INDEX
Articles: by title
PROTECTING THE MEDICALLY
VULNERABLE: PRO-LIFE PRINCIPLES…. by Fr Jim Whalen,
2000, Issue 2
THE ABILITIES, DISABILITIES AND
RESPONSIBILITIES OF PRO-LIFE PENNY LECLAIR-
Article contributors: Penny LeClair; Karen Coffey-Crouch, Disabilities
Counsellor, Algonquin College; Vera & Bob Kendall, Outreach Ministry
Friends; Fr. Jim Whalen, 2000, Issue 2
THE PRO-LIFE FAITH OF DAN SOINI
(prayerful perseverance) - Article
contributors: Dan Soini; Vera and Bob Kendall, Cumberland, ON; Fr. Jim
Whalen, Priests For Life Canada, 2000, Issue 2
CONFRONTING THE CONTRACEPTIVE CULTURE “A COMPREHENSIVE
PRO-LIFE CHECKMATE STRATEGY”, by Fr. Jim Whalen,
2000, Issue 3
A COMPREHENSIVE PRO-LIFE
CHECKMATE STRATEGY (for Adults and Youth), by Fr. Jim
Whalen, 2000, Issue 3
THE CONNECTION BETWEEN
CONTRACEPTION AND ABORTION, by Professor
Janet E. Smith, PhD, 2000, Issue 3
THE CONSEQUENCES OF
CONTRACEPTION, by Fr. Paul Burchat,
A Priest of Madonna House, 2000,
Issue 3
THE 21ST CENTURY BELONGS TO
NATURAL FAMILY PLANNING, By Fr. Joseph Hattie, O.M.I.
Priests for Life, Canada - Member of the Board, 2000, Issue 3
CHURCH TEACHING ON CONTRACEPTION,
by Dr. Donald DeMarco, 2000, Issue 3
AFFIRMATION OF THE VALUE OF
NATURAL REGULATION OF FERTILITY BY THE NATURAL FAMILY PLANNING SUMMIT
MEETING, (Rome, Dec. 9-11, 1992), 2000, Issue 3
Articles: by
writer
Fr. Jim Whalen, National
Director, Priests for Life Canada
PROTECTING THE MEDICALLY
VULNERABLE: PRO-LIFE PRINCIPLES…. by Fr Jim Whalen,
2000, Issue 2
CONFRONTING THE CONTRACEPTIVE CULTURE “A
COMPREHENSIVE PRO-LIFE CHECKMATE STRATEGY”, by Fr. Jim Whalen,
2000, Issue 3
A COMPREHENSIVE PRO-LIFE
CHECKMATE STRATEGY (for Adults and Youth), by Fr.
Jim Whalen, 2000, Issue 3
Fr. Joseph Hattie, OMI, a
Member of the Board of Priests for Life Canada
THE 21ST
CENTURY BELONGS TO NATURAL FAMILY PLANNING, By Fr.
Joseph Hattie, O.M.I. Priests for Life, Canada - Member of
the Board, 2000, Issue 3
Dr. Janet E. Smith,. PhD
THE CONNECTION BETWEEN
CONTRACEPTION AND ABORTION, by
Professor Janet E. Smith, PhD, 2000, Issue 3
Fr. Paul Burchat, a
Priest of Madonna House
THE CONSEQUENCES OF
CONTRACEPTION, by Fr. Paul Burchat,
A Priest of Madonna House, 2000, Issue 3
Dr.
Donald DeMarco
CHURCH TEACHING ON
CONTRACEPTION, by Dr. Donald DeMarco, 2000, Issue 3
Other
THE ABILITIES, DISABILITIES AND
RESPONSIBILITIES OF PRO-LIFE PENNY LECLAIR-
Article contributors: Penny LeClair; Karen Coffey-Crouch,
Disabilities Counsellor, Algonquin College; Vera & Bob Kendall,
Outreach Ministry Friends; Fr. Jim Whalen, 2000,
Issue 2
THE PRO-LIFE FAITH OF DAN SOINI
(prayerful perseverance) - Article
contributors: Dan Soini; Vera and Bob Kendall, Cumberland, ON; Fr.
Jim Whalen, Priests For Life Canada, 2000, Issue 2
AFFIRMATION OF THE VALUE OF
NATURAL REGULATION OF FERTILITY BY THE NATURAL FAMILY PLANNING
SUMMIT MEETING, (Rome, Dec. 9-11, 1992), 2000, Issue 3
Articles in
2000, Issue 1 are not available
PROTECTING THE MEDICALLY
VULNERABLE: PRO-LIFE PRINCIPLES….
by Fr
Jim Whalen
2000, Issue 2
Protecting vulnerable
persons has been supported, in the past, by a fundamental medical
principle: Do No Harm. This has been enshrined in the Hippocratic Oath
and in Medical Ethics. Situation Ethics challenges this position and we
are all aware of the resulting legislative consequences as evident in
euthanasia, mercy killing, and assisted suicide. Among the most
vulnerable, we find the chronically ill, the terminally ill, the
severely mentally disabled and the severely physically disabled, all of
whom are classified as ‘medically vulnerable’.
Inherent in the teachings of Fletcher,
Kohl and other Situation Ethics adherents is the false principle that
proportionate reason should govern medical decisions for the medically
vulnerable. This implies that “some human beings have fewer moral
rights to care and medical treatment than others, and that directly
willing death is morally unobjectionable in some cases”.1
Many decisions have been made based on
such reasoning. This has resulted in legally-endorsed assisted suicide
and non-voluntary mercy killing. In the 1982 case of Claire Conroy, who
suffered from diabetes, a gangrenous leg and an organic brain syndrome,
it was argued that “dehydrating to death was ethically permissible
because her life had become impossibly burdensome to her”.2
In the 1984 Crista Nursing Home case3,
six nurses were threatened with dismissal because
they did not comply with a directive to
remove nutrition and fluids provided by feeding tubes to two elderly
women who were judged to be comatose and terminally ill. In both cases,
the feeding tubes were removed, an act which was in accord with the
situation ethics principle that ‘all decisions asserting “rational
control” over death (are) acknowledged and respected, however that be
defined’.
In the 1994 Tracy Latimer case
(Saskatchewan), a 12-year-old disabled daughter with cerebral palsy, was
gassed by her father, Robert. Many Canadians accepted this as an act of
love (mercy killing). The disrespect and devaluation of human life by
society contributed to this act of involuntary euthanasia.
It has been shown conclusively that the
terminally ill do not wish to die or be killed.4 What is
surmised here is that helping or aiding terminally ill patients to die
takes advantage of them and exploits their vulnerabilities: be they
dependency, helplessness and/or despair. The philosophy of Situation
Ethics promotes deliberate killing through denial of food and fluids, by
denial of beneficial medical treatments and care and by calculated
benign neglect. It has resulted in a permissive society in which
contraception, abortion, infanticide, suicide, assisted suicide and
euthanasia have been or are in the process of being socially and legally
endorsed.
Some of the basic principles for
protecting the medically and physically disabled, proposed as model
guidelines by Fr. Robert Barry, O.P., for supportive care, include the
following:
1. The life of the person with a mental or
physical disability has the same intrinsic value as that of a person
considered to be normal or able-bodied.
2. The primary aim of caregivers is to
promote and support the finest physical, mental, spiritual, emotional
and social life possible for the medically vulnerable person.
3. Denial of beneficial, life-sustaining
medical treatments and normal care is a violation of the moral rights of
the medically vulnerable person.
4. No medically vulnerable person should be
forced to choose between length of life and quality of life. Routine and
customary care should be understood as protection from exposure,
sanitary care, psychological support, and life-sustaining food and
water.
5. Preserving, extending, enhancing and making
more comfortable the life of the medically vulnerable person is always
in the best interest of the person, regardless of physical or mental
condition.
6. The legally and clearly competent
medically vulnerable person should be encouraged to participate in
decision-making to the fullest extent possible.
7. Decisions about medically vulnerable
persons who are severely disabled in any way should be monitored with
particularly close attention.
8. Medical and nursing staff should not
assist in the crime of suicide.
9. Decisions to limit treatment for a
medically vulnerable person should be fully documented.
