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Posted on 02/16/2010 3:57:13 PM PST by NYer
PORTLAND, Ore. (CNS) -- The Diocese of Baker has ended the church's official sponsorship of central Oregon's largest medical center, citing the hospital's refusal to adhere to some Catholic teachings.
Baker Bishop Robert F. Vasa said St. Charles Medical Center in Bend "gradually moved away" from church ethical and religious standards and can no longer be called Catholic.
"As bishop, I am responsible for attesting to the full Catholicity of the hospitals in my diocese, a responsibility which I take very seriously, and I have reached the conclusion that I can no longer attest to the Catholicity of St. Charles," Bishop Vasa wrote in the Feb. 18 issue of the Catholic Sentinel, diocesan newspaper for Portland and Baker.
The main point of contention is tubal ligation, a form of permanent female reproductive sterilization.
"It would be misleading for me to allow St. Charles Bend to be acknowledged as Catholic in name while I am certain that some important tenets of the ethical and religious directives are no longer being observed," the bishop said in a statement issued jointly with hospital officials.
The statement said the decision was difficult for all involved.
Mass will no longer be celebrated in the hospital's chapel and all items considered Catholic will be removed from the hospital and returned to the church. The St. Charles name will remain the same and the cross will remain on top of the building.
The Sisters of St. Joseph of Tipton, Ind., founded St. Charles 92 years ago. In the 1970s, the hospital became a community nonprofit organization with the sisters remaining as sponsors.
In 1992, when the sisters decided they could no longer sponsor St. Charles because of the smaller number of sisters, an "association of the Christian faithful" took up the duty of making sure the hospital's Catholic identity was preserved. At the same time, control of policy and operations went to a board of directors.
Bishop Vasa said the association's structure did not give it sufficient authority to control the tenets of Catholic identity as expressed in the U.S. bishops' "Ethical and Religious Directives for Catholic Health Care Services." In 2007, the bishop asked St. Charles officials for an audit of compliance with the directives. He identified problems and began talks, which hit an impasse.
In the joint statement Feb. 15, hospital administrators and the bishop said they have "respectfully disagreed" on the meaning of some of the directives.
"We are saddened by this decision because of the 92 years of history the St. Charles Bend hospital has had with the Catholic Church," said James Diegel, president and CEO of Cascade Healthcare Community, the parent company of St. Charles. "But, we have an obligation to provide comprehensive health care services to our patients while remaining true to our values of compassion and caring for all."
Diegel said the Cascade Healthcare board of directors intends to continue using the ethical and religious directives as they have been interpreted by the hospital. Bishop Vasa has encouraged the hospital to stay as close to the directives as possible in the future.
"This is not a condemnation of St. Charles, it is a sadly acknowledged reality," Bishop Vasa wrote in the Sentinel.
The bishop said he is convinced that the St. Charles board genuinely thought the ethical and religious directives were voluntary and optional and board members now cannot see a way to move back into compliance.
Ping!
” the ethical and religious directives were voluntary and optional “...
Hmmmm.
Wow. Where’s that bishop-with-a-spine graphic?
One of many formerly Christian organizations. This always starts with someone thinking: “We would be better off with a secular focus. We could broaden our base. We could raise more money. Etc., etc..”
What was the tangible loss for the hospital?
If the Bishop thinks this hospital is bad, just wait till we get Obama death care.
Well, in a sense they were optional. The Church said these are the rules to abide by to be called Catholic. If you abide by them, you’re Catholic, if you don’t, you’re not. The hospital chose the option of moving away from Catholic teaching so the church chose it’s option of taking away it’s sponsorship of the hospital.
I wonder if this will change the hospital’s management to move back toward life??
I had my fourth child in a Catholic hospital (St. Edward Mercy in Fort Smith). It was nice not to be offered to have a tubal on the delivery table for once!
My husband had a coworker complain because the hospital pharmacy wouldn’t fill a prescripton for birth control pills (like we don’t have a few dozen pharmacies in town that would have filled it). He told her it was a Catholic hospital and they weren’t supposed to under Catholic teaching. Her reply was ‘well, they serve the public.’ You can’t argue with stupid...
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Now onto some of those CINO universities, Notre Dame and Georgetown.
Sort of - The bishop appears to have withdrawn the right of the Hospital to refer to itself as Catholic.
One wonders if the Bishopric still owns the facility.
My thoughts, exactly. Add:
St. Joesph’s University in Philadelphia
Loyola University Maryland
Marymount University
Notre Dame of Maryland
The more I hear about this Vasa guy, the better I like him!!
The diocese never owned the hospital. A religious order (Congregation of St. Joseph) ran it with the permission of the bishop until they no longer had sufficient sisters to do so (one look at their website gives any discerning soul a ready clue as to why). Once the religious order could no longer run it, they turned it over to a foundation.
Bottom line, this is about the limit as to what the bishop can do.
Translation: "Anything we can do to turn a buck we're going to do."
Correction: board members now refuse to move back into compliance.
Do you mean the part about community organizations, systemic change, compassionate immigration policy, or the dying earth?
I don't know, I'm not Catholic, but it seems to me being involved in any of those things, amidst the powers in today's society who bring forth the laws of men, only gives power to the death cult at the heart of leftism - which does give rise to a major conundrum with which a lot of pro life religious folks take major issue.
That said, our regional medical center in Eugene is a sponsorship of The Sisters of Saint Joseph of Peace (a different congregation), and they present a similar message on their website, and far as I know it's a standard thing among such congregations.
Ethics can be voluntary....
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