Dumbing-Down the Pro-life Movement

CatholicCitizens.Org ^ | 9/1/03 | Dr. Brian Kopp

[Polycarp]

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		Dumbing-Down the Pro-life Movement 9/1/2003 4:05:00 PM By Dr. Brian Kopp - Catholic Family Association of America, www.cathfam.org Pope Paul VI warned that the contraceptive mentality was counter to Christian morality, and would open the floodgates of divorce, abortion, euthanasia, and moral decine. He was right, but some pro-lifers still don't get it. In this post-Christian era of American society, where conservative politics and the multitude of Christian sects blur in a desperate attempt to build more effective coalitions, many pro-life activists have embraced a ‘least common denominator’ approach to confronting the problem of legalized abortion. In so doing, basic fundamental tenets of moral theology are set aside in hopes of forging a voting block large enough to accomplish incremental advances in this long entrenched battlefront of the culture wars. But by allowing ‘exceptions’ and contraceptions, has political expediency so diluted the Pro-life movement that its political effectiveness and its very moral foundations have been compromised? Has the Pro-life movement been dumbed-down to the point of being unable to credibly defend the unborn? Broad coalitions and voting blocks are essential for achieving political victories. Unfortunately, each incremental increase in size of the ‘conservative/pro-life’ voting block has been gained by incremental lowering of the ‘least common denominators’ to being Pro-life. The most obvious and most debated lowering is in allowing exceptions for the ‘hard cases’ of rape, incest, and the life of the mother. A further lowering includes a generic ‘health of the mother’ exception, which casts a net so wide that the most ardent pro-lifers leave the coalition, and the line between pro-life and pro-choice becomes hopelessly blurred. The pro-life movement began in the late 1960s and early 1970's in response to efforts to legalize abortion. In the ensuing years, the coalition set aside arguments over ‘exceptions’ to forge a larger coalition. The issue of contraception was never credibly debated because many of the movement’s founders were evangelical Protestants who held that the issue had already been ‘settled,’ in spite of the historic Christian traditions to the contrary. For better or for worse, in the interest of political effectiveness, compromises were made, and a movement was born. The historical Christian prohibition on contraception was first shaken by the Anglican's 1930 Lambeth Conference, and within three decades practically all the main Protestant sects had abandoned the universal Christian prohibition against contraception. A large portion of Catholics joined in the rejection of Humanae Vitae in 1968, so that in the earliest stages of the pro-life movement, contraception, a fundamental consideration in the fight against abortion, was never really examined or debated, in spite of Pope Paul VI’s landmark encyclical. The Pope had warned that legalized contraception would result in widespread divorce, abortion, euthanasia and disregard for life and morality, and of course, he was correct. The connection between the acceptance of contraception, beginning only in 1930, and the legalization of abortion, just four decades later, cannot be overstated. The apocryphal ‘right to privacy,’ upon which the horrid decision in Roe v. Wade was based, was first invented by five justices on the Supreme Court in the 1965 case Griswold v. Connecticut. That case held that married couples have a ‘privacy’ right to purchase contraceptives. To this day, Constitutional scholars openly concede that there was simply no foundation or precedent for such a ruling, but there was also no means to stop the Justices from imposing their morals on the nation. The Griswold ruling struck down the only remaining ‘Comstock Laws,’ which were written by Protestant legislators in the 1800's, and made illegal the sale or distribution of all forms of contraception. Over time, contraception and birth control became accepted in our culture because certain Christian sects abandoned traditional Christian teaching regarding sexual morality. The Roe v. Wade ruling was based upon that so-called ‘right to privacy’ unknown prior to Griswold’s overturning of anti-contraception ordinances. The fabricated legal foundations for the ‘right’ to birth control progressed naturally to the philosophical foundations of a ‘right’ to abortion. In Planned Parenthood v. Casey the US Supreme Court said: "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." This brutal honesty on the part of the US Supreme Court should have been cause for the pro-life community to reevaluate the role of secular and Christian acceptance of the contraceptive mentality is fomenting the legalization of abortion. Unfortunately, that didn’t happen. To orthodox Christians who form the core of the Pro-life movement, it is morally and philosophically inconsistent to support contraception and oppose abortion. The Pro-life community must come to understand the roots of the acceptance of contraception and the direct correlation between the contraceptive mentality and legalized abortion. Even the US Supreme Court admitted the connection. Surely the Pro-life community can address this topic, which has, for the most part, never even been debated, in spite of its role in the legalization of abortion. It can be argued that the dumbing-down of the pro-life movement (i.e. the acceptance of contraception and ‘exceptions’) has prevented any real success in advancing pro-life legislation, and set the movement back. By diluting traditional doctrines of sexual morality within the Pro-life movement, it has become less of a moral movement, and more of a political fishnet designed for harvesting voters for right of center Republican candidates who are expected to moderate their Pro-life views with sufficient ‘exceptions’ to be deemed ‘electible.’ The difference of opinion regarding contraception demonstrates that even Christians can’t agree on what constitutes orthodoxy in theology or sexual morality. Prior to the Lambeth Conference, the major differences between Catholicism and orthodox Protestantism surrounded the Sacraments and the definition of “salvation.” Until 1930, however, all Christians, be they Catholic, Eastern Orthodox, or Protestant, agreed on what constituted orthodoxy in moral theology - adultery, abortion, homosexuality, divorce, and contraception were universally condemned as gravely sinful. Sadly, only Roman Catholics have carried this torch into the 21st century. The general acceptance of contraception and the steadfast position of the Roman Catholic Church against it is now one of most compelling arguments that Roman Catholicism is Christ's church. In this context, the abandonment of sexual morality is a harbinger of that Great Apostasy foretold in scripture. And how could it be anything else? The dumbing-down of the Pro-life movement to its ‘lowest common denominator’ is a suicidal policy, and it must be resolved among pro-life Christians, even if the larger political pro-life movement refuses. Failure to resolve the inconsistency between being pro-contraception and anti-abortion pits the Pro-life movement against itself, a position from which we cannot effectively demand public policies protecting society from abortion. The pro-life movement cannot stop judges from ‘playing God’ in courtrooms or women from ‘playing God’ with their unborn babies if they insist on ‘playing God’ in their homes using contraception and birth control. Dr. Brian Kopp - Catholic Family Association of America, www.cathfam.org