10. Emergency medical treatment should be
given to any medically vulnerable person in the event of injury
or accident. ¤
Footnotes:
Protecting the Medically Dependent: Social
Challenge and Ethical Imperative, 1988, American Life League, Fr. Robert
Barry, pp. 112: 1p. 8; 2p. 19; 3p.
19; 4pp. 45-51.
Back to the index
THE ABILITIES, DISABILITIES AND
RESPONSIBILITIES OF
PRO-LIFE PENNY
LECLAIR
Article contributors: Penny LeClair; Karen
Coffey-Crouch, Disabilities Counsellor, Algonquin College;
Vera & Bob Kendall, Outreach Ministry Friends; Fr.
Jim Whalen.
2000, Issue 2
How
do you think you would cope in a post-secondary, educational
institution, if you were deaf and blind? It takes a Pro-Life Person with
a Pro-Life Vision.
Penny Leclair is a remarkable woman
doing just that. Born without sight, and educated in the school for the
deaf and blind in British Columbia, Penny is immersed in her chemistry
class at Algonguin College, Ottawa, in the Career and College
Preparation for the Health Science Program. Before she lost her sense of
hearing, she completed a Business Diploma at the British Columbia
Institute of Technology. She is married, living with her husband, and
has one son, now a grown man. She began to lose her ability to hear
when her son was eight years old. A sense of isolation from the world
set in. Eventually, she accepted her state with the help of a therapist
and got on with her life. Looking back, she remarks: “Being a Mom was a
highlight of my life”.
Penny's Pro-Life-Outlook constantly
points to growth, inspiration, and new experiences. She came to realize
one day after undergoing her first massage treatment that this was
something she, too, could do. Her research into the area of massage
therapy brought her to the Centre for Students with Disabilities at
Algonquin College. With the help of intervenors, who communicated with
her through a form of sign-language known as the British 2-hand method,
classroom lectures were spelled out into her hand.
Her professor, Ann Croll, tells it like
it is: “Penny has been a wonderful surprise and an inspiration to me and
the student, shattering all their misconceptions”. Penny was able to
see implications of what they were learning far ahead. Her fellow
students have quickly adjusted to the ‘Penny Gang’, the two intervenors
and Kilo, her seeing-eye dog, a black, gentle, female Labrador
companion. The biggest challenge facing her classmates was to leave
Kilo alone and not to pet or step on her. Kilo’s habit of snoring during
lectures was a great amusement source to all present. Penny is Algonquin
College’s first student who is both deaf and blind, a phenomenal woman,
paving the way for others, educating the educators, alleviating fear and
misperceptions, showing that working together, we can accomplish amazing
things.
Penny's pro-life activism focuses on
improving living conditions for handicapped people, regardless of the
nature of their disabilities. Her spirit of caring and supporting
others in their endeavours is evident in her philosophy of life: “I
always like others to know about how things can be achieved. We are all
capable of doing whatever we set our minds to”. Both the Police Services
Board and the Local Shopping Centre Management now realize the
importance of educational print materials in Braille and the necessity
of railings and ramps. Penny truly believes that we all have the
responsibility to use the abilities God gives us and to work with the
Holy Spirit to understand and acquire as many skills as possible. She
believes her life is to do God's will. She has always looked to what she
can do, regardless of any barriers.
Realizing she needs support in many
instances, such as crossing the street, going to the grocery store or
touch-signing communication, she is willing and able to contribute her
services to several organizations at the executive level, such as The
Canadian National Institute for the Blind and The National Federation of
the Blind Advocates for Equality. Penny aims to change and better the
existing communication means of the blind and deaf. She is convinced
that if deaf-blind persons followed her path of being computer-literate,
their communication skills would soar. By means of her Braille-equipped
computer, she is able to maintain a lively e-mail contact with the
community and friends.
Penny is a committed and devoted member
of St. Margaret Mary’s bilingual parish in Cumberland, Ontario. She and
Kilo are regular front pew participants at weekend Masses. Kilo is
occasionally awakened by Fr. Jim’s pro-life sermons, or busy distracting
him with her dream yelps and antics. As a talented craftsperson, Penny
has contributed as both a donor and a purchaser to the CWL craft sales.
Her crystal Christmas Tree snowflake decorations are second to none.
At Mass, she does not hear a lot of
what is said, but follows along reading the Braille material she
receives from the Xavier Society. It is during the Consecration at Mass
that her weekly miracle takes place. Her words explain this phenomenon:
“At Mass, when all are kneeling to hear the words “He took bread…”, I
hear every word as clear as a bell. I know it is God’s will that He
allows this. It is not because I know the words… (I know the words at
other times during Mass that I can’t hear) … but every time I can
honestly hear every word”. Penny counts this as her personal miracle,
the work of God, telling her of His power and that she is being watched
over, and that He gives her gifts both to appreciate and to use for the
benefit of others.
In her signature to every e-mail, Penny
quotes from Emily Dickinson: “the truth must dazzle gradually / or ever
man be blind”. We can say no more. ¤
Back to the index
THE PRO-LIFE FAITH OF DAN SOINI
(prayerful perseverance)
Article contributors: Dan Soini; Vera and Bob
Kendall, Cumberland, ON;
Fr. Jim Whalen, Priests For Life Canada.
2000, Issue 2
Danny Soini had overcome many obstacles in his life, but on August
21,1999, a vehicle accident would change his life forever.
At the age of seven, Danny was struck
with multiple myeloma, generally a progressive and fatal disease of the
bone and bone marrow; in 1986, he developed a tumour in his pituitary
gland which later led to a diagnosis of gigantism. As a result, he
ballooned to 980 pounds, with an expectation that he could live for only
two more years. Even so, he knew that he still had many battles to win,
and so he persevered, and against medical odds and by using various
methods, by Christmas of 1999, he had reduced his weight to just over
500 pounds.
Then, as if this weren't enough for
Danny to deal with, tragedy struck again. At mid-day on August 21,
1999, as he rode as a passenger in the family truck driven by his
sister, Linda, their vehicle was broadsided by a car driven by a young
man. Both Danny and Linda were injured, but it took the fire department
with their jaws-of-life two hours to extricate Danny from the tangled
mess. He had sustained massive blood loss, irreparably crushed femurs
and knees, and damage to his lower spine and pelvic area. After a few
unsuccessful surgeries and further complications in his right leg,
twenty-eight inches of bone were unsalvageable, and chronic
osteomyelitis set in causing high infection and severe, continual pain.
Five of the screws holding the external fixator which held his right leg
together began to loosen on their own, a phenomenon which his physician
had never seen before and which has now been documented on video tape.
All of this resulted in pain so severe that Danny asked God 12 times to
come and get him.
Since Christmas, 1999, his multiple
myeloma and lymphoma have recurred. During an operation to fuse his
left leg on January 17, 2000, he developed coagulase negative staph
infection. He has endured ten major surgeries and expects to go through
twenty more within the next one thousand days. He has borderline
leukemia and is within 1.73 percentage points of requiring dialysis.
Bedridden for over 250 days, with no end in sight, he has persevered,
with over six thousand medical injections, at least 117 pills each day,
and with the assistance of his personal staff of 15 professional nurses,
orderlies and medics who provide him with care around the clock at
home. Paralyzed from the waist down, and with no apparent chance of
regaining his ability to walk or to control his lower body, Danny’s
situation is very serious.
If you think that all of the above
paints the picture of a sad, depressed, unhappy and miserable man, you
could not be further from the truth. The fact is, Danny retains an
immense good humour and optimism. He even manages to maintain an
active business from his bedroom. He attributes his positive attitude
to advice given by his mother many years ago: “Get up with a smile on
your face or don’t get up at all; and, if something hurts, say it once,
then keep on smiling”. One of Danny’s prayers even now is: “Thank you,
God, for giving me another day, and let me try to put a smile on
someone else’s face”.
Danny feels blessed by the support of
his two sisters, Linda and Shirley, who still live at home with him, of
his relatives, Sisters Anita and Ange-Aimé Paquette of the religious
order of the Sisters of Charity and of Sister Anizette Bélanger,
Provincial Superior of the Daughters of Wisdom. He also receives great
and positive spiritual energy from Brendan (head of his medical team),
whom he credits with giving him a renewed ability to look at the
positive side of life.
