Archive for May, 2015

‘The Devil Has Not Gone Away’ But the Faith Runs Deep in Ireland

celtic-cross“There is an old prophecy that the Faith in Ireland will nearly die out, but will reignite and turn the nation into a bonfire of Catholicism.”

Father Tom Forde, OFM Cap, is a Chaplain at the University of Cork. In this deeply serious interview, he unflinchingly discusses the agony of Irish Catholicism today —and points to an unexpected light on Ireland’s dark horizon.

Q. What do you think is the greatest myth about Ireland today?

A. That we are still the old Ireland, a country filled with green hills and sheep. The reality is that out of a total of about 6 million people in Ireland — 4.5 in the Republic and 1.5 in Northern Ireland– 1.5 million live in or near Dublin alone, with over 500,000 living in Belfast and another 250,000 in Cork. Therefore a sizable portion of the population is urbanized and that alone has an impact on religious practice. Most of the immigrants to Ireland have come from ‘Catholic’ countries but that has not significantly impacted on the practice rates. The Poles especially tend to stick together and intend to return to Poland.

Q. Could you provide some insight on what’s happening to the Faith in Ireland today?

A. The Faith runs deep. Human beings are naturally religious and the Irish are no different. Mary Kenny (an Irish Catholic journalist) has a book where she argues that the faith and interests of the laity of one generation determines the faith and interests of the clergy of the next. When the people were pro-British we had generations of clergy who were also pro-British but when the people turned against the British the clergy did too. The exception, she believes, were the religious who were often counter-cultural. It’s an interesting argument.

Q. What have been the major trends contributing to the lack of religious practice in Ireland today?

A. There is a connection between the decline in the practice of the Faith in Ireland and the swing away from traditional values, between a skepticism about nationalism, an increasing devotion to consumerism and above all the widespread embracing of contraception. On the latter point if one could chart the decline in Mass attendance and the increase in contraceptive availability/sales (especially after legalization in 1979) I think there would be a clear correlation.

Q. This is not unique to Ireland, of course.

A. Yes. The same rebellious spirit that swept the Church, especially in Europe and the States, swept Ireland too but it took a little longer to have its effect. Ireland looks much more to the States than to probably any other country largely due to the sheer numbers of emigrants who have gone there.

Q. Has this affected the Irish clergy?

A. The Irish Church is no different (than the people). America has long been the country of choice for religious and clergy to study since travel there became cheaper and easier. That swing away from Europe towards the U.S. has meant that the liberalism that has dominated the American Church has also dominated the Irish if in a more toned-down form. The clerical promoters of the morality of contraception seem to have received little resistance within the Irish Church in the 70’s or since.

Q. And what about today?

A. The bishops say the right things but do little it seems to correct abuses until they are public scandals. One Irish priest Fr. Iggy O’Donovan, a religious, was deprived of faculties in the Archdiocese of Armagh after he had publically celebrated Mass with a Protestant minister as concelebrant and carried out invalid baptisms. He was granted faculties in another diocese (Limerick). That was last year!

There is not much confidence in the Irish bishops – they are not very inspiring. Apart from Child Protection (at which the Irish Church now excels) the dioceses of Ireland are not known for doing anything well. Even the Eucharistic Congress in 2011 was like a throwback to the 80’s! Unfortunately despite Pope Francis’ warnings against careerism it still thrives. There are also dark rumours of some of the filth that Pope Benedict spoke about. The devil has not gone away.

Q. To what do you attribute this?

A. I think that the Irish Church, like the Irish nation, is largely in decline due to the embracing of contraception. Contraception is the technology by which the net fertility rate has declined to as low as 1.8 (should be at the replacement rate – a minimum of 2.1) and although it has temporarily jumped up a little it is still below 2.1. It has been below the replacement rate since the late 80’s. Our nation like the rest of the West and much of the civilized world is in decline.

Q. Contraception is a technology that is used by non-Catholics as well, of course.

A. Yes, but for the Church this is a double blow. The people who contracept are largely Catholic and this places them in conflict with the Church’s official teaching and God’s plan. Even if they are reassured by some clergy, in their hearts they know the two are irreconcilable. With a refusal to co-operate with God’s plan for human sexuality and fertility – a moral problem – there comes the spiritual problem that faith does not thrive under disobedience and this means an interior conflict. That interior conflict leads to either repentance or exterior rebellion – they walk away. It also means that not only will vocations not thrive in such an atmosphere but a contracepting people will not conceive enough babies to support their own future let alone the priesthood and the future of the Church.

