A couple thoughts
** I’m still trying to understand precisely what the Pope said and meant**. It sounds as though he was suggesting that it’s okay for male prostitutes who have HIV/AIDS to use a condom, that somehow it indicated some sense of responsibility on their part. A rather strange statement. No, I know he doesn’t in any way give approval to male prostitutes - of course, not. But to say that they can - and suggest that they should - use condoms to protect the partner from contacting HIV/AIDs is quite a step.
Code:
** Now, perhaps this has been raised already. **If a husband has contracted HIV/AIDS, as often happens in parts of Africa, why then would he not be justified in using condoms to protect his wife - or even another sexual partner, in fact? Because it is also likely to avoid conception, is this automatically wrong? Somehow, I think that the Pope should be at least as concerned and compassionate when it comes to protecting a wife than in protecting homosexuals, since the church so strongly endorses marriage while condemning acts of homosexuality.
** My own position, for what it’s worth, is that the dieheard Catholic position against contraceptives is wrong. **Why? To begin with. the Church accepts ‘natural birth control’ based on the cycle of the woman, which has the same goal: to impede contraception. In the second place, it seems to me that sexual relations between a husband and wife are private, and the decision as to family planning has to be theirs. The Church may suggest a position, but to make articial birth control a major violation of Catholic policy is self-defeating.
** I remember two cases in which the natural method failed** when the couple had been warned that bearing another child would endanger the life of both the mother and baby. One couple followed the Church’s teaching, trusting in God, and both mother and baby died, leaving a grieving husband, six other motherless children, and a family which then left the Church. The other couple reluctantly opted for an early abortion, the woman was severely scolded by the priest at confession, so they, too, left the Church.
** Most married Catholic couples, after they have the number of children they feel they can provide adequately for, use artificial birth control.** Probably no issue, except maybe the sex scandal, has done more to drive Catholics away from the Church, at least among people I know. It has effected my attitude toward the Church as well, and it take a special effeort to maintain respect for some of its policies.
** I also am inclined to think that lack of artificial birth control leads to more abortions. I certainly would prefer the first to the second, wouldn’t you?** When no conception occurs, with or without artificial birth control, no baby is killed, no baby is lost.
The medical world has implemented hundreds of ways of extending life which some might consider ‘against natural law’ or against God’s plan. We use surgery and pills, for example, to battle cancer or heart disease or other afflictions? Why is it that these medical acts also are not against divine law? Is there nothing to the old notion that God has determined when we are born and when we are to die? Should we not let nature take its course rather than try to buck nature through modern medicine? Some of this smacks a bit of Mormonism, which (as I recall) suggests that souls are just waiting in heaven to be born, so parents need to have large families, etc.
It’s time for Catholicism to adopt a new policy in line with reason, compassion, good health, responsibility, and family happiness. I know one devoted Catholic couple well who confidentially have shared with me that sexual relations for them is rare and even scary because they have three teenage children and do not feel psychologically or financially (and even for other reasons, too) that they should risk having another child. This reluctance to have normal and joyful sexual relations has injured their intimate relationship, but they also are convinced that they must suffer through this because the Church has spoken. Is that what the Church should demand?
