The Greatest Evil

26

Though brother and sister, Vincent and Lucy Delvecchio seldom got together. Each was proud of what the other had accomplished. Each wished a closer bond with their brother Tony. All three of them were busy. And the glue that once held them together-their mother-had dissolved with her death.

With infrequency marking their relationship, when Vince phoned, Lucy was pretty sure what it was about: He had to have learned of her pro-choice activity. If that was indeed the case, this evening would not be pleasant.

Actually, Lucy did not consider herself pro or con anything. She simply followed where the trouble traveled. The recent vasectomy, for example. She handled few such procedures. Partly because few men opted for that resolution, partly because most men preferred a male physician for that “man’s” operation.

She would not have counseled the procedure for this healthy man. But when she learned to what extremes he and his wife had gone to plan their family, and their failure with every method but abstinence, and his determination to have the operation, she went ahead with it.

Lucy was not part of any movement for or against abortion. She was just as apt to counsel carrying to full term with possible adoption thereafter as she was to counsel abortion.

However, she knew the odds of convincing her brother of the validity of her position fell between no way and never.

When the doorbell rang, her back stiffened. The inevitable moment she had most dreaded was here.

They hugged. She took his hat and coat. Dinner was ready. He’d brought a bottle of domestic wine.

It did not occur to Vincent that this was only the second woman with whom he had dined alone. So deep in his subconscious had he buried Jan Olivier that it was as if she had never entered his life. All that stood in that space was an imaginary monument to his victory over concupiscence.

The atmosphere through dinner affected to be convivial, friendly, and old-shoe-much more so than was warranted. Somehow, they made it to the dessert course.

Lucy, unable to stand the tension any longer, broke the ice. “Well, big brother, this has been nice, but there’s no evident reason we should enjoy dining together. No birthday, no holiday-come to think of it, we don’t get together even on those occasions. You called me. So, what’s on your mind?”

Vincent was eager to be the first to dive in; once again, he was on the side of the angels. The problem would be Lucy’s should she not respond properly to his admonition.

“I had lunch yesterday with a gentleman who has a business colleague who recently saw you professionally.”

“Oh?”

“This colleague, your patient, has-or rather, had-a problem with family planning. You solved the problem by giving him a vasectomy!”

“He wanted it,” she said calmly.

“If one of your patients wanted something that was foolish, would you give it to him?”

“It’s not the same.”

“You’re right there: A vasectomy is a sin-a serious sin.”

Lucy sighed deeply. “Vince, either one of us could write the rest of this script. I know what family planning procedures you object to. I know what my patients need. Sometimes there’s a conflict between your morality and my medicine. We know all this. Why go through the agony of arguing about it?”

“You went to a parochial school. You came from a good Catholic home. How dare you question these matters! This is not my morality we’re talking about; it’s the moral stance of our Catholic Church!”

“I was a kid. Sure I learned-and believed-what the nuns and priests taught us. I’m an adult now. I can think for myself. And I can read about a Cardinal who thinks it’s wrong for a man to wear a condom to prevent communicable diseases-even if it’s a gay man. As if a condom has some sort of morality in and of itself!”

This was going nowhere, just as Lucy had anticipated. Vincent decided to drop the bomb.

“Lucy, we can get back to these ‘procedures,’ as you call them, later. Let’s talk about something we can at least agree on: abortion.”

“If we must.”

“I hope-and I pray-that you can deny this. I’ve heard that you perform abortions in a clinic that deals in such things.”

“Did your informant tell you I have a policy of not performing the procedure after the first trimester?”

“What difference does that make?”

“A lot … to me … and to lots of people in the medical community-”

“That’s not a wart that’s growing in a pregnant woman!”

“It’s a zygote.”

“It’s a human being.”

“Come on … it’s two cells, for God’s sake!”

“For God’s sake, indeed! You’re killing a person.”

“Vince, with the union of a sperm and an egg there’s something that, left alone and with no trauma, will develop into a fully human being. I believe that happens during pregnancy. When? I’m not so sure. From the beginning, the multiplying cells will develop into a person. So, from fertilization to some point in the pregnancy only the most compelling reason can justify terminating. I believe it would be wrong to induce an abortion after that point unless there was some medical necessity … such as an ectopic pregnancy.”

“And you can terminate up to three months. Why not six? Eight?”

“After very long and serious study and consideration, three months seems right. Besides, Vince, the Church wants it both ways: You won’t prevent a pregnancy and you can’t terminate one.”

