Why is "Natural Family Planning" ok when other contraceptive methods are not?

[Doc_Keele]

So, if I donate a kidney to someone, will I be impaired? It was my understanding that donors were fine afterwards.

Well what exactly did you mean by “fully functioning”?

Someone with one kidney has a lower GFR than someone with two - not exactly half because the other kidney tends to hypertrophy. The renal reserve means that the person will be perfectly healthy, but nonetheless they have lower renal function. This is true for all the viscera, they have a certain reserve.

 

[St_Francis]

There’s plenty of things that the Church comes out with which don’t seem rooted in right reason.

The fact that a person, esp. one not versed in Catholic thinking, does not understand a Catholic line of reasoning does not mean that it is the Catholic reasoning which is wrong.

 

[St_Francis]

Well what exactly did you mean by “fully functioning”?

Someone with one kidney has a lower GFR than someone with two - not exactly half because the other kidney tends to hypertrophy. The renal reserve means that the person will be perfectly healthy, but nonetheless they have lower renal function. This is true for all the viscera, they have a certain reserve.

Since the person is left “perfectly healthy,” the goal of saving the life of another person would permit kidney transplants from a living person.

 

[Doc_Keele]

Since the person is left “perfectly healthy,” the goal of saving the life of another person would permit kidney transplants from a living person.

“perfectly healthy” - how are you defining “perfectly healthy” then?

 

[Doc_Keele]

Since the person is left “perfectly healthy,” the goal of saving the life of another person would permit kidney transplants from a living person.

Which goes to show that “fully functioning” isn’t really a helpful term without defining what you mean by the term. Nor is “perfectly healthy” for that matter.

 

[Abu]

The following may be helpful, even for those who, so far, have been unwilling to use reason to accept that contraception is against the natural law:

catholiceducation.org/articles/medical_ethics/me0019.html

INTER VIVOS DONATIONS (on transplants)
In every instance, inter vivos transplants (vital homografts) demand answers to serious ethical and moral questions. Because these donations require a transplant from one living person to another, a moral dilemma involving the principle of totality arises. According to this principle, the parts of the body are ordered to the good of that specific body. Therefore, the surgical mutilation of a donor for the good of the recipient must not seriously impair or destroy bodily functions or beauty of the donor. [2]

For example, both eyes are necessary for certain visual functions. A living person would seriously impair his ability to see if an eye were donated to another. Such a sacrifice would detract from the wholeness or full functioning of the donor’s body. It would be a bad means to a good end, and therefore morally wrong.

Some argue that each person has a right over their body to provide self-sacrifice for another in need. They cite people who gave their lives to save another, like St. Maximilian Kolbe. The analogy fails. Kolbe and others freely accepted death, but did not choose death. They did not end their own life. Rather, these martyrs accepted death so as to save another’s life. In contrast, an organ donor does choose to impair or destroy bodily functions within himself by transferring these functions, via transplant, to another. [3]

Based upon the law of fraternal charity, one may intend to sacrifice an organ for the sake of another, but one also has the responsibility for the integrity of one’s body. Therefore, the principle of totality sets limits on inter vivos organ donations. Otherwise, inter vivos transplants could lead to euthanasia or assisted suicide.
Notes;
[Thomas O’Donnell, S.J., *Medicine and Christian Morality: Second Revised and Updated Edition (Alba House: New York, 1991), 118-22].
2.O’Donnell, 122.
3.Germain Grisez, *Living A Christian Life *(Quincy, IL Franciscan Press, 1993) vol. 2, 543-

 

[St_Francis]

Perhaps we can look at this another way:

The Church teaches in Humanae Vitae that “…if each of these essential qualities, the unitive and the procreative, is preserved, the use of marriage fully retains its sense of true mutual love and its ordination to the supreme responsibility of parenthood to which man is called.”

Now, suppose that a married couple receives bad news: the wife is no longer able to have sex at all, say due to an auto accident. Would that justify her husband’s breaking his marriage vows and having sex with other women?

