HIV, The Wretched of the Earth, and CC's Teaching

[nerfherder]

Again you blame the Churc for the misery caused by peoples promiscouity. Again you expect the Church to overturn 2,000 years of teachings because of what is going on in one region at one point in time.

Please see my additional notes below c 118.

And please please be clear that we are not blaming the Church. We are not indulging in low blows. We are trying to understand one of the teachings of the Church, see how it applies to death of millions, and see both impact and resolution of the quandary.

 

[nerfherder]

Sex in marriage that isn’t open to life is immoral and sinful. Using a condom prevent the spread of HIV also prevents life which is immoral in all cases. You can not ever get a moral out come form an immoral act. I know that sounds rabidly uncaring and I assure you that isn’t my intent. My point is the spiritual ramifications of braking natural law is far worse than the effects of any disease. We tend to focus far to much on the exterior horror of HIV and forget than the focus of this life is not the “quality of life” but the after life.

Did you read Fr K’s opening quote? He is stating just the opposite. Condom use saves life, and as saving life takes priority over giving life, he argues it is not immoral where HIV is concerned - a mother can be protected from being infected by an HIV+ father. Please read post # 1.

 

[nerfherder]

I read the quote and am disgusted that Catholic theologians would even consider this a valid topic for discussion.

We are all going to die and when we do we will have to face God’s Justice. Is sex really worth going to hell for all eternity? I would rather live a celibate life than risk my soul’s final destination.

Anyone knowing they have HIV who has sex ,with a condom or not, is commiting a mortal sin against the 5th Commandment “Tho shalt not kill.”

Do you know the failure rate of condoms for pregnancy? A leading NZ abortionist stated that 30% of the abortions she performed were due to condom failure. And the HIV virus is smaller than human sperm.

Not all HIV infection is caused by sex by any stretch of the imagination. There are a variety of other reasons. Go Google.

I have posted a United Nations AIDS programme advisory on the efficancy of condoms, for information, which would help you to understand that they are effective.

I do not understand that you would prefer 200 million people or more to die, so that you can take a ‘moral’ stance on condoms and sex: life takes priority over procreation. Come and watch people die, in delierium, covered in faeces, wracked with pain, full of candida/thrush, unable to keep food down, and covered with cancer sores.

Did not Christ teach compassion and healing above all. Does not Christ have priority over the Church’s teaching? What stance should we take, once we get over our knee-jerk reaction?

 

[nerfherder]

I don’t buy into the AIDs across Africa thing. Some of it may be due to HIV infection, yea, I’ll give you that, but my nickel is on the drinking water.

You better put a dollar on a whole complex of issues that relate to poverty, undereducation, lack of health services, customary beliefs, concepts like the one that men can be cured or prevented from getting HIV by having sex with a baby - and then come and talk to the doctors who have to save the child’s body, the deferential role of women ad infinitum.

Yes, of course people would be healthier with clean drinking water, but dirty water does not cause AIDS, although it contributes to its effect on the individual who is infected.

Go Google - better before you make a statement like this. Not helpful I think.

 

[nerfherder]

Sex in marriage that isn’t open to life is immoral and sinful. Using a condom prevent the spread of HIV also prevents life which is immoral in all cases. You can not ever get a moral out come form an immoral act. I know that sounds rabidly uncaring and I assure you that isn’t my intent. My point is the spiritual ramifications of braking natural law is far worse than the effects of any disease. We tend to focus far to much on the exterior horror of HIV and forget than the focus of this life is not the “quality of life” but the after life.

So it’s good that people die fast so they can go to heaven and life everlasting?

I know you are trying to sound rabidly uncaring (above), and I am sure that is not your intent. But what are the alternatives? Surely there are some? Especially in marriage where one partner is infected: both sex and procreation are prohibited by your reading of the issues.

 

[nerfherder]

You want the Church to overturn 2,000 years of teachings out of a misguided compassion for people in a certain region at a certain point in time.

Please be absolutely sure that no one blames the Church - which needs as many members as possible.