Q. Certainly contraception is not the only reason why the Irish have turned away from their Church?

A. Of course not. Neither can it be denied that the abuse of children by clergy and religious both in institutions and in private has done immense damage to the Faith in Ireland.

It has done immense damage to the victims and their families. It has been a body blow to faithful clergy, religious and laity. It has reassured some that it is right to walk away. It has erected walls across the path to the Faith for others. It has handed the enemies of the Faith and the Church a weapon with which to scourge and torture.

Q. Yes, Catholics in many countries are familiar with this agony — and with the fury it generates.

A. Today, it is not easy to be Catholic in public in Ireland. But the Church and the Faith were in decline even before the scandals broke. Some suggest that the abuse of children and vulnerable adults by clergy, religious and laity are signs that something had gone profoundly wrong in Ireland (as it obviously had in other countries e.g. Holland). The rot was already there spreading beneath the veneer of Irish Catholicism.

Q. These are dark days indeed for the Faith in Ireland.

A. Nevertheless, there are signs of hope. There is an old prophecy that the Faith in Ireland will nearly die out but will re-ignite and turn the nation into a bonfire of Catholicism.

There are small groups of young people ardent for the Faith all over the country. They are already like veterans so toughened by opposition that they take it for granted. You have to have a thick skin to be Catholic in many parts of Ireland. Eventually some of them will make it not only into the clergy but into the episcopacy and perhaps then we will see a change.

In the meantime there are clergy who are loyal to the Faith and who want to see it flourish. They are quietly organizing and working to reinforce and to rebuild what they can.

The Irish Church has a long dark road still ahead of her but she is not alone – she never was.

Couple Welcomes Their 100th Grandchild, Says “We Could Start Our Own Town”

SARAH ZAGORSKI MAY 26, 2015, SPRINGFIELD, IL

zangers

In Illinois, Leo and Ruth Zanger are celebrating 59 years of marriage and the birth of their 100thgrandchild. Leo said, “The good Lord has just kept sending them. We could start our own town.” The Daily Mail reports that the couple has 12 children, 53 grandchildren, 46 great-grandchildren and one great-great-grandchild. Ruth added, “There’s always room for one more.”

The couple’s oldest child, Linda, is 58-year-old and their youngest is Joe, who is 31-years-old. In between are Debbie, Donna, David, Greg, Daniel, Mike, Steve, Chuck, Matt, and Ernie. On April 8th, the couple’s grandson, Austin, welcomed his second

child and the couple’s hundredth grandchild into the world, Jaxton.

For family get-togethers, the Zangers usually rent out a church hall and share the responsibilities regarding food preparation. Leo and0 Ruth’s daughter, Donna, said, “Everyone takes their turn (in helping with food),

and they all try and outdo each other. We are always getting together for something.”

Donna’s also been named the family historian because she keeps track of all the birth records, phone numbers and anniversaries in the family. She said,”(Other family members) always say, ‘Since you already have all of the phone numbers, can you just text (or call) them and let them know about whatever the event is?’ ”

Although the Zangers say they have plenty of excuses to gather, unofficial ‘mandatory’ gatherings are Thanksgiving, Christmas, Easter, Mother’s Day, and Father’s Day. ‘We’re all really close. We get together a lot,’ Austin told the Whig.

‘There’s always a lot of interaction. We spend a lot of time with each other. I know there are a lot of families half of our size who only get together maybe once or twice a year.’

Austin said that he and his wife didn’t know that Jaxton would be the 100th grandchild until Donna, the unofficial family historian, told them.

‘It’s pretty special — 100 grandkids, that’s a big deal,’ Austin told the Whig.

Ashleigh said she is extremely proud of being the mother of grandchild No.100.

The Zangers describe themselves as close-knit with, all of the grandchildren knowing Ruth and Leo and much of the family living in or near Quincy.

A family gathering usually consists of 50 pounds of ham or 10 turkeys, according to NBC. But the family has had a lot of time to hone a routine for supplies and duties.

‘It’s a very busy family, and we enjoy being around each other,’ Daniel told the Whig. ‘There’s never a dull moment. We always had a lot of fun growing up.’

Murder Before Conception

 

SoDn Joseph Gleasonurce: https://theorthodoxlife.wordpress.com/2013/12/09/murder-before-conception/

 

The Orthodox Church has historically taken a powerful stand against birth control.

Saints and Early Church Fathers put contraception on the same level as homicide.  St. John Chrysostom, St. Ambrose, St. Augustine, St. John IV Nesteutes (St. John the Faster), St. Clement of Alexandria, St. Epiphanius of Salamis, and St. Caesarius of Arles are among the holy Fathers who condemned contraception in the strongest imaginable terms.