 

[PassingThru]

Well, when we do that, we get comments about “appealing to authority” and “dishonest” arguments.

St Francis, your refusal to stop and think about what I say, and quickly retort with something clearly not thought through is astounding. I just laid out, in detail, the difference between a statement of faith: “The Church teaches ABC is wrong” and supporting a logical assertion with with a statement of faith: “ABC violates the natural sexual union, because the Church teaches ABC is wrong.” Can you please stop, think, and look for a difference between these two? The first is of course acceptable, and can not be refuted. The second is an assertion we could easily debate, but you are supporting it with a statement of faith. I don’t know how much more clear that could be.

A point of truth is not subject to a vote. The fact that some, many, most, or even almost all Catholics believe something contrary to the teaching of the Catholic Church only means that those Catholics are in error, not that the truth taught is wrong.

I didn’t mean that the teaching were incorrect. Rather, so many do not understand them, or at least understand well enough to make a distinction between ABC and NFP. Its truth is not in question.

 

[PassingThru]

Actually, no, I totally disagree with you. In fact, I think that all the responses here have shown me that there is a huge difference between the way people who have grappled with the NFP issue and come to understand it see the marital act and the way people who do not understand the immorality of abc see it.

The problem is that your responses indicate that you see it in the more widely-distributed way, and thus do not yet understand that there *is *a different way to see it, much less that you are there.

So, are you then saying there is a difference between those who accept and practice NFP, and those who do not?

I originally asserted that you were looking at people differently based on there use, or understanding, of NFP. I said “To conclude that they somehow view sexuality differently based on [use and understanding of NFP], I think, is an error.” You said, no, I was wrong. “I totally disagree with you.” is your quote. You then said there is a difference. “…there is a huge difference between the way people who have grappled with the NFP issue and come to understand it see the marital act and the way people who do not understand the immorality of abc see it.”

So, which is it? My discussion is based on people being equal. You are saying they are, or they are not, equal. Your view is important. If you view them as different, then you likely are a bit too biased to express anything related to the facts of NFP vice ABC. Please say so up front.

 

[lil_flower_luv]

St Francis, your refusal to stop and think about what I say, and quickly retort with something clearly not thought through is astounding. I just laid out, in detail, the difference between a statement of faith: “The Church teaches ABC is wrong” and supporting a logical assertion with with a statement of faith: “ABC violates the natural sexual union, because the Church teaches ABC is wrong.” Can you please stop, think, and look for a difference between these two? The first is of course acceptable, and can not be refuted. The second is an assertion we could easily debate, but you are supporting it with a statement of faith. I don’t know how much more clear that could be.

Hello PT

Look at the similarities rather than differences between the two. The Church (instituted by Jesus Christ) is always looking out for our benefit…not just spiritual but physical. ABC *does *violate the natural sexual union, and the fact that the Church believes it is wrong is all the more reason to believe violating the sexual union is not of God. If A = B and A = C, then C = B.

Are we on the same page? I don’t want to jump in and force you to repeat yourself.

 

[davidv]

So, are you then saying there is a difference between those who accept and practice NFP, and those who do not?

I originally asserted that you were looking at people differently based on there use, or understanding, of NFP. I said “To conclude that they somehow view sexuality differently based on [use and understanding of NFP], I think, is an error.” You said, no, I was wrong. “I totally disagree with you.” is your quote. You then said there is a difference. “…there is a huge difference between the way people who have grappled with the NFP issue and come to understand it see the marital act and the way people who do not understand the immorality of abc see it.”

So, which is it? My discussion is based on people being equal. You are saying they are, or they are not, equal. Your view is important. If you view them as different, then you likely are a bit too biased to express anything related to the facts of NFP vice ABC. Please say so up front.

Yes there is a difference, but has nothing to do with equality. Besides, we are equal in some things, like dignity. But we are quite unequal in other ways, like intelligence, or physical stature.

