 |
Please pray for a pregnant woman and her unborn child. The woman had a heart attack a week after her 4th baby was born due to the stress of the delivery on her heart. She now has cardiomiopathy and her heart is at 40%. She was told to never get pregnant again because the chance of a future pregnancy killing her was very high. She has been told by her “pro-life” doctor that she falls into the category of women who might die if she continues the pregnancy. He told her that it would be OK to end the pregnancy, according to Catholic doctrine.
Without a doubt she will be continuing the pregnancy, but not everyone is having mercy on her. They have reacted with anger that she allowed herself to get pregnant again. They see this child as a mistake and not the blessing of a new life. She is a strong soul, but please pray for her.
Photo: St. Gianna Molla, pray for us! St. Gianna gave her life for her unborn child.
|
What DOES Catholic doctrine say?
I What if the life of the mother or of the child to be born is in danger?
“Never and in no case has the Church taught that the life of the child must be preferred to that of the mother. It is erroneous to put the question with this alternative: either the life of the child or that of the mother. No, neither the life of the mother nor that of the child can be subjected to an act of direct suppression. In the one case as in the other, there can be but one obligation: to make every effort to save the lives of both, of the mother and of the child.
It is one of the finest and most noble aspirations of the medical profession to search continually for new means of ensuring the life of both mother and child. But if, notwithstanding all the progress of science, there still remain, and will remain in the future, cases in which one must reckon with the death of the mother, when the mother wills to bring to birth the life that is within her and not destroy it in violation of the command of God – Thou shalt not kill – nothing else remains for the man, who will make every effort till the very last moment to help and save, but to bow respectfully before the laws of nature and the dispositions of divine Providence.” Pius XII, Allocution to Large Families, November 26, 1951. (15)
II And if she is the mother of a large family?
“But, it is objected, the life of the mother, especially the mother of a large family, is of incomparably greater value than that of a child not yet born. The application of the theory of the equivalation of values to the case which occupies us has already been accepted in juridical discussions. The reply to this harrowing objection is not difficult. The inviolability of the life of an innocent human being does not depend on its greater or lesser value. It is already more than ten years since the Church formally condemned the destruction of life considered to be ‘without value’; and whosoever knows the sad events that preceded and provoked that condemnation, whosoever is able to weigh the direct consequences that would result, from measuring the inviolability of innocent life according to its value, can well appreciate the motives that determined that condemnation.
Besides, who can judge with certainty which of the two lives is in fact the more precious? Who can know what path that child will follow and to what heights of achievement and perfection he may reach? Two greatnesses are being compared here, one of them being an unknown quantity.” Pius XII, Allocution to Large Families, Nov. 26, 1951. (16)