St. John Chrysostom goes so far as to call it “murder before conception”.

Why is this the historic position of the Orthodox Church?
Why do the Saints say that birth control is equivalent to murder?

Murder in the Heart

Imagine that your next-door neighbor hates you. He does not merely dislike you;
He wants you dead.  He does not merely want you out of town, or out of the country.
He wants you off the planet.

His desire is for you to not exist.

According to Christ, this person is guilty of murder.  God not only judges outward sins;
He also judges sins of the heart.  Just as lust makes a person guilty of adultery,
hatred and anger make a person guilty of murder.

Murder by Time-Travel

Now suppose your neighbor hatches a wild plan. He attempts to invent a real working time-machine, so that he can use it to get rid of you. He does not want to kill you, because that would make a big mess, and he does not want to dispose of your body. He simply plans to go back in time, and provide your parents with birth control during the month you were conceived, so that you would never exist in the first place.

Does this new plan make you feel better about your neighbor?

Of course not.  Planning to avoid your existence is no better than murdering you.  Either way, he is showing hatred for you, regardless of the fact that you are a real human being, created in the image of God.  Even with his “time travel” plan, he is still a murderer at heart.

Now consider a slightly different scenario.  Instead of using a time-machine to go backward, you use it to go forward in time.  You and your spouse travel 12 months into the future, to see what your life will look like a year from now.  After making the trip, you find out that you will have a new little baby boy named “Johnny”.  He is a precious child, created in the image of God.

But you and your spouse do not want Johnny.  You don’t like him, and you would prefer that he never exist.  But you don’t really want to kill him.  You don’t want to dispose of his body.  So you just use your time machine to return to this present time. Then your family doctor provides a prescription for birth-control pills.  That way Johnny will never be conceived in the first place.  Thanks to you, Johnny will never exist.

If you do this, are you not showing hatred for Johnny?  Are you not a murderer at heart?

Yet millions of people make this sort of decision daily. With their current sexual practices, they know that a pregnancy is likely to occur within the next 12-24 months. They have good reason to believe that a precious little “Johnny” is on the way.  And with this likelihood in mind, they intentionally try to stamp out Johnny’s existence.  They use contraception, for no other reason than to avoid the existence of a precious child, created in the image of God.  In their minds, it would be better for Johnny to never exist.

They think about Johnny.  They hate him.  They seek to deprive him of existence.
By using birth control, they reveal themselves to be murderers at heart.

A child is a blessing, a human being created in the image of God.  It is an act of hatred–an act of murder–to intentionally avoid that blessing, whether the avoidance is done before the fact (via birth control) or after the fact (via abortion or infanticide).

Birth Control in the History of the Church

For 1,900 years, every church in the world opposed birth control.  Throughout history, the Greek Orthodox, Russian Orthodox, Serbian Orthodox, and every other Orthodox jurisdiction condemned the use of birth control.  Not only that, but the Catholic and Protestant churches prohibited birth control as well.  Prior to the 20th century, there was not a single “Christian” group that approved of contraception.

The Early Church Fathers did not merely call birth control a sin.  They called it murder.

One of the most respected saints in the history of the Church is St. John Chrysostom. The most frequently used Orthodox divine liturgy is named after him.  He was the archbishop of Constantinople, and he left us with many volumes of solid Orthodox teaching. Here is what he had to say about birth control, otherwise known as “medicines of sterility”:

“Why do you sow where the field is eager to destroy the fruit, where there are medicines of sterility [oral contraceptives], where there is murder before conception? You do not even let a harlot remain only a harlot, but you make her a murderess as well. . . . Indeed, it is something worse than murder, and I do not know what to call it; for she does not kill what is formed but prevents its formation. What then? Do you condemn the gift of God and fight with His [natural] laws? . . . Yet such turpitude . . . the matter still seems indifferent to many men–even to many men having wives. In this indifference of the married men there is greater evil filth; for then poisons are prepared, not against the womb of a prostitute, but against your injured wife. Against her are these innumerable tricks”

~ St. John Chrysostom (Homilies on Romans 24 [A.D. 391]).

Another well-known early Father is St. Ambrose, bishop of Milan. In his commentary on Genesis, this saint commented on the contraceptive drugs which many people procured during his time. He lamented that people using birth control,

“lest their patrimony be divided among several, deny their own fetus in their uterus and by a parricidal potion extinguish the pledges of their womb in their genital belly, and life is taken away before it is transmitted.’”

