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WCC Public Policy Positions: Require Parental Consent for Medical Treatments
Here we elaborate on each of the WCC's 2023 Public Policy Positions. The complete document can be found below. You can learn more about Catholic Social Teaching on the USCCB website.
Require Parental Consent for Medical Treatments. Parents bear primary responsibility for ensuring the health, well-being, and education of their children. Wisconsin must prohibit abortion, artificial contraception, gender transition, and medical treatment for children without parental consent.
The family is the original cell of social life (Catechism of the Catholic Church (CCC) 2207). The family is the community in which, from childhood, children can learn moral values, begin to honor God, and make good use of freedom (CCC 2207). Until such a time that children are fully formed adults, parents have both a right and responsibility to give their consent for their children’s medical treatments. However, the Catholic Church does not say that parental rights are absolute. For example, society rightly has laws against child labor that limit what some parents demand of their children.
The Church also opposes efforts to withhold crucial information from parents about their children’s wellbeing. Some schools will not let parents know when their children express a desire to use different pronouns at school. Some lawmakers support the right of children to receive vaccinations without parental consent. Some organizations, like Planned Parenthood, dispense contraception to minors without parental consent.
The Church observes with dismay that the medical, counseling, and pharmaceutical industries are placing enormous pressure on parents to assent to their children’s desire for hormonal and surgical interventions to pass as members of the opposite sex. Gender transitioning of children upends the natural development of the human person and sends the message that some bodies are mistakes that can be manipulated at will. It is possible to help children mature without resorting to sometimes irreversible hormonal and surgical interventions that can render them sterile, reduce their bone density, remove healthy parts of their body, and cause further physical and psychological damage. Most children experience some level of confusion and dislike for their bodies. However, in the absence of hormonal and surgical interventions, and with proper support, the majority of children with gender dysphoria will grow to accept their bodies as they are. For all these reasons, the Church supports laws to prohibit gender transition medical intervention for individuals under 18 years of age (see story above).
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