Infuriating Stupidity and Myopism (UPDATED)

Brazil Girl, Alleged Rape Victim, Aborts Twins
The procedure on the 9-year-old girl draws complaints from Catholic Church

This is a shame. The little girl at the center of this storm must feel awful.

I have a minor quibble with the main headline -- a 9-year-old cannot give consent, so of course she was raped, the only allegations are over who did it -- but the subhead really pushes my buttons. The statements from the Church demonstrate an affliction of rigid thinking coupled with massive ignorance. This unbending attitude and ignorance is borne out in the text of the article:

But Marcio Miranda, a lawyer for the Archdiocese of Olinda and Recife in northeastern Brazil, said the girl should have carried the twins to term and had a cesarean section.

"It's the law of God: Do not kill. We consider this murder," Miranda said in comments reported by O Globo.

Mr. Miranda obviously believes that if a girl is capable of conceiving, she is capable of carrying to term and surviving delivery. This particular girl, this 9 year old, is too small to carry twins to term. Forcing her to attempt it is almost certain to damage her health or even kill her. This abortion is not murder; it's self-preservation.

I can only hope that the Church never finds out who this little girl is. They'd never leave her alone again.

Via Pharyngula. I've also seen this on Shakesville, but I saw it at PZ's site first.

UPDATE: It turns out that everyone who supported the abortion, i.e., the doctors and the child's mother, have been excommunicated by the Church. The child herself was exempted "because of her age." The Archbishop of Olinda and Recife has stated that "God's law is above man's law."

Well, God's law is apparently as blind as ever justice could be, because it still does not see any difference between this particular pregnancy and an adult's.