It seems to me this discussion hasn’t gone far because we cannot come to an agreement on some basic premises.

1. What does it mean to act morally?
2. What is NFP (NBC)?
3. What is ABC?

If we cannot agree on what these are, there is no possible way to make any kind of valid judgement requested of the OP.

Just like there are difference between people who are supposedly equal, there are difference between NFP and ABC. What I have read indicates the these differences have not been acknowledged, or have been dismissed as insignificant without a plausible reason.

 

[St_Francis]

So, are you then saying there is a difference between those who accept and practice NFP, and those who do not?

I originally asserted that you were looking at people differently based on there use, or understanding, of NFP. I said “To conclude that they somehow view sexuality differently based on [use and understanding of NFP], I think, is an error.” You said, no, I was wrong. “I totally disagree with you.” is your quote. You then said there is a difference. “…there is a huge difference between the way people who have grappled with the NFP issue and come to understand it see the marital act and the way people who do not understand the immorality of abc see it.”

So, which is it? My discussion is based on people being equal. You are saying they are, or they are not, equal. Your view is important. If you view them as different, then you likely are a bit too biased to express anything related to the facts of NFP vice ABC. Please say so up front.

You said that to conclude that [people who use NFP]view sexuality differently would be an error.

Therefore you seem to be saying that people who use NFP or people who use abc think pretty much the same.

I disagree. I think that those who have seriously considered and thought over the issues (ie, *possibly *not all NFP users, but those who have “grappled with” the issues) think very differently about sexuality. I think that I was very clear about that.

I do not think that the fact that I disagree with you on an issue ipso facto makes *me *biased, nor do I think that any bias would be relevant to my expression of anything related to NFP vs abc.

Now, personally, if I ask someone with whom I disagree to explain their reasoning, I do not think that because they disagree with me that they are too biased to explain their reasoning, because the whole point of my asking them instead of someone who agrees with me is *that *they don’t agree with me.

But if you want to ask someone who thinks that everything is hunky-dory, that the decline in sexual mores in our society has no relation to the increased use of abc, that the killing of millions of babies in their mothers’ wombs is perfectly ok and certainly not a sign of a decline in sexual mores or a sign that maybe there is a problem with abc, that’s fine, but you should go over to Planned Parenthood and ask them to explain the difference between the use of NFP and abc, because of course they would not be biased like I am.

 

[St_Francis]

St Francis, your refusal to stop and think about what I say, and quickly retort with something clearly not thought through is astounding. I just laid out, in detail, the difference between a statement of faith: “The Church teaches ABC is wrong” and supporting a logical assertion with with a statement of faith: “ABC violates the natural sexual union, because the Church teaches ABC is wrong.” Can you please stop, think, and look for a difference between these two? The first is of course acceptable, and can not be refuted. The second is an assertion we could easily debate, but you are supporting it with a statement of faith. I don’t know how much more clear that could be.

Your disingenuity is showing…

Guess what? The question under discussion is what differentiates NFP and abc such that the Catholic Church teaches that the former is all right and the latter is wrong.

Answering “ABC violates the natural sexual union, because the Church teaches ABC is wrong” would not have answered the question.

Now, the Catholics on this thread have turned themselves inside out to answer this question. They have totally explained the Church’s position on this. The fact that you do not accept their reasoning does not mean that there is a problem with the reasoning but with your understanding of the reasoning.

It is not saying ABC is wrong because the Church teaches it is wrong to say that the Church teaches it is wrong because it violates the marital act, renders the marital act incomplete, and thus is wrong.

It is not saying that when we say because the people who use abc are engaging the pleasurable aspect of the act *while *denying the potential for conception.

It is not saying that when we explain about the need to respect the human body and not interfere with its normal functioning.

It is not saying that when we say that the unitive and procreative aspects of the sex act must always be kept together as God put them together, not as we mere mortals choose.