[sinkspur]

I appreciate your response, but it is "up here."

People live "down here", and I really think the Church's response is just about right.

Engaged couples have to go through a six month preparation program in our diocese, with certain steps required, or no "church wedding." I regularly address "Engaged Encounter" weekends to talk about my experiences at the Tribunal, and about real-life cases where one or the other partner had some indication EVEN BEFORE THE MARRIAGE, that there might be a problem, but, "I thought he'd change!" Only the couple, sometimes, know each other well enough to be aware of these things, but they'd rather not deal with them. I try to get them to deal with them.

Thanks for the exchange.

[Maximilian]

you'll forgive me if "your" position struck me as a reactionary and unwarranted extension of Church teaching. It obviously isn't, which leads me to wonder why the Church, at least the American Church, has been so gung-ho on rhythm and NFP all these years without pointing out its proper place.

That's a big admission which takes a lot of character to make. I hope that I can show the same kind of character when I am faced with evidence that I'm wrong. Honestly, however, it's difficult to impute any "personal responsibility for learning the Faith" to individuals such as yourself when the things you're hearing from representatives of the Church does not coincide with true Catholic teaching. You have right to be able to rely on the validity of what your told by priests, catechists, teachers, etc.

To compare it to the situation in politics, the things you hear from the Republicans are vaguely more "conservative" than the things you hear from the Democrats. But how do they compare to an objective standard? Same thing with those promoting NFP, the charismatic movement, etc. They sound vaguely more "conservative" than Charles Curran or Hans Kung, but how do they compare to the objective standard of Catholic teaching as it has been defined over the course of 2000 years? Unfortunately, the answer too often is that objectively they really don't match the true standard much better than the liberals.

[litany_of_lies]

"If a couple lacks the maturity to be responsible parents, then they have no business getting married at that point in time. The primary purpose of marriage is procreative. If the couple is not ready for procreation, then the couple is not ready for marriage."

You still have to deal with Paul's statement in Corinthians:

"But if they cannot control themselves, they should marry, for it is better to marry than to burn with passion."

Someone told me today that their take on it is you have to understand Paul in the context of his, and therefore the Church's, position that his calling (celibacy and priesthood) is a "higher calling" than that of marriage. He isn't denigrating people who get married, but he's stating that "sacred celibacy" (don't know chapter or verse) requires more of a person called to it (hard to disagree).

So MAYBE Paul isn't saying "if you don't have self-control, get married even if you're otherwise not emotionally ready so at least you're not fornicating," he's saying "get married when you meet a like-minded person and stay celibate until then, taking comfort in the fact that your passions won't have to burn for a lifetime."

