Posted on 01/13/2004 6:30:40 AM PST by dead
A Belgian cardinal who is among the leading candidates to succeed Pope John Paul has broken the Catholic church's taboo on the use of condoms, declaring that, in certain circumstances, they should be used to prevent the spread of AIDS.
Godfried Danneels was careful to say he preferred abstinence as a means of prevention, but added that if someone who was HIV-positive did have sex, failing to use a condom would break the sixth commandment, thou shalt not kill.
His comments are a further sign that the ailing Pope may be losing some grip on the more liberal wing of his immense church. Shortly after being named a "prince of the church" last September, Cardinal Keith O'Brien, of Scotland, said the ban on contraception should be debated, along with such issues as priestly celibacy and homosexual clergy.
In an interview with the Dutch Catholic broadcaster RKK, Cardinal Danneels said: "When someone is HIV-positive and his partner says, 'I want to have sexual relations with you', he doesn't have to do that . . . But when he does, he has to use a condom."
He added: "This comes down to protecting yourself in a preventive manner against a disease or death. [It] cannot be entirely morally judged in the same manner as a pure method of birth control."
The cardinal's argument emphasises the importance of human life, the very factor that Pope John Paul has long evinced as justification for a ban on all forms of contraception.
The Catholic church teaches that abstinence, including between married couples, is the only morally acceptable way to prevent the spread of AIDS.
Cardinal Danneels's views clash with those aired last year by Cardinal Alfonso Lopez Trujillo, the Vatican's top adviser on family questions. The Colombian cardinal claimed that condoms could not halt HIV because it was small enough to pass through them. He said relying on them to prevent infection was like "betting on your own death".
Those remarks were condemned by, among others, the World Health Organisation, which said condoms reduced the risk of infection by 90 per cent.
In 2000, Cardinal Danneels caused consternation in the Vatican by suggesting that popes should not remain in office until they died but have limited terms.
Cardinal Danneels, 70, and Archbishop of Brussels and Mechelen,
has also called for flexibility and leniency for Catholics who divorce and then remarry without obtaining a church-sanctioned annulment, and has said he advocates women playing a larger role in the church.
Objectively, you're right. However, if her motivation for using the condom is to protect her life, that is a mitigating factor.
The only correct answer to this problem is abstinence and cultural change. Any other "answer", such as the one you propose, will result in more death, and more suffering in both the short and long term.
How? What do you do for the women who are exposed while we're waiting for this "cultural change" to take place? Just tell 'em "tough luck"?
This whole issue is like the "cases of rape and incest" arguments for abortion.
Nope. Abortion involves intentionally taking the life of a fetus. Using a condom, in this situation, protects the life of a mother.
To think that protecting women exposed to AIDS will somehow result in the collapse of the Church's teaching on contraception leads me to wonder how strong you think that teaching is in the first place. I think it's strong enough to admit of an exception like this.
How do you know? Doing nothing condemns her to death.
How about sweeping cultural changes and a committment to Christ. There is a radical idea.
How about it? What do you tell the women who are waiting for cultural changes to be driven by the very men who are exposing them to the AIDS virus?
You accuse me of being secular, yet anything you offer is of NO HELP to them, whatsoever, and of small comfort to the family the woman will leave behind.
I can no longer talk to a friggin' disingenuous jerk like you!
I try to have an honest conversation, and you come in with the ad hominems.
You're an example of why the Church has trouble reaching people, because of arrogance!
I can no longer talk to a friggin' disingenuous jerk like you!
I try to have an honest conversation, and you come in with the ad hominems.
You're an example of why the Church has trouble reaching people, because of arrogance!
I can no longer talk to a friggin' disingenuous jerk like you!
I try to have an honest conversation, and you come in with the ad hominems.
You're an example of why the Church has trouble reaching people, because of arrogance!
To some African men with the AIDS virus, it is. What does this mean for their wives?
It's of help after the woman contracts the AIDS virus.
What do you tell her to avoid getting the AIDS virus? Accept the passive will of Christ? Lay back and enjoy it? Wait for the culture to change?
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