Maternal Mortality rate and the morality of contraception

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We are not obligated to save a person’s physical life but in doing so be material cooperators in their eternal spiritual death.

There is a greater evil than bodily death, and that is eternal damnation.
 
save their life by helping them, not interfering with their natural body functions. Have you ever considered that maybe God is helping them by taking them out from under the control of evil men or government and bringing them into Heaven where they will no peace, love and eternal joy? If you want to save them, donate money, get doctors together to bring medicine and technology over there to save their lives, don’t send them a pill and say “here, dot procreate” BTW, do you know anything about the connection cancer has to the pill? And what about the correlation b/w abuse and contraception use? Look those up and then come back here with a more educated opinion about the solution to problems in the 3rd world countries
 
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migurl:
one other thing, if you are so worried about the non-white people, why are you trying to advocate contraceptives to them? Margret Sanger (founder of the contraceptives movement AND Planned parenthood) believed that all non-whites, catholics, women with 2 kids already etc should be immeadeatly put on contraceptives. SHe was racist and she admitted it. She also was a firm suporter of eugenics and breeding out the other races and less intelligent people in the world. Do you agree with her?
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Obviously, not. First of all, it’s wrong and second, I am black and from a third world country. I have seen exactly what is it like to have nine children you can’t feed. Haitian parents regular send their children to work for free (in exchange for food and shelter) with middle class families because they simply can’t afford to feed and shelter all of them. Many of these children end up being sexually abused and beaten by the people who “employ” them. They are regularly humiliated by the families who exploit their labor.

When they grow up, they sell themselves into slavery in the Dominican Republic. Or they brake the dangers waters of the Altantic trying to make it to Miami.

Now, I am in no way advocating that we take these children and put them out of their misery. But if a mother already has five children she can’t feed, and she has already sent three of them off to be exploited by a pampered middle class family, should she really have another child so knowing that child will face a life of malnutrition, exploitation, and possibly sexual molestation. How is this remotely loving?

Lastly, I realize that there are many other things that need to be done for the people of Haiti. I am in no way suggesting that we sterilize them and be done with it. I am only suggesting that it might be helpful in some cases.

Kendy
 
Then for some reason God wills that poorer, nonwhite people in the world have shorter more miserable lives than wealthy, western people. In fact, it is apparently, God’s will that American white people have longer lives than African-Americans.
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Hold hard.

For “some reason” by YOUR logic God wills that people throughout the world today have LONGER and LESS MISERABLE LIVES than people throughout the world 200 years ago. 400 years ago. 700 years ago. 2000 years ago. 4700 years ago. 10000 years ago. 50,000 years ago.

ETC.

The average life span for a man born ANYWHERE in America in 1900 was–47.

Now, virtually every nation in the world, even in the poorest countries, has a higher life span.

Diseases which ravaged two-thirds of the population of Europe (those wealthy whites) in the late Middle Ages (the Bubonic Plague) are gone today.

Smallpox, which decimated indigenous native Americans in the 17th century. . .was declared eradicated in the 1960s by the WHO.

Did God hate those Europeans or Native Americans from those times?
 
I uneerstand where you are coming from, but contraception is not the answer. Faith is. Many saints were tortured, burned at the stake, Christ himself was beaten and crucified. THey were all rewarded in the end. I know that what these people go thru is hard and it is wrong that they have to be in these situations, but the bottom line is that you don’t fix an evil with another evil. THe devil rejoices in that kind of logic. But if times of severe pain and suffering people can still have faith in GOd and do the morally right thing, he is defeated and we are rewarded.
 
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migurl:
save their life by helping them, not interfering with their natural body functions. Have you ever considered that maybe God is helping them by taking them out from under the control of evil men or government and bringing them into Heaven where they will no peace, love and eternal joy? If you want to save them, donate money, get doctors together to bring medicine and technology over there to save their lives, don’t send them a pill and say “here, dot procreate” BTW, do you know anything about the connection cancer has to the pill? And what about the correlation b/w abuse and contraception use? Look those up and then come back here with a more educated opinion about the solution to problems in the 3rd world countries
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No need to be condescending. I do know about the correlation between the pill and cancer; I would also not recommend the pill because it abortificient (sp). I seriously doubt the correlation between abuse and contraception, but you are welcome to provide the evidence.

Kendy
 
What I fail to understand is how somebody can seriously advocate that the major criteria for having a child is “affording it”.

I know all too many people who might be able to give a child material goods–and give them nothing else, treating the child as some sort of extension of themselves, to be trotted out and shown off, then shunted into boarding school, aftercare, all SORTS of “activities”, ANYTHING rather than actually spend time with the child as a parent.

I also know those who made careful preparations for a child or children, and then–catastrophe. Illness, death, failed investments, fires, floods, theft… resulting in poverty, but poverty in material goods is only a part, and a SMALL one at that, of life.