And it is not saying that when we quote from Humanae Vitae that the capacity for generating more of God’s highest creations is a great gift from God which should not be thrown in His face and used as a form of entertainment.

The reality is that the prohibition on abc is perennial: it has been found since the earliest years of the Church. Every Christian denomination understood this until the Episcopalians suddenly turned 1930 years of Christian teaching on its head. Since then we have seen the decline of sexual mores, the decline of the family, the devaluation of women, the denigration of the sexual act into a form of entertainment. We have seen the killing of millions of babies in their mothers’ wombs. Guess what? ABC *is *WRONG!!!

You look at sexual activity from the point of view of secular society–you do not see it as an enormous gift from God, that is why you cannot understand the reasoning of the Church in this matter. You run down our explanations, you split hairs, you don’t accept this little detail or that…

So, yes, *you *are biased. Because if you were asking honestly, you would try to understand rather than pick apart every single thing we say, and tell us it is dishonest to do something and then say why didn’t we say it? And you wouldn’t say that every explanation we give is just saying that the Church teaches it, and you wouldn’t say that this argument doesn’t count and that argument doesn’t count and the other one doesn’t count.

And if you were asking honestly, you wouldn’t say that my very *obvious *conclusion that people who understand the difference between abc and NFP think differently about sexuality shows bias on my part to the point where you would not accept as valid anything I have to say on the subject.

I didn’t mean that the teaching were incorrect. Rather, so many do not understand them, or at least understand well enough to make a distinction between ABC and NFP. Its truth is not in question.

Well, I don’t know what you mean by this, because you do not seem to understand *any *distinction we make between abc and nfp.

 

[22568]

To add to what Seatuck said, not only is this wrong (called “Onanism”–see Genesis 38:9,10) but is a contraceptive act and, therefore, a mortal sin. Please go to confession a.s.a.p.!

In addition, withdrawal is the totally ineffective because there is always some leakage prior to the climax. NFP gives you the ability to know when you’re fertile so you know when to abstain.

Tracy

 

[22568]

To add to what Seatuck said, not only is this wrong (called “Onanism”–see Genesis 38:9,10) but is a contraceptive act and, therefore, a mortal sin. Please go to confession a.s.a.p.!

In addition, withdrawal is the totally ineffective because there is always some leakage prior to the climax. NFP gives you the ability to know when you’re fertile so you know when to abstain.

Tracy

wow!

 

[PassingThru]

You said that to conclude that [people who use NFP]view sexuality differently would be an error.

Therefore you seem to be saying that people who use NFP or people who use abc think pretty much the same.

I disagree. I think that those who have seriously considered and thought over the issues (ie, *possibly *not all NFP users, but those who have “grappled with” the issues) think very differently about sexuality. I think that I was very clear about that.

I do not think that the fact that I disagree with you on an issue ipso facto makes *me *biased, nor do I think that any bias would be relevant to my expression of anything related to NFP vs abc.

Now, personally, if I ask someone with whom I disagree to explain their reasoning, I do not think that because they disagree with me that they are too biased to explain their reasoning, because the whole point of my asking them instead of someone who agrees with me is *that *they don’t agree with me.

But if you want to ask someone who thinks that everything is hunky-dory, that the decline in sexual mores in our society has no relation to the increased use of abc, that the killing of millions of babies in their mothers’ wombs is perfectly ok and certainly not a sign of a decline in sexual mores or a sign that maybe there is a problem with abc, that’s fine, but you should go over to Planned Parenthood and ask them to explain the difference between the use of NFP and abc, because of course they would not be biased like I am.

I should have been more specific. I think it is an error to assume all practitioners of NFP are different than ABC. It would have been better if I made the clear.

Look, my only point was that no where have I drawn a distinction between the hearts and minds of people who use ABC, NFP, both or neither. To me, it is not relevant to distinguishing between the two. You do have some thoughts about them, whatever they may be. I wanted to point out that these differences, if any, do not effect the discussion. That is all.

