Charlie's parents have raised more than $1.6 million to help seek experimental treatment for him in the U.S. Their decision faced legal challenge from Great Ormond Street Hospital, where he is being treated.
In early April, the baby's hospital challenged their efforts. The hospital's experts argued in court that long-term life support should be withdrawn from the baby because his quality of life was so poor.
Charlie's court-appointed lawyer argued before a High Court judge that any treatments in the U.S. would be experimental and long-term life-support would only "prolong the process of dying."
Charlie's parents had their own legal representative in the case, who argued that travel to the U.S. for treatment would not cause the boy significant suffering or harm and could give him another chance.
Yates, Charlie's mother, has argued that she would welcome any treatment that could help him live. She also suggested anything learned during an experimental treatment could help treat future babies who suffer from the disorder.
According to Moschella, who has a background in parental rights and medical ethics, said parental rights derive both from the "special intimate relationship" they have with their child and from their primary obligations to care for their own children. Interfering with their conscientious best efforts is akin to violating religious freedom, she said.
"It is a deep violation of conscience, when, without a very serious reason, the state prevents parents from fulfilling that conscientious obligation," she said.
She noted that what Charlie's parents are trying to do by helping secure extraordinary treatment is not ethically required by Catholic ethics.
"It would be perfectly morally acceptable should they choose to forgo seeking further treatment and take the baby off life support and allow him to pass away naturally due to the underlying disease," the professor said. "But it's also acceptable, on Catholic ethics, to do whatever you can to heal a person if you think that there's any chance that a treatment could have a positive effect."
She suggested that extraordinary treatment could be unethical only when "there is absolutely no hope of any benefit whatsoever" and the treatment is painful to the patient, or the treatment would take away "important resources that are needed to help other patients who could benefit."
Moschella said there should only be legal intervention against the wishes of parents in cases "when there is a clear case of abuse or neglect or some significant threat to the public order."
(Story continues below)
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"Neither of those situations is the case here."
Kevin J. Jones is a senior staff writer with Catholic News Agency. He was a recipient of a 2014 Catholic Relief Services' Egan Journalism Fellowship.