Contraception, Abortion, and the Catholic Church

One must look at the underlying reasoning for the why the Catholic Church opposes contraception and abortion to really try to understand and appreciate their side of the argument without jumping to conclusions.  Because, often in today’s world we are too quick to jump to conclusions and therefore never get clarity on a subject.  Therefore we only see darkness in a tunnel where in fact there is light at the end.  So I ask you to hear me out and not jump to conclusions halfway through reading this post.

Remember I love comments and opinions but be respectful and thoughtful cause I know this is a heated issue.

What does the fact that our culture even needs contraception say about our moral standards, that we are actively determined to artificially prevent life from being born into this world?  I think of it this way.  There are solutions that solve problems and then there are solutions that, on the surface, appear to solve a problem but really all they do is allow the problem to fester while getting rid of an unwanted consequence of that problem.  Contraception negates the consequence of unwanted pregnancy but it allows the underlying problem to fester and perpetuate.  That underlying problem is the moral state of our society and that is what the Catholic Church is concerned about and why it opposes the use of contraception for birth control.  Now, let me clarify what I mean by “moral state” by posing a series of questions, “What do we, as human beings value more?  Is it life?  Is it love?  Is it our fellow human being?…..Or is it pleasure?  Is it our own self-satisfaction?”  Because these are the fundamental questions at the center of this argument.  The people’s belief in the right to individual choice has become such an integral aspect of the way we think in this twenty-first century and it is no different on the issues of contraception and abortion.  But when do we ever stop to think of the common good?  When do we ever stop for a moment of self-reflection and stop worrying about individual choice long enough to think about how our choices affect others?  Because the fact is the freedom and happiness we get from loving each other is more fulfilling and more meaningful than the freedom we perceive as getting from being able to make individual choices based only on what we want without any concern for others.  Humans live in an interconnected community, but we so often like to think of ourselves as living in individual spheres of influence where our choices have no cumulative effect on the rest of society.  That’s why poverty exists.  That’s why there is inequality in society.  That’s why one percent of people control 25% of wealth in this country.  That’s why the Occupy movement began.  That’s why we had the 2009 financial collapse.  Well that is a patently false notion.  The right to free choice does not preclude responsibility to others.  In the papal encyclical, issued in 2009, entitled Caritas in Veritate:On Integral Human Development in Charity and Truth, Pope Benedict XVI says this,

“An overemphasis on rights leads to a disregard for duties.  Duties set a limit on rights because they point to the anthropological and ethical framework of which rights are a part, in this way ensuring that they do not become license.  Duties thereby reinforce rights and call for their defence and promotion as a task to be undertaken in the service of the common good.”

Rights are not just there for the taking.  They come with the responsibility to act within an ethical framework.  Now what does this mean regarding contraception?  Well  Pope Benedict  XVI explains,

“The Church, in her concern for man’s authentic development, urges him to have full respect for human values in the exercise of his sexuality.  It can not be reduced merely to pleasure or entertainment, nor can sex education be reduced to technical instruction aimed solely at protecting the interested parties from possible disease or the “risk” of procreation.  This would be to impoverish and disregard the deeper meaning of sexuality, a meaning which needs to be acknowledged and responsibly appropriated not only by the individuals but also by the community.  It is irresponsible to view sexuality merely as a source of pleasure, and likewise to regulate it through strategies of mandatory birth control.  In either case materialistic ideas and policies are at work, and individuals are ultimately subjected to various forms of violence.

When we accept contraception as a necessity and a right in our lives, we are perpetuating a cycle, in which through the exercise of our sexuality we let it be known that pleasure is our first priority and our respect for human values is always secondary to that pleasure.  It’s an even more serious issue but none too different with abortion.  The individual pleasure gotten from sex is more important than the procreation to the point where procreation is viewed as a risk rather than a gift?  When did we become so materialistic?  When did we become so self absorbed that we deem it justifiable to kill a fetus, a developing life with a future in this world, for the sake of preserving carnal pleasure?  Where does it stop?  How many times?  How many times are we permitted to unilaterally end a life?