By the way, in your effort to show how unbiased you are, you just threw in everything but the kitchen sink. Planned Parenthood, moral decline, abortion? You sold me. Now I am convinced you are here to discuss differences between NFP and ABC without bias.

 

[PassingThru]

Your disingenuity is showing…

Guess what? The question under discussion is what differentiates NFP and abc such that the Catholic Church teaches that the former is all right and the latter is wrong.

Answering “ABC violates the natural sexual union, because the Church teaches ABC is wrong” would not have answered the question.

Now, the Catholics on this thread have turned themselves inside out to answer this question. They have totally explained the Church’s position on this. The fact that you do not accept their reasoning does not mean that there is a problem with the reasoning but with your understanding of the reasoning.

It is not saying ABC is wrong because the Church teaches it is wrong to say that the Church teaches it is wrong because it violates the marital act, renders the marital act incomplete, and thus is wrong.

It is not saying that when we say because the people who use abc are engaging the pleasurable aspect of the act *while *denying the potential for conception.

It is not saying that when we explain about the need to respect the human body and not interfere with its normal functioning.

It is not saying that when we say that the unitive and procreative aspects of the sex act must always be kept together as God put them together, not as we mere mortals choose.

And it is not saying that when we quote from Humanae Vitae that the capacity for generating more of God’s highest creations is a great gift from God which should not be thrown in His face and used as a form of entertainment.

The reality is that the prohibition on abc is perennial: it has been found since the earliest years of the Church. Every Christian denomination understood this until the Episcopalians suddenly turned 1930 years of Christian teaching on its head. Since then we have seen the decline of sexual mores, the decline of the family, the devaluation of women, the denigration of the sexual act into a form of entertainment. We have seen the killing of millions of babies in their mothers’ wombs. Guess what? ABC *is *WRONG!!!

You look at sexual activity from the point of view of secular society–you do not see it as an enormous gift from God, that is why you cannot understand the reasoning of the Church in this matter. You run down our explanations, you split hairs, you don’t accept this little detail or that…

So, yes, *you *are biased. Because if you were asking honestly, you would try to understand rather than pick apart every single thing we say, and tell us it is dishonest to do something and then say why didn’t we say it? And you wouldn’t say that every explanation we give is just saying that the Church teaches it, and you wouldn’t say that this argument doesn’t count and that argument doesn’t count and the other one doesn’t count.

And if you were asking honestly, you wouldn’t say that my very *obvious *conclusion that people who understand the difference between abc and NFP think differently about sexuality shows bias on my part to the point where you would not accept as valid anything I have to say on the subject.

Well, I don’t know what you mean by this, because you do not seem to understand *any *distinction we make between abc and nfp.

Look, don’t get mad at me because you have trouble with analytical thinking. I am an analyst by trade, and I get in trouble plenty for my lack of emotion. You are putting a lot of passion into this. But your emotion is not leading to much in the way of logical discussion.

I may be short with my words, overly direct, rude, a jerk, whatever. But if you go back through all I have posted, I go to great lengths so keep both sides equal as much as possible, keep subjective thoughts out, keep to objective measures, and I have not ONCE used MY opinion/belief/religion for anything. You are just mad because I don’t accept your religion as a basis of a proof. As I have said before, I could just use my beliefs as a reason, then jump up and down when you don’t agree. But that would be dumb. I have actually gone out of my way to accept ABC as immoral as a belief, but not a proof. The fact you can not see the difference and it makes you mad is not my fault.

BTW, you just recanted a lot of the arguments you were making with your list of “It is not…” statements. That seem like an odd thing to switch.

Your last two points are entirely different line of thinking. I would place all of the “society” issues as a valid but separate discussion. If that is your reasoning, fine, but that is not what you have been asserting.

But really, what this most comes down to is your faith. I think all of your emotion is because you really, truly believe these things. I think that is wonderful. But, if that is your reason, then just say it. But don’t use it to support a line of thinking and expect me to let you off the hook without proving it with some form of reason that doesn’t involve me accepting your belief system.