Interesting take-still digesting. Maybe he's saying both things in 20 or so compact words. The word "cannot" seems to run against this line of thinking, though.

I don't know how your statement about being ready for procreation and it being the primary purpose of marriage is supposed to apply the infertile or those past their fertile years. With all due respect, I think such people can marry for "secondary," non-procreative reasons without jeopardizing their souls.

And finally, in the real world, I don't know if ANY couple REALLY knows whether they have the emotional maturity to be responsible parents when they get married. I would think at best they would say "with God's help and grace we'll do our utmost." I'd almost be scared of the ones who are sure they are ready; it implies that they feel they don't need further emotional or spiritual development, which never should stop.

[litany_of_lies]

Not to quibble, but I don't think the Church has dealt with family planning issues during its entire 2000 years. Maybe I'm not giving the ancients enough credit, but did they even know that women had relatively fertile and infertile periods during the month, or if they did, were the men smart or communicative enough to "take advantage" of them?

Somwhere along the way, priests "on the street" must have observed the selfishness of some couples planning their sexual relations around the menstrual cycle, which would have given rise to the need for the Church to (eventually) take a formal position.

Maybe I need to get a life, but I think it would be real interesting to learn how the Church's position on children and family planning came to be from its inception, starting WAY before 1930, when the Protestants started giving in, but probably well after the original disciples.

[litany_of_lies]

BTW, thanks for the props. I suppose that many years ago we had the "right to rely on the validity of what you're told by priests,....etc.," but it would appear that the advice for today should be what Breshnev said: "Trust, but verify."

I also find it interesting that I used the word "reactionary." Upon further reflection (excuse me if this is boring), the true "reactionaries" are those who don't have a coherent belief system and have to "react" to each new development in science, technology, politics, etc. without a frame of reference. Those who have a coherent belief system don't "react" at all; they integrate and evaluate the goodness, badness, or indifference of a development by reference to that already-existing belief system.

So the Church didn't in this sense "react" to, say, the invention of the condom, it merely told the world "Anything that separates procreative from unitive is inherently evil. We've been saying this for hundreds of years. So what else is new?"

Meanwhile the incoherent world "reacted" by dazzled by the short-term and transitory "benefits" while ignoring the considerable and ongoing downside.

Transitioning to the political, this perhaps explains why the left, which hasn't had a coherent belief system since the 60s (Ann Coulter would argue for the 50s) is SOOO "reactionary" to any changes in Social Security, the education system, and the like, and why they'll decry segregation in one generation and support it in the next.

Maybe this is the working definition of a "reactionary" when you hear the term used by the mainstream media in regards ot political or religious issues: "A reactionary is a conservative or an orthodox religious person who has been proven right."

[Dajjal]

The Brave New World marches on...

WebMD Health

FDA Approves New Birth Control Pill

Seasonale -- First Birth Control Pill Approved for 'Seasonal' Periods

By Jeanie Lerche Davis
Reviewed By Brunilda Nazario, MD
With reporting by Gina Shaw.

Friday, September 05, 2003

The FDA has given its blessing to Seasonale, the first extended-cyle birth control pill. For women who dread their monthly period, there's no better news - the pill promises to cut the number of women's periods to four times a year.

[snip]

In fact, the future likely holds even greater options, he adds. "This probably is the first step of a progression towards yearly ... periods, maybe longer -- absolutely."

"Even if a woman has no period for years and years, the safety has been well proven," Norris says.

[snip]

[Dajjal]

If a couple lacks the maturity to be responsible parents, then they have no business getting married at that point in time. The primary purpose of marriage is procreative. If the couple is not ready for procreation, then the couple is not ready for marriage.
235 posted on 09/09/2003 2:32 PM PDT by traditionalist

Thank you. This should be obvious to any properly catechized Catholic.
236 posted on 09/09/2003 2:45 PM PDT by Polycarp

Dittoes

[litany_of_lies]

Oh, this is too funny (not the news, which is not good, but the coincidence with Thread 245):

The Church's statement on this development is "Anything that separates procreative from unitive is inherently evil. We've been saying this for hundreds of years. So what else is new?" This pill does that, even if it doesn't have abortificant potential (does anyone know?).

I also thought a few days ago that the Church MIGHT be okey-dokey with a "mythical" egg-preventing pill (so much for "mythical"). That's obviously not the case.

