11-year-old Paraguay girl denied abortion after ‘being raped by stepfather’ gives birth (UKInd))

Continuing with the rape drumbeat (really, guys, can we please stop this?) … here comes a difficult one if you really think about it. Abortion is, in my opinion, wrong. Two wrongs don’t make a right. However, just because I think abortion is wrong is no reason for a government to compel you to follow my opinions.

I’m not swayed by the argument that it was rape, nor that it is a child bearing a child. But I do think that even if you disagree with me, you have a right to live according to your beliefs, not mine.

Catholic Paraguayans, please note that even the Catholic Church believes this. Note the following words of the Declaration on Religious Freedom (Diginitatis Humanae), promulgated Dec. 7, 1965:

A sense of the dignity of the human person has been impressing itself more and more deeply on the consciousness of contemporary man, and the demand is increasingly made that men should act on their own judgment, enjoying and making use of a responsible freedom, not driven by coercion but motivated by a sense of duty. The demand is likewise made that constitutional limits should be set to the powers of government, in order that there may be no encroachment on the rightful freedom of the person and of associations. (DH, 1)
This Vatican Council declares that the human person has a right to religious freedom. This freedom means that all men are to be immune from coercion on the part of individuals or of social groups and of any human power, in such wise that no one is to be forced to act in a manner contrary to his own beliefs, whether privately or publicly, whether alone or in association with others, within due limits. (DH, 2)

If this girl would have preferred not to bear a child, she had the right to choose that course—even if, by some lights (including mine), it is wrong.