And really, stop telling me what I think just because you are angry. I haven’t said a thing about it. I am being as objective as I possibly can.

And I am not interested in what you feel, just as you are not interested in how I feel. I am only interested in what you can demonstrate, explain, or prove.

BTW, you just went off and exploded into an anti-ABC rant? But you still think I am somehow on this big “secular” bender and think I can not be objective? OK.

 

[St_Francis]

I should have been more specific. I think it is an error to assume all practitioners of NFP are different than ABC. It would have been better if I made the clear.

Look, my only point was that no where have I drawn a distinction between the hearts and minds of people who use ABC, NFP, both or neither. To me, it is not relevant to distinguishing between the two. You do have some thoughts about them, whatever they may be. I wanted to point out that these differences, if any, do not effect the discussion. That is all.

The differences between the way practitioners of either do affect the morality of their use only peripherally; however, the fact that people do see things differently will affect the *discussion. *The fact that you, Doc Keele, and others in this discussion see things differently has an effect.

By the way, in your effort to show how unbiased you are, you just threw in everything but the kitchen sink. Planned Parenthood, moral decline, abortion? You sold me. Now I am convinced you are here to discuss differences between NFP and ABC without bias.

Of course I’m biased; I have an opinion on the subject, I list myself as Catholic, what more can you ask for? You should have figured out that I was “biased” according to your apparent definition (holds an opinion different from mine) from the beginning.

It is *completely absurd *to ask Catholics to explain the Catholic Church’s teaching on something and then expect only those with no opinion on the matter to reply!

 

[St_Francis]

Look, don’t get mad at me because you have trouble with analytical thinking. I am an analyst by trade, and I get in trouble plenty for my lack of emotion. You are putting a lot of passion into this. But your emotion is not leading to much in the way of logical discussion.

I have not trouble with analytical thinking either. What you do not understand is that you are asking people to explain an issue which flows from their belief and then criticising them for using the belief from which the issue flows.

I may be short with my words, overly direct, rude, a jerk, whatever. But if you go back through all I have posted, I go to great lengths so keep both sides equal as much as possible, keep subjective thoughts out, keep to objective measures, and I have not ONCE used MY opinion/belief/religion for anything.

You have been very nice

The problem is that you can’t keep both sides equal in discussions of this sort. In this particular discussion, the two sides are inherently “unequal,” in that they are two *different *schools of thought.

And I said this long before in this thread, that what you were asking of us seemed to be as impossible as explaining a physics problem using only biology.

You are just mad because I don’t accept your religion as a basis of a proof.

It is not that you are not accepting my religion as a proof. Yes, the view my religion has of the issues involved forms the actual points that we were making, but the points were different from the religion itself. As a result, from our point of view, what you were saying made no sense.

You did not come right out and say, I want an explanation of this that makes no reference at all to anything that anyone anywhere might possibly consider Catholic. You just said, on what basis is nfp differentiated from abc to the point that the former is moral and the latter immoral?

As I have said before, I could just use my beliefs as a reason, then jump up and down when you don’t agree. But that would be dumb. I have actually gone out of my way to accept ABC as immoral as a belief, but not a proof. The fact you can not see the difference and it makes you mad is not my fault.

I sure do hope that the above has answered this as well.

BTW, you just recanted a lot of the arguments you were making with your list of “It is not…” statements. That seem like an odd thing to switch.

First, I agree with all of them. I may have moved away from asserting them because of your comments, but I do agree with them. And secondly, I was trying to list all the arguments presented, not just mine.

Your last two points are entirely different line of thinking. I would place all of the “society” issues as a valid but separate discussion. If that is your reasoning, fine, but that is not what you have been asserting.

And the reason I moved away from asserting them was that you were not accepting them.

