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Bishop Says Nun is Automatically Excommunicated for Rubberstamping Hospital Abortion

"It is through My voice-boxes throughout the world that We must send this warning of caution to all of Our cardinals and bishops. The Father will not tolerate their entering into secret societies! The discipline and rules set down by My Son and those He chose to write the Book of life and love must be adhered to. We direct, in the name of the Trinity, that you bishops and cardinals of the world must use your full powers as hierarchy to excommunicate and defrock all who seek to dethrone My Son and destroy the Faith!" - Our Lady of the Roses, August 21, 1974

LifeSiteNews.com reported on May 17, 2010:

The Bishop of Phoenix has announced that a Catholic nun and administrator of St. Joseph’s Hospital and Medical Center in Phoenix has automatically excommunicated herself by approving an abortion on a woman who was 11-weeks pregnant, and whose life hospital officials allege they were trying to save.

Bishop Thomas J. Olmstead said the excommunications apply to all involved, and lambasted the hospital’s defense of their decision by comparing the ill woman’s unborn child to a disease that needed to be removed.

The Arizona Republic reports that in late 2009, Sister Margaret McBride, then vice president of mission integration at St. Joseph’s, joined the hospital’s ethics committee in determining that doctors and the hospital would be morally justified in performing a direct abortion in the first trimester, because they felt that the mother’s life was at risk.

The woman, whose identity is anonymous, was reportedly seriously ill with pulmonary hypertension.

The hospital has two directives relating to abortion, as reported by the Republic. The first says that physicians cannot perform direct abortions under any circumstances, including for such reasons as to save the life of the mother.

A second directive adds, however, that "operations, treatments and medications that have as their direct purpose the cure of a proportionately serious pathological condition of a pregnant woman are permitted ... even if they will result in the death of the unborn child." This directive is based on the Catholic philosophical principle of double effect, which says that if the treatment sought addresses the direct causes of the woman’s health condition (such as radiation treatment for cancer), but never intends to kill the unborn child (even though that may happen as a secondary, but unintended, effect of the lifesaving treatment), then it is morally licit.

Hospital officials claimed that they were following the second directive by aborting the baby.

But Bishop Thomas J. Olmstead said in a statement provided to the Republic that he was “gravely concerned by the fact that an abortion was performed several months ago in a Catholic hospital in this diocese,” and furthermore said he was appalled by the hospital’s twisted reasoning that justified the direct abortion by reducing the unborn child to a disease.

“An unborn child is not a disease. While medical professionals should certainly try to save a pregnant mother's life, the means by which they do it can never be by directly killing her unborn child. The end does not justify the means," the prelate said.

Olmstead made clear that McBride and all Catholics who had “formal cooperation” in the woman’s abortion of her child, were automatically excommunicated from the Church.

"The Catholic Church will continue to defend life and proclaim the evil of abortion without compromise, and must act to correct even her own members if they fail in this duty," Olmstead declared.

McBride has since been demoted from her position, and transferred by the hospital to another area of administration.

Catholic Healthcare West, which oversees St. Joseph’s hospital, sent a letter to Olmstead Monday defending McBride’s and the hospital’s actions.

"If there had been a way to save the pregnancy and still prevent the death of the mother, we would have done it," the letter says. "We are convinced there was not."

However, Dr. Paul A. Byrne, Director of Neonatology and Pediatrics at St. Charles Mercy Hospital in Toledo, Ohio, disputes the claim that an abortion is ever a procedure necessary to save the life of the mother, or carries less risk than birth.

In an interview with LifeSiteNews, Dr. Byrne said, “I don’t know of any [situation where abortion is necessary to save the life of the mother].

“I know that a lot of people talk about these things, but I don’t know of any. The principle always is preserve and protect the life of the mother and the baby.”

Byrne has the distinction of being a pioneer in the field of neonatology, beginning his work in the field in 1963 and becoming a board-certified neonatologist in 1975. He invented one of the first oxygen masks for babies, an incubator monitor, and a blood-pressure tester for premature babies, which he and a colleague adapted from the finger blood pressure checkers used for astronauts.

Byrne emphasized that he was not commentating on what the woman’s particular treatment should have been under the circumstances, given that she is not his patient.

“But given just pulmonary hypertension, the answer is no” to abortion, said Byrne.

Byrne emphasized that the unborn child at 11 weeks gestation would have a negligible impact on the woman’s cardiovascular system. He said that pregnancy in the first and second trimesters would not expose a woman with even severe pulmonary hypertension – which puts stress on the heart and the longs – to any serious danger.

A pregnant mother’s cardiovascular system does have “major increases,” but they only happen “in the last three months of pregnancy,” Byrne explained.

The point of fetal viability is estimated at anywhere between 21 - 24 weeks, he indicated, at which point a baby can artificially be delivered and have a good shot at surviving. In the meantime the mother’s pulmonary hypertension could be treated, even by such simple things as eliminating salt from her diet, exercising, or losing weight.

“It’s not going to be any extra stress on the mother that she can’t stand,” said Byrne. “Eventually you get to where the baby gets big enough that the baby can live outside the uterus and you don’t have to do an abortion.”

“I am only aware of good things happening by doing that. I am not aware of anything bad happening to the mother because the baby was allowed to live.”

“The only reason to kill the baby at 11 weeks is because it is smaller,” which makes the abortion easier to perform, he said, not because the mother’s life is in immediate danger.