It seems clear that the Church has three fundamental and clear positions:
- You don't take life in the womb.
- You don't snuff out a life just because it hasn't implanted itself.
- You don't mess with Mother Nature (Natural Law) in the reproductive process, except in "grave or serious" situations (the definition of which is subject to at least some debate).

Most of society buys into #1. People who bother to understand what's involved buy into #2. The American Church at least has done a lousy job of explaining #3. Very few are even aware of #3, and almost no one buys into it. This is not a good thing.

[Snuffington]

I sometimes wonder if some Catholics live in the real world. I've worked with the Marriage Tribunal, on and off, for 30 years.

I worked for 3 years with one of the formost secular researchers in marriage and family. He's neither Catholic, nor (more than nominally) Christian, but his work is heavily relied on in Catholic marriage preparation (as well as that of other Christian denominations). Being one of a two person IT team working for him, I got to see a LOT of data he gathered.

Yet not a thing I saw refuted traditional Catholic teaching about marriage and family. What it demonstrated most clearly was that people were simply "hooking up" and calling it marriage. They weren't making mature, serious, and deep commitments to one another. His data showed they frequently had never even discussed whether they wanted to have children before marriage.

In my opinion, that's the divorce (and annulment) problem in a nutshell. People taking marital vows without even knowing what marriage means are likely to find themselves unprepared for marital responsibility. It is no mystery why Catholic teaching about marriage and family looks alien to marriages like that.

[Maximilian]

Not to quibble, but I don't think the Church has dealt with family planning issues during its entire 2000 years.

It's true that scientific knowledge has changed some of the specifics of the issue. But the principles have remained unchanged since the time of Onan. The "pill" wasn't invented until 1958, but people have always used one method or another to avoid children. The New Testament mentions "pharmakeia" as a common problem of the time.

Here is a quote from a pastoral letter written by Cardinal Mercier in 1909:

It is clear, therefore, that marriage has for its primary end a duty from which married people cannot withdraw themselves; save in the wholly exceptional case where, by mutual consent, they agree to seek in voluntary continence the realization of a higher ideal - the mortification of the senses, and closer attachment to God and their spiritual interests.

[litany_of_lies]

One would suppose that you can be "ready for procreation" but still defensibly choose to delay it. Or am I missing something?

If a couple of college sophomores wish to marry, are they literally not supposed to until they graduate? You could argue that they're not going to be ready until they graduate because they won't be able to provide for a child. Seems to me that if they're "sure" and "prepared," they should marry ASAP. Then the NFP question becomes "Is our lack of financial wherewithal a 'serious' justification to use NFP?" True?

[Snuffington]

You still have to deal with Paul's statement in Corinthians...

I'm curious what it is about Paul's statement (especially in light of the rest of the Bible) that makes you think he was talking about NON-procreative sex. To me it seems to coincide easily with the notion of procreative sex, without a hint of Paul suggesting otherwise.

[Snuffington]

With all due respect, I think such people can marry for "secondary," non-procreative reasons without jeopardizing their souls.

Incidentally, they cannot do this within the Catholic sacrament of matrimony, which requires both to commit to attempt to have children and raise them in the Catholic faith.

If you're saying they may have more prominent reasons on their mind, well of course. But they cannot deny the essential elements of marriage and still validly claim to be married. Intending procreation is one of these.

[litany_of_lies]

My thought process on Paul is that he's telling people who can't control their passions to get married so they won't fornicate.

If that's how you should interpret that passage, many such people would, IMHO, have to be characterized as not ready to take on the responsibilities that having children entails immediately after they marry. They can't (not won't, can't) abstain (noted by Paul), so saddling them with immediate parenthood would seem to prevent the necessary maturation from occuring and would be unfair (must be a better word) to the new child, who would be raised by immature parents. Enter NFP, and the belief that such a situation consitutes a "serious" reason to practice it. What also has to be considered is the unfortunate chance that a couple who can't abstain (there's that word again) will resort to artificial birth control if the NFP door is shut.

Now I'll admit as I did in 235, that I might be totally misreading Paul. But why did he make such a strong statement ("cannot control" and "should marry") if he didn't also expect that some marriages need a lot of work before a couple is ready to have children? I'll give the grace of the sacrament and the Holy Spirit a lot of credit, but I can't support a claim that they are always immediately transformative, especially on an immature couple.

[sinkspur]

People taking marital vows without even knowing what marriage means are likely to find themselves unprepared for marital responsibility. It is no mystery why Catholic teaching about marriage and family looks alien to marriages like that.

Well, most dioceses require some preparation, including a compatibility profile and some discussions with mature married couples.

