conscience. Which, oddly, is also what the Church teaches: that one must follow one’s carefully formed conscience. Is that what happened?”
“Yes!” He could not see her vigorous nod.
“Let me pose a hypothetical question, Lucy. If you were dying now, and you were making your final confession, would you confess to having carried out any abortion procedures?”
She paused, thinking. “I don’t think I would …” she said finally, “… unless I was scared and wanted to touch all bases. But …” She considered further. “… really, no,” she said firmly. “Confession is for absolution from sin … and having gone over it in my mind, and after all the thought, prayer, and consideration I’ve given it, I don’t believe I’m committing a sin in this regard.”
“Then I’d have to agree with you: You are following a carefully prepared conscience.
“But you must be extremely cautious about performing an abortion-even in the first trimester. Only the most compelling reason can be sufficient for such an intervention.” Koesler paused for a moment. “I think your use of the clinic should be most rare. After all, a zygote’s sole purpose is to be human. So only the most compelling possible concern should be allowed to interrupt its development.”
“You’re right, Father. I will watch that carefully.” It was said in a measured tone, as if taking a vow.
“But”-her voice lightened-“you don’t know how good you’ve made me feel. Now, what do I do with Vinnie?”
“Leave it. Maybe someday we’ll get a chance to talk it over, just he and I. I know where he’s coming from. But in this case the question is the supremacy of conscience.”
Still, Koesler hesitated. He was loath to leave it at that. It was not all that simple. “But,” he said, after a moment, “we can’t afford to get smug about this. At this stage we’re muddling through at best. Every abortion is sad. Most of them are tragic … and every one of them is the end of a living thing. You know that and I know that. And someplace in this procedure, there is sin. Serious sin. Our Church is not teaching infallibly here. But, it is teaching. Add to that, we-you and I-are not infallible. We’re trying to reach a tolerable compromise. Because we need to.
“For now, I can tell you two things: You’re not excommunicated. And you listened to our Church reverently and you prayerfully formed your conscience. And now you’re following your conscience. You-we-may be wrong. But you are not committing a sin.”
“Thank you!” Never were these words more sincerely meant.
After he hung up, Koesler continued to think.
Not all that long ago, defining an actual time of death was of little practical value. There are, of course, incontrovertible signs that death has occurred. But there was no general agreement as to the exact moment of death. Then medicine and religion combined to agree that the cessation of brain function-as evidenced by the flat line-marked the moment of death. Then came organ transplants, and with them the need to know the exact instant the donor organ was available for “harvesting.”
In the opinion of Koesler-and many others-a similar criterion was needed to identify and agree upon the time that human life begins. The need was unquestionably there. But the problem polarized the concerned parties. One must be pro-choice-holding that human life begins at birth-or pro-life, holding that human life begins at the first moment of conception.
Neither side had so far been able to prove its point convincingly enough to reach any sort of agreement with the other.
Conscience, he pondered, what a tricky concept.
Dissenters from the supremacy-of-conscience theory frequently point triumphantly to the occasional murderer, thief, or traitor, and mockingly cite such wrongdoers’ claims that they were only following their conscience. But the people committing such acts are plainly sick people with sick consciences.
The conscience that must be followed is the “well-formed” conscience.
Such as Lucy’s.
Whimsically, Koesler turned to his filing cabinet and pulled the file on “Conscience.” It held treatises on abstract theological applications and definitions. There were normal or abnormal consciences, lax or scrupulous, tender or burned out … and so on.
Then came the conscience blockbuster.
Pope Paul VI wrote his encyclical “Humanae Vitae.” In it, he stated that every act of intercourse must be open to the possibility of conception. And lots of the faithful-including the Pope’s own appointed committee-for the first time in their lives disagreed with the ordinary teaching of the Church.
In response to this encyclical, the French bishops wrote, “If these persons [who dissent from “Humanae Vitae”] have tried sincerely but without success to conform to the given directives, they may be assured that by following the course which seems right to them they do so in good conscience.”
Of course, thought Koesler, as Henry Higgins of “My Fair Lady” observed, “The French don’t care what they do, actually, as long as they pronounce it correctly.”
But if the French bishops were not convincing, there is the testimony of far more conservative American bishops: “There exists in the Church a lawful freedom of inquiry and of thought, and also general norms of licit dissent.… In the final analysis, conscience is inviolable and no person is to be forced to act in a manner contrary to his or her conscience, as the moral tradition of the Church attests.”
The final document in Koesler’s file was, as far as he was concerned, the clincher. It was from Vatican II’s Pastoral Constitution:
“Conscience is the most secret core and sanctuary of the person.… Where one is alone with God, and there in one’s innermost self perceives God’s voice.”
“Alone with God” says it all.
Lucy Delvecchio studied, queried, then prayed, before dissenting from official Church teaching. Now she is alone with God. She perceives no sin. She sleeps tranquilly.
The Koesler conscience is not that untroubled. For him, contraception is one thing, abortion another. But he has not seen nor studied what Lucy has.
He fixed himself a gin and tonic.
He would drink to conscience.
27
It did not take long for Merl Goldbaum’s prediction to become fact.
It was a slower than usual news day. The city desk was floating in a sea of lazy tranquility. Things did seem to be moving right along. But, as W.S. Gilbert once wrote, “Things are seldom what they seem.”
In late morning, the city editor beckoned to one of his reporters who was not in the running for an Oscar for his portrayal of a busy newsman.
“There’s a pro-choice rally at Cobo Hall this weekend. We’ve got that covered, but we need some sidebars. Go dig up some abortion clients and get their comments on how they were treated-their reaction to the whole thing. Be sure to get the date of the procedure so we can do a graph on whether things are getting better or worse.” Such a setup was hardly a scientific approach-but, what the hell …
“You want me to do a customer survey on abortion clinics?” The reporter tried to make the assignment sound ridiculous: He didn’t want to do the story.
“Yeah.”
“Where am I supposed to find these broads … at least the ones who’ll talk for the record?”
“That’s why we pay you such a lavish salary: so you can put together simple stories like this.” The reporter was dismissed with a get outta-here gesture.
How the hell was he supposed to find somebody who used an abortion clin-Wait: His wife’s friend had a cleaning woman who’d had an abortion …
A few phone calls nailed it down. He would interview Loretta.
