Bishop Olmsted: A Bishop With A Backbone!

“There Cannot Be A Tie In This Debate”

By Susan Brinkman, OCDS
Women of Grace- Bishop Thomas J. Olmsted of Phoenix is planning to strip a local medical center of its Catholic status tomorrow if it does not meet his demands to guarantee compliance with Church teachings.
The Arizona Republic is reporting that Bishop Olmsted sent a letter on Nov. 22 to St. Joseph’s Hospital and Medical Center, the same hospital where Sister Margaret McBride gave approval for an abortion to be performed on a woman allegedly suffering from pulmonary hypertension last year. In the letter, the bishop is demanding that the hospital comply with Catholic health-care rules, educate its medical staff on those rules, and acknowledge what is the correct Church position on the abortion that took place. If the hospital’s parent company, Catholic Healthcare West (CHW), does not agree to these demands by tomorrow, he will strip the facility of its Catholic status.
“There cannot be a tie in this debate,” Olmsted wrote. “Until this point in time, you have not acknowledged my authority to settle this question…”
“Your actions communicate to me that you do not respect my authority to authentically teach and interpret moral law in this diocese,” he writes. (Emphasis added.)
If our bishops had shown such firm resolve dealing with predator priests who raped adolescent boys, there is no telling what better repair Holy Church would be in these days. God grant us more bishops like Olmstead.