  Now, then one might bring up the question of whether abortion is justified in the case of rape.  I remain steadfast in saying that abortion remains unjustified even in such terrible circumstances and here’s why.  Rape is an act of blatant disregard for human life and human dignity.  It is meant to cause pain and suffering.  It is a horrific act born out of pure selfishness and insatiable desire for power and influence.  And I realize that it is the impulse of the mother to say she doesn’t want a child conceived from rape.  But just consider this.  When the mother makes that decision to abort, is she not showing that same disregard for human life and human dignity that her attacker showed for her?  Now I know people are going to jump all over me and say “How can you compare a rapist to a mother who wants to abort?”  Now I am not saying that the motivations for both are the same and clearly the motivations of a rapist are born out of such an evil and distorted mindset that it is impossible and absurd to compare them in that respect.  But I ask you to look at the end results of both actions.  One life is scarred and damaged forever and one is ended.  Two lives are ruined and one is not even given a chance.  Where is the morality in that?  Where is the morality in arbitrarily deciding that because I suffered another life must suffer as well.  Violence begets violence.  Abortion is a form of violence and it just continues a cycle of violence that began with the rape.  That’s my point here.  Contraception and abortion are just more cogs in a cycle that promote immorality over morality, that promote the sanctity of personal choice over the sanctity of life.

Now I know people will say, “Who are you to decide what is moral and immoral?”  I will answer that it is not me who is making the decision.  Consider this.  Every human beings have moral feelings termed a conscience.  But no matter how much of a moral relativist you may claim to be, you moral sense does not end with your conscience.  We also have moral standards by which we evaluate others that Timothy Keller in his book, The Reason for God, terms” moral obligation” and defines as “the belief that some things ought not to be done regardless of how a person feels about them within himself or herself, regardless of what the rest of the community and cultures says, and regardless of whether it is in his or her self-interest or not.” (Keller 147).  Now let me give you a scenario.  If you are going to be a moral relativist and say that it is the mother’s free choice to abort her baby and no one can make that decision for her, than you have no ground on which you can stand and say, “I oppose female genital mutilation”  “I oppose the practice of not allowing women to drive cars in Saudi Arabia.”  I oppose the practice that every time women leave their homes in Saudi Arabia they must be accompanied by a male family member.”, to just name a few cross cultural practices.  Why can’t you?  Because even though you know in your heart, even though you know at a basic, moral level that these practices are inherently wrong because they strip the human being of all dignity and respect and freedom you are still willing to defend your own cultural practice which does the exact same thing.  Think about it.  You are setting a double standard when you are saying, “I am a moral relativist.”  Nobody is a true moral relativist, because morality is transcendent.  Morality transcends cultures.  Universal moral standards do exist whether you admit or not because feeling a sense of moral obligation is part of being human.  And the reason we often don’t want to admit it is because it’s, in our own selfish interest not to or because we have this perverse view of freedom like in the case of abortion.  I said before that with freedom comes responsibility and that responsibility is to our fellow human being.  The freedom to abort a fetus is much different from the freedom of allowing women to leave their houses without a male accompaniment or drive a car.  The latter is a freedom that properly respects the human being and recognizes her inalienable rights and dignity.  The former takes away our most basic right……the right to life.

Is not the first right of the human person whether he or she is a fetus, a fertilized egg, one year old, ten years old, or 60 years old…….is not that first right the right to his or her life?  Life is not a privilege that someone can bestow upon you or take away from you.  Life is a gift, first and foremost, and it is what we do with that life that matters in this world.

Now a lot of people ask the question, “Well where do you draw the line?  Where does life begin?”  People like to make this question seem like such a hard question to answer.  And I’m not speaking from the mouthpiece of the Catholic Church here.  I’m speaking from common sense.  I’m speaking from fact.  It begins at conception.  It begins when the sperm fertilizes the egg.  Why?  Because barring a  medical tragedy, that fertilized egg will mature into a human being.  To try to have this “debate” is like saying that the development from a fertilized egg to a fetus to a born child  is any different from a 1 year old developing into a 3 year old developing into a ten year old.  There is life at every stage.  The biological condition of life at each stage may be different but they are all life nonetheless.

A Framework for American Education

Last semester my Philosophy of Education course culminated in a final paper in which we were asked to devise a societal goal for education.  In other words, what type of society would our educational system produce?  Branching outwardly from this goal are various objectives which are skill sets, understandings, and abilities which our educational system will have to develop in its students in order so that this goal can be achieved.  Finally, branching outward from these objectives are specific teaching methods which develop the student’s capacity to meet these objectives and thereby the goal.

This class meant so much to me and ultimately I put all my effort into this final paper because, in the end, this is what I want to do with my life.  There needs to begin a serious movement in this country to radically reform the way America looks at the purpose of education in the broader view of society. I wrote this paper not just as another assignment for another class for the purposes of getting another grade.  Education is the one institution that could transform this country and ultimately the world but first it needs to be transformed.  This is not the whole paper just part of it.

