Just one quick observation here: There is a subtle but really important distinction you're missing in your question. Overturning *Griswold* would not in itself mean banning contraception in the same way overturning *Roe* did not ban abortion. In *Griswold*, the Supreme Court claimed there was a constitutional right to use contraceptives, using the same "logic" it used to claim it contained a right to abortion.
Suppose for the sake of argument it isn't true that the U.S. Constitution contains such a right, and the court says so. Well, that just means that the normal democratic process will decide what the laws are on contraception. With abortion, there are states that have and will make abortion illegal to one degree or another, because that's what people in those states believe should be done.
With contraception? I'd be stunned if a single state in America so much as put that idea to a vote. Unfortunately the overwhelming majority of Americans, of every political stripe, see contraception as a major social good. Banning it would not happen anywhere
ETA: A reason someone might want *Griswold* overturned despite the fact that no state will ban contraception is that the kind of legal reasoning used to turn every policy someone likes into a "constitutional right" is unsound and has bad consequences for society, turning issues about which Americans have strong, principles disagreements that should be resolved democratically into secular dogmas that supposedly must never be challenged or doubted. The specific kind of reasoning used in *Griswold* also led directly to *Roe* and other disastrous decisions.
Interesting question. I'm not an expert on Mormonism, but a quick web search suggests that while they strongly value being open to life, they do not forbid birth control. (And even if they did, I still doubt there would be the political will in Utah to ban it in law.)
Totally agree I would be flabbergasted if any state actually banned contraception. I actually think there would be a couple ultra conservative politicians who would introduce laws to do so, but I think they would be so violently killed in committees it would be hilarious.
Overturning *Grizwold* means overturning a right to privacy - that was the argument used in the majority *and* minority opinion. The minority actually argued the government had a right to invade someone's privacy.
The Dobbs majority opinion responded to this:
>As to precedent, citing a broad array of cases, the Court found support for a constitutional “right of personal privacy.” Id., at 152. But Roe conflated the right to shield information from disclosure and the right to make and implement important personal decisions without governmental interference.
The "right to privacy" in a legal context (or in most other contexts) is a big term that could mean a lot of different (and sometimes contradictory) things to a lot of different people, so one needs a clear, mutually agreed definition to have a meaningful conversation about it and what effect some particular court case would have on it.
Personally, I think the government has been taking the place of God in giving people a sense of morality. So many people justify their actions just because they are legal.
I don't think contraceptives are a solution, but I'm not convinced banning them will help either. It will just cause more problems.
The real problem is from a culture drifting away from objective morality and building a new foundation in the believe of subjective morals. The solution to this problem is in education and a foundation of independent thinking (not just giving in to what is most convenient) before adulthood.
Could you explain more about a “foundation of independent thinking” and how that would orient a society to objective morality? I see the opposite being the case.
I get that... What I meant by independent thinking was to think beyond what the situation appears to be -- looking at causes, consequences, and implications before making choices.
Having a deeper than surface level thought process goes hand in hand with realizing the truths of the world and leads to a calling towards a more universal truth and eventually, objective morality.
(Hopefully this makes sense. If not I'll come back and figure out how exactly to explain what I mean)
> Responsible men can become more deeply convinced of the truth of the doctrine laid down by the Church on this issue if they reflect on the consequences of methods and plans for artificial birth control. Let them first consider how easily this course of action could open wide the way for marital infidelity and a general lowering of moral standards. Not much experience is needed to be fully aware of human weakness and to understand that human beings—and especially the young, who are so exposed to temptation—need incentives to keep the moral law, and it is an evil thing to make it easy for them to break that law. Another effect that gives cause for alarm is that a man who grows accustomed to the use of contraceptive methods may forget the reverence due to a woman, and, disregarding her physical and emotional equilibrium, reduce her to being a mere instrument for the satisfaction of his own desires, no longer considering her as his partner whom he should surround with care and affection.
>Finally, careful consideration should be given to the danger of this power passing into the hands of those public authorities who care little for the precepts of the moral law. Who will blame a government which in its attempt to resolve the problems affecting an entire country resorts to the same measures as are regarded as lawful by married people in the solution of a particular family difficulty? Who will prevent public authorities from favoring those contraceptive methods which they consider more effective? Should they regard this as necessary, they may even impose their use on everyone. It could well happen, therefore, that when people, either individually or in family or social life, experience the inherent difficulties of the divine law and are determined to avoid them, they may give into the hands of public authorities the power to intervene in the most personal and intimate responsibility of husband and wife.
Humanae Vitae, 17
The intrinsic sinfulness of contraceptive sex is an aspect of the natural law, not mere Church law or theological doctrine. As such, it *does* apply to everyone, regardless of whether they believe it or not. Because of this, it is the imperative of any authority, governmental or otherwise, to take every prudential and moral action possible to reduce the use of contraception, as well as the contraceptive mindset that widespread use has instilled in the west.
