Two years ago a 14 year old girl from Lublin became pregnant. She agreed to an abortion, though it seems only because she couldn’t persuade her mother to let her have the baby. Several hospitals refused to carry out the abortion, citing among other reasons that the girl often changed her mind, and they could not be sure that she wanted it. The mother and her daughter contacted the ministry of health and asked to be directed to a hospital that would carry out the procedure – the minister for health Ewa Kopacz, who later declared herself a church-going Catholic with nothing on her conscience, did so. This appears to have been what was required by Polish law.A priest-ethicist from a Catholic university said
I grieve over the situation of the 14 year old from Lublin, but a government minister must respect the law … the minister is not responsible for the fact that such is currently the law in Poland, but she is bound to respect it.
Thus the Reverend Professor dr. hab. Andrzej Szostek, MIC. Member of the Pontifical Academy for Life!
I am sure our three readers remember Fr Morrow's defence when in court for blocking access to abortion clinics:
as the Abortion Act is invalid, Fr Morrow had merely been acting to prevent unlawful killing of infants.
So was the minister justified in doing what she did?
Laodicea 
September 23, 2010 at 6:37 pm
No.
Next question?
September 23, 2010 at 6:45 pm
Was I justified in swearing at my computer screen as I translated this man’s “expert” opinion?
September 24, 2010 at 11:39 pm
Your swearing was entirely justified, the behaviour of the minister entirely unjustified and the opinion of the priest-ethicist entirely wrong!
September 30, 2010 at 9:19 am
Unjustified and wrong, absolutely.
On a more trivial note, sausage joke, please?
October 2, 2010 at 4:54 am
is there something wrong with you all. why are you so f****ng worried about a little four letter word.
[links and swearing removed by Berenike]
October 2, 2010 at 7:37 am
Since that appears to have been an attempt to formulate some kind of coherent contribution to the discussion, I’ve left it up. But as it may also have been a cheap attempt to get people to go and look at your site (in other words, spam) I’ve taken the links out.
Feel free to try again 🙂 But try harder if you do.