Excommunication for Andalusian woman

THE FIRST Andalusian woman to take advantage of Spain's new abortion law was excommunicated, according to reports earlier this week.
The 20-year-old woman, who has not been named, had to travel over 200 miles to Jerez for the abortion because no doctors at the state-run hospitals in Jaen were willing to carry it out. She sought the abortion because of the likelihood of malformation of her child as a result of German measles contracted during pregnancy.
Bishop Miguel Peinado of Jaen commented that she "has incurred excommunication along with the medical team which performed the operation."
The Spanish Catholic hierarchy had spoken out repeatedly and strongly against abortion, especially since the papal visit of 1982. When the new law was passed on August 2, Bishop Jose Guerra Campos of Guadalajara, remarked, "With the abortion law, it is open season for killing children." Bishop Jose Guerra Campos of Cuenca, commented, "We are confronted with the legalisation of a crime."
In a letter published last week by the Granada daily Ideal, the Bishop of Jain congratulated doctors in his diocese for refusing to perform the abortion.