Remember, I love comments and opinions.

The most glaring problem facing the current American educational system is that it fails to have a viable goal for society.  In his essay, entitled The School and Social Progress late nineteenth century educational philosopher and professor, John Dewey said “Whenever we have in mind the discussion of a new movement in education, it is especially necessary to take the broader, or social view.  Otherwise, changes in the school institution and tradition will be looked at as the arbitrary inventions of particular teachers, at the worst transitory fads, and at the best merely improvements in certain details—and this is the plane upon which it is too customary to consider school changes.” (Lewis, Grinberg, & Laverty, 2009, p. 98).  As a student mired in the quagmire that is American education, I can identify with Dewey’s sentiment that a contrived and arbitrary education is a pointless one not only for the individual but for society.  How many times does one hear a frustrated and disillusioned student ask his or her teacher some variation of the question, “What is the purpose of my learning this information?”?  Indeed, what is the purpose of learning every single subject from calculus and trigonometry to biology and chemistry and ending with art history and the works of Shakespeare?  Teachers, administrators, and guidance and college counselors all tell us that the purpose of exposing us to such a broad subject-based curriculum is to fashion us into more well-rounded people.  The question is what does the phrase “well rounded” actually mean.  Apparently it means that students are supposed to be schooled in a generalized knowledge of various subject matter so that they will be better equipped to choose a career path.  There are two problems with this goal.  Firstly, it does not address a goal for society but merely for the individual.  Secondly and most importantly, the idea that bombarding our youth with subject-based curriculum translates to them being equipped to better cope with the trials and tribulations of the modern world and find a job is ludicrous and demonstrates the inherent disconnect between the goal and the objective.  As it stands, school is an institution that remains extremely isolated from not only the realities of the world outside its walls but also the needs and interests of the students forced to occupy its corridors and classrooms.  This fact must change.  Our educational system must recognize the constant struggle of humanity to thrive in this world and adopt a societal goal based on bettering the human condition.  It is due to this belief that I believe the purpose of education should be to create a mutually supportive society.

The ultimate goal for a compulsory, publicly funded educational system should be to create a society of mutually supportive individuals.

A mutually supportive society is one in which each and every member recognizes the common conditions that unite them, but just as well respects the differences that may separate them.  By this creed, the notion of one for all and all for one becomes self-evident in a mutually supportive society.  The society supports each of its individual members with their inherent differences and the individual members support society as a whole.  By support I mean working together for the common good of the individual and society, because ultimately these two should never conflict with one another.  When we live for one another, we live for ourselves and this is why the good of the individual and the good for society should never conflict.

A society of mutually supportive people would be devoid of economic and social stratification and therefore much of the hatred that fosters conflict.  Goods and services would be exchanged on a fair basis with everyone being treated equally except in regards to their individual personalities.  What I mean by this is even though everyone is committed to supporting one another, each still retains individuality so society does not become lifeless and robotic.  An individual in a mutually supportive society would be devoid of any sort of bias that creates division in society whether racial or ethnic or anything else.  They would view their fellow individual as an equal in terms of deserving of respect and basic rights and services.

I chose this goal over To create a more peaceful society because a peaceful society may be devoid of war and conflict but just as well it may be lifeless and people may not care about one another.  There may be stark differences but no one chooses to recognize them and therefore every individual lives within their own little sphere of influence and there is no mutual support or societal values.   

In order for education to attain its ultimate goal of creating a mutually supportive society, it needs to develop, in its students, an ability to critically think as well as an understanding of what it truly means to be human.  Education must also cultivate, in each of its students, an exceptional self- awareness as well as historical awareness.

To think critically is to recognize what harms society and the individual and what benefits society and the individual and why.  These could be institutions, systems of government, economic systems, cultural practices, and a variety of other things present in our everyday life and our world.  The ability to think logically, seek new and innovative ways of thinking, as well as exercise excellent value judgment is necessary for critical thinking.

Critical thinking increases our ability to create a mutually supportive society by providing us with the necessary tools to constantly evaluate how society is functioning with regards to the ultimate goal of mutual support.  It is useless without things to critically think about.  Institutions, systems that govern us, and our way of life must be understood and analyzed, so that we are able to change and evolve them for the betterment of society and the individual.