Your concept of ‘misguided compassion’ is puzzling in the extreme: what would Christ have done? Left 200 million people to die?

And as I have pointed out in response to the idea that this is an ‘African thing’ that is completely erroneous.

Go Google UNAIDS.

 

[nerfherder]

Killing your self to kill others is a completely different thing. Even in the example of someone blowing themselves up of an abortion clinic, where immoral actions take place every day. There is no morality in this because of the command “Thou shalt not Kill” which applies even to yourself. Even if you manage to shut down the clinic (arguably saving lives) it is still completely immoral act.

I think someone has implied, correctly, that interpreting absolutely Absolute Truth of one’s faith, without considering alternative interpretations (in the Catholic case the priority of saving life over procreation), leads to the current Muslim intifada and the deaths of thousands of innocent people.

Taking care of the sick helping to make sure they die with the sacraments and with human dignity would be far more caring and loving that condoning people to live in sin.

No one wishes to condone people living in sin. Your point here about the role of the Church in caring for those who are dying of HIV and AIDS, or helping to supply drugs - which must be taken at the same time every day for the rest of one’s life - may be a major role for the Church, or individuals within it.

It is against Natural Law to take the procreative element out of sex - marital or otherwise. When you do, even to “save a life” you have perverted the act and made it an abomination.

Can you elaborate on the saving of lives as being against Natural Law? I have always been confused about the definition of ‘Natural Law’ as far as the CC is concerned.

 

[nerfherder]

Killing your self to kill others is a completely different thing. Even in the example of someone blowing themselves up of an abortion clinic, where immoral actions take place every day. There is no morality in this because of the command “Thou shalt not Kill” which applies even to yourself. Even if you manage to shut down the clinic (arguably saving lives) it is still completely immoral act.

Can you elaborate on the saving of lives as being against Natural Law? I have always been confused about the definition of ‘Natural Law’ as far as the CC is concerned.

 

[nerfherder]

LJN21:

Killing your self to kill others is a completely different thing. Even in the example of someone blowing themselves up of an abortion clinic, where immoral actions take place every day. There is no morality in this because of the command “Thou shalt not Kill” which applies even to yourself. Even if you manage to shut down the clinic (arguably saving lives) it is still completely immoral act.

I think someone has implied, correctly, that interpreting absolutely Absolute Truth of one’s faith, without considering alternative interpretations (in the Catholic case the priority of saving life over procreation), leads to the current Muslim intifada and the deaths of thousands of innocent people.

Taking care of the sick helping to make sure they die with the sacraments and with human dignity would be far more caring and loving that condoning people to live in sin.

No one wishes to condone people living in sin. Your point here about the role of the Church in caring for those who are dying of HIV and AIDS, or helping to supply drugs - which must be taken at the same time every day for the rest of one’s life - may be a major role for the Church, or individuals within it.

It is against Natural Law to take the procreative element out of sex - marital or otherwise. When you do, even to “save a life” you have perverted the act and made it an abomination. Can you elaborate on the saving of lives as being against Natural Law? I have always been confused about the definition of ‘Natural Law’ as far as the CC is concerned.

 

[nerfherder]

I undestand that is the assertion, but it is a faulty type of reasoning. A good end is never justified by an evil means. Once the act is frustrated, like using a condom, it is no longer a good act. It is not sex but masturbation.

If I am reading Fr K’s opening quotation correctly, it is the teaching of the Church that he is pointing to: life over procreation. I think you may be giving us your opinions rather than the actual teaching of the Church.

Perhaps you would like to elaborate the Church’s most current policy on the matter of saving life vs preventing procreation. Or if you cannot do it, perhaps someone else will. Fr K is certainly au fait with the latest policy - let’s check it out.

 

[nerfherder]

nerfherder,

I note from your profile that you are converting to the Catholic faith.

Is the issue of birth control one you find troubling within the faith?

Nah - I’m too old to worry about that.