But really, what this most comes down to is your faith. I think all of your emotion is because you really, truly believe these things. I think that is wonderful. But, if that is your reason, then just say it. But don’t use it to support a line of thinking and expect me to let you off the hook without proving it with some form of reason that doesn’t involve me accepting your belief system.

How many times did I say that I didn’t think this could be explained without reference to Catholicism?

And really, stop telling me what I think just because you are angry. I haven’t said a thing about it. I am being as objective as I possibly can.

I reflected what your comments indicated.

And I am not interested in what you feel, just as you are not interested in how I feel. I am only interested in what you can demonstrate, explain, or prove.

That’s fine. But if you are going to ask people to explain a conclusion without reference to the thinking from which it came, just say so. Don’t eat away at the edges of your restriction bit by bit.

BTW, you just went off and exploded into an anti-ABC rant? But you still think I am somehow on this big “secular” bender and think I can not be objective? OK.

I think that you are being “secular” and are *therefore *just as biased as you think I am. People think that secular thinking is somehow objective, but it is not. From the point of view of a Catholic, secular thinking leaves out way too much, and the motive for that (not yours, but way back when people first started moving down this direction) is that they were biased against the teachings of the Catholic Church.

From the Catholic point of view, it is Catholic thinking which is unbiased, and secular thinking which is biased. See what I mean? You think I’m biased, I think you are biased. In any discussion in which people disagree, each will think that the other is biased because each believes something different.

 

[XinMinny]

St Francis (by the way, if everything you hear about him is true, he was a great guy),

I was glad to read your last post. I had decided to give up on this thread, because it seemed that it had gotten to the point of pure argumentation. But, now I am not sure about.

I don’t want to quote anything specific, but I am looking for a confirmation of your origin of thought, so can you tell me if this is what you are saying:

1. Your reasoning is more than just “The Church says so.” Your own personal reasoning is more like, “I can follow the logic of the Church’s reasoning, even if I can’t explain it to you in non-Catholic terms”
2. You can follow the Church’s reasoning, and it makes sense to you, because as a Catholic, you have the same world view as the Church does, in terms of respect between spouses, the need for self-control, and the general idea that it is not safe to blindly modify what God has made.
3. Your general thought is that (for the most part) people who use ABC or defend the use of ABC do so because they resist the idea of self-control. That is, they simply want to feel good (now!!!), and that idea is foreign to Catholic thought.
4. Those who think that way, and then demand non-moral logic in the argument, are beginning from (that’s their bias) a secular point of view. Of course, they can’t understand how the Church thinks, and they can’t understand how a Catholic thinks.

If all that is correct, I respect your points. It is not fair for anyone to try to take any of that away from you.

Then, there is one more point, which I don’t understand, and I maybe need another thread for it (however, it is so emotional I am not sure we would get very far). And, I am thinking about the idea that secular thought is “anti-Catholic.” Now, this is my question about that, and it is a deep question, one that requires self-examination.

The question is: What does “anti-Catholic” mean? As a way of explanation, I was raised in a Catholic family, and in a parochial elem school. I remember very well being left with the impression that every thing in our culture that goes against Catholic teaching was “anti-Catholic” by which was meant “intentionally put there to hinder, bother, disturb, or destroy the Church.” Please note the word ‘intentionally.’ I have come the point in life where I honestly feel that the culture doesn’t care what the Church thinks, doesn’t make determinations based on what will happen to the Church. That goes for faith in general as well. The culture doesn’t seem to care what any person of faith thinks. I believe that the culture does not ‘intentionally’ do anything to bother people of faith. Rather, I have come to the conclusion that the culture is simply people following the base instincts of human nature.

So, again,
Does ‘anti-Catholic’ mean ‘intentionally set up to hinder the Church and its people.’
Or, does it mean ‘not intentionally, but along the way in opposition to the Church and its people, because faithful people are trying to walk a different way?’

Thank you for considering this.

And, thank you for this morning’s (name removed by moderator)ut into the thread.

~ Minny