Mercy sister shown mercy

Mercy nun at hospital that allowed abortion 'no longer excommunicated'

Mercy Sister Margaret McBride, who is on the staff of a Phoenix hospital, is back in good standing with the Church. In May 2010 Phoenix Bishop Thomas J. Olmsted said she had incurred an automatic excommunication because of her role on the ethics committee that in 2009 sanctioned an abortion at St. Joseph's Hospital and Medical Center. Sister Margaret, seen in a 2008 photo, "has met the requirements for reinstatement in the Church," according to a Dec. 8 statement from the hospital, which was stripped of Catholic affiliation in December 2010. CNS photo by J.D. Long-Garcia, Catholic Sun.

A Mercy sister who was automatically excommunicated because of her role on the ethics committee that allowed an abortion to be performed at a Catholic hospital in Phoenix in 2009 is back in good standing in the Catholic Church.