Except that I still have to work through issues of contraception, abortion, euthanasia, Absolute Truth, Truth, truth, accepting what the Church says with grace and humility, transubstantiation, the extent of the Teaching of the Church, the Garden of Eden vs Original Sin and evolution, the divine inspiration of the Magisterium, infallibility, the veneration of Mary and the virgin incarnation, the Dogmatic Constitution of Vatican II, the difference among practising Catholics between doctrine and their behaviours, engagement with other faiths, inter alia.

And I wonder: if God made sure to give me free will, then why does the Church seem to take so much of it away? And that is applicable in the case of HIV prevention, is it not?

 

[nurseryworker]

I remember during my university years coming across an article in the school newspaper writing about a scientist who made the claim that HIV did not cause AIDS. I thought he was a crackpot and decided to see if I could locate any of his work…at the time I found a paper entitled* AIDS Acquired by Drug Consumption and Other Noncontagious Risk Factors* published in 1992 in Pharmacotherapeutics . It was about 80 pages long and I photocopied it and started reading. I started reading with the viewpoint that this guy was a nut and instead that paper convinced me he was far from a nut. The gist of his paper was that if AIDS was caused by a virus, there should be a definitive incubation period and a predictable progression of the disease and its’ symptoms. There is no common, predictable pattern of AIDS symptoms in patients of different risk groups. Instead, different risk groups have characteristic AIDS diseases. Thus AIDS does not meet even one of the classical criteria of infectious disease. He goes on to discuss in detail each of these groups of people (hemophiliacs, IV drug users, cocaine addicts, homosexuals and Africans) and the reasons behind immunodeficiency in each group.

duesberg.com/index.html is his website for those who’d like to read his papers for themselves.

To address some points made earlier. I don’t understand the argument for condoms in the case of rape. The only reason a rapist would wear a condom is to prevent his identification from DNA left behind, not to protect his victim from HIV or because he listens to what the Church says (if that were the case, he wouldn’t rape to begin with).

In the case of philandering husbands, the focus should be on educating boys to be abstinent until marriage and then to remain faithful to their wives throughout marriage when they become men. The Church teaches adultery is a serious sin so again, if these men were listening to the Church to begin with they would not be having premarital or extramarital sex. How does advocating for the condom promote the dignity of men and women? It discourages men from exerting control over their sexual urges and encourages men to view women as objects to be used to satisfy those urges.

NW

 

[jack_hawkins]

please - HIV denialism is bunkum, there is no other word for it.
there was a time when this hypothesis was remotely possible, and then research was done to clarify once and for all
this movement has only served to delay access to vital drugs in sub-Saharan Africa
the most telling evidence is the dramatic change in prognosis with the introduction of Highly Active Anti-Retorviral Therapy

 

[fix]

I think the story in Mark 2:23-27 shows there are time when the Law is to be set aside in promotion of a greater good.

There is no analogy here. Working on the Sabbath is not intrinsically evil, but contraception is. There is no dispensation form intrinsically evil acts. If there is please provide some evidence.

 

[fix]

By quoting this point, you have confirmed the Jesuit’s point exactly: it is lawful to tolerate the lesser moral evil - one form of contraception - in order to promote a greater good - preservation of life by using a condom to prevent HIV.

The entire quote reveals Church teaching. It is never justified to use an evil means to obtain a good end. No one is exempt from acts that are intrinsically wrong.

 

[fix]

So what do good Catholic kids who are sent to Iraq to fight a war that cannot be won do about their morals, and particularly the commandment about not killing? Is this a relevant question here?

I have no idea of your point? If one thinks their actions of fighting in a war would be unjust then they ought not fight. Has the Church bound anyone’s conscience in that fight?

In the condom case we have Church teaching to inform our conscience. The teaching is such acts are never correct. Once one knows this one is bound.

 

[fix]

If I am reading Fr K’s opening quotation correctly, it is the teaching of the Church that he is pointing to: life over procreation. I think you may be giving us your opinions rather than the actual teaching of the Church.