He believes that another positive effect of his
illness is that he now knows who his real friends are. He is most
appreciative of all the assistance he receives from friends and
neighbours alike. He is especially thankful for the pastoral care which
has been provided by the Ottawa Hospital - General Campus. He is
grateful for the regular visitation and sharing with Vera and Bob
Kendall from the Outreach Ministry of St. Margaret Mary Parish,
Cumberland, and for the prayerful support he receives from his pastor,
Father James Whalen.
Danny lives a prayerful pro-life faith,
evident in his daily recitation of the rosary and weekly reception of
the Eucharist. He believes that one must continue living, and try to
stay sane most of the time, with God’s help. “Through faith and
prayer”, he says, “you can achieve almost anything”. He believes that
God is preparing an eventual place in His garden where there will be no
more suffering. When pressed, Danny hopes, with a twinkle, that God
has not forgotten that his formerly expansive frame now supports only
350 pounds.
What is Danny’s most fervent wish?
That some of the pain and spasms can be controlled, that he can spend
more precious time with family members and friends and, most of all,
that soon he will be granted the miracle of being able to stand, even
for just one more day.
His advice to all of us is to try to
make the most of every gift, to thank God for our daily bread and for
each new sunrise. “Keep a positive attitude”, he says in conclusion.
“Have faith; all of our prayers will be answered eventually”.
We have found that in sharing with Dan, we receive
much more than we can give. Dan, with his sense of humour and good
will, has provided a learning experience for all who have come to know
and love him. On his behalf, we would like to ask for continued
prayers. ¤
Back to the index
CONFRONTING
THE CONTRACEPTIVE CULTURE
“A COMPREHENSIVE PRO-LIFE
CHECKMATE
STRATEGY”
by Fr. Jim Whalen
2000, Issue 3
The issue of a CONTRACEPTIVE CULTURE provokes different reactions
among parents, doctors, public authorities, and whole nations. It
implies that a couple has not only the means to separate intercourse
from procreation, but the right or responsibility as well. Its purpose
is to allow contracepting partners to enjoy the pleasures of sex without
fear that their activity will lead to the procreation of another human
person.
A conspiracy of silence
There is first of all a conspiracy of silence regarding
contraception from the fearful be they parents, young adults, youth or
pastors. There is a fear of listening to the truth for it may mean
changing ways of thinking and ways of acting. There is a fear of
teaching or preaching the truth for it may mean being rejected or
persecuted. There is a fear of witnessing to the truth for it is
sometimes controversial or complicated. There is a fear of living the
truth for it is not politically correct, and leads to marginalization or
isolation. There is even a pathological fear of parenthood. There is a
fear of offending the sensitivities of men or women, friends, neighbours
or parishioners but strangely enough, not of offending God.
A contraception deception
There is secondly a massive acceptance of falsehood, half-truths or
secular views regarding artificial contraceptive means for they are
endlessly promulgated in advertising campaigns by governments, anti-life
organizations, (e.g.: IPPF), and in the media, as safe and available.
They are erroneously promoted as instant solutions for recreational sex,
pleasure without consequences. They are presented as the answer to world
overpopulation, a myth advocated by national and international groups
such as Planned Parenthood Federations. They are even offered as part of
financial aid packages to third world countries, stipulating mandatory
sterilization or birth control quotas. (e.g.: World Bank loans; China’s
one child per family policy). Many are ignorant of the whole truth or
misinformed about contraceptive abortifacients, their harmful and even
life threatening effects, being swayed by various superficial arguments,
by personal preferences or circumstances” (Situational Ethics).
There is thirdly a strong opposition to the contraceptive culture
by those who faithfully follow The Teaching Magesterium of the Catholic
Church. This is evident in such Pro-Life groups as Priests for Life,
Canada, Human Life International and One More Soul. They adhere to
Catholic Church Teachings: documents about choosing life at all stages
from conception to natural death, about rejecting contraception,
abortion, sterilization, euthanasia and assisted suicide; about
promoting Generosity, Chastity and Natural Family Planning and Adoption.
Why this eclipse of reason and
faith?
How can thinking people forget that conception of a new life
depends on the activity of God and parents and that God’s role is
decisive? How can practicing Catholics ignore responsible parenthood and
accept the error of Consequentialism: the end justifies the means? How
can the teaching of dissenting theologians, who foster Moral Relativism
regarding marriage be allowed to continue in some seminaries when they
repeatedly contradict the doctrines and Teaching magesterium of the
Church? How can married couples and other believers disobey God’s
natural and moral laws regarding procreation, unity and mutual love and
claim it is for the good of society? How can Catholics and Catholic
Organizations support organizations or movements that include in their
agenda ambiguous goals and demands directly opposed to essential and
fundamental Catholic teachings such as defending life from conception to
natural death?
A conspiracy of evil
The basic answer is that there is a worldwide evil conspiracy which
shows its hidden agenda in contraception: meaning, against the beginning
of life, which seeks to annihilate through a culture of death: life,
family, truth and faith. To demand rights to contracept, to abort, to
sterilize, and to euthanize is the actualizing of evil, to attribute to
human freedom, to give absolute control and power over others and
against others. There is a need for a face to face confrontation with
the contraceptive proponents. There is a need to develop ‘A
COMPREHENSIVE PRO-LIFE CHECKMATE STRATEGY’ (see end of this article).
This calls for a realistic assessment of enemy strategy and eliminating
the contraceptive mentality. Failure to curb dissenting theologians or
expose erroneous principles results in misleading and incomplete
presentations and interpretations of Magisterial Pro-Life Teachings,
which obstruct truth and weaken rather than develop faith. The
essentials to build a ‘Culture of Life’ depend on biblical foundations,
ethical and moral grounds, and sound principles and doctrines that
should be the heart and core of conscience formation.
‘Truth Tactics’ are an essential part of a checkmate strategy, as
present in Scripture, Tradition, and the Teaching Magesterium of the
Catholic Church. In Revelation, God’s plan is clear with regard to
procreation: “Be fruitful and multiply and fill the earth” (Gen. 1:28).
Many today, including those who consider themselves Christians or
Catholics, imitate Onan, who offended God by avoiding conception. He had
a direct intention of avoiding procreation during the conjugal act. He
was punished for his crime of contraception: “He wasted his seed on the
ground to avoid contributing offspring.... What he did greatly offended
the Lord and the Lord took his life” (Gen. 38: 9-10). God’s will is a
fruitful womb: “Shall I who allow her to conceive, close her womb? says
your God” (Is 66:9). A great progeny of children is a special blessing
to married couples, a reward to the faithful: “I will make you
exceedingly fruitful and will make nations of you” (Gen. 17:16).
Contraception is a violation of procreation, a self-seeking pleasure, an
immoral act which defiles and divorces the sacred meanings of the
conjugal act in matrimony: the procreative meaning, and the unitive
meaning. It seeks to separate the life-giving act and the love-giving
act. “The body is not meant for immorality but for the Lord and the Lord
for the body” (1 Cor 6:13). To deny or question Scriptural teachings
against birth control is to refuse obedience to God’s revealed natural
and supernatural truths. To interpret them as not applicable is to deny
objective or absolute truths and fall into humanism, relativism, or
subjectivism.
Key questions
Do we choose to live a lie, or the Truth? Is the Church’s teaching
about Contraception too much for us? It need not be if we remember Jesus
continues to speak to us through the Scriptures, and through the
Magisterial Teachings of the Church He founded. His Vicar General, Pope
John Paul II, continues to guide and instruct us. God is still in charge
of creation and procreation. Jesus is alive. He is present in His Body,
Blood, Soul, and Divinity in the Blessed Sacrament in our tabernacles in
our Catholic Churches. He is also present in His Living Word in
Scripture, in the Sacraments and where two or three are gathered in His
name. He comes to us as our Daily Bread in the Holy Eucharist at
Communion. He is the Way, the Truth, and the Life. The Holy Spirit
continues to sanctify us and reveal the truth to us. The fact is that we
cannot be Pro-Life and Pro-Contraception. They are mutually exclusive.
We are challenged to choose Truth and Life. To be Pro-Life is to be
Pro-God, Pro-Family, Pro-Women, Pro-Men and Pro-Church.
