2008 Woodie Awards
Contraception bill draws opposition from church
Associated Press
Issue date: 2/23/06 Section: News
- Page 1 of 1
|
The legislature's Public Health Committee is drafting a bill requiring all Connecticut hospitals, including the four Roman Catholic hospitals, to provide emergency contraception to rape victims.
In response to the proposal, the Connecticut Catholic Conference sent out an "action alert" recently that charges that the proposed legislation threatens religious freedom of Catholic hospitals in Connecticut.
Connecticut's Catholic hospitals have "provided the citizens of Connecticut with a high standard of care for decades," the alert reads. "These institutions should not be forced to violate their religious beliefs, especially those concerning the human dignity of every person, no matter at what stage of life."
The state's four Catholic hospitals are the Hospital of Saint Raphael in New Haven, St. Vincent's Medical Center in Bridgeport, St. Francis in Hartford and St. Mary's in Waterbury.
State Rep. Deborah Heinrich, D-Madison, a member of the Public Health Committee, said she fully appreciates the concern the church has about the bill. But Heinrich said she ultimately supports a rape victims right to have an abortion.
"By withholding emergency contraception, you're either forcing a rape victim to have a rapist's baby or the other option is an abortion," Heinrich said.
The Rev. John Gatzak, director of communications for the Archdiocese of Hartford, said the archdiocese would oppose any legislation requiring hospitals to administer contraceptives in cases where an egg already has been fertilized or ovulation has begun.
The Catholic Church "does believe and always has that human life begins at conception and that human life" at the point of conception "is entitled to all the respect that other human life is entitled to," Gatzak said.