WE DON’T HAVE ANY GUARANTEES IN LIFE.

We are assured the PURSUIT of happiness, but we are not assured we will “catch” it.

A child is more than an “expense”. A child is more than a “burden”.

Some posters seem to be running perilously close to the belief that only certain people should be “allowed” to have children. . .I find that elitist and bigoted in attitude.
 
Tantum ergo:
Hold hard.

For “some reason” by YOUR logic God wills that people throughout the world today have LONGER and LESS MISERABLE LIVES than people throughout the world 200 years ago. 400 years ago. 700 years ago. 2000 years ago. 4700 years ago. 10000 years ago. 50,000 years ago.

ETC.

The average life span for a man born ANYWHERE in America in 1900 was–47.

Now, virtually every nation in the world, even in the poorest countries, has a higher life span.

Diseases which ravaged two-thirds of the population of Europe (those wealthy whites) in the late Middle Ages (the Bubonic Plague) are gone today.

Smallpox, which decimated indigenous native Americans in the 17th century. . .was declared eradicated in the 1960s by the WHO.

Did God hate those Europeans or Native Americans from those times?
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I think It’s quite obvious that that is not what I am saying.

Kendy
 
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bear06:
I’ve just got to ask at this point - do you have children? My children have great lives and we are about to have our 7th. What give you the impression that small families have greater lives than large ones? How expensive do you think children are? We’ve never had a super paycheck and yet I’ve always managed to stay at home and dress, feed and provide for their medical needs. How much do you think you need per year per child? Did I mention I also live in one of the highest priced places in California? It’s called sacrifice. It’s amazing how much you can give your kids when you don’t give them an x-box and have a tv in every room.
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What’s the average income in the US, 30K? If a man makes that much, the woman will have to work too. Where would they put their 8 kids during the day? Daycare they cannot afford? Let them run wild on the streets?

How much do you and your husband make? Foregoing an X-box and a TV might at best save you a few thousand in a lifetime.
Once again, the UN is there passing out ABC left and right and guess what, the situation is getting worse and not better.
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Here is how available birth control is: ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/entrez/query.fcgi?cmd=Retrieve&db=PubMed&list_uids=12281360&dopt=Abstract

The populations of the developed countries have easy access to contraception, but adequate family planning services are lacking in 80 of 93 recently studied Third World countries. 58% of the population of the developing world lives in these 80 countries.

Only 27% of couples in developing countries apart from China use modern contraception.

Asia also contains countries like Yemen, Pakistan, and Afghanistan where less than 10% of the population uses contraception.
It also raised the divorce rate and allowed for men to stray without being caught. It also brought on a miriad of health issues such as heart disease and cancer. Why do you feel it necessary for women to have careers and lives outside the home?
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And the internet allows men to look at internet pornography and ruin their marriage. Should we made the internet a sin?

As for women’s lives outside of the home, some women have other interests in talents. Some women might be talented academically, others might have contributions to make in medicine, in politics. It all depends. Some women prefer staying at home, and that’s great, but not all women would be content with this kind of a life.
I’ve got news for you. Africa is only about 17% Catholic so to blame the state of Africa on Catholic teachings is ludicrous. The fact is, the government of Africa is big on promoting condom use to stem the AIDS epidemic there and guess what? It’s not working.
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I am not blaming the Church, I am saying its moral teaching is flawed becuase it doesn’t protect human life at all times.
 
Actually, it is NOT obvious.

You were saying that "
Then for some reason God wills that poorer, nonwhite people in the world have shorter more miserable lives than wealthy, western people. In fact, it is apparently, God’s will that American white people have longer lives than African-Americans. That seems really odd
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I pointed out that there have been inequities among people in the world forever.

Can you deny that what I said below is true?
The average life span for a man born ANYWHERE in America in 1900 was–47.
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Now, virtually every nation in the world, even in the poorest countries, has a higher life span.
Click to expand...
Diseases which ravaged two-thirds of the population of Europe (those wealthy whites) in the late Middle Ages (the Bubonic Plague) are gone today.
Click to expand...
Smallpox, which decimated indigenous native Americans in the 17th century. . .was declared eradicated in the 1960s by the WHO.
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God no more would “will nonwhites and poor to have poorer and more miserable lives than wealthy whites” TODAY
than He would have “willed Europeans in the late Middle Ages to have poorer and more miserable lives than others living then” or than He would have “willed Native Americans decimated by smallpox to have poorer and more miserable lives than the Europeans living then.”

So your argument (perhaps it was tongue in cheek) falls apart.
 
Svoboda, you dodged bear’s question.

Do YOU have children?