Contraceptive calamity broad statistics
indicate that:
About 340 million couples in the world now use
Contraception/Sterilization, out of about 880 million couples in their
fertile years; that rate would be 40%. (Catholic Teachings on Pro-Life
Issues, pub. by Humanae Vitae Research Institute, Japan, Fr. Anthony
Zimmerman, STD, 1996, p. 4).
Over 60 million people worldwide use the Pill.
One More Soul, an international organization promoting the
Catholic Church’s teachings against contraceptives, states that
Contraceptives are harmful for they lead to abortion; encourage
promiscuity; jeopardize marriages; treat children as a disease; degrade
women; have horrific side effects such as breast cancer, blood clots,
heart attacks, and have even caused death. According to Dr. Bogomir
Kuhar, in ‘Infant Homicides Through Contraceptives’, certain forms of
birth control, such as all oral contraceptives, Norplant, Depo-Provera,
and IUD’s take an estimated 8.1 to 12.5 million lives each year. Preven,
is the latest Morning After Pill, a chemical abortifacient used as an
“Emergency Post-coital Contraception”, that prevents ovum implantation.
Contraceptive consequences, as outlined in Humane Vitae, include
conjugal infidelity; general lowering of morality; loss of respect for
women; erroneous thinking that mankind has unlimited dominion over self;
placing a dangerous technological weapon in authoritarian hands that
take no heed of moral exigencies (Sec. 17). Pope John Paul II, in
Evangelium Vitae, has pointed out that the links between contraception
and abortion are increasingly obvious and undeniable: Contraception and
Abortion are often closely connected, as fruits of the same tree (Sec.
13). Janet Smith has outlined this truth for us, while recognizing that
contraception prevents life from coming to be and abortion takes a life
that has already begun, it is a fact that many pro-life movements avoid
completely the issue of contraception or are reluctant to deal with it,
or make a connection between contraception and abortion. The fact that
some contraceptives are abortifacients should be sufficient reason to
get on board with rejecting the life-styles and attitudes that
contraception promotes including an alleged need for abortion.
New perspectives
Dr. Donald DeMarco, states that the ‘Contraception Mentality’
contained the seeds of the ‘Abortion Mentality’. He outlines four
morally revolutionary events that prepared the ground for public
acceptance of Abortion:
1 rethinking of traditional views of sexual morality
2 the rise of feminism
3 recognition of the hazards of the pill
4 perceived population explosion
Contraception is unquestionably the primary, major factor, if not the
direct and primary cause of family breakdowns according to Rev Paul
Marx, O.S.B., founder of Human Life International (From Contraception to
Abortion, Homiletic Pastoral Review, Feb., 1983, pp. 8-13).
The fact is, that many dissent from Humanae Vitae. This includes
people from all walks of life.
Janet Smith tells us in her video: ‘Contraception: Why Not?’,
That only 37-45% of priests support Catholic Teachings regarding
contraception as contained in Humanae Vitae.
Statistics taken in Canada in 1993, show that 91% of Catholics approved
of contraception (Macleans Magazine, April 12, 1993).
In the United States, 89% of young people rejected the Church’s
teaching against contraception (CNN Pole released August 1993, during
the Visitation of Denver by Pope John Paul II).
In 1960, before the Pill came on the scene in the US, there were
393,000 divorces. After 15 years of Pill usage, in 1975 there were
1,026,800 divorces... an explosion of 260%.
Culture of death business
The prime advocates of contraception include Planned Parenthood
Federation.
In 1997-1998, they earned $60 million from the sale of Birth Control
Pills with a profit of $45 million. They made $20.9 million profit from
surgical abortions, which were carried out in their own abortion mills.
In the last 11 years, they received support of $1.634 billion and
made a profit of $212.3 million (The Ryan Report, February 1999).
The intent of their involvement in a contraceptive conspiracy is evident
in their proposal to The Human Right to Family Planning (1984): “10 year
olds should have the right to contraception”.
Enough is enough. We have witnessed to prevention of life, to
attacks on the unborn and the human person at all stages of life; the
failure of authorities to act decisively against contraception; the
multiplication of misleading and erroneous statements about
contraception; the watering down and compromising of truth about
contraception; the passing of laws void of morals and rejecting God’s
law.
Contraception is anti-life
Msgr. Vincent Foy summarises it well: ‘The primal evil of
contraception is ‘Anti-God’. It puts up a barrier against God’s creative
will, a horrendous crime when seen in all its implications in time and
eternity. It is ‘Anti-Church’ for it is against Church unity and results
in mass immorality and mass weakening of the faith...; It is
‘Anti-Society’ for it diminishes the level of love in society and
increases the level of selfishness and lust; It is ‘Anti-Family’ for it
makes a lie of the marriage covenant, replacing self-giving love with
the hate of marital abuse. It is ‘Anti-Spousal’ for it promotes mutual
abuse and violates the conscience and person...; It is ‘Anti-Self’ for
it creates selfish and exploitive persons’. (from Humanae Vitae To
Veritatis Splendor, produced by St Joseph’s Workers for Life & Family,
Msgr Vincent Foy, March, 1994, pp. 15-18).
New Perspectives on Contraception, published by One More Soul, Dr.
Donald De Marco, 1999, pp. 69-70.
One More Soul,
1846 North Main Street,
Dayton, Ohio 45405,
1-800-307-7685
or (937) 279-5433
www.onemoresoul.com
E-mail: omsoul@omsoul.com
Back to the index
A COMPREHENSIVE PRO-LIFE
CHECKMATE STRATEGY
(for Adults and Youth)
by Fr. Jim Whalen
2000, Issue 3
SPIRITUAL STRATEGY:
A. Perpetual Adoration.
B. Active Prayer Life-Style: Mass; Holy
Hours; Scripture; Crusades; Retreats; Rosary.
C. Bishop’s Pastorals on Marriage,
Sexuality & Chastity; Priests Preaching on Sexual Morality; Application
of Familiaris Consortio re: Communion Reception, in Sacrament of
Reconciliation.
D. Marriage Preparation Courses and
Seminarian Training to emphasize Pro-Life Spirituality; Pro Life
Encyclicals, Natural Family Planning, Palliative Care.
E. Children Prayer Crusades.
LEADERSHIP STRATEGY:
A. Proper use of authority: Teach what
Catholic Church Teaches re Pro-Life rather than personal opinion,
preference or interpretation. ( Catholic Pro-Life Papers &
Organizations: i.e. Priests For Life, Canada).
B. Clearing out the dissenting theologians
and teachers from Seminaries and Universities and Schools.
C. In Catholic Institutions, employ only
teachers, professors, etc. who accept all Catholic Pro-Life Church
Teaching and give witness by living out this belief. Promote Pro-Life
Leadership.
EDUCATION STRATEGY:
A. Re-educate Catholic Educators in
Christian Sexuality and Chastity. (Conferences, Symposium etc.).
B. Stop inadequate unorthodox sex
education programs at all levels: replace with orthodox teaching.C Use
television, Radio, Internet, Newspaper, etc. to promote Civilization of
Love & Culture of Life.
PRO-LIFE TRAINING & SUPPORT:
A. Seek out and train Volunteers to lead
Parishes & Communities in Pro-Life Activities.
B. Establish Pro-Life Teams in every
Diocese, Parish and School.
C. Train and Mandate Pro-Life Teachers in
every Diocese Parish and School.
D. Tithing at the Diocesan and Parish
levels to support Pro-Life Work.
ECUMENICAL AND CIVIL OUTREACH:
A. Conduct Ecumenical Prayer Services to
promote Pro-Life Culture and Resist The Culture of Death.
B. Collaborate & Network with other faiths
and organizations in Pro-Life Work without compromising Catholic
Teachings.
C. Support Pro-Life Candidates and
Leadership in Governments.
D. Co-operate in joint campaigns to end
Contraception, Abortion, Sterilization, Euthanasia, Assisted Suicide,
poverty, and other perversions; to defend and protect life at all
stages; to promote Natural Family Planning and adoption on local,
national and international levels.
