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COLOMBIA-ABORTION Aug-31-2006 (450 words) xxxi
Cardinal says Colombian prelate must decide on penalty for abortion
By Carol Glatz
Catholic News Service
VATICAN CITY (CNS) -- A top Vatican official said it is up to the archbishop of Bogota, Colombia, not Vatican authorities, to determine whether those involved in carrying out Colombia's first legalized abortion should be excommunicated.
Colombian Cardinal Alfonso Lopez Trujillo, head of the Pontifical Council for the Family, spoke with Catholic News Service Aug. 31, a day after news reports showed conflicting versions of his comments concerning the termination of an 11-year-old girl's pregnancy.
The girl had been raped by her stepfather, who admitted to sexually abusing her from the time she was 7 years old.
While a Colombian television station quoted the cardinal as saying every Catholic who submits to an abortion will be excommunicated, Cardinal Lopez Trujillo told CNS that he was not pointing to any particular case, but was merely giving the church's theoretical, moral stance on the issue. Initial news reports cited the cardinal as saying the people involved in the girl's abortion were excommunicated.
"I don't aim to judge in this case," he told CNS, adding that the penalty of excommunication was a matter "that belongs to the archbishop of Bogota," Cardinal Pedro Rubiano Saenz.
While he declined to say what the church's stance would be concerning the 11-year-old Colombian girl's abortion, Cardinal Lopez Trujillo did say the girl deserved compassion for her situation.
"She is a child, but one must also have much mercy for the human person that was destroyed," he said.
The cardinal condemned the man who raped the girl, saying he should bear "the full weight of the law" for his actions.
The cardinal said rape "is among the sinister things" plaguing societies, and the rapist should be held accountable for his crime.
According to canon law, anyone who procures a completed abortion incurs an automatic excommunication, meaning there is no need for an official decree from church authorities.
However, canon law indicates several conditions -- for example, not yet having turned 17 years old -- that would render an individual exempt from the penalty of excommunication.
"I think in this case (of the Colombian girl), the church can still do a lot to welcome this child, because look what family she has," the cardinal said, referring to the girl's abusive stepfather.
Cardinal Lopez Trujillo and church officials in Colombia had criticized Colombia's recent decision to partially legalize abortion. The country's constitutional court ruled in May that abortion was legal in cases of rape or serious congenital malformation or when the pregnancy threatens the woman's life or health.
The girl's abortion was performed at a public hospital toward the end of August.
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Contributing to this story was John Thavis.
END
Copyright (c) 2006 Catholic News Service/USCCB. All rights reserved.
This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or otherwise distributed.
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