How do YOU know what it might cost a given family to live? My uncle and aunt raised 11 terrific children in upstate New York, 6 through college, three went into the service. They grew their own fruit and vegetables, made their own clothing, all had after-school jobs but school always came first. My uncle was a carpenter and my aunt a stay at home mother. They bought second hand, bartered, and had the practical skills to make everything from furniture to rebuilding small engines, and to cook, clean, and sew. . .boys and girls together. There was never any LACK of the necessities, and there was love in super abundance. No debts either–cash only. My special cousin (we were born the same year) watched TV (there was a small black and white one just like WE had), had a transistor radio she shared with her sisters (just like I did), played the same sports, had the same one Barbie doll, wore the same “Ambush” cologne, was no “different” than any other girl of our time.

Thinking that somebody might, on the grounds of “cash value” alone, have kept my aunt and uncle “limited” to 2 or 3 children, appalls me.
 
Tantum ergo:
Svoboda, you dodged bear’s question.

Do YOU have children?
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I did not think it was relevant, my own finances and what I can do with them wouldn’t say much for the rest of the world. Since you’re so curious, no I don’t.

My own parents had 2 children, and struggled financially and when my brother and I were young we often couldn’t afford things. We had second hand clothing, we had to count every penny, we were receiving government aid.

Of course this was more because we were an immigrant family than because my parents had children. But if my parents had 10 children I can see how our lives would have been awful and how we wouldn’t have had enough of anything.
 
Tantum ergo:
What I fail to understand is how somebody can seriously advocate that the major criteria for having a child is “affording it”…
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Well, it’s quite simple. Children must be fed and clothe. They often need to go to the doctor. If you are unable to do these things, then you are bringing the child into the world to suffer. I realize that often when Americans say they can’t afford children, they mean, they can’t buy them bicycles, but for a lot of people, it means I can’t feed them. That is a serious problem.
Tantum ergo:
Some posters seem to be running perilously close to the belief that only certain people should be “allowed” to have children. . .I find that elitist and bigoted in attitude.
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Well, if you find it elitist and bigoted, then may I suggest that you empty your pockets and support those children. I am not trying to be harsh, but this has been on my mind a lot lately. After I read the Pope’s encyclical, I thought, that’s wonderful, but as the leader of the church, what are you going to do concretely to make this happen. There’s a part in there about no brother in Christ should go in need. I would love to see it happen, but it’s not happening. I am also reading the encyclical on the family (1981), and it states that families have a right to have as many children as they want no matter how poor they are. Again, it’s nice in theory, but what is the church doing to make it a reality?

I tithe regularly, but that seems like a dirty word among American catholics. My church is currently on a campaign to try to get members to give 1% of their income to the archdiocese, and it was pretty pathetic the way my priest was obviously afraid to offend us while he begs for money. Does the church plan to get on Western catholics about providing the resources to make sure that African familes can be as large as possible?

Is it really elitist to tell someone not to have a child that she can’t afford knowing that you plan to do nothing to feed that child when they arrive?

Kendy
 
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Kendy:
Just because there are many thing you can do does not mean that trying to get women who don’t want to constantly pregnant to control at least that part of their lives is not an option. You may disagree with that option, but don’t you dare suggest that I don’t think about the women who eat out garbage dumps that I have seen with my own eyes.
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You’re missing the key points of my post:
Why push sterilization or birth control when they do NOT solve the problems or effect ecomonic/health change?
The assumption that a woman will be “constantly pregnant” is in error. A breastfeeding woman in a 3rd world nation will usually not have a child every year. Usually it’s every 2 or 3 years. Unhealthy living conditions are not known for promoting fertility and breastfeeding may help to lengthen time between pregnancies.

**It’s clear you do think of those women. It appears you think the world would be better if they had never been conceived?😦 **
 
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Kendy:
Well, it’s quite simple. Children must be fed and clothe. They often need to go to the doctor. If you are unable to do these things, then you are bringing the child into the world to suffer. I realize that often when Americans say they can’t afford children, they mean, they can’t buy them bicycles, but for a lot of people, it means I can’t feed them. That is a serious problem.
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This is an excellent point. I live in Canada, where social services are great. Even in the US so many people don’t have medical insurance and can’t afford to take their kids to the doctor.
Well, if you find it elitist and bigoted, then may I suggest that you empty your pockets and support those children. I am not trying to be harsh, but this has been on my mind a lot lately. After I read the Pope’s encyclical, I thought, that’s wonderful, but as the leader of the church, what are you going to do concretely to make this happen. There’s a part in there about no brother in Christ should go in need. I would love to see it happen, but it’s not happening. I am also reading the encyclical on the family (1981), and it states that families have a right to have as many children as they want no matter how poor they are. Again, it’s nice in theory, but what is the church doing to make it a reality?
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I tithe regularly, but that seems like a dirty word among American catholics. My church is currently on a campaign to try to get members to give 1% of their income to the archdiocese, and it was pretty pathetic the way my priest was obviously afraid to offend us while he begs for money. Does the church plan to get on Western catholics about providing the resources to make sure that African familes can be as large as possible?
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Is it really elitist to tell someone not to have a child that she can’t afford knowing that you plan to do nothing to feed that child when they arrive?
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Kendy
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Again, great point. Since people here don’t want to let women there use birth control, how about sponsoring some of those children and providing them with food, clothing, and the like?