Back to the index
THE CONNECTION BETWEEN
CONTRACEPTION AND ABORTION
by Professor Janet E. Smith, PhD
2000, Issue 3
Janet E. Smith is an associate professor
of philosophy at the University of Dallas, Texas. She has edited Why
Humane Vitae Was Right: A Reader and authored Humanae Vitae: A
Generation Later, and numerous articles on abortion, contraception,
virtue, and Plato. This article was edited and reprinted with
permission.
Many in the pro-life movement are reluctant
to make a connection between contraception and abortion. They insist
that these are two very different acts - that there is all the
difference in the world between contraception, which prevents a life
from coming to be, and abortion, which takes a life that has already
begun.
With some contraceptives, there is not only
a link with abortion, there is an identity. Some contraceptives are
abortifacients; they work by causing early term abortions. The IUD seems
to prevent a fertilized egg - a new little human being - from implanting
in the uterine wall. The pill does not always stop ovulation, but
sometimes prevents implantation of the growing embryo. And of course,
the new RU 486 pill works altogether by aborting a new fetus, a new
baby. Although some in the pro-life movement occasionally speak out
against the contraceptives that are abortifacients, most generally steer
clear of the issue of contraception.
Contraception creates alleged “need” for
abortion
This seems to me to be a mistake. I think
that we will not make good progress in creating a society where all new
life can be safe, where we truly display a respect for life, where
abortion is a terrible memory rather than a terrible reality, until we
see that there are many significant links between contraception and
abortion, and that we bravely speak this truth. We need to realize that
a society in which contraceptives are widely used is going to have a
very difficult time keeping free of abortions since the lifestyles and
attitudes that contraception fosters, create an alleged “need” for
abortion.
Planned Parenthood v. Casey, the US Supreme
Court decision that confirmed Roe v. Wade [U.S. decision to permit
abortions] stated “in some critical respects, abortion is of the same
character as the decision to use contraception… for two decades of
economic and social developments, people have organized intimate
relationships and made choices that define their views of themselves and
their places in society, in reliance on the availability of abortion in
the event that contraception should fail”.
The Supreme Court decision has made
completely unnecessary, any efforts to “expose” what is really behind
the attachment of the modern age to abortion. As the Supreme Court
candidly states, we need abortion so that we can continue our
contraceptive lifestyles. It is not because contraceptives are
ineffective that a million and a half women a year seek abortions as
back-ups to failed contraceptives. The “intimate relationships”
facilitated by contraceptives are what make abortions “necessary”.
“Intimate” here is a euphemism and a misleading one at that. Here the
word “intimate” means “sexual”; it does not mean “loving and close”.
Abortion is most often the result of sexual relationships in which there
is no room for a baby, the natural consequence of sexual intercourse.
To support the argument that more
responsible use of contraceptives would reduce the number of abortions,
some note that most abortions are performed for “contraceptive
purposes”. That is, few abortions are had because a woman has been a
victim of rape or incest or because a pregnancy would endanger her life,
or because she expects to have a handicapped or deformed newborn.
Rather, most abortions are had because men and women who do not want a
baby are having sexual intercourse and facing pregnancies they did not
plan for and do not want. Because their contraceptive failed, or because
they failed to use a contraceptive, they then resort to abortion as a
back up. Many believe that if we could convince men and women to use
contraceptives responsibly, we would reduce the number of unwanted
pregnancies, and thus the number of abortions. Thirty years ago this
position might have had some plausibility, but not now. We have lived
for about thirty years with a culture permeated with contraceptive use
and abortion; no longer can we think that greater access to
contraception will reduce the number of abortions. Rather, wherever
contraception is more readily available, the number of unwanted
pregnancies and the number of abortions increase greatly.
Sexual revolution not possible without
contraception
The connection between contraception and
abortion is primarily this: contraception facilitates the kind of
relationships and even the kind of attitudes and moral characters that
are likely to lead to abortion. The contraceptive mentality treats
sexual relationship as a burden. The sexual revolution has no fondness -
no room for - the connection between sexual intercourse and babies. The
sexual revolution simply was not possibly until fairly reliable
contraceptives were available.
Far from being a check to the sexual
revolution, contraception is the fuel that facilitated the beginning of
the sexual revolution and enables it to continue to rage. In the past,
many men and women refrained from illicit sexual unions simply because
they were not prepared for the responsibilities of parenthood. But once
a fairly reliable contraceptive appeared on the scene, this barrier to
sex outside the confines of marriage fell. The connection between sex
and love also fell quickly; ever since contraception became widely used,
there has been much talk of, acceptance of, and practice of casual sex
and recreational sex. The deep meaning that is inherent in sexual
intercourse has been lost sight of; the willingness to engage in sexual
intercourse with another is no longer a result of a deep commitment to
another. It no longer bespeaks a willingness to have a child with
another and to have all the consequent entanglements with another that
babies bring. Contraception helps reduce one’s sexual partner to just a
sexual object since it renders sexual intercourse to be without any real
commitments.
“Carelessness” is international
Much of this data suggests that there is
something deep in our natures that finds the severing of sexual
intercourse from love and commitment and babies to be unsatisfactory. As
we have seen, women are careless in their use of contraceptives for a
variety of reasons, but one reason for their careless use of
contraceptives is precisely their desire to engage in meaningful sexual
activity rather than in meaningless sexual activity. They want their
sexual acts to be more meaningful than a handshake or a meal shared.
They are profoundly uncomfortable with using contraceptives for what
they do to their bodies and for what they do to their relationships.
Often, they desire to have a more committed relationship with the male
with whom they are involved; they get pregnant to test this love and
commitment. But since the relationship has not been made permanent,
since no vows have been taken, they are profoundly ambivalent about any
pregnancy that might occur.
Sexual Promiscuity Increases
By the late sixties and early seventies,
the view of the human person as an animal, whose passions should govern,
became firmly entrenched in the attitudes of those who were promoting
the sexual revolution. One of the greatest agents and promoters of the
sexual revolution has been Planned Parenthood. In the sixties and
seventies, many of the spokesmen and women for Planned Parenthood
unashamedly advocated sex outside of marriage and even promoted
promiscuity. Young people were told to abandon the repressive morals of
their parents and to engage in free love. They were told that active
sexual lives with a number of partners would be psychologically healthy,
perfectly normal, and perfectly moral. Now, largely because of the
spread of AIDS and the devastation of teenage pregnancy, even Planned
Parenthood puts a value on abstinence. Yet they have no confidence that
young people can and will abstain from sexual intercourse, so they
advocate “safe” sex, “responsible” sex, whereby they mean sexual
intercourse wherein a contraceptive is used. Sex educators assume that
young people will be engaging in sexual activity outside of marriage.
Young people do not need sex education of
the Planned Parenthood type; they need to learn that sexual intercourse
can be engaged in responsibly and safely only within marriage. Rather
than filling young people’s heads with false notions about freedom, and
filling their wallets with condoms, we need to help them see the true
meaning of human sexuality. We need to help them learn self-control and
self-mastery so that they are not enslaved to their sexual passions.
They need to learn that sexual intercourse belongs within marriage, and
that with the commitment to marriage comes true freedom; the freedom to
give of one’s self completely to another, the freedom to meet one’s
responsibilities to one’s children.
There are two cornerstones on which education for
sexual responsibility should be built - cornerstones that are both
corroded by contraceptive sex. One cornerstone is that sexual
intercourse is meant to be the expression of a deep love for another
individual, a deep love that leads one to want to give of oneself
totally to another. Most individuals hope one day to be in a faithful
marriage, to be in a marital relationship with someone one loves deeply
and by whom one is loved deeply. One of the major components of that
deep love is a promise of faithfulness, that one will give oneself
sexually only to one’s spouse.
Contraception severs connection between sex
and babies
The other cornerstone for a sex education
program should be the refrain that ‘if you are not ready for babies, you
are not ready for sexual intercourse, and you are not ready for babies
until you are married’. Most people want to be good parents; they want
to provide for their children and give them good upbringings.
Contraception attempts to sever the connection between sexual
intercourse and babies; it makes us feel responsible about our sexuality
while enabling us to be irresponsible. Individuals born out of wedlock
have a much harder start in life; have a much harder time gaining the
discipline and strength they need to be responsible adults. Single
mothers have very hard lives as they struggle to meet the needs of their
children and their own emotional needs as well. Those who abort their
babies are often left with devastating psychological scars. The price of
out of wedlock pregnancy is high.
