t r u t h o u t - Dowd & Rich | DeLay and His Demagogues
My wise friend Barbara is a wonderful Catholic woman who became pro-choice (she's also pro-life) when she was 19. She was going to a Catholic private school and knew the gardener (she works for me and is currently trying to find our Latina custodian better employment and healthcare on her own time) and his wife. They had six children, being good Catholics, and the wife became pregnant with a seventh. Her doctors told her she needed a hysterectomy and carrying the child to term could kill her and/or the baby--the doctor recommended an abortion. The gardener's wife went to the priest and asked what she should do. The priest told her that she had a choice between her body and her soul; if she sought an abortion, he told her, he would excommunicate her from the Church. He was advocating that the mother of six children risk her life just for the chance to bring a new life into the world. How does anyone justify this? How does a fetus' life become disproportionally more important than an adult's life?
Barbara left before the woman gave birth. She does not know what happened to her or the baby--but Barbara has since strongly supported a woman's right to control her reproductive abilities.
This is why policy based exclusively or heavily on theology has no place in our government. And in particular, it targets women.
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