. Though if you save the Woman, she would be more likely to live being grown and strong, whereas the baby had not yet tried to live on its own out of the womb and might die of some complication, if it is even far enough along to live without a womb. So you have a definite yes, versus a 50/50maybe.
KAnderson | Jan 29, 2011, 08:27 AM EST
> Posted by seanomelbourne on Jan 29, 2011, 04:19 AM EST > If an abortion is murder when saving a mothers life therefore > saving the baby's life is murdering the mother... Which is a > sin against God? Both, see in nature both would have naturally died, which the religiously inclined would then say was God's will. Science and medicine being an artificial construct of man, therefore against God's natural will, allows us to save one or the other un-naturally. So it technically doesn't matter which. By nature they both would have died. If you save the woman, she can work to help raise the existing children, or if none might have another child some day without complication. If you save the child, it may live or have medical complications with living outside the womb and die. Saving the mother was a better bet. My father almost had to make the same choice about my mother who had a tumor in her womb at the same time she was pregnant with my sis. He said he would have picked his wife to save if he had had to chose. He felt he wouldn't have been to manage things without her. My sis couldn't blame him for that. You could say my sis is glad to be alive, but then so is my mother. They are both alive due to advancement in medical science.
seanomelbourne | Jan 29, 2011, 04:19 AM EST
If an abortion is murder when saving a mothers life therefore saving the baby's life is murdering the mother. cannot have it both ways choice Which is a sin against God?
thinkingartist | Jan 29, 2011, 02:17 AM EST
The term ''murder'' is an unlawful killing of a human being. Abortion is (1)lawful and(2)the term ''human being'' refers to an already born alive person,not an embryo or fetus. Only a simpleton would be ignorant of these facts.The majority of Americans are not Catholic and do not want the medieval Catholic Directives imposed on them when they are brought as emergencies to the nearest hospital which happens to be Catholic. Had the doctors at St. Joseph's refused to perform the abortion and allowed the woman to die they would have been in violation of The Emergency Medical Treatment and Active Labor Act, a Federal law which all hospitals are subject to when they treat Medicare and Medicaid patients. If Catholic hospitals want to be in compliance with Catholic Directives which forbid abortions under all circumstances, then they must forego accepting Medicare patients and payments.Without Medicare payments they would soon be out of business and would be replaced by secular hospitals which have high standards of care for all aspects of women's reproductive health,including emergency contraception for women who have been raped,tubal ligations and abortions.This would be a social good!
kilgara | Jan 29, 2011, 12:13 AM EST
Anyone in 2011 who fails to admit that an abortion murders someone is a scientific, medical and moral ignoramus.Step into the present century you "pro-choicers", it is no longer arguable.
HorsesInMdstrm | Jan 28, 2011, 10:15 PM EST
Why should any of us care what the bishop has done? I read a wire service story today that says the big difference now is that mass can't be said in the hospital chapel, but can be said in the airport chapel. The bishop is irrelevant to all but those who can't see the hypocrisy and stupidity.
seanomelbourne | Jan 28, 2011, 09:52 PM EST
2bornot2b is clutching at cruciform shaped straws.He has drowned his own argument.
DanOLoingsigh | Jan 28, 2011, 06:34 PM EST
Thinkingartist – thanks for the information…afraid I can never square the US attitudes on abortion versus attitudes on gun control…both appear extremist by many on this side of the pond.
olovely | Jan 28, 2011, 06:22 PM EST
You "heard testimony" from "doctors" that contradicts the actual doctors decisions? Cite your sources for these claims. The real facts, which the article reproduces, are that the woman would have died. The article makes clear that the tensions between the bishop and the hospital were long simmering. You don't read the articles you criticize and you make stuff up when you don't like the facts.
thinkingartist | Jan 28, 2011, 06:21 PM EST
2BorNot2B is making it up as he goes along....he should tell us ''the truth''... where is the ''testimony from doctors familiar with the case saying the mother's life was never in danger''? Do tell us and let us get our ''facts straight''!