~ St. Ambrose (Hexameron 5.18.58 [CSEL 32: 184])

According to St. Ambrose, it was dreadfully sinful for people to limit the number of offspring, merely so they could avoid dividing their inheritance “among several”. When considering their children’s inheritance, they mistakenly believed that money and land would make a better heritage than brothers and sisters.

When the Fifth Ecumenical Council singled out twelve “Holy Fathers” as being worthy of particular attention and veneration, St. Augustine was included as one of the twelve. (This list of 12 Fathers also included St. John Chrysostom and St. Ambrose, already quoted above.) In one of his letters, St. Augustine strongly condemns the use of birth control:

“I am supposing that then, although you are not lying for the sake of procreating offspring, you are not for the sake of lust obstructing their procreation by an evil prayer or an evil deed. Those who do this, although they are called husband and wife, are not; nor do they retain any reality of marriage, but with a respectable name cover a shame. They give themselves away, indeed, when they go so far as to expose their children who are born to them against their will; for they hate to nourish or to have those whom they feared to bear. Therefore a dark iniquity rages against those whom they have unwillingly borne, and with open iniquity this comes to light; a hidden shame is demonstrated by manifest cruelty. Sometimes this lustful cruelty, or cruel lust, comes to this, that they even procure poisons of sterility, and, if these do not work, extinguish and destroy the fetus in some way in the womb, preferring that their offspring die before it lives, or if it was already alive in the womb to kill it before it was born. Assuredly if both husband and wife are like this, they are not married, and if they were like this from the beginning they come together not joined in matrimony but in seduction. If both are not like this, I dare to say that either the wife is in a fashion the harlot of her husband or he is an adulterer with his own wife.”

~ St. Augustine (Marriage and Concupiscence 1.15.17, CSEL 42:229-230)

In St. Augustine’s understanding, there is very little difference between contraception and abortion. Either way, the spouses are avoiding the blessing of God, and are intentionally stopping a real human being from walking on earth.  Birth control renders sexual relations illicit, even within a marriage.  By default, the marriage bed is holy and undefiled.  But according to this saint of the Church, birth control reduces the marital act to the level of fornication and adultery, satisfying one’s fleshly lust as with a whore.

St. John IV Nesteutes (St. John the Faster), a 6th century Patriarch of Constantinople, had the following to say regarding birth control:

“If someone to satisfy his lust or in deliberate hatred does something to a man or woman so that no children be born of him or her, or gives them to drink (pharmakon), so that he cannot generate or she conceive, let it be held as homicide.”

Many other Saints and Fathers of the Church have spoken likewise against contraception.
For example:

“Because of its divine institution for the propagation of man, the seed is not to be vainly ejaculated, nor is it to be damaged, nor is it to be wasted”.
~ St. Clement of Alexandria

“They [heretics] exercise genital acts, yet prevent the conceiving of children. Not in order to produce offspring, but to satisfy lust, are they eager for corruption”.
~ St. Epiphanius of Salamis

“Who is he who cannot warn that no woman may take a potion [an oral contraceptive] so that she is unable to conceive or condemns in herself the nature which God willed to be fecund? As often as she could have conceived or given birth, of that many homicides she will be held guilty, and, unless she undergoes suitable penance, she will be damned by eternal death in hell. If a woman does not wish to have children, let her enter into a religious agreement with her husband; for chastity is the sole sterility of a Christian woman.”
~ St. Caesarius of Arles

Marital Abstinence is Permitted

This last comment by St. Caesarius is noteworthy.  While he agrees with the patristic consensus that artificial birth control is equivalent to homicide, he nevertheless observes that “chastity is the sole sterility of a Christian woman.”  It would be wrong for a married couple to have sex, while using birth control to prevent conception.  But it is OK to avoid sex itself.  A married Christian couple is not required to copulate daily, in order to have as many children as possible.

St. Paul himself notes that marital abstinence is acceptable, as long as it is for the purpose of deepening the spiritual life of the couple:

Do not deprive one another except with consent for a time,
that you may give yourselves to fasting and prayer; and come together again so that Satan does not tempt you because of your lack of self-control. (1 Corinthians 7:5).

It is acceptable for a husband and wife to avoid sexual relations for a time, so they can focus on prayer.  It is also acceptable for a husband and wife to have normal sexual relations, with a willingness to conceive children.  But it is sinful to intentionally separate sex and conception from one another.  It is sinful to have sexual relations, while intending to avoid the conception of children.

Consensus Through Recent Times

As recently as 1963, in his book, The Orthodox Church, Bishop Kallistos (Timothy) Ware states clearly and without qualification:

“Artificial methods of birth control are forbidden in the Orthodox Church.”

(Timothy Ware, The Orthodox Church, Penguin, 1963, p. 302.)