Perhaps you would like to elaborate the Church’s most current policy on the matter of saving life vs preventing procreation. Or if you cannot do it, perhaps someone else will. Fr K is certainly au fait with the latest policy - let’s check it out.

I simply repeat what the Church has taught and offered links to Vatican teaching. Does the Father have magisterial documents to show his teaching is approved?

 

[jack_hawkins]

. If for no other reason that condoms tear, they aren’t 100% effective. To say that they’re e.g. 90% effective (not sure what number you actually use), so sex is now safe is ridiculous

well a lot more than 90% effective for one thing
“sex is now safe” - a straw man argument
who here has made that statement
try the reality which has been stated over and over again
condoms like many other interventions work in conjunction with other measures
please let’s get away from these silly straw man arguments

 

[vern_humphrey]

Vern, I don’t think the situation is nearly as simple as you describe. If you ask Nerfherder for a copy of Fr. Kelly’s paper you will see he is calling for more than the Church giving a green light to condoms… he is calling for the Church to take a more active leadership role in the HIV pandemic.

And sending mixed messages – “Don’t do that, but when you do it, wear these.”

The Church’s servant role in caring for those stricken with the infection is well known. Approximately 25% of global care to those with HIV/AIDS is from Church organizations or Catholic NGOs. But it has roles beyond that which it hasn’t fully realized.

I have no problem with caring for people. My problem is with abandoning the method that works and leading people down the garden path with the method that doesn’t work.

Consider its role as a Protector of Morals. Fr. Kelly writes:
“the Church likewise speaks out strongly against adultery, fornication and lustful thoughts. It also speaks out against the debasement of girls and women which these practices so frequently imply. The Church further speaks out in defence of the right to life and the sacredness of life. Hence it condemns abortions which are deliberately sought in order to terminate the life of an unborn child. Also, when speaking about landmarks in the human and Christian vision of marriage, it states that “every action which … proposes … to render procreation (conception) impossible” is illicit (Humanae Vitae, §14).”

And after speaking out, we issue the tools to commit those sins?

These are all important values in which the the world community needs the Church’s leadership. I don’t think anyone here is asking for anything different. Yes, some of us may think the Church leadership should re-visit the issue of condoms to prevent HIV transmission, but doesn’t mean we reject the idea that artificial birth control is wrong.

When we start handing out condoms to gays, we are saying that we support illicit sex. We are also telling them a lie – that there is such a thing as “safe sex” outside of a faithful marriage.

The Church can especially do good in promoting the value of abstinence. Surely this is something we can all agree on.

We can’t do it while handing out condoms.

I don’t think this thread is about an either/or choice.

AIDS is an either/or disease. You have it or you don’t.

And **if **you have it, the overwhelming odds are you got it through illicit sex. AIDS is spread through behavior – and we cannot encourage that behavior or lead people to think that somehow that behavior can be made “safe.”

 

[seekerz]

In the case of philandering husbands, the focus should be on educating boys to be abstinent until marriage and then to remain faithful to their wives throughout marriage when they become men. The Church teaches adultery is a serious sin so again, if these men were listening to the Church to begin with they would not be having premarital or extramarital sex. How does advocating for the condom promote the dignity of men and women? It discourages men from exerting control over their sexual urges and encourages men to view women as objects to be used to satisfy those urges.

NW

That is indeed a worthy goal but we have to be realistic: sexual indiscretions have been a part of human life (even some of the noblest ones) since the dawn of time. People fall, they rise, they ask forgiveness.

Are we saying that a woman must risk her life and the well-being of her children to fulfill her duties as wife if her husband sins (even once) and so brings HIV home to her? Worse yet for the spouse of someone who gets HIV in a way that is not sinful. If everybody in the world stopped having sex today, there would be still plenty of ways for HIV to spread: not the least of all because some are born with it.

I have been taught as a Catholic that God calls some to single life, some to religious and some to marriage. Where else in the course of history have vast numbers of married couples been called to lifelong abstinence? Is that in line with the teachings of the Church and according to natural law? Might that, if it were attempted at all, not lead to more temptation and mortal sin?