2BorNot2B | Jan 28, 2011, 05:50 PM EST
@Cahir -- Get your facts straight Mr(?) columnist! You are skewing and spinning! -- The 'conflict' did not 'escalate' from December, it had been simmering and ONGOING. --- The excommunication was not product of a single incident, it was the result of a deliberate disregard and provocation to the authority of the bishop by the secularized nun-administrator, going back to the time of Olmstead's predecessor. Tell the truth! The violations to the 'Code of conduct' established for an institution billing itself as "Catholic" were MULTIPLE, as well as the warnings from the bishop to the effect that if they continued defying the Diocese the charter would be removed. The abortion performed on this woman was only the last straw. --- Further, it is patently untrue that it was done to save the woman's life, I heard testimony from doctors familiar with the case saying mother's life was never in danger.
thinkingartist | Jan 28, 2011, 05:29 PM EST
Katiemac; The woman was so close to death that there was no time to even move her to an O.R. to perform the abortion. So there was certainly no time to move her to a non-Catholic hospital.Had the doctors not aborted the 11 week embryo,the woman would have died and so,of course, would her embryo. St. Joseph's has never received any financial support from the Catholic Church. The hospital accepts Medicare and Medicaid patients and payments-paid by taxpayers, (most of whom are not Catholic) and therefore must by U.S. law follow accepted best practices medical standards. These standards in the circumstances of ectopic pregnancies and other troubled pregnancies are sometimes in direct conflict with Catholic Directives. The U.S. laws must be followed or doctors are prosecuted and imprisoned. Catholic hospitals are not little ''R.C. Kingdoms'' that can do whatever suits their immoral theology to whomever is brought to their E.R.s. By law,patients must be stabilized before being transferred to another hospital. U.S. laws do not give equal legal standing to embryos and fetuses with already born human beings- thus the term ''birthright''. Also, in many parts of the U.S., Catholic hospitals are the only hospitals for miles around. I've been treated at Catholic E.R.s. Believe me, the hospitals do not communicate their Directives to their non-Catholic patients. I wonder how many women have already died in Catholic hospitals that followed the Directives?
maloney | Jan 28, 2011, 04:48 PM EST
olovely..an abortion is OK as long as you don't say you were killing your offspring. Get a life.
seanomelbourne | Jan 28, 2011, 04:46 PM EST
Everyone is an opinion mongerer except 2bornot2b. He's a self righteous hypocrite telling the rest of us we are wrong. Olmstead is wrong he should keep his false doctrines to himself. I bet he's a card-carrying member of OPUS DEI and the rest of the right wing fascists who have hijacked the Catholic Church.
PhlutiePhan | Jan 28, 2011, 04:10 PM EST
Yes, "life and death" is a moral absolute that you cannot have contained a "gray area". Since this is an Irish blog, why not do some research on the newly "minted" Cardinal Raymond Burke and how he was "run out of town" in St. Louis by the political maneuvering of pro-abortion forces in the Chancery?
snakehips | Jan 28, 2011, 03:43 PM EST
I always thought that Catholic Theology would allow the death of an infant in deference to the saving of the life of a mother. I guess since the procedure involved abortion, the Church believes it can not yield. What does excommunication mean in today's World anyway? The Church in today's World should work on how to keep their faithful instead of hacking them away. The Church is throwing a party and no one is attending. Shall we excommunicate the bishops who moved perverts and abusers from parish to parish and diocese to diocese. I believe the children who were molested and abused suffered more than the poor child who sacrificed to save a mother's life.
olovely | Jan 28, 2011, 03:27 PM EST
2BORNOT2B: what is your claim that "anyone needing to kill their offspring should simply apply to" other hopitals if not explosive language? You commit the very sin you're chiding. That makes you no better or worse than anyone else. That's the point you see - you should grant other people the maturity and conscience you grant yourself.