Similarly, after the Humanae Vitae encyclical letter was released in 1968, reaffirming Rome’s rejection of contraception, the Ecumenical Patriarch Athenagoras of Constantinople reviewed it and then wrote a letter to the Roman Pontiff, affirming the Orthodox Church’s “total agreement” with the contents of the encyclical:

“We assure you that we remain close to you, above all in these recent days when you have taken the good step of publishing the encyclical Humanae Vitae. We are in total agreement with you, and wish you all God’s help to continue your mission in the world.”

(Patriarch Athenagoras telegram to Pope Paul VI, 9 August 1968, reprinted in Towards the Healing of Schism, ed. & trans. E.J. Stormon, 1987, p. 197.)

For nearly 2000 years, the Orthodox Church has spoken with one voice.
Contraception is a sin.  Artificial birth control is unacceptable.

If it was wrong for the Saints and the Early Church Fathers,
then it is wrong for us.

If it was wrong from the first century until the year 1968,
then it is still wrong today.

From the first century through the 1960s, I do not know of any Orthodox sources which advocate artificial birth control. The first hint of doctrinal innovation came in 1974 with
the article, “Morality of Contraception: An Eastern Orthodox Opinion”, written by Chrysostom Zaphiris and published in the Journal of Ecumenical Studies.  Interestingly, this article ignores 1900 years of Orthodox consensus on this topic, and fails to address any of the pertinent quotes from St. John Chrysostom, St. Ambrose, St. John the Faster, St. Clement, St. Epiphanius, etc.  Instead, Zaphiris invents a new “Orthodox” opinion out of thin air, without relying on the historic teachings of the Orthodox Church and its saints.

CJS Hayward offers an effective critique of the Zaphiris article in his booklet,
Orthodoxy, Contraception, and Spin-Doctoring, available from the Amazon.com website.

Thankfully, people like CJS Hayward, Taras Baytsar, and a number of other Orthodox Christians are remaining faithful to the historic teachings of the Orthodox Church.

Contraception is not a Christian option.

As St. John Chrysostom said, birth control is “murder before conception”.  

Evangelium Vitae – False Freedom at the Root of Abortion

Twenty years ago, Pope Saint John Paul II denounced the moral impoverishment, particularly abortion and euthanasia, that devalues human life in his encyclical Evangelium vitae. He described Christ’s central message that we “may have life, and have it abundantly,” which is the eternal life He came to bring that also gives “full significance” to “all aspects and stages of human life” (1). John Paul rails against a false notion of freedom and autonomy that is used to justify crimes against life, but actually inverts freedom and leads to the opposite of human good. An authentic understanding of freedom, freedom for excellence, is much needed in our culture to explain the goodness of life and opposition of abortion.

John Paul II does not wholly blame the individuals who face “difficult or even tragic situations” when facing abortion, and notes that such circumstances can “mitigate…subjective responsibility.” Rather, he locates the problem “at the cultural, social and political level” where legalized abortion is disturbingly interpreted as “legitimate expressions of individual freedom” (18). As he goes onto explain, this notion of freedom is fundamentally backwards and opposed to true democracy.

pregnant-244662_1280True freedom is the ability of every human being to seek their own good and potential; it is an expression of their intrinsic worth as made in the image of God and naturally harmonizes with the good for humanity as a whole and therefore does not involve killing or harming the human person. Law naturally recognizes this in the case of adults; we have a prohibition against murder, assault, and even illicit drug use that harms the individual himself and thus the wider social community of which he is an inseparable part.

John Paul praises the development of “human rights” in the Western tradition as the basis for constitutions and government. He says that “the various declarations of human rights and the many initiatives inspired by these declarations show … there is a growing moral sensitivity” that acknowledges the “dignity of every individual as a human being, without any distinction of race, nationality, religion, political opinion or social class” (18).

Yet the practical denial of the value of every human life in abortion and other crimes, he says, “is still more distressing…precisely because it is occurring in a society which makes the affirmation and protection of human rights its primary objective and its boast” (18). The United States and Western Europe posit our flagship virtue as the virtue of securing rights for all. America’s Declaration of Independence famously and rightly recognizes the foundation of society as affirmation of the rights of all humanity to “life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness.” And how tragic the contradiction when we say that some humans are not persons or do not have lives worthy of living simply because their end is likely to be swift.