How many of you do it?

I’m in university now, but once I have a job I plan to, and not for God, but for those poeple.
 
Tantum ergo:
Actually, it is NOT obvious.

You were saying that "

I pointed out that there have been inequities among people in the world forever.

Can you deny that what I said below is true?

God no more would “will nonwhites and poor to have poorer and more miserable lives than wealthy whites” TODAY
than He would have “willed Europeans in the late Middle Ages to have poorer and more miserable lives than others living then” or than He would have “willed Native Americans decimated by smallpox to have poorer and more miserable lives than the Europeans living then.”

So your argument (perhaps it was tongue in cheek) falls apart.
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Obviously, God does not will for nonwhites to die. Someone suggested earlier that in the face of these rampant death, we should not use contraception because we should trust God and persumably, we die when he wants us to. I was saying that the implications of that is that God wants poor, nonwhite people to have shorter lifespans because that’s what happens. I obviously don’t think that. There’s a danger of complacency when you look at people dying and you respond, it’s God’s will.

Kendy
 
First, I said “virtually every nation” precisely because I was sure that there would be at least ONE nation that might be a little lower than 47. Botswana, of course, has seen its life expectancy rate PLUMMET due to AIDS.

Countries surrounding, sharing similar climates and ethnic groups, but spared (currently) civil war or natural disaster, have higher rates.

Interestingly, the United States itself does not have the highest life expectancy. Nor is high life expectancy linked purely to Caucasians, as Japan’s life expectancy is higher than that of Italy.

Saudi Arabia’s life expectancy is 75; Libya 76, Chile 75, Bahrain 75. All of these countries have had, in not too far distant pasts, much shorter life expectancies than they have now.
 
In studying our religion, our daughter memorized the following, “Why did God make you? God made me to show His goodness and to make me happy with Him in Heaven.” This is a very simple and accurate statement that I wish I had learned growing up.

This is true of all people He brings into the world. You don’t have to be Catholic or even believe in Him. It is the Truth.

We all have hard times, but I know that my crosses were hand-tested by Christ and that how I handle every difficulty can help me someday become “happy . . . in Heaven.”

Teaching people about their fertility and NFP use really is the answer. Now, someone already stated that men in third world countries won’t follow it. First of all, you don’t know that. Secondly, that is underestimating what having this knowledge does for people. The men may surprise you.

Imagine a woman in that situation. She now understands that when a child may be created. Even if she has no say in the actual act and really doesn’t want to have another child, might she be able to approach it differently with a little bit of self knowledge. It is amazing what knowledge does for people.

Certainly, women die from having babies. Those babies get to enjoy eternity and I imagine their mothers as well. After all, “there is no greater love than to give up your life for your friends!” (And doesn’t a woman’s child fit into that definition?)
 
I understand that most people tend to base their judgments on their “personal” experience.

So theoretically somebody who felt “poor” and “underprivileged”, or who felt that her race had been discrimated against, might be expected to make judgments regarding moral issues based on their experiences, which would differ from judgments made by someone who felt secure, average, or otherwise not discriminated against.

One must be careful to separate the feelings in the experience with the reason involved in making any type of informed judgment.

Not to denigrate feelings–we are all entitled to them–but I would be rather stupid to assume, for example, that just because “I” stayed home with my children when they were young, and enjoyed it, that my “experience” would be preferred by all other mothers, now or at any other time. Likewise, if “I” had NOT stayed home with my children, or had hated staying home, I would not assume that every other mother would have felt the same way.

But do we do things for a “feeling”, or do we do them for a “reason”? Reason need not preclude feeling, but feeling often precludes reason.

Which explains why couples who are “passionately in love” one day can “hate” each other the next, even though nothing in their lives otherwise has changed.

Whereas, the person who has made a commitment to a spouse who once gave him/her “goosebumps”, but who over the years has lost THAT “feeling”, yet chooses in reason to continue to love, honor and cherish their spouse even if that “passion” has changed, shows real love, which is itself much more than some excited feeling.

“Personal experience” is worthwhile, but it cannot be allowed to exclude reason. Because a person “FEELS STRONGLY” about something or someone does not make the feeling moral or correct.

There’s a little core of insecurity in all of us. Maybe looking at that statistic of mortality FRIGHTENS you, and you attempt to master that fright, not for yourself, but project that fright onto other people. NOW you can “fight” not for yourself, but for those “other women”; even if those women do not share your feelings.
 
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