(February 9, 2013 at 7:52 pm)The Germans are coming Wrote: And that is also catholic position, therefor if a catholic representative argues in a court of law in a way that contradicts catholic doctrin - he is a hypocrit or his church is.
We should note that employees in Catholic hospitals - or any other institutions associated with the Church, or anyone such as lawyers hired to act on their behalf - are not 'Catholic representatives'.
For a start, they might not even be Catholic!
For be sure we have a proper definition of any particular Catholic belief, value or opinion, we should only ever refer to the Catechism of the Catholic Church, and the pronouncements of the Pope (currently Benedict XVI).
The media often overlook this (what should be obvious) fact, and happily latch onto (eg) what the janitor at the local catholic school said, and present it as a credible example of Catholic opinion.
(February 9, 2013 at 7:52 pm)The Germans are coming Wrote: There is hypocracy involved because by arguing that way in court they contradict their own policy.
Remember that it is a hospital which is involved in the court case, not "the Catholic Church".
While the hospital has a Catholic identity and is obviously run with a Catholic ethos, that does not mean it has the Catholic Catechism explicitly enshrined in its policy documents.
(I cant state for definite that it doesn't, I have not seen the hospitals policy documents, but I would be very surprised indeed, if it did).
(February 9, 2013 at 7:52 pm)The Germans are coming Wrote: They have a certain opinion and they reject it in court to preveil as inocent infront of the legal system.
The court case is not decided based on Catholic doctrine, nor anyone accepting or rejecting it.
The court case must be decided in accordance with what the law says - it is the secular law which is supreme here - and the law says an unborn child is not a person.
No-one is changing Catholic opinion, the case is simply proceeding in accordance with the law - as all court-cases should.
Yes, it is a notably quirk that a catholic institution might benefit from a law which disagrees with Catholic doctrine, but - hey - that's life. We should treasure these little moments of comedy.
The law is renowned for often creating bizarre circumstances, especially in America, where court-cases mean megabucks for lawyers.