Indeed, even within marriage, contraception
is destructive; it reduces the meaning of the sexual act; again it takes
out the great commitment that is written into the sexual act, the
commitment that is inherent in the openness to have children with one’s
beloved.
Those who are unmarried do face a disaster, and
abortion seems like a necessity since no permanent commitment has been
made between the sexual partners. Those who are married have often
planned a life that is not receptive to children and are tempted to
abort to sustain the child-free life they have designed. I am not, of
course, saying that all those who contracept are likely to abort; I am
saying that many more of those who contracept do abort than those who
practice natural family planning.
Contraception takes the baby-making element
out of sexual intercourse. It makes pregnancy seem like an accident of
sexual intercourse rather than the natural consequence that responsible
individuals ought to be prepared for. Abortion, then, becomes thinkable
as the solution to an unwanted pregnancy. Contraception enables those
who are not prepared to care for babies to engage in sexual intercourse;
when they become pregnant, they resent the unborn child for intruding
itself upon their lives, and they turn to the solution of abortion. It
should be no surprise that countries that are permeated by contraceptive
sex, fight harder for access to abortion than they do to ensure that all
babies can survive both in the womb and out. It is foolish for
pro-lifers to think that they can avoid the issues of contraception and
sexual irresponsibility and be successful in the fight against abortion.
For, as the Supreme Court of the US has stated, abortion is “necessary”
for those whose intimate relationships are based upon contraceptive sex.
References:
For verification of the claims here made about
Planned Parenthood, see George Grant, Grand Illusions: the Legacy of
Planned Parenthood (Brentwood, TN: Wolgemuth and Hyatt Publishers, Inc.,
1988), and Robert Marshall and Charles Donovan, Blessed are the Barren
(San Francisco, CA; Ignatius Press, 1991).
Portions of this article are printed as
portions of chapters in “Abortion and Moral Character”, in Catholicism
and Abortion, ed. By Stephen J. Heaney to be published by the Pope John
XXIII Medical-Moral Research Centre and “Abortion and Moral Character”,
in Doing and Being: Introductory Reading in Moral Philosophy, ed by
Jordan Graf Haber, to be published by Macmillan.
Permission given for reprinting portions from
‘The Connection between contraception and Abortion’, by Dr. Janet E.
smith, published by Homiletic & Pastoral Review, April 1993, distributed
by One More Soul.
"The Connection between Contraception and
Abortion" by Janet E. Smith is available from One More Soul.
Back to the index
THE CONSEQUENCES OF
CONTRACEPTION
by Fr. Paul Burchat,
A Priest of Madonna House
2000, Issue 3
Chronically, all the direct and indirect effects of contraception
is beyond the scope of this article, and so I will focus on the more
immediate and damaging consequences of the use of unnatural means to
regulate fertility, both within and outside of marriage. For a more
lengthy and in-depth treatment of this topic, I would refer the reader
to two sources: “Paul VI as Prophet”, by Janet Smith, ed., Ignatius
Press, San Francisco, 1933, pp. 519-32 and “Sexual Wisdom” by Richard
Wetzel, M.D., Proctor Publications, Ann Arbor, MI, 1998. Dr. Wetzel’s
book is a thorough documentation of the very great misery that a lack of
chastity has produced in our culture over the last 30 years, and I
would highly recommend it to anyone interested in this subject.
The first and most serious result of contraception is what
happens to us any time we commit a mortal sin, i.e. the loss of
sanctifying grace and the possible loss of eternal life. Spouses who
know contraception is a grave evil and freely consent to use it commit a
moral sin and risk losing their place in God’s Kingdom, for all time.
However, even if they are not committing a moral sin by contracepting,
because they do not know it is a grave evil or do not freely consent to
use it, they still put their marriage at risk because of the nature of
marriage itself.
Marriage, by its nature, is the “total mutual self-giving”
(Canadian Catholic Catechism #1644) of the spouses, to each other, which
by necessity, implies a total mutual reception as well. When couples
contracept, there is no total mutual self-giving and reception in the
conjugal act, because they are withholding their fertility from each
other. They vowed to give themselves completely to one another at a time
of their marriage, but now during the act, which more than any other is
meant to signify this total mutual self-giving and reception, they keep
back a part of themselves and violate the very covenant they made on
their wedding day.
Familiaris Consortio says this very clearly in #32; “thus the
innate language that expresses the total reciprocal self-giving of
husband and wife is overlaid, through contraception, by an objectively
contradictory language, namely, that of not giving oneself totally to
the other. This leads not only to a positive refusal to be open to life,
but also to a falsification of the inner truth of conjugal love, which
is called upon to give itself in personal totality”. This quote uses the
word “language” in relation to the conjugal act, and so reminds us that
when spouses contracept, they are lying to one another in their most
intense and intimate form of communication. If they lie to one another
(and to themselves), and for all practical purposes, reject one another,
during the time that they should be growing closer together, is it any
wonder that among spouses who contracept (90% of all sexually active
couples (Wetzel, p. 100), there is a divorce rate which is greater than
50% (and may reach as high as 66% in the not too distant future (Wetzel
p. 114). Contrast this with husbands and wives who use natural means to
regulate their fertility, who have divorce a rate as low as 3% (Wetzel,
p. 114).
So, the next most devastating consequence of contraception, after the
seriousness of the sin involved, is the high rate of divorce and family
breakdown that occurs with its use. This is not to say that every couple
who has ever used a contraceptive is destined for divorce any more than
a small to medium-sized crack in the foundation of a house will cause it
to fall. However, if contraception becomes a longstanding or permanent
part of the couple’s life, as is the case with surgical sterilization,
then that crack may become large enough such that the house will fall.
Interestingly, “A great many divorces occur after couples have ‘had
their family’, after one of the partners has been sterilized” (Wetzel p.
99).
I will just mention two other effects of contraceptive use. The
first is that the contraceptive culture and mentality promotes and fuels
the demand for abortion, most especially when it fails and a child is
conceived. “Many now recognize that widespread use of contraception has
paved the way for more abortions” (Smith p. 523). “Indeed, the
pro-abortion culture is especially strong precisely where the church’s
teaching on contraception is rejected… The close connection which
exists, in mentality, between the practice of contraception and that of
abortion is becoming increasingly obvious” (Evangelium Vitae #13).
The second is the very damaging effect it is having on young
people, particularly teenagers. “Numerous studies support the assertion
that contraception promotion leads to promiscuity among teens” (Wetzel
p. 214). With greater promiscuity has come, not surprisingly, an
increase in teen pregnancy, abortion and sexually transmitted diseases
(Wetzel pp. 214-18). Contraception has done much to harm teenagers and
has in no way been beneficial to their sexual maturation and
development. The very last thing teenagers need is more confusing
information about the nature of human sexuality, in particular,
information which is divorced from any sound moral content and training.
Contraception says that we can have sex whenever we want, without any
harmful effect. It also promotes the lie that we are unable to govern
our sexual desires and bring them under the control of our higher
faculties. Consequently, because we lack the discipline necessary to
master our sexual behaviour (like lesser creatures), we must then
regulate the consequences by some extrinsic, unnatural means. This of
course denies the efficacy of grace and ultimately dehumanizes people.
Contraception has not delivered on its promises to make sex more
enjoyable and enhance a couple’s intimacy and unity. In fact, it has had
the exact opposite effect and continues to jeopardize the sexual,
physical, spiritual and moral health of countless numbers of individuals
and marriages. Only chaste relations between men and women, in marriage
and outside of marriage, can promote our true well being and enhance our
dignity as God’s sons and daughters.
Back to the index
THE
21ST CENTURY BELONGS TO
NATURAL FAMILY PLANNING
By Fr. Joseph Hattie, O.M.I.
Priests for Life, Canada - Member of the Board.
2000, Issue 3
In the last century, family planning was a battleground where the
forces of good and evil fought for the mind and soul of the family. Pope
John Paul II told us that today “the family is placed at the centre of
the great struggle between good and evil” (Letter to Families, 1994) the
good of being good stewards of the gift of fertility and faithful to
God’s definition of the human being, or the evil of claiming man’s
ownership of fertility and his right to define himself.
