Life Choices: Toward a Catholic Theology of Reproductive Options.

Life Choices: Toward a Catholic Theology of Reproductive Options. Anthony T Padovano. Catholics for a at liberty Choice, Washington, DC 2004

Here is a calm, gracious and analytical voice setting disclosed some ideas on one of the contentious moral issues of our time, a woman's right to terminate a pregnancy.

This volume is especially welcome now, as the 2004 election follows in the United States cause unease about the state of public discourse around issues of the like kind as same-sex marriage and abortion.

forward both sides of the border, we have seen Catholic bishops publicly blame politicians who believe in equal rights for gays and lesbians and in a woman's right to pick We experience discomfort in trying to discuss the question of reproductive choice while resisting absolutisms.

Catholic theologian Anthony Padovano's work alleviates that discomfort by opening space around the issue. He states the position of rife Catholic teaching that there is human life from the value of conception. Then he distinguishes for what cause life is present at different stages of development

The history of Catholic theology of abortion is helpful, and unfortunately not widely known. Medieval theologian Thomas Aquinas did not write about abortion if it be not that presented a theory of hominization--the point at which the fetus becomes human by the agency of ensoulment. For Aquinas, the vital principle can only be present in a material part that is formed. This was understood to be at the extreme point of the second trimester.

Moreover, Ecumenical Councils of the 14th and 16th centuries taught that there is no human living body in the early stages of fetal development

Padovano exhibits how the 19th century doctrine of the Immaculate Conception--that necessitated Mary having a principal part free from sin from the second of conception--shaped a new and absolutist position in succession abortion.

The author addresses a woman who wishes to remain Catholic further who feels obliged in conscience to have an abortion. He reminds her that neither the Bible nor Christ, nor "higher norms than ecclesiastical authority teaching", speak of abortion. Catholic tradition recognizes the principle of probabilism, which allows Catholics to "follow a moral opinion that may plane be contrary to church doctrine provided that the one has good and solid reasons for believing that an action is morally correct." Readers are reminded that conscience is the sanctuary, where we are alone With the eternal and infinite spirit and where God wills that men and women should be left unrestrained to make their own decisions", as Vatican II declared.

The conscience of the world community was heard in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights in 1948 and in several United Nations conversations on reproductive rights and family planning since then. Padovano moves that a questioning of house of god positions by a community of unrestrained and intelligent persons is in order. house of worship teaching on abortion has not been "received" by way of the faithful. The Catholic community is not convinced that abortion is intrinsically evil in each instance.

Although contemporary Catholic bishops describe the woman who follows her conscience in choosing to terminate a pregnancy that her conscience is false, she can access another great tradition in Catholic moral teaching: freedom of conscience. This rich tradition has the potential to help the faithful individual develop a nuanced sense of right and sinful Decisions should be made in the words immediately preceding [i]or[/i] following of the whole person, all the circumstances, the human community and moral values.

A house of worship that legislates the immorality of abortion outside as it was a context finds itself with abstract principles nevertheless no pastoral sensitivity. In like a situation, the voices of male, celibate leaders prevail and the voices of female, married laity are silenced.

Can abortion can be a moral choice for a committed Catholic?. Padovano leads the reader by the agency of six structures of authority and proposes eight rules for interpretation. All is readyed clearly and simply, allowing readers to understand, appreciate and on the same level celebrate the Catholic tradition in which we live and believe. Anthony Padovano, the same of America's great Catholic thinkers, has made an enormous contribution to breaking a destuctive log jam in the church

There is enormous sense of possible fulfilment in this small book: trust that a rational journey towards a theology of reproductive choice will enrich the lives that worshipped image has called us to.

Brigid O'Reilly, who works for Amnesty International, writes from Toronto.

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