Pastors have to insist on this; I'd imagine some parishes take it more seriously than others.

My wife and I work with about five engaged couples a year, and, over the last five years, we've had serious reservations with three of them.

Two ended up breaking their engagement before they got married; the other couple got married and I have no idea what happened to them.

[litany_of_lies]

Incidentally, they cannot do this within the Catholic sacrament of matrimony, which requires both to commit to attempt to have children and raise them in the Catholic faith.

Hold on thar, Bobba Looie. I'm probably as receptive to thought-process change as I have been in a long time, but you can't be telling me that the Church won't marry a couple in their 60s, can you? That seems to be what you're implying as it relates to infertile or couple where the woman is post-menopausal.

How do a couple of 60-somethings keep a straight face when they're asked if they intend to procreate? I'd be tempted to say "we'll try like crazy, Father, but we're not very optimistic!"

I don't mean to mock your position, I really do want to understand it. Just injecting (a little) levity.

Or did God do what he did for old what's-her-name in the New Testament (I should know, I just have a mental block on it at the moment) so an older couple could say "See? It could happen"? (snicker)

[Poohbah]

Well, most dioceses require some preparation, including a compatibility profile and some discussions with mature married couples.

In my diocese, it's a minimum of six months; some parishes make it nine. And you're expected to go to Pre-Cana (a workshop with compatibility profile) and Engaged Encounter (done as a weekend retreat).

Pastors have to insist on this; I'd imagine some parishes take it more seriously than others.

You're right.

My wife and I work with about five engaged couples a year, and, over the last five years, we've had serious reservations with three of them.

On two occasions, when I heard that "A just asked B to marry him," I actually choked on my beverage, because A and B were a recipe for divorce. (in one of those cases, she actually stormed out of Engaged Encounter after throwing the engagement ring at the fiance in front of the group.)

[litany_of_lies]

In one of those cases, she actually stormed out of Engaged Encounter after throwing the engagement ring at the fiance in front of the group.

Better to throw an engagement ring before the marriage takes place than a legal brief afterwards!

We attended Engaged Encounter. It was considerably less than orthodox, which seemed cool at the time. We heard a few things we wanted to hear, and didn't hear a few things we needed to hear. In hindsight, I name at least 3 clearly erroneous messages that came out of it. I suspect it has changed for the better, but don't know for sure. We really saw it as a way to get of the more "burdensome" pre-Cana program. We also saw a couple split during EE, but we didn't have the ring-throwing.

BTW, to all those in the Engaged/Marriage Encounter/Retrouvaille movement...I salute you.

[Poohbah]

Well, the ring bit was, to quote mhking, a "just damn" moment.

We had a pretty orthodox EE.

But what summed up our marriage was seeing Apollo 13 together.

"Failure is not an option!"

[Snuffington]

...saddling them with immediate parenthood would seem to prevent the necessary maturation from occuring and would be unfair (must be a better word) to the new child, who would be raised by immature parents.

No offense to you, because I find the above an accurate depiction modern thought on the topic, but it's bunk. What is this "necessary maturation" before parenthood that allows for marriage? If a priest feels maturity isn't present, he needs to refuse to perform the marriage. He shouldn't marry children hoping they'll eventually grow into married adults.

I don't think Paul was talking about lack of self control due to immaturity. He was talking about the lack of self control to take up an entire lifetime of chastity. That's quite different from not being able to avoid sex as recreation (which is more like a pathology than a matter of normal morality).

Enter NFP, and the belief that such a situation consitutes a "serious" reason to practice it. What also has to be considered is the unfortunate chance that a couple who can't abstain (there's that word again) will resort to artificial birth control if the NFP door is shut.

Totally correct, and you're speaking to someone who fell for it hook-line-and-sinker early in my marriage. It's really not that hard to make this belief seemingly coincide with Humanae Vitae in a vaccuum. But viewed in light of the constant teaching of the Church on the matter, of which Humanae Vitae was only a restatement, it is incompatible.

But why did he make such a strong statement ("cannot control" and "should marry") if he didn't also expect that some marriages need a lot of work before a couple is ready to have children?

In addition to my comments above, I would add that your ears are attuned to our modern hyper-sexualized age, which sees constant recreational sex as the normative condition of mankind. Understand that in Paul's age, this was not the case at all. Nor was marriage assumed to have a "trial" phase before the couple was TRULY committed to it. Those are both modern corruptions that make Paul more difficult to hear, but no less correct.