2BorNot2B | Jan 28, 2011, 03:18 PM EST
cont'd -- The problem in this case is that some US 'interpreters' of Vatican II decided on their own that the Council intended for the Church to ditch its moral moorings, adjudicating to themselves the 'authority' to build 'a new Church' according to their lax morals and sinful image. The result was the decay we are presently witnessing which, btw, IC cannot tire of describing for us. From that frame of mind we got Bishops like the corrupt Rembert Weakland of Wisconsin who was eventually booted out; seminaries full of homos who brought about the supposed pedophilic -but in reality homosexual- scandals; orders of nuns who had previously given their life to serve God and their fellow-man in hospitals, now abandoned convent and cloister to conveniently live in 'community apartments' with other women of like mind as 'single spinsters,' undistinguishable from the secular population. Some 'coming out' as masculinized professionals of dubious sex, and even as lesbians, eager to co-opt the dictates of the secular world. I have seen this Sister Margaret, and she could be a poster child for what I described above. -- Radicalized Ex-priests and nuns alike have used the education the Church provided for them to turn their menopausal anger against it.
2BorNot2B | Jan 28, 2011, 03:15 PM EST
@ Cahir -- **Relationships between the hospitals and the increasingly hard line US bishops have become so explosive in recent months they're making national news.** --- That's right Cahir... just insert a few incendiary words to set the mood and attract the usual bomb throwers: "increasingly hard line US bishops...become so explosive.." -- The reality is: The moral guidelines for Catholic institutions have ALWAYS been the same... the problem was a change in personnel!; not only among the board or directors and trustees of hospitals, but among the bishops themselves. --- It is a fact that Catholic hospitals were founded for the same reasons as Catholic schools: to serve the needs and moral conscience of Catholic patrons, not to accommodate to the whims of secular patrons and their needs. There are plenty of hospitals in the US where pro-life qualms are non-existent. Anyone needing to kill their offspring should simply apply to them, not to the ones that have a Catholic charter --- cont'd
DanOLoingsigh | Jan 28, 2011, 02:23 PM EST
2BorNot2B - That is your OPINION, and you are quite entitled to it. Just don't expect others to always agree, as they are equally entitled to their OPINION. You live my your conscience, and allow others to live by theirs.
Ms.Gail | Jan 28, 2011, 02:10 PM EST
Wouldn't the church have just loved to see the nun in prison for refusing lifesaving treatment to the dying pregnant woman.
2BorNot2B | Jan 28, 2011, 02:04 PM EST
@ Cahir -- **The hardening of attitudes in our political culture has reached our Catholic hospitals.** -- Just in case you were wondering: The application of Catholic doctrine has NOTHING to do with 'our political culture,' the teachings of the Church are the teachings of Jesus in the bible and they are meant to be perennial -not adjusted to the prevailing cultural climate of the times- therefore they are not 'hardened,' they are unchangeable. So... wrong on the first count!
SCVMal | Jan 28, 2011, 12:48 PM EST
One statement you made was very personal to this former Roman Catholic: "...the Church left me. I didn't leave it." Now I am happy, fulfilled and catholic involved in ministries.
Ajreaper | Jan 28, 2011, 12:19 PM EST
A nun who makes a medical decision that is deemed to be correct gets excommunicated a preist who abuses children gets shuffled about- I guess it's far better to be a priest then a nun.
Parents | Jan 28, 2011, 12:14 PM EST
I am a catholic and this bishop has just done a great diservice to us all. The hospital could not practice good medicine with him making the decisions so maybe they are better off now. If only these bishops who do not live in the real world had been so quick to excommuicate some of the other real wrongs that has happened for decades. Instead of exoommunicating a pedophile priest they moved them so they could carry on ruining other little lives knowing full well what was happening. They also deliberatly hid the truth and told a lot of lies. A lot of sins there but saving the life of this mother isn't one of them. This is just shameful.
olovely | Jan 28, 2011, 11:51 AM EST
Children all over the world were abused and tortured by the clergy and these bishops were directed by the Vatican to keep their mouth shut about it. And they kep their mouths shut. So their brave stands now make a dreadful contrast to their silence all these decades.
olovely | Jan 28, 2011, 11:15 AM EST
Mr. O'Doherty, good story. Well written. Well presented. Thank you.