John Paul excoriates the mentality which equates personal dignity with the “capacity for verbal and explicit, or at least perceptible communication” (19). In such a biased approach, the dignity of the unborn and the dying is rejected. In contrast, their dignity exists simply on the grounds of being human, of being made in the image of God. Even without an explicitly religious context, this dignity is what all declarations of human rights recognize. They are “human” rights, not rights of “humans who can communicate.” While secular democracies now abridge the rights of “fetuses” and the elderly, saying that they are not “persons,” it would be absurd to deny their humanity, which begs the question of the legitimacy of distinguished between “human” and “person”.

Actual human rights would recognize the freedom of these weak members of the human community, though they are “completely at the mercy of others and radically dependent on them, and can only communicate through the silent language of a profound sharing of affection” (19). Protection and love for these weak ones is the only authentic expression of human value; to dispense with them because of their weakness is to act as though we are fundamentally positioned competitively against or other members of our human family rather than in solidarity with them.

This atomistic view of self becomes a “promotion of the self,” that “is understood in terms of absolute autonomy,” and when this happens, “people inevitably reach the point of rejecting one another. Everyone else is considered an enemy from whom one has to defend oneself” (20). This defensive form of freedom is nothing more than the freedom of ‘the strong’ against the weak who have no choice but to submit” (19). John Paul II continues that this is tragically “the exact opposite of what a State ruled by law” is supposed to be. Governments, in classical philosophy, are meant to end the anarchy of the strong against the weak by enshrining protections for the weakest members. The culture of death, he says, “is a threat capable, in the end, of jeopardizing the very meaning of democratic coexistence: rather than societies of ‘people living together’, our cities risk becoming societies of people who are rejected, marginalized, uprooted and oppressed”  (19).

“God entrusts us to one another. And it is also in view of this entrusting that God gives everyone freedom, a freedom which possesses an inherently relational dimension” (19). This solidarity, relational freedom, ties us to the broader human community and sees individual growth and development as linked to the growth and development of all. In this way, a use of freedom that harms others is no true freedom.

Consider that forbidding murder does not make American citizens less free; on the contrary, it makes citizens free to thrive in a peaceful environment. Likewise, a prohibition on abortion does not abridge anyone’s rights or make anyone less free. On the contrary, it recognizes with love the humanity of the growing child and demands help for a struggling mother from the wider human community. Abortion, in contrast, leaves a woman alone and hurting when faced with an unplanned pregnancy.

St. Thomas Aquinas argues that man’s freedom is found precisely in his ability to act for an end goal. “Since man especially knows the end of his work, and moves himself, in his acts especially is the voluntary to be found” (Summa Theologica II-I, 6, 1). Man’s truest freedom is when he acts for the true good and highest end, which is eternal beatitude with God and on earth a life of flourishing, not merely his own pleasure. All acts of the will, or choices, are made for a perceived good. Though those who seek abortion seek it for an illusory good, the woman is more free when she chooses the higher end, which would be the life of the child and solidarity with that child. True freedom, then, expresses not mere power or compulsory force of the agent, but rather a formative knowledge of the good to be sought in human life—that is to say, as we make choices for the good, we actually become better. So freedom is not an indifferent principle, but a force for human development.

Our nation, every nation, would only benefit from promoting authentic freedom and a culture of life that values the development of all its citizens, not just the strong ones.

Stephanie Pacheco is a writer, blogger, and speaker in Northern Virginia. She earned a M.A. in Theological Studies, summa cum laude, from Christendom College and holds a B.A. from the University of Virginia in Religious Studies with a minor in Government and Political Theory. She has presented at a conference of the American Catholic Historical Association and for Christian Women in Action. She lives with her husband and two young children.

Father’s Day

New Study Confirms Free Morning After Pill Increases STDs, Fails to Cut Pregnancy Rate

Dr. Peter Saunders   Life News

Half of all pregnancies in the United States are unintended. One might therefore assume that making the morning-after pill (MAP) more widely accessible would cut the unplanned pregnancy rate.

Not so.

A new recent US study is the first to estimate the impact of making the morning-after pill available over the counter without prescription on abortions and risky sexual behaviour as measured by sexually transmitted infection (STI) rates.

Dr Karen Mulligan, associate professor of economics and finance at Middle Tennessee State University, found that providing individuals with over-the-counter access to emergency contraception (EC) leads to increased STI rates and has no effect on abortion rates.

Moreover, risky sexual behaviour such as engaging in unprotected sex and number of sexual encounters increases as a result of over-the-counter access to EC.

Mulligan’s analysis estimated that over the counter access increases STI rates by approximately 12% for women aged 15-44 and 9% for teenagers; these numbers are also consistent with the 12-17% increase in gonorrhea rates found in Washington as a result of expanded access.

