The Catholic Church teaches that abortion is the murder of innocent human life: always, all the time, no exceptions.1 This is a mortal sin, and those who procure an abortion are automatically excommunicated from the Catholic Church.2 This means everyone involved in the process, not just the mother and abortionist. It also includes everyone who works at the abortion clinic, the husband/boyfriend who drove the mother in for the appointment, the person who knowingly consented to pay for the procedure, the political activist who lobbied to legalize the procedure, the judge who legalized the procedure in court, and the politician who voted to keep the procedure legal. This applies to all persons at least sixteen years of age.3 In fact, the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops (USCCB), by no means a politically conservative body, has explicitly stated that it is impossible to be pro-abortion (pro-choice) and remain Catholic.4
However, medical procedures, designed to save the life of the mother, do not qualify as an abortion, so long as there is no intent to kill the unborn child. This is called the “principle of double effect.”5 The death of the unborn child may be the unintended result of the procedure, with both the doctor and patient knowing this in advance. So long as the desire to kill the baby (or terminate the pregnancy) is not present in such a medically-necessary procedure, it is not an abortion, nor is it murder, even if both the doctor and patient know that termination of the pregnancy will be the likely result. Such rare circumstances qualify as “double effect” because both lives (baby and mother) are equally valuable, and losing both would be a greater evil than losing one. “If medical treatment or surgical operation, necessary to save a mother’s life, is applied to her organism (though the child’s death would, or at least might, follow as a regretted but unavoidable consequence), it should not be maintained that the fetal life is thereby directly attacked.” – (Catholic Encyclopedia, Abortion, 1907).
- Catechism of the Catholic Church, paragraphs 2270-2275
- Code of Canon Law 1398
- Code of Canon Law 1323, 1325
- National Council of Catholic Bishops, Fall 1989 conference resolution of November 8, 1989
- Catechism of the Catholic Church, paragraphs 1752, 1754, 1756, 1759
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