“I’ve done this work just about as long as neonatology has existed,” said Byrne. “The key is we must protect and preserve life, and we have to do that from conception to the natural end.”

To contact Catholic Healthcare West:

Catholic Healthcare West
185 Berry Street, Suite 300
San Francisco, CA 94107

Phone: (415) 438-5500

Click here to contact CHW electronically.

To contact Bishop Thomas Olmstead:

Diocese of Phoenix
400 East Monroe Street
Phoenix, Arizona 85004-2336
Phone: 602-354-2000
Fax: 602-354-2427
Email: Contact-Us@diocesephoenix.org

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Bishop Vasa Affirms Church’s Use of Excommunication

"It is through My voice-boxes throughout the world that We must send this warning of caution to all of Our cardinals and bishops. The Father will not tolerate their entering into secret societies! The discipline and rules set down by My Son and those He chose to write the Book of life and love must be adhered to. We direct, in the name of the Trinity, that you bishops and cardinals of the world must use your full powers as hierarchy to excommunicate and defrock all who seek to dethrone My Son and destroy the Faith!" - Our Lady of the Roses, August 21, 1974

LifeSiteNews.com reported on January 7, 2010:

Bishop Robert Vasa of Baker Oregon has written a column in the diocesan Catholic newspaper defending the Catholic Church’s teaching on and use of excommunication.

The article by the outspoken and deeply pro-life bishop aims to show that the practice is motivated by mercy and charity, and that the bishops who resort to its use are not “tyrannical power mongers,” contrary to the typical mainstream media treatment of the subject.

Rather, he explains that the first purpose of excommunication is for the good of the person being excommunicated. “It is intended primarily as a means of getting the person who is in grave error to recognize the depth of his error and repent,” says Vasa.

Vasa says that the declaration itself does not cause the excommunication, but rather, by excommunicating somebody, the bishop “only declares that the person is excommunicated by virtue of the person’s own actions. The actions and words, contrary to faith and morals, are what excommunicate.”

Using medical imagery, Vasa explains that just as it is not good for a doctor to allow a patient with diabetes to continue eating sugar, so also a bishop cannot let a Catholic who is in error remain so. It is the duty of the doctor to prescribe the proper medication and “accusing the doctor of being a tyrannical power monger would never cross anyone’s mind,” says Vasa.

“In fact, a doctor who told his diabetic patient that he could keep ingesting all the sugar he wanted without fear would be found grossly negligent and guilty of malpractice.
In the same way, bishops who recognize a serious spiritual malady and seek a prescription to remedy the error, after discussion and warning, may be required to simply state, ‘What you do and say is gravely wrong and puts you out of communion with the faith you claim to hold.’ ”

Further, Vasa also explains that excommunication guards the rest of the faithful from falling into the same error as the excommunicated. If a person is allowed to publicly dissent from the Catholic faith, Vasa says that other Catholics may become confused as to what the Church actually teaches.

“When that moral error is espoused publicly by a Catholic who, by the likewise public and external act of receiving Holy Communion, appears to be in ‘good standing’ then the faithful are doubly confused and doubly discouraged. In that case, the error is certainly not refuted. Furthermore, the impression is given that the error is positively condoned by the bishop and the Church. This is very discouraging to the faithful.”

Thus, Vasa says that excommunication is a practice that at certain times must be employed by bishops to guard the rest of their flock. He says that the Church and bishops have the two-fold responsibility of defending the faith and protecting the faithful, which sometimes involves excommunicating dissident Catholic. He says, though, that “we do not generally see the dissidence of public figures as something that harms the faithful but it has a deleterious effect upon them.”

“The Lord has called bishops to be shepherds. That shepherding entails both leading and protecting… Bishops and the pastors who serve in their Dioceses have an obligation both to lead their people to the truth and protect them from error.”

The subject of excommunication gained national attention late last year when Bishop Thomas Tobin of Rhode Island publicly acknowledged that he had asked Rep. Patrick Kennedy to refrain from receiving communion. Though Tobin never excommunicated Kennedy, the incident was enough to respark debate over the practice.

To read the column in full, click here.

See related LifeSiteNews.com coverage:

Bishop Vasa: Pro-Abortion Candidates are "Disqualified" - Clarifies "Faithful Citizenship"
http://www.lifesitenews.com/ldn/2008/sep/08091203.html

American Bishop: Catholic Disobedience on Contraception has caused "Tremendous Harm to Society"
http://www.lifesitenews.com/ldn/2007/nov/07110604.html

"My child, you will be mocked for this message. You will be scorned by many, but you are bringing the truth.
     "The enemies within the Eternal City have opened the doors wide and allowed the enemies of God to enter. They consort with the devil.
     "You will cleanse your city. You will send out the traitors, excommunicate the wrongdoers who do not repent of their sin. What does it gain a man if he gain the whole world and suffer the loss of his soul? Your gathering in worldly wealth shall give you no passport to Heaven.
     "Come out of the darkness! The Red Hats have fallen and the Purple Hat is being misled. Cardinal against cardinal, bishop against bishop! All that is rotten shall fall. Blood shall flow in the streets--revolution upon revolution! Do you not know-have you learned nothing from the past history of mankind--that the Father will chastise those He loves?" - Our Lady of the Roses, September 27, 1975

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