She concluded that switching EC to over the counter status has three main effects on behaviour: individuals are more likely to have sex, they have a higher number of sexual encounters, and are less likely to use condoms.

The FDA approved access to emergency contraception, or Plan B (equivalent to Levonelle in the UK), through US pharmacies without a prescription in 2012 nationally. This followed pilot programmes in several states starting with Washington in 1998.

But the US’s persistence with this unproven strategy is apparently driven more by ideology than evidence.

In the light of Mulligan’s research, Dr David Paton, professor of industrial economics at Nottingham University Business School, today called on local and national governments in the UK to review their current policy of aggressive promotion of emergency contraception (EC) to young people in schools, pharmacies and sexual health centres.

‘It is very interesting to see further confirmation that access to emergency birth control (EBC) does not seem to reduce abortions but leads to higher rates of STIs. This paper is one of the first to explore the mechanisms whereby EBC affects STIs, finding that both rates of ‘unprotected’ sex and numbers of partners increase in response to over-the-counter EBC. Although this paper uses US data, it is consistent with evidence from the UK’, he said.

A previous 2012 American study showed that making emergency contraception available free over the counter without prescription leads to an increase in rates of sexually transmitted infections and does not decrease pregnancy or abortion rates.

Christine Durrance, Assistant Professor of Public Policy at the University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill, used county-level data as well as specific timing of changes in pharmacy access to consider the intended and unintended consequences of pharmacy access to emergency contraception in Washington.

The results were almost identical to those of a British study published in the Journal of Health Economics (full text) in December 2010 and reported in the Daily Telegraph in January 2011.

This research, by professors Sourafel  Girma and David Paton of Nottingham University, compared areas of England where the scheme was introduced with others that declined to provide emergency contraception free from chemists.

The academics found that rates of pregnancy among girls under 16 remained the same, but that rates of sexually transmitted infections increased by 12%.

In fact, in a systematic review published in 2007, twenty-three studies published between 1998 and 2006, and analyzed by James Trussell’s team at Princeton University, measured the effect of increased EC access on EC use, unintended pregnancy, and abortion. Not a single study among the 23 found a reduction in unintended pregnancies or abortions following increased access to emergency contraception (see also fact sheet here).

The phenomenon whereby applying a prevention measure results in an increase in the very thing it is trying to prevent is known as ‘risk compensation’.

The term has been applied to the fact that the wearing of seatbelts does not decrease the level of some forms of road traffic injuries since drivers are thereby encouraged to drive more recklessly.

In the same way it has been argued that making condoms readily available actually increases rather than decreases rates of pregnancy and sexually transmitted infections because condoms encourage teenagers to take more sexual risks in the false belief that they will not suffer harm.

Whilst condoms offer some protection against sexually transmitted infections the morning-after pill offers none.

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Britain has the highest rate of teenage pregnancy in Western Europe.  But international research has consistently failed to find any evidence that emergency birth control schemes achieve a reduction in teenage conception and abortion rates.

Now there is growing evidence showing that not only are such schemes failing to do any good, but they may in fact be doing harm.

Making the emergency contraceptive pill available over the counter free, without prescription, is sadly an ill-conceived knee-jerk response to Britain’s spiralling epidemic of unplanned pregnancy, abortion and sexually transmitted disease amongst teenagers. It is also not evidence-based.

The best way to counter the epidemic of unplanned pregnancy and sexually transmitted disease is to promote real behaviour change. The government would be well advised to enter into dialogue with leaders of communities in Britain where rates of sexually transmitted diseases and unplanned pregnancy are low, especially Christian faith communities, to learn about what actually works.

LifeNews.com Note: Dr. Peter Saunders is a doctor and the CEO of Christian Medical Fellowship, a British organization with 4,500 doctors and 1,000 medical students as members. This article originally appeared on his blog. He is also associated with the Care Not Killing Alliance in the UK.

The birth control pill is killing women, but no one’s warning them of the risk

monofasicaMay 7, 2015 (STOPP.org) — The young newlywed put herself at risk for collapse, stroke, heart attack, and death every day when she popped her birth control pill. Tragically, she had no idea there was any danger. Even medical personnel thought her symptoms were no big deal, and on more than one occasion chalked her symptoms up to dehydration. They never told her it could be that her contraception was causing blood clots.

Her name was Kate. She was a 28-year-old business woman whose story is told in “What Every Woman Needs to Know about Blood Clots” posted on the National Blood Clot Alliance “Stop the Clot” website. Kate’s symptoms started while she was in Hawaii on her honeymoon. She suffered pain in her calf that was so intense it woke her up at night. She went to an orthopedic surgeon, who ordered scans, found no problems, and dismissed her. She forgot about it. Seven months later she passed out in an airport following a flight. Medical personnel said she was dehydrated.

