|
|
 |
Ken
wrote:
|
|
Hi, guys —
- What is the belief of the Church on a woman who has been raped?
- Can she, if possible, douche with a spermicide?
Yours in Christ,
Ken
|
|
{
From the Church's view, can a woman who has been raped douche with a spermicide? }
|
|
Mike Humphrey has prefaced this
team answer:
|
Hi Ken,
Our answer assumes that the woman in question has had no prior or recent sexual activity
or that she couldn't have conceived from a different means.
Mike
|
Mary Ann replied:
|
Hi Ken,
The Church teaches that a woman who has been raped has the right to protect herself
from conceiving a child. She does not have the right to abort the child. She can
take measures to stop ovulation, if ovulation has not occurred, and to kill or block
sperm.
The (NCBC) National Catholic Bioethics Center has posted a statement regarding treatment
of victims of sexual assault, in response to a statement released by the Bishops of Connecticut on a permitted protocol for Catholic hospitals for the treatment of victims of sexual assault.
Part of it is included below.
Hope this helps,
Mary Ann
|
October 3rd, 2007
Recently the Bishops of Connecticut permitted a protocol in Catholic hospitals
for the treatment of victims of sexual assault. This action on the part of
the Connecticut bishops received national attention and requires some commentary.
This is a complex moral matter and does not lend itself to brief explanation.
This difficulty was rendered all the worse by inaccurate reporting and inappropriate,
indeed misleading, terminology.
Catholic hospitals have always provided contraception for the victims of sexual
assault. This was usually done with a medication or medications which would
prevent ovulation. If an egg is not released from the ovary, the victim cannot
become pregnant. There was a difficulty here, however, because some medications
appear to have a negative effect on the lining of the womb that might prevent
an implantation of a new human embryo if one is engendered as a result of the
assault. This would amount to an early medical abortion that would not be allowed.
In light of these facts, two protocols were generally developed and approved
by bishops. One protocol allowed for no use of a medication for contraceptive
purposes because it might have an abortive effect.
Another more commonly used protocol tried to take into account the variety
of circumstances surrounding a sexual assault in such a way as to allow the
use of a contraceptive medication – if it truly worked as a contraceptive.
The protocol with the ovulation test.
A rather simple (ovulation) test is used to determine whether or not a victim
has begun to ovulate or has already ovulated. If the victim has not ovulated
she is given the drug that will prevent the release of the egg from taking
place. If the woman has already ovulated, the drug is not given because:
- it will not have the desired effect of preventing
ovulation, and
- it might, if a new life is present, have
an effect on the lining of the womb and prevent implantation.
|
|
Mary Ann followed-up:
|
Ken,
While the Vatican has not definitively ruled on the question of non-abortifacient
post-rape contraception, the opinion of Catholic moralists for generations
has been nearly unanimous that it is licit, because the woman has a right to
defend herself against the unjust aggressor (the sperm as an extension
of the rapist).
Because rape is:
- not a conjugal act
- nor even a human act
of sexuality, nor
- an act on her part at all
she is not bound to maintain
its openness to life. It is definitely possible to ascertain if a woman
has already ovulated or not. If she has not already ovulated, ovulation
may be prevented. Again because the woman has no obligation to join herself
to this act of violence. In past times, it was considered permissible to
douche or use a spermicide means which are now known not to work contraceptively
because, within 5-30 minutes, the sperm is already in the fallopian tube,
or to use a barrier or spermicide if one were about to be raped.
The problem with the Connecticut law is that it prohibits a doctor from determining
if the woman has ovulated, and mandates administration of the contraceptive, which
would act as an abortifacient if the woman had already conceived and might act as
one if the woman has already ovulated.
The Connecticut bishops decided that since
the chances of ovulation and pregnancy were slim, and since under the law there was
no way to know whether the woman had ovulated, it was not intrinsically wrong to
administer the drug for the purpose of preventing ovulation, under the principle
of double effect, the giving of the medication is not itself an intrinsically morally
evil act. That is their reasoning.
As for what is possible to know or not:
For a given number of days past ovulation,
it is impossible to know for sure if a woman is pregnant or not and it is impossible
to know for sure that she has ovulated for a few of days around peak day, but it
is possible to know with certainty that a woman has not yet ovulated. When she has not yet ovulated, one can administer the contraceptive medication, because it will
not be abortifacient and because she has no obligation to participate in the act
of rape by supplying her egg.
This is what the National Catholic Bioethics Center (NCBC)'s position is on the decision of the Connecticut bishops:
In matters that have not yet been decided definitively by the Holy See, The National Catholic Bioethics Center has refrained from adopting one or another position on
a disputed question. However, in the matter of protocols for sexual assault, there
is virtual unanimity that an ovulation test should be administered before giving
an anovulant medication. The protocol the NCBC has supported requires the ovulation
test because it provides greater medical and moral certitude that the intervention
will have its desired anovulatory (inhibiting ovulation) effect.
The NCBC objects
strongly to state mandates, such as those passed by Connecticut and Massachusetts,
that do not allow health care professionals and facilities to exercise their best
medical judgment and which do not protect the consciences of all parties. We also
object to state mandates that do not allow the victim of sexual assault to have all
the information necessary for a medical intervention so that she might make an informed
judgment. However, the NCBC understands the judgment of the Connecticut bishops that
the administration of a contraceptive medication in the absence of an ovulation test
is not an intrinsically evil act. However, it is immoral to violate one's conscience, including the
corporate consciences of health care agencies, and the unwillingness of the state
to allow an exemption of conscience makes the law unjust and onerous. |
Mary Ann
|
Rob replied:
|
Ken,
Yes, you can use a spermicide because it can't harm human life or a conceived
egg.
Some may say, But you are still preventing life.
I would agree with Mary Ann's reply. A rapist doesn't have a right to force
a woman to have his child.
What you cannot do is harm a fertilized egg.
In this situation, the chaste woman could:
- kill sperm with a spermicide, or
- let the
unfertilized egg go through it's natural cycle of passing out of the body.
If it is a case of date rape or a situation where the woman willingly had sex, then
after, was raped involuntarily, she could not use a spermicide within three hours and
could not use a contraceptive medication within two days of the act because she would
have prevented a voluntary conception.
Chances of prevention after ovulation are small.
Rob Coutinho
Former Grammarian
|
Fr. Francis replied:
|
Mike,
First, the original question is vague — perhaps on purpose and to see if we would take on the Catholic Bishops in Connecticut N.B. (nota bene=note well). Not everyone asking
us questions is:
- a sincere seeker of Catholic teaching, or
- looking for a clarification of
the Church's teaching.
I would basically agree with what has already been posted by our members.
Rape is an act of aggression and power, and while it might use the genital
faculties for its act,
in no way can one consider it conjugal or even
sexual in this sense. Thus the teachings of the Church concerning the
meaning of [conjugal love or the conjugal act], (See Humanae Vitae),
do not apply here — at least
directly.
There would not be a need to be open to life however there
must be a protection of (possible) human life. The issue of ovulation is
critical here — and apparently the Connecticut law, perhaps purposefully to undermine
the pro-life ethic, prohibits discovering whether or not the woman has
ovulated. This led to a real pastoral crisis for the Catholic bishops
in Connecticut who not only are Teachers but also have Catholic hospitals in
their dioceses — thus they are faced with an enormous pastoral crisis:
How can Catholic health care live and operate under such a law?
Fr. Francis
|
|
|
|