Shannonjackson | Jan 28, 2011, 11:04 AM EST
The higher up someone climbs in any organization the more removed he/she becomes from the realities of life. I'm sure it is a serene existence to lie around your ivory tower and gaze at your definition of lily-white hands while the rest of us mortals deal with real life.
mrkennedy | Jan 28, 2011, 10:57 AM EST
So many people don't care about the life of a fetus. Read the story about Paris Tassin who the other day auditioned on American Idol and advanced to the next round in Hollywood. Paris revealed that at 18 she was pregnant and an ultrasound showed the baby had "HYDROCEPHALIS INSIDE THE SKULL!!" The doctors told her to ABORT THE BABY! Paris said "NO" I want the baby and today that child is 4 years old with only one complication, needing a hearing aid. Paris told the judges that this baby "WAS THE BEST THING THAT EVER HAPPENED TO ME IN MY LIFE AND I AM SINGING FOR HER!!!" CONGRATULATIONS TO THE STAND OF BISHOP OLMSTED WHO UPHELD THE TEACHING OF THE CATHOLIC CHURCH!!!!
Nelsonbarry | Jan 28, 2011, 10:54 AM EST
I'm catholic but I must tell you the Bishop is a feckin ass
sroneil | Jan 28, 2011, 10:08 AM EST
WHAT IS THE PHOENIX DIOCESE RECORD ON PREDATOR PRIESTS? HAVE THEY BEEN AS SWIFT TO JUSTICE AS WITH THE HOSPITAL?? MAYBE HIS HOLINESS (WHAT A JOKE!!) BISHOP OLMSTED SHOULD STATION HIMSELF AT THE HOSPITAL AND MAKE THE MEDICAL/THEOLOGY DECISIONS ON THE SPOT...REALLY MAKE SURE ALL THESE SO CALLED CATHOLIC HOSPITAL NUNS AND NURSES AND DOCTORS ARE DOING THE RIGHT CATHOLIC THING!!!! AGAIN I SAY WHAT IS THE PREDATOR PRIEST RECORD IN PHOENIX...WHERE'S BISHOP OLMSTED IN REGARD TO THAT QUESTION!!!! HELP-HELP-HELP!!!!
slainte9 | Jan 28, 2011, 09:53 AM EST
Jansenism resurgent. Our bishop in Phoenix is leading the movement in the Catholic Church reverting to that old heresy, trying to turn us into fundamentalist Protestant followers of John Calvin.
mayoman | Jan 28, 2011, 09:50 AM EST
This stubborn reactionary can excommunicate anyone he pleases, but the fact remains that medical decisions are the province of medical professionals and the patient.
olovely | Jan 28, 2011, 08:39 AM EST
You've just done what the Church does when confronted with a real world dilemma: retreat into doctrine, into theological and ideological purity. The bishop ended the hospital's Catholic affiliation when the staff saved the life of the person it was best able to save - didn't you read the article? No need to patronize other people's philosophy and ethics - instead why don't you grapple with your own.
BishopSean | Jan 28, 2011, 08:28 AM EST
Hi, Cahir. Although I am not Roman Catholic, I believe Roman Catholic theology teaches that the doctor's role is to save both persons, mother and unborn child and, when this is not possible, the doctor should strive to save the life of the person (s)he is best able to save. Cahir, there is another extreme opposite what you describe--the opposite is one of moral relativism. This was promoted in the USA with Columbia U.'s John Dewey's teaching that truth is not discovered; it is constructed. What you and I decide today is ethical; tomorrow it can be the opposite by majority vote. Or, you have your truth and morality and I have mine. What's true for you is OK for you, and that might not be true for me. No wonder Goebbels could say with a straigt face, "Repeat a lie often enough and everyone will believe it." This is why our contemporary intellectuals are tripping into post-modern irrationality. We need to regain realism in philosophy, including ethics. Best regards.