From the perspective of this article, the forces of good rallied
around Natural Family Planning (NFP) and those of evil around the
methods of artificial contraception. This battle became particularly
intense during the 1960's when the ‘Pill’ came on the ‘in’ market. It
gave the edge to the contraceptive mentality side. The ‘Pill’ was not
only well received by the world, but proclaimed by many: in medicine,
the media and politics, as a kind of modern day saviour. This secular
messiah easily pushed Natural Family Planning to the side of the public
battle-ground. It seemed that Goliath had appeared and was beating up on
David.
Goliath took the form of an organization called Planned Parenthood
International. It devised the strategy, recruited and lead the troops
both in the field and in the boardrooms of the nation. Huge sums of
money were contributed to its war chest. It seemed unstoppable and was
quite arrogant in its continued skirmishes with the Natural Family
Planing side. It gathered more and more support from vested interest
groups, not the least of which was the multi-national drug companies,
who produced and sold the artificial contraceptives.
During this time, artificial contraception seemed to have won the day -
not only winning the mind and soul of the secular media, but more
tragically the minds and souls of so many families who chose some form
of artificial contraception as the means of planning their family. This
was quickly followed by winning the minds of governments who made these
methods, the methods of choice for their policies and funding of family
planning. From the 1960's to the end of the 20th century, Goliath seemed
so successful, one could say that he had won the battle and that the
20th century belonged to artificial contraception and the contraceptive
mentality.
It seemed well on its way of attaining its goal of providing
artificial contraception for all the women in the world. This focus
often blinded Goliath to the obvious. This is illustrated by experiences
related by a female doctor working in Kenya. In villages where she
worked, women died because clinics had no penicillin (costing only a few
cents a vile), with which to save their lives. Each one could have been
fitted with any number of IUDs while she was dying.
India and China were particularly targeted because of their large
populations and their perceived threat to the world. Planned
Parenthood’s succeeded in transplanting the contraceptive mentality into
China’s family law. The legislative fruit of that transplant, the one
child per couple policy, has had drastic effects on the families.
Natural Family Planning
Meanwhile, the troops on the Natural Family Planning side
continued to fight on - developing, refining, publishing and teaching
the modern methods of NFP. Like David, they worked under difficult
conditions and with very limited (usually financial) resources. But like
him, they were rich in faith. This is best illustrated by the example of
Father Maurice Catarinich, a priest of the Melbourne Archdiocese,
Australian, who, in the 1950's was devoting his life and talents to the
service of marriages and families. Natural Family Planning was one of
the services he provided. He knew that the Rhythm Method of NFP did not
respond to all the needs of his married couples and that something more
was needed. Desiring to respond to their need he walked forward in
faith. A deep faith in Divine Providence, expressed in his statement:
“That God would not deprive the poor of a simple indicator of their
fertility”, and also, a firm belief that the Church’s teaching was
correct in these matters. His faith inspired the work that bore fruit in
the discovery of this “simple indicator” of a woman’s fertility, and in
the development and spreading, throughout the world. It is the simplest
and it is natures most obvious indicator of approaching fertility. The
research done in developing and refining the Billings Ovulation Method
has scientifically enriched other methods of NFP.
His faith, service and prayer encouraged NFP troops to remain in
the battle and to serve all who would listen. Many who did were
causalities from the contraceptive mentality: weakened marriages,
infertility problems, etc.
Like David, going out against Goliath, NFP workers relied on
God’s providence, and He provided in unexpected ways. Not only with
financial help as it was needed, but also with the gift of people of
deep faith: Some examples:
Pope Paul VI, a teacher who taught with divine clarity in those
troubled and confused times, especially with his prophetic encyclical
Humanae Vitae.
Mother Teresa, whose faith allowed her to see that men and women
from the poorest of the poor are capable of achieving self-mastery and
therefore capable of putting their sexual energies at the service of
love and family, and capable of good stewardship of their gift of
fertility, if given the proper help. At a time when many authorities
were convinced that the poor, even when provided with contraception,
could not take responsibility for their fertility, she provided help by
having many of her Nuns trained, by the Drs. Billings, as teachers of
the Billings Ovulation Method. In the early 1970's they taught 11,000
married couples from Calcutta’s poorest of the poor. These couples
learned well and demonstrated such a mature stewardship of their gift of
fertility that when the Indian Government imposed sterilizations on the
poor, these poor couples were exempted. Later, they sent a delegation to
Mother Teresa to say: “Thank you, Mother, for giving us back our
dignity”. Natural Family Planning won the hearts and souls of these
families.
Pope John Paul II was another great gift from Divine Providence.
His faith rallied the people in the field; he continued proclaiming and
further developed the Church’s clear teaching on these matters; in faith
and prayer he has supported NFP workers in many and various ways.
Because of his consistent faith “signs of a reawakening of
consciences began to appear”. For example: More Catholic physicians
began re-examining their understanding of conjugal love and responsible
parenthood, artificial contraception and Natural Family Planning, and
discovering the truth became NFP Only Physicians. A book with the names
of these Physicians can be obtained from One More Soul.
One also began to discover more priests who were getting back to the
basic truth in these issues and in harmony with the Pope, proclaiming
the truth in sound homilies and in various forms of support for the NFP
workers.
In the 1990's the signs became more evident that Goliath, while
still winning some battles, was going to lose the war. India began
making the Billings Method of NFP the Method of Choice in their national
programs, and the Health Department of China, growing more aware of the
damage that was being done to Chinese women, marriages and families, by
the artificial contraception, sterilization, abortion programs, invited
the Drs. John and Evelyn Billings to China and asked them to develop a
program to train teachers in the Ovulation Method for all 2000 countries
of China. This has begun, and is progressing well, but slowly because
the normal sources of funding for Family Planning, outside of China, are
not making funds available for this marvellous NFP project. But God
provides. Twenty women, mostly gynaecologists, were trained in the
initial teacher training course. These teachers were so well received by
the people that at the next teacher teaching course (a year later) there
were seven hundred women wanting to be trained as teachers. Today there
are several thousand teachers. And the government has established “A
Billings’ NFP Centre of Excellence in the city of Nan King. Natural
Family Planning is now winning the minds and hearts of thousands and
thousands of families in China.
The evidence indicates that the tide of battle has turned and
that the 21st century will belong to Natural Family Planning. We
priests, are priests for life, and we have an important part to play in
this battle. Our contribution will depend on the strength of our faith.
We will be effective if we have the same faith as Fr. Maurice Catarinich:
faith in God’s Providence and the Church’s teaching, and if we teach
with joy. We will then strengthen the faith of our people so that the
minds and hearts of families will be receptive to the truth about
Natural Family Planning, a truth that can set them free to love God and
one another more totally.
Let us also encourage them to take advantage of the graces of conversion
available during this Year of the Lord’s Favour.
The Lord has done much in the last part of the 20th century in
preparing the Church for taking the Good News of Marriage and Family
into the third Millennium of Christianity. Natural Family Planning will
play an important role in making us more credible witnesses of that good
news. As priests, encourage your families to become more like the Holy
Family - a family ‘of life’ and a family ‘for life’, a family that puts
the gift of fertility at the service of Life. As holy families, your
families will do their part in making the 21st century Natural Family
Planning’s.
Fr. Joseph Hattie, O.M.I. is the Spiritual
Director of
W.O.O.M.B. Canada, the Canadian arm of the Billings Method of
natural family planning. Further information by Fr. Hattie is available
in his book titled “Totally Yours”, available from Priests for Life,
Canada for $4.50 plus $2.00 shipping.
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CHURCH TEACHING
ON CONTRACEPTION
by Dr. Donald DeMarco
2000, Issue 3
Contraception negates the
creative act of God. It also compromises the unity of the relationship
between the marriage partners. For these two reasons, fundamentally, the
Church teaches that contraception is disordered and morally wrong. It is
wrong, according to he Church, because it separates the procreative and
the unitive meanings of the marital act. In this way, the Church
condemns contraception, primarily because it violates the goods of
marriage and procreation. In Humanae Vitae, we find the following
statement:
By safeguarding both these essential
aspects, the unitive and the procreative, the conjugal act preserves in
its fullness the sense of true marital love and its orientation towards
man’s exalted vocation to parenthood.1
In the same document, the
denunciation of contraceptives of every kind is most clear: “every
action which, whether in anticipation of the conjugal act, or in its
accomplishment, or in the development of its natural consequences,
proposes, whether as an end or as a means, to render procreation
impossible” is intrinsically evil.2 Here, the Church is explicitly
rejecting such form of contraception as the Pill, condoms, and
spermicides.