“Of course pregnancy can be prevented: rhythm and abstinence.”

“One is by no means foolproof and the other is unrealistic. Add to that, mistakes happen.”

Silence. Vincent studied his sister. She did not turn away.

“You won’t change, will you?” he said finally.

She shook her head, firmly.

“I don’t know whether you’re aware of it, but you are excommunicated.”

“What?”

“Anyone who performs an abortion, causes one, or provides needed assistance for one is automatically excommunicated.”

“What a terrible thing to say!” Lucy stood. “You may leave!”

“I can’t-”

“You … may … leave!”

Vincent stood. “I’ll pray for you.”

He didn’t need to don his clerical collar and vest; he hadn’t taken them off. Without further word, he left.

Tears flowed freely. Lucy loved her Church. She had turned down marriage proposals from two men. Not because she was not compatible with either of them, but because they were antagonistic to everything her Church meant to her.

She could not believe her Church would turn against her because of a prayerful and painful decision she had made-a decision that represented the best effort of her conscience.

She did not know where to turn.

Shaken, after some thought, she dialed a number.

“Father, this is Lucy Delvecchio. I hope I’m not interrupting anything. I’ve got to talk to you.”

Koesler detected the distress in her voice. “No, go ahead. What’s the problem?”

She gave a detailed account of her just completed discussion with her brother. “I think he’s wrong, Father,” she concluded. “But I’ve got to know … and I trust you. Am I … am I excommunicated?”

Lucy did not hurry the pause that followed her very personal question.

It was well that she didn’t. Koesler needed to think about this one.

Vince, as usual, had given a textbook decision based on institutional legalism. It was the Vatican line. But the Vatican generally is tardy when it comes to keeping up with the ever more rapid developments in theology as they are nurtured by theologians, priests, and laity. The most recent exception was when Pope John XXIII called for an ecumenical council and the reform of Canon Law. In this directive, a Pope was way ahead of everyone else in charting a new course for the Church.

But that was a singular event.

The present Church law was clear: In the 1917 Code, under which the Vatican currently operated, the Church held that any and all involved in the deliberate and successful effort to eject a nonviable fetus from the mother’s womb incur automatic excommunication.

But what Vince had forgotten-or decided not to include-was a strange paradox in Church doctrine, to wit: That, on the one hand, Catholics must respect the teaching authority of the Church, yet, on the other hand, Catholics must follow their well-formed consciences.

After weighing the pros and cons, Koesler decided to level with his young friend. But he would do so in gradual steps. There were a couple of relevant questions he was pretty sure Vincent hadn’t asked.

“Okay, Lucy, did you know there was a special penalty attached to the sin of abortion?”

Silence. “I guess I felt some guilt,” she said slowly. “But that was because I knew the Church condemned it.”

“You went through twelve years of parochial school and never heard of automatic excommunication for abortion?”

“If they taught that, it must’ve gone in one ear and out the other. I guess I just never considered that I would be involved with an abortion.”

“That takes care of one phase. If the Church attaches a penalty to a sin, the person has to know about the penalty-in this case excommunication-before he or she can incur the penalty. So, you’re not excommunicated. That would be a very ancient interpretation of Church law,” he explained parenthetically, “way back before my time in the seminary. Actually, excommunication is not as bad as it sounds; usually it requires only a slightly different way of confessing a sin to be absolved.”

“Okay.” She felt more relieved than she should have.

“Now, let’s consider whether or not you’ve actually been committing a sin. You told Vince that you studied and prayed over this matter … right?”

“Yes.”

“So you knew that the Church’s ‘official’ position was that from the moment of conception a fertilized egg is considered a person. Right?”

“Then …?”

“I just wasn’t convinced that the Church was realistically facing the problem.”

“What problem?”

“As to when distinctively human life begins.”

“So …?”

“So I read everything I could get my hands on. Talked to everyone I could-pro-life and pro-choice. Considered what I saw under my microscope. I was convinced that human life begins long before normal delivery. But when? Certainly not in those early cells dividing and multiplying.

“I think what finally threw me into the end of the first trimester was St. Thomas Aquinas.”

“Aquinas?”

“He taught that a fetus was invested with a human soul at the time of ‘quickening’-the end of the first trimester.

“Then I prayed like mad over it. It was as if I were tortured. Not about the conclusion I reached … but whether I would act on that conclusion.

“Finally, I decided I had to act.”

“So, after study and prayer, you found your conscience differed from Church teaching. You followed your 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.