"It is important to note once again that the prohibition of murder and abortion must be appreciated in a therapeutic, not a juridical or punitive light, with which such offenses are often regarded in most Western moral, philosophical, and theological systems: the goal is not to subject the sinner to just punishment, but to bring the sinner through repentance and God’s grace to holiness. Because of this perspective the Orthodox Church never endorsed a doctrine of double effect, such as developed in the West, which allowed Roman Catholicism to approve of indirect abortions. The doctrine of double effects holds that when an action produces two effects, one good and one evil, one may nevertheless act, as long as the act is not evil in itself, the good effect is not produced by the bad effect, the evil effect is not intended,, and there is a proportionate reason (more good will be produced than evil). According to the doctrine of double effect, when these conditions are fulfilled, one is held to be juridically innocent. In contrast, the Orthodox Church recognizes that close causal involvement in the death of another, whether a guilty or an innocent person, may harm one’s spiritual life. Orthodox Christianity recognizes harms from both involuntary and “justifiable” homicide, including homicide in a just war, both of which incur excommunication not as punishment, but as spiritual therapy (Basil, 1983, Canon 13, pp. 801-802). It is in this spiritually therapeutic context that one should understand the absolution of women who miscarry. The absolution expresses the Orthodox Christian healing approach to the involuntary loss of life."