Now as espoused previously, critical thinking is useless without things to think critically about.  Therefore the educational system must address and develop a certain type of historical awareness in its students.  By awareness, I mean a deep understanding of how the superficial classifications we attach to each other and place such undue importance such as race, ethnicity, wealth status, and others have directly caused nearly all human conflict and suffering.  This type of awareness increases our ability to create a mutually supportive society by helping us to transcend these differences and work together to solve problems without there being any type of prejudice or bias to affect our decisions.

To understand what it truly means to be human is to recognize the common thread that binds us together as a species.  This involves taking an objective look at the human being from a spiritual and metaphysical point of view, and is pivotal in building a mutually supportive society.  To identify and respect the common threads that bind all human beings and to recognize how they affect our everyday lives, the lives of others, and the progression of human civilization as it stands will make us realize that despite all our superficial differences and the problems that have sprouted as a result of our willingness to identify with these differences so strongly, we have more in common than we may yet choose to realize right now.  Naturally, once we are able to respect our commonalities over our differences, we will be more capable and willing to support one another.

Lastly, an educational system aimed at creating a mutually supportive society, will need to develop, in its students, an exceptional self-awareness.  By self-awareness, I mean the ability to identify one’s individual passions and dreams and recognize how cultural and political norms have influenced them.  Also, students will need to recognize how their dreams and passions fit or do not fit into the larger framework of contributing to a mutually supportive society.

To be truly self-aware one must not only know what one is passionate and convicted about, but also how outside influences have shaped those convictions.  Criticism of one’s self is essential to being truly objective and therefore not being subservient to the cultural and political environment in which you live.  Change for the individual and therefore change for society with the goal of mutual support is impossible without being able to look in the mirror and criticize one’s self.

Losing our Way–America

The Occupy Wall Street Movement could just as well be called the Common Sense Movement or the Movement for Humanity.  This movement is not truly just about Wall Street and the greed of big corporations and their influence on the political process even though these aspects of American society bring out the most anger in these protesters.  Rather these are concrete entities that people are able to focus their anger on, but I want to think a bit more idealistically.  There can be no disputing that our political and economic systems in this country are completely broken and dysfunctional.  Supposedly, America is a democracy, a government of the people, by the people, and for the people.  Now we know that’s not true or else common sense dictates there wouldn’t be any protests.  But one must ask the question, “Why did America develop into a society where an amazingly small minority has all the voice and all the influence in a political system that is supposed to serve the masses.  Now one might say that the government exercises a certain level of power over its citizens and that wealth has become the greatest influence of power.  Therefore since a small minority controls most of the wealth, America, regardless of its claim to democracy, will tend towards oligarchy.  That is a simple answer and it is true but it does not address the inherent problem and leads me to another question, “Why does our society value wealth and power to such an extent that it is blind to the fact that our obsession with these two things has created the unhealthy economic and political system in which we now find ourselves suffering within and protesting against?”  It is not only our obsession with wealth and power but just as well the unreasonable extent to which we make one depend so much on the other.  To wield any sort of authority in this country you, often, need not be an authority on whatever it is you are doing but just generate enough wealth to be able to attain and retain that authority.  Just look at what it takes to become President of the United States or a member of Congress, and I am not talking about the requirements laid out in the Constitution.  Any sort of authority, whether it be the authority of a teacher or the authority of the President is scarcely defined by competence.  Merit, not money, should be the currency of success.

