Big article out today about doctors refusing care to women based on their personal belief systems. The article has, at one point, a headline which reads:

"An ethical dilemma"

In this portion of the article we meet Sandy Christiansen, M.D., an ob/gyn in Frederick, Maryland. She says that providing services that are legal, like abortion referrals, EC and even birth control cause an "ethics problem" for her. She says that, "Doctors are people, too," she adds. "We have to be able to leave the hospital and live with ourselves. If you feel in your heart an action would cause harm to somebody — born or unborn — it's legitimate to decline to participate."

Here's what I have to say to that. If you feel that you're a "christian" doctor, then you need to advertise yourself as such. You need to tell your patients up front that if they come to you they had better be on the same moral footing as you, believe the same things as you and be living the perfect little Christian life that you seem to be saying you're living.

When you simply hang out a shingle that says OB/GYN on it and allow any woman to make an appointment, regardless of what her beliefs might be, she has the right to expect she will receive access to all legal medical options allowed her in this country, including the ones that don't jive with your self-righteous mind-set. You want to ride the high moral tide? Great! Then your ad in the yellow pages better read something like this:

"Christian OB/GYN. Will not give patients access to most modern procedures. Believes self to be above reproach and has developed a God complex that allows self to make moral judgements of others that will govern the standard of care they receive. Those of questionable moral fiber need not call for appointments. This includes, but is not limited to: lesbians, single mothers, sexually active teenagers, rape victims, victims of incest, women with piercings in places I may find disgusting, women with oddly colored hair, and women of other religions. We are taking new patients. Mary, Mother of Christ always welcome. Mary Magdalene need not apply."

There's a difference between ethics and morality. The ethics of a given profession are there to ensure that those of us who rely on the people practicing that profession get a high standard of care. Morals are the code each individual person lives by. If you can't seperate the two then you need to build yourself a time machine and haul your June Cleaver ass back to the 1950's.

I believe in a higher power. I also believe that when people like this pass into the next life they will find a seriously pissed of version of said higher power waiting for them with one question: "What exactly was it that you thought you were doing?" It gives me some measure of comfort knowing that for every tiny minded individual like this one there is a higher force waiting to judge them....and the retribution will be Divine.