The Vatican on Tuesday praised an Italian woman who died after refusing cancer treatment that would have required her to have an abortion. Rita Fedrizzi died this week, three months after giving birth to a baby boy.
Vatican newspaper L'Osservatore Romano compared Fedrizzi's decision to that of an Italian pediatrician Gianna Beretta Molla, who died in 1962 after refusing to end her pregnancy despite warnings that it could kill her. Beretta Molla was made a saint by John Paul II in 2003 and has become a symbol for opponents of abortion. The Roman Catholic Church considers abortion a grave sin.
Fedrizzi, 41, who refused the abortion and cancer treatment, found out she had cancer about the same time she learned she was pregnant, the Vatican paper said.
"She was aware that if she gave birth she wouldn't have had any hope of surviving," the Vatican newspaper wrote. "Despite that she went through with her choice, the choice of welcoming new life even at the cost of her own death."
Besides Federico, born after six months of her pregnancy, she left two children, ages 10 and 12.
"Rita's choice, which I always shared, was a choice of faith," her husband, Enrico Ferrari, told the Italian news agency ANSA.
"Whenever someone recommended abortion as the only way to escape (death), she would say, 'It's as if they're asking me to kill one of my other two children to save my skin.' She welcomed Federico as a gift, the husband was quoted as saying.
Fedrizzi was buried in Pianello del Lario, near Como, on Tuesday.
RAI state TV said the woman was very active with a Catholic group devoted to Mary, the mother of Jesus.