Now when trying to understand logically why humans have created such a flawed and inequitable system in which to live, one must ask a series of question, “As one biological unit, as one species separate from all others in the animal kingdom, what is the one thing we all have in common with one another?  What is it that motivates us and how does that motivation translate to our ultimate goal as members of the human race.  Let me answer these questions by using a somewhat primitive example.  Suppose you are stranded on an island with an unlimited amount of money and one other person.  But for whatever reason you two are unable to communicate and will never be able to communicate in any meaningful way.  Besides money and you two, there is also a fictitious machine that spits out food, water, medicine, and all the other essentials for life in exchange for your money.  But the machine is also programmed in such a way that for your money it will only spit out these items for the other person and vice versa.  So what do you have on this island?  You have a home, two people whose only purpose for each other is to keep the machine functioning properly and therefore keep one another alive, and lastly you have money which is the medium of exchange.  Will you two survive on this island?  The plain and simple answer is NO.  I don’t care if one of you was a greedy CEO in a previous life while the other was a factory worker who just lost his or her job.  I don’t care if one of you is Black and the other is White.  I don’t care if one is a man and the other is a woman.  I don’t care if one is Muslim and one is Jewish.  I don’t care if one is American and one is Pakistani.  Because the fact is that since the beginning of time, these racial, ethnic, cultural, and wealth disparities, are differences we have created among ourselves.  They did not spring out of thin air.  Being able to reason and think logically about the world around us should be a wonderful blessing, but we have made it into a terrible blight onto our society.  The value and undue attention we attach to being of a different race, or a different culture, or a different religion, or a different social status, or a different wealth status has clouded our judgment and made us forget the fact that we are all human.  You think just because he lives in a hut and you live in a mansion he is different?  You think just because he is black and you are white there is a difference?  You think just because he worships one god and you worship another he is different?  You think just because he lives in a hut and you live in a mansion you are different?   You think just because he is a farmer and you are a CEO he is different.  You think just because he is the teacher and you are the student, he is different.  You think just because you have a PhD and he has a B.S. you are different.  You think just because you go to Felician and he goes to Yale you are different.  The fact is, regardless of your insignificant materialistic differences, you are both human and you are both stuck on this island with no one to share one another’s sorrows, joys, ideas, emotions, desires and so you can never make an impact on each other and so you will never grow as individuals and so you will not survive.  You are not cats.  You are not rats.  You are not squirrels.  The promise of food and water and medicine and money does not motivate you to continue living on that island.  As long as a squirrel has nuts and a place to bury them it is able to live on. By contrast, the human instinct is not driven by material things.  No matter how much we try to deny it by continuing to be spectators in a world where financial capital has become more valuable than human capital, the fact is, at our core, we still value each other above anything else in this world.  Back on that island, you will never share the human connection.  The only influence you have on one another is materialistic.  I put my money in the machine so you get your materials, and you put your money in the machine so I get mine.  But in the end that is not enough motivation for either of you.  Eventually, both of you will go crazy and commit suicide, because no matter how many things you have, you will never have that human connection and so you will never be happy.  And that is the ultimate goal of everyone standing here and everyone in this world, to achieve happiness.

I just came to the basic conclusion that the ultimate goal of the individual is to achieve happiness and that in order to achieve this happiness he or she must have others to communicate with and share in the experiences, emotions, and ideas of life.  Now let’s progress from the individual back to a societal point of view.  If a society is comprised of individuals that all share the common goal of happiness and it is agreed that this happiness can only be achieved by that essential exchange of ideas and emotions that mark us as separate from the rest of the animal kingdom, than should not all of us lead our lives in such a way that we are always working and supporting one another?  As a result, society would become more cohesive, interconnected, and ultimately happy.  We would all still be different.  We would all still have our individual personalities and tendencies, but nonetheless we would remember that what makes us human is that we all share the same essence.  And that essence is the human connection.  We cannot live and be happy without each other.  That essence speaks to our exclusive intelligence unlike any other species on this planet.  But sadly our leaders have forgotten about this human essence and it has led to the corrupt system of government we Americans find ourselves protesting against.

“Why have the political and economic systems that govern America evolved in such a way that the procurement of great wealth is considered the ultimate mark of success?  Now I am not talking about the individual.  The individual may not value wealth as much as other things in his or her life, but as a collective people we are governed by a system that makes it the ultimate priority.  The answer is simple.  The people who rule this country and the ones who influence them, namely the big corporations and special interests, even and probably most importantly our educational systemhave lost touch with what it means to be human.

All students are asking “Why”

As a student mired in the quagmire that is American education, I can identify with Dewey’s sentiment that a contrived and arbitrary education is a pointless one not only for the individual but for society.  How many times does one hear a frustrated and disillusioned student ask his or her teacher some variation of the question, “What is the purpose of my learning this information?”?  Indeed, what is the purpose of learning every single subject from calculus and trigonometry to biology and chemistry and ending with art history and the works of Shakespeare?  Teachers, administrators, and guidance and college counselors all tell us that the purpose of exposing us to such a broad subject-based curriculum is to fashion us into more well-rounded people.  The question is what does the phrase “well rounded” actually mean.  Apparently it means that students are supposed to be schooled in a generalized knowledge of various subject matter so that they will be better equipped to choose a career path.  There are two problems with this goal.  Firstly, it does not address a goal for society but merely for the individual.  Secondly and most importantly, the idea that bombarding our youth with subject-based curriculum translates to them being equipped to better cope with the trials and tribulations of the modern world and find a job is ludicrous and demonstrates the inherent disconnect between the goal and the objective.  As it stands, school is an institution that remains extremely isolated from not only the realities of the world outside its walls but also the needs and interests of the students forced to occupy its corridors and classrooms.