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Friday, August 01, 2008 |
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Pastors Computer
By St Mary Administrator @ 10:11 AM :: 243 Views ::  :: Church News
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Dear Parishioners,
Forty years ago the papal encyclical Humanae Vitae appeared on the world scene. When issued it met with benign silence among priests and a rush of anger and backlash of apathy among lay people. Smug disdain characterized much of the reaction in the non-Catholic world.
Humanae Vitae reaffirmed that sex, the power of procreation, is sacred. It is never a power which involves individual rights alone but rights shared with the Creator.
Artificial contraception infringes on the rights of the Creator. Natural contraception through periodic abstinence or intercourse only during infertile periods works in concert with the Creator.
By practicing an idolatry which makes ourselves gods, by appropriating God’s rights to ourselves, we have set up a chain of causality which has successively abrogated the rights of the unborn, the rights of infants, the rights of children, the rights of young adults, the rights of women and finally the rights of men themselves. Abortion, the shame of American society lies under the surface of an unthinkable chain of crimes in our beloved land: infanticide, child abuse, banishment of youth, battering of women and degradation of men.
Failure to respect the prophetic voice of Pope Paul VI at the outset of the sexual revolution of the last forty years now finds a world society, and every person in it, plagued by the fear of AIDS and ignorance of its effects.
The religious and clerical vocation crisis in the Church is without doubt traceable to that shortfall of generosity which contracepts the “rhythm accident” and prevents the birth of the unexpected child of blessing who will later become a priest or sister.
Pope Paul VI made these four prophetic warnings: (1) the widespread use of contraception would “lead to conjugal infidelity and the general lowering of morality.” (2) the man who grew accustomed to the use of contraception would ultimately lose “respect for the woman,” and “no longer caring for her physical and psychological equilibrium” would come to consider her as in “instrument of selfish enjoyment, and no longer as his respected and beloved companion.” (3) the widespread acceptance of contraception would place a “dangerous weapon… in the hands of those public authorities who take no heed of moral exigencies.” (4) and, this is probably the most subtle yet important of all, it would lead men and women to think that they had limitless dominion over their own bodies and function. Idolatry is the original sin!
On the positive side Pope Paul gave us these prophetic words of encouragement: “this discipline which is proper to the purity of married couples, far from harming conjugal love, rather confers on it a higher human value. It demands continual effort, yet, thanks to its beneficent influence, husband and wife fully develop their personalities, being enriched with spiritual values. Such discipline bestows upon family life fruits of serenity and peace, and facilitates the solution of other problems; it favors attention for one’s partner, helps both parties to drive our selfishness, the enemy of true love, and deepens their sense of responsibility. By its means parents acquire the capacity of having a deeper and more efficacious influence in the education of their offspring; little children and youths grow up with a just appraisal of human values, and in the serene and harmonious development of their spiritual and sensitive faculties.” (sec. 21)
Fr. Ronald Crewe
Pastor—Sacred Heart Parish, Racine Wisconsin
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