BARCELONA, June 22, 2011 (LifeSiteNews.com) – Vatican officials are expressing “concern” over several hospitals in the Barcelona area that continue to be tied to the Catholic Church, despite the fact that they perform abortions and abortion-related services.
In a letter from the Holy See’s Pontifical Council for Health Care Workers, a copy of which was obtained by LifeSiteNews, Subsecretary Msgr. Jean-Marie Mupendawatu recognizes the complaints of Fr. Custodio Ballester, a Barcelona area priest who has been protesting the relationship of his archdiocese with the hospitals for months.
“His Excellency Mons. Zimowski sincerely thanks you for the documentation sent, which we have studied attentively,” writes Mupendawatu in Spanish.
“In fact, the topic addressed in the dossier concerns the Universal Church and the Pontifical Council for Health Care Workers is conscious of the challenge that is presented above all for Catholic hospitals, because they are called to care for and defend human life amid a culture of death.”
Mupendawatu also notes that his office has been in contact with those who are “responsible,” but does not specify whom.
“On other occasions we have been informed regarding this situation in Catalonia, and we have had the opportunity to speak with those who are responsible exhorting them to investigate in detail what has been happening so that they can seek concrete solutions to eventual problems on an individual basis, as soon as possible,” he writes.
As LifeSiteNews reported in late May, Fr. Ballester and other priests and laity of the Archdiocese of Barcelona are protesting the ongoing relationship between the archdiocese and several hospitals that perform abortions.
The archdiocese maintains official representatives on the boards of directors of two hospitals, Santa Creu and Sant Pau, despite their involvement with abortion. Other hospitals and at least one other diocese in the Barcelona area are involved, despite the Catholic Church’s condemnation of abortion as murder.
Ballester says that he has written directly to Cardinal Sistach, the Archbishop of Bareclona, but has received no response.
Contact information:
Archdiocese of Barcelona
https://www.arqbcn.org/es/contactar/formulario
(Enter name in the first field, email address in the second, subject in the third, and text in the fourth. Click “Enviar” to send.)