Sexual intercourse is
naturally ordered to procreation. This order, like the way leaves are
ordered to produce food by undergoing photosynthetic activity in the
presence of sunlight, exemplifies the natural law. In the Latin text of
Humanae Vitae (Latin is the official language of the Church”, the
expression “per se destinatus” (in itself ordered) is used to indicate
the natural relationship that exists between intercourse and
procreation. What Church teaching opposes is the violation of the
natural ordination between intercourse and the initiation of new life
that God, Himself, has established. The Church does not oblige people to
have as many children as possible, or to engage in sexual intercourse
every time the wife appears to be fertile. She teaches that if the
married spouses do have sexual union, that they do not deliberately
attempt to negate the natural order that God established between the
marital act and His power to create new life. Contraception, so to
speak, slams the door in the face of God and encloses the married couple
in a world that is deprived of important avenues of grace and therefore
to sources of supernatural help.
At the same time, the Church
does not forbid married couples from enjoying conjugal love when they
know that procreation is either unlikely or impossible. The Church has
no objection whatsoever to married couples making love when the wife is
already known to be pregnant, when the wife or husband are infertile, or
when the partners themselves are infertile as a couple. As Pope Paul VI
states in Humanae Vitae: “Marital acts do not cease being legitimate if
they are foreseen to be infertile because of reasons independent of the
spouses”.
Throughout her history, the
Catholic Church has maintained a clear, forceful, and consistent
position in her teaching about the essential evil of contraception.
After surveying the Church’s historical teaching on contraception, Pope
Paul VI’s Minority Report offered the following statement:
One can find no period in
history, no document of the Church, no theological school, scarcely
one Catholic theologian, who ever denied that contraception was always
seriously evil. The teaching of the Church in this matter is
absolutely constant. Until the present century this teaching was
peacefully possessed by all other Christians, whether Orthodox or
Anglican or Protestant.3
On December 31, 1930, only
four and one-half months after the Lambeth Conference opened the doors
to contraception for the Anglican Church, Pope Pius XI issued his
encyclical Casti Connubii (On Chaste Wedlock) in which he reiterated the
Church’s Teaching long-standing opposition to contraception, while
explaining that, for right reasons, it is permissible to confine
conjugal acts to known periods of infertility.
In 1980, at the Synod of
Bishops, representatives of national hierarchies from around the world
addressed the issue of contraception. After giving the matter careful
consideration, the bishops professed their agreement with Humanae Vitae
and Vatican II’s Guadium et Spes on contraception. John Paul II ratified
their statement and, reflecting on the significance of the matter at
hand, stated:
Consideration in depth of all
the aspects of these problems offers a new and stronger confirmation
of the importance of the authentic teaching on birth regulation
re-proposed in the Second Vatican council and in the Encyclical
Humanae Vitae.4
In July of 1987, at a
conference on responsible procreation, Pope John Paul II reminded
participants that the Church’s consistent teaching has been vigorously
expressed by Vatican II, Humanae Vitae, Familiraris Consortio, and Donum
Vitae. He went on to say “The Church’s teaching on contraception does
not belong in the category of matter open to free discussion among
theologians. Teaching the contrary amounts to leading the moral
consciences of spouses into error”.5 In the words of one bishop: “The
Church has not changed its teaching against contraception. What is more,
the Church cannot change its teaching against contraception. Because the
Church sees that teaching as based on God’s moral order”.6
Humanae Vitae affirms the
Church’s consistent and historical teaching that there is an
“inseparable connection, willed by God and unable to be broken by man on
his own initiative, between the two meanings of the conjugal act: the
unitive and the procreative”.7
This teaching is not a mere “ideal”
for those who find contraception to be more “realistic”. It is eminently
practical, as attested by the great successes reported throughout the
world by couples who practice natural Family Planning. Moreover, because
NFP honours the personal wholeness of its practitioners, it accords with
the nature and dignity of their incarnate humanity.
Church teaching concerning NFP
recognizes the priority that the person has over pleasure, that love has
over appetite, and that generosity has over selfishness.
The Church’s teaching
concerning marriage and contraception is directed to the home, but its
implications are far-reaching, both in time and in space. One of the
greatest disappointments the Church has experienced in the second half
of the twentieth century is not so much the informed dissent from the
conscientious rejection of Humanae Vitae, but in so many Catholics
turning a blind eye and a deaf ear to its liberating message. It is the
truth, not the capacity to dismiss Church teaching that makes people
truly free. The Promethean gesture is self-defeating. God is man’s
supreme benefactor and the Church is his most reliable teacher. The
Church shines a light that reveals the holiness of marriage, the value
of the family, and the inviolability of human life. She is also a
channel of grace that helps make the truth liveable, and the community
of helpmates who assist in making them shareable. Her truths are the
truths that will enable husbands and wives to find the freedom they need
in order to love each other as God wills, and to raise children who will
take their rightful places in the world and continue the work of
renewing the face of the earth.
Permission given for
reprinting portions from “New Perspectives on Contraception” by Donald
DeMarco, PH. D., pub. By One More Soul, Dayton, Ohio, USA, 1999, pp.
109-119.
1 Pope Paul VI, Humanae
Vitae, Sec. 12.
2 Ibid, Sec. 14.
3 Minority Papal Commission
Report, The Catholic Case of Contraception, Daniel Callahan (ed.),
London, England: Collier MacMillan, 1969, p. 179.
4 Ronald Lawler, Joseph
Boyle, and William E. May, Catholic Sexual Ethics (Huntington, IN: Our
Sunday Visitor, 1985) p. 156; see also John Paul II, Familiaris
Consortio, Sec. 29.
5 John Paul II, “The
Church’s Teaching on Contraception is Not a Matter for Free Discussion
Among Theologians." L’Boservatore Romano, July 6, 1987.
6 Archbishop John F.
Whealon of Hartford, CT, the Hartford Catholic Transcript, Feb. 28,
1980.
7 Humanae Vitae, Sec. 12.
Dr. Donald DeMarco, Ph.D.,
a professor at Waterloo University, has written extensively on
contraception and other moral matters. For further information on
Contraception by Dr. DeMarco, we suggest his book titled “New
Perspectives on Contraception”, available from One More
Soul.
One More Soul,
1846 North Main Street,
Dayton, Ohio 45405,
1-800-307-7685
or (937) 279-5433
www.onemoresoul.com
E-mail: omsoul@omsoul.com
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AFFIRMATION OF THE VALUE OF NATURAL
REGULATION OF FERTILITY BY
THE NATURAL FAMILY PLANNING SUMMIT
MEETING
(Rome, Dec. 9-11, 1992)
2000, Issue 3
- The natural methods are easy to teach and understand. They do not
require literacy.
- The health of mothers and infants if furthered through spacing
childbirth in a natural way which harms neither the mother not her
baby, or the health of couples.
- the freedom and rights of the wife and husband are respected
through these methods which centre around the woman and are based on
the integrity of her body.
- Because they indicate the time of fertility, the natural methods
can help couples to achieve pregnancy. These methods have brought joy
to couples facing problems of apparent infertility.
- The natural methods can develop a deeper interpersonal
relationship between a wife and husband, based on communication,
shared decisions and mutual respect. The use of these methods
reinforces marriage and hence strengthens family life.
- The natural methods promote a positive attitude towards the child
and maintain reverence for human life at all stages of development.
- The natural methods are compatible with all cultures and all
religions.
- These methods do not place a financial burden on families hence
they are welcomed by many women and men in developing countries.
- Development of sexual responsibility, understood as chastity
before marriage and fidelity in marriage, is fostered by knowledge of
our fertility. The teaching of Natural Family Planning is therefore of
primary importance in preserving reproductive health, including the
prevention of AIDS and other sexually transmitted diseases.
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Articles in 2000,
Issue 4 are not available
