A Christian parable (def. a simple story illustrating a religious or moral lesson).
About ten years ago a family of itinerant workers were working their way around farms in (I think Central America, but it's on record).
They sent the youngest child, aged about 11 to get water and she was raped by a farmer, leaving her with two sexually transmitted diseases and a pregnancy.
The doctors of the Catholic hospital where she was treated over the next few months hid her pregnancy from the parents until it was past the legal date when a termination could be carried out, and then refused to carry out the operation which, they said, was contrary to their Christian principles anyway, despite the fact that they admitted that letting the pregnancy run its full course would put the girl's life at severe risk.
The parents appealed to to the highest authority of the church to allow the termination to go ahead; the reply they received was that the girl should "Embrace her martyrdom with joy and gratitude".
Good Christians all maybe, human beings - answers on a postcard!!
This from memory, but I have looked it up for such discussions in the past, and will happily do so again to refresh my opinion of what religion is all about.
Jim Carroll