Kaveny on Abortion for Health of the Mother

Kaveny's discussion as I read it, is more limited than Patrick's summary suggests.  She is talking about abortion to protect the health or life of the mother, a point on which most Americans (and most American Catholics) agree with Kaveny.  It's an area of the Church's teaching on abortion that I've often struggled with.  Kaveny compares requiring a mother to carry a child to term even at the risk (or certainty) of substantial physical harm to other areas of the law in which duties to render assistance are not legally enforced.  The Church's views on the morality of abortions in such contexts (as well as abortions to protect the life of the mother) are clear, but I struggle with them.  While my wife was pregnant last year, I frequently asked myself what, if her life were in danger from the pregnancy, would be the proper course of action.  The decision would be a very painful one, but I for one can say that it's a decision with which I would want the state to have nothing at all to do.

In any event, my question for Patrick is whether he really believes that Kaveny's writing on this subject merits excommunication.  Patrick does not come out and say it, but he certainly suggests as much in his post.  (The law at issue in Mexico City was far broader than the situations Kaveny discusses, so the relevance of the Pope's comments seems at least questionable.)  If Patrick does believe she should be excommunicated, I'd also be curious why he would stop there.  Should she, in his view, be permitted to retain her academic position at a Catholic university?  And, if not, what would that suggest about the viability of academic freedom at a Catholic university run according to such principles?