the one true church

Just so I can be sure I have this straight, since I never have been (nor, you can be damn sure, will I ever be) a Catholic...

If you're a priest who fucks a few kids, you get reassigned, and the Church's hierarchy may very well cover your ass up to and including the point of obstructing justice.

If you're a nun who--acting in your capacity as an administrator of a Catholic hospital--signs off on an abortion that saves the mother's life, you get excommunicated.

"She consented in the murder of an unborn child," says the Rev. John Ehrich, the medical ethics director for the Diocese of Phoenix. "There are some situations where the mother may in fact die along with her child. But — and this is the Catholic perspective — you can't do evil to bring about good. The end does not justify the means...

Ehrich agrees that sexual abuse can't be tolerated. But he says neither can McBride's actions.

"She said, 'Yes, you can kill that unborn child.' That's a heinous act. And I'm not going to make a distinction between what's worse. They're both abhorrent," Ehrich says.

First of all, a moral philosophy that makes no distinction whatsoever between the agency of a living, breathing, conscious mother of 4 living, breathing, conscious children and that of an 11-week-old fetus is not one that deserves to be taken seriously.

Second, Ehrich's assertion that there's no distinction to be made from the Catholic perspective between abortion and child-fucking is utter nonsense. The Church has made the distinction very, very clearly, and it is this: Sister McBride was automatically excommunicated. There was no fact-finding, no process. It just happened. Not one priest has been excommunicated over substantiated claims of abuse. Even if 95% of the claims of sexual abuse by priests are false, the distinction remains just as clear, from "the Catholic perspective".

This is insane. At some point, a noble (even though I happen to disagree with it) concern for the sanctity of human life devolved into fetus worship.

By way of preemption: I am completely uninterested in debating abortion, here or anywhere else. You are free to sound off to your heart's content on the subject, but don't expect me to respond.