Completely unknown to her, Kate had developed deep vein thrombosis in her calf. From there, blood clots began breaking off and going to her lungs. These blood clots in the lungs, called pulmonary emboli, “can be life-threatening and in 10-15 percent of cases, cause sudden death,” according to Dr. Jack Ansell. Dr. Ansell is a hematologist and member of the National Blood Clot Alliance’s Medical & Scientific Advisory Board. The Alliance website goes on to quote Dr. Ansell: “The first sign of a PE can be death.”

Thanks to Kate’s mother, a nurse, who suggested that she might have pulmonary emboli, Kate got help and did not die. She caught it before it killed her. Many other women are not so lucky. They don’t learn the truth until it is too late.

The truth is that the birth control pill increases a woman’s relative risk for developing blood clots 300- to 500-fold—blood clots that can cause stroke, heart attack, blindness, brain damage, and death. Still, women are not warned about the risk of blood clots with their daily steroidal hormone pill. This is serious and senseless deception and negligence.

According to a Canadian Broadcasting Company report in June 2013, birth control pill manufacturer Bayer paid out in excess of $1 billion to settle thousands of birth control pill lawsuits in the United States. Those settlements were all related to two low-dose contraception pills, Yaz and Yasmin. At the same time, an investigation by the CBC revealed that pharmacists suspected the deaths of 23 Canadian women were attributable to those two same pills.

Miranda Scott, only 18, was working out at the University of British Columbia gym when she fell over backward and died. Her autopsy showed that she died of blood clots throughout her body. She was taking Yasmin at the time of her death. Her mother is now part of a Canadian class action lawsuit against the drug manufacturer, along with hundreds of family members and women who have been harmed or killed by the pill.

Yet, even as Bayer pays out huge settlements, it says it “stands by” its birth control products. Even Elizabeth Kissling, writing for the radical feminist magazine Ms, is troubled by the cover-up and lack of education and testing women are given before being prescribed the pill.

“Today . . . young women are again dying from something purported to help them, something that affects mostly women. Thousands more are experiencing life-threatening, health-destroying side-effects, such as blindnessdepression, and pulmonary embolism,” Kissling said, citing accounts of young women who had suffered all these consequences.

She referenced a first-person account posted on xojane.com, that highlighted this shocking quote by a young woman who almost died from pulmonary embolism caused by her birth control pill. “‘Isn’t this bizarre?’ [the young woman] asked doctors in the hospital. They shook their heads and informed me that they regularly encountered otherwise healthy young women with blood clots, almost all caused by birth control.”

The pill kills truth. It exists and is prescribed to women amid a swirl of chaos; amidst contradictions and lies; and amidst dead, blind, and profoundly injured women. Prescribing doctors tell women birth control is perfectly safe if they don’t smoke. Emergency room doctors tell women they “regularly encounter otherwise healthy young women with blood clots, almost all caused by birth control.” Billions of dollars are paid out by drug companies to settle lawsuits, while they say they still stand by their contraceptive pills.

Women need to know. Join American Life League and a host of sponsors around the nation on June 6 to expose the lies and shine the light on the truth about the pill. For more information, visit our website, thepillkills.org. To sign up to sponsor the National Day of Action and/or organize a local event, click here.

Reprinted with permission from STOPP

Fr John Hollowell’s sermon on sexuality

Summary of Fr John Hollowell’s sermon on sexuality

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* We representatives of the Church have failed to talk about sexual issues either because we are embarrassed or because we lack the courage.

* Public school sex education focuses on fear of pregnancy or of STDs, with the cure to both being one form or another of contraception.

* The accusation is made that the Church is obsessed with sex. The fact is that we have the obsession with sex and the Church is trying to help us deal with this obsession.

* We are told that the Church teaches us to feel bad about sex. The fact is that in 31 years he has never heard a sermon about saving yourself for marriage, about the problems with sex before marriage, about the joys and beauty of sex in its proper place, or about contraception.

* He has, however, dealt with people in the confessional who are devastated by the effects of pre-marital sex. Sex before or outside of marriage is Satanic communion; it is a Satanic sacrilege.

* Cohabitation endangers you soul.

* Contraception is sexual bulimia. Sterilization and contraception take God’s offer to co-create human beings with God and say: thanks, pal, for the offer, but I have my own ideas in mind.

* He sees the pain all the time from these sins.

* When we seek sex for pleasure, we are using the other person.

* If you have had sex, it is possible to start over.

* It takes heroic virtue to be chaste in this world.