Category: ChristianityCatholic

Bolivian Catholic Bishops comment on freedom of conscience and religion

Assert right to conscientious objection

Sean Murphy*

The Conference of Catholic Bishops of Bolivia have published a statement commenting favourably on changes to Bolivia’s law on freedom of conscience and religion. However, they criticize the failure to recognize a right to conscientious objection, referring to a physician in Sucre who is being disciplined for refusing to provide an abortion.

“[W]e have expressed on several occasions the need to recognize in Bolivia the right to conscientious objection, in this and other matters, because we consider first order safeguarding individual and thought freedom and because no one should be forced to act against their conscience.”

The right to conscientious objection

Catholic hospital group sued for refusing transgender hysterectomy

Cathoic News Agency

San Francisco, Calif., Mar 25, 2019 / 02:00 pm (CNA).- A group of five Catholic hospitals in California is being sued by a woman who identifies as a transgender man after one of its locations, St. Joseph Hospital, Eureka, refused to perform a hysterectomy.

Oliver Knight is suing St. Joseph Health of Northern California, alleging that she was refused the surgery because of her “gender orientation.”

The suit was filed in the Humboldt County Superior Court on Thursday, March 21. In the lawsuit, Knight says that workers at the hospital canceled the surgery because she identifies as transgender. . . [Full text]

State hospitals must provide abortion if Catholic clinics will not – report

Patient’s life must take precedence over ethos in emergencies, says report

The Irish Times

Paul Cullen

State-owned hospitals should provide abortions in situations where neighbouring Catholic institutions are unwilling to do so, a new report suggests. . . the report says it is clear there will be situations where abortions have to be carried out in acute hospitals, rather than maternity units. There are seven Catholic voluntary hospitals in Dublin, Cork and Limerick . . . [Full text]

New hope for Ontario doctors’ conscience fight

The Catholic Register

Michael Swan

New evidence heard in court has given Ontario’s medical conscientious objectors renewed hope.

Two days of hearings before the Ontario Court of Appeal Jan. 21-22 has provided Christian Medical and Dental Society (CMDS) executive director Deacon Larry Worthen a dollop of confidence as he waits for a decision from the three-judge panel. . . Full Text

A matter of conscience

The Irish Catholic

Greg Daly

“The one thing that doesn’t abide by majority rule is a person’s conscience,” Alabama lawyer Atticus Finch tells his daughter in Harper Lee’s 1960 novel To Kill a Mockingbird. It’s a powerful statement, and one worth bearing in mind by those who’d seek to make an idol of the ballot box.

It also homes in on one of the key issues facing doctors, religious or otherwise, who believe that they have duties towards all human beings, born or unborn, regardless of how the 36th Amendment to the Constitution permits the State to regulate abortion by law. . .[Full text]