Case 1. Unlawful Precautions

Caia, the wife of Caius and of infirm health, heard from a physician that at her next delivery the next offspring would very probably be death to her. Hence she was placed in distress, for she does not wish to deny the debt to her husband, but if she grants it, she will bring death upon herself. Therefore she goes to a physician of certainly not the best reputation and buys a medicine by which, taken once each month, she will be rendered safe, as the physician says, from the danger of future offspring. An outcome happy from her point of view proves the physician’s knowledge, but nevertheless also casts scruples into Caia as to whether it is lawful to take such a medicine, and she approaches her confessor to resolve them. Hence it is asked:

1. How are the direct and indirect killing of a human being distinguished? And is it lawful to kill an innocent person?

2. In a case in which either the mother or the fetus or both are certainly going to perish, is it ever lawful to procure abortion? Even of an inanimate fetus?

3. What is to be said of the case?

1. How is direct distinguished from indirect homicide, and is it ever allowable to kill the innocent? Homicide is direct when it is intended, and it may be intended either explicitly or implicitly. It is intended explicitly when the homicide wishes to cause death; it is intended implicitly when an action is intentionally put which can not but cause death. Thus one would directly cause death who kept another under water for some time, though his primary intention might have been not to kill him, but to prevent him from calling out. On the other hand, homicide is indirect when it is not intended, though it is foreseen that it will follow from some act which is put for another purpose. It is never allowed to kill the innocent directly; it is allowed to do so indirectly, for a great and proportionate cause.

2. In a case where either the mother or the fetus, or both, must necessarily perish, is it allowable to procure abortion at least, if the fetus has as yet no soul?

Following the common opinion, we may put aside, as antiquated, the hypothesis of a living fetus not yet informed by a human soul. The human soul is infused into the fetus at the moment of conception, according to the common opinion. The answer, then, to the question proposed will be that it is never allowed to procure abortion of the immature fetus directly, since it is never allowed to kill the innocent directly. If the fetus, though not quite mature, may probably be saved, as it may be after about the seventh month or even earlier, by artificial means, it will be lawful to bring it to the birth for a reason grave in proportion to the danger incurred. Indirect abortion, like indirect killing of the innocent, is allowable for a sufficiently grave reason.

3. The case. Caia did wrong in taking medicine to prevent having another child. If the medicine acted so as to prevent conception, she sinned mortally; for as St. Alphonsus teaches (III, no. 394): “It is never lawful for a mother, on account of any danger whatsoever, to take a potion to impede conception.” If the medicine acted on the fetus after conception, Caia was guilty of infanticide. Her confessor should tell her that she is justified in refusing her husband, supposing the danger to life to be real, but that she may also allow him marital rights and commit herself to God’s providence. The latter course may be adopted with greater security than the advice of some doctors would lead one to suppose.¹

1 See Génicot, Theol. Mor., vol. ii, nn. 551, 553.