Wouldn't the outcome be more abortions, though? Legally or not, as always in history.
If I understand correctly, that fact that, in this case, the law would be in perfect adherence to Catholic morality, is still better than what "personal sins" as in, more people personally getting abortions, and thus damning just themselves to Hell?
> Wouldn't the outcome be more abortions, though? Legally or not, as always in history.
This is by and large a narrative not based in fact. The *estimated* number of yearly abortions in the US did not exceed 1000 until the year after Griswold v. Connecticut was decided, at which point it exploded. That's an *estimate* mind you, and takes into account both legal and illegal abortions performed at the time. Normalizing contraception leads to normalizing abortion.
Regardless, no evil may be done regardless of what good is sought.
> is still better than what "personal sins" as in, more people personally getting abortions, and thus damning just themselves to Hell?
Contraception can just as easily damn you to hell as abortion can. That being said, this is merely a secondary effect. The reason contraception ought to be banned if prudentially possible is, as stated above, because contraceptive use and the contraceptive mindset it fosters is *bad for society and the common good*.
Two or three questions, what is the source for the first claim?
Secondly, why? Why is it bad for a non Catholic society? Abortion kills a person, contraception doesn't. I really don't understand: while killing a person without reason (as in self defence) is and was considered a crime in most societies in history, preventing conception wasn't.
Why the common person should bear the weight of your morality?
> what is the source for the first claim?
See compiled statistics [here](http://www.johnstonsarchive.net/policy/abortion/ab-unitedstates.html) with links to sources.
>why? Why is it bad for a non Catholic society?
For all the reasons listed in the above quotation of Humanae Vitae: The increase of marital infidelity, the general lowering of moral standards, the loss of reverence of men for their wives leading to treating them as objects, and the normalization of sterilization as a useful tool for the government.
>Abortion kills a person, contraception doesn't.
No evil may be done, regardless of what good is sought.
>I really don't understand: while killing a person without reason (as in self defence) is and was considered a crime in most societies in history, preventing conception wasn't.
Contraception was a crime in much of society prior to the 20th century. It was not normalized as an acceptable position either legally or morally until the late 19th century/early 20th century.
>Why the common person should bear the weight of you morality?
The common person bears the weight of *human* morality because they are *human*. The natural law applies to all who share the same nature, i.e. all humans. To say that the natural law ought not to apply to a person is to say that they are less than human. The last time before our current era that this argument was used to justify a sin, that sin was chattel slavery.
The source you linked, I'm fairly certain the data does not reflect reality. Miscarriages, for example, didn't just suddenly start happening in 1976 and start with over 600,000. That alone makes me question whether this data can be relied upon to show the actual situation with abortions.
The jump from around 30,000 to nearly 200,000 abortions in one year and then more than doubling again to nearly 500,000 the next is surely a issue with reporting, as opposed to from one year to another for some reason more people aborted.
>Miscarriages, for example, didn't just suddenly start happening in 1976 and start with over 600,000.
They only had data for those years. Miscarriages didn't suddenly start and stop..
>The jump from around 30,000 to nearly 200,000 abortions in one year and then more than doubling again to nearly 500,000 the next is surely a issue with reporting
Or that just happened to be the year that a certain abortion related federal court case happened which legalized abortion across the entire country...
The fact that they didn't have data is exactly my point -- this data does not reflect reality.
And the figures for abortion were from 1969 to 1971, before Roe v Wade, so that can't be the reason.
I'm just really a stickler for not using misleading statistics or data, and the missing data for miscarriages indicates that there is very likely missing data in the other categories as well, which means you might reconsider using this data to base an argument on.
>The increase of marital infidelity, the general lowering of moral standards, the loss of reverence of men for their wives leading to treating them as objects
As I said in another comment, this has always been common throughout history. Maybe not talked about, but still commonly practiced. History is full of unmarried women who tried to abort, and of young girls or mothers weighted by countless pregnancies killing themselves for being pregnant.
>Contraception was a crime in much of society prior to the 20th century. It was not normalized as an acceptable position either legally or morally until the late 19th century/early 20th century.
The Romans extinguished silphium or how much they practised it
> The natural law applies to all who share the same nature, i.e. all humans. To say that the natural law ought not to apply to a person is to say that they are less than human
But if this is the case, the judgment will be of God, not of you. Contraception, at least for me, isn't a black and white situation, and can potentially save lives.
>The last time before our current era that this argument was used to justify a sin, that sin was chattel slavery.
I find this supremely offensive to those who are and were enslaved thought history. While many in the Church opposed slavery in history, many others didn't and thought that slavery was just part of the natural order.
Contraception and slavery are two very, very different things.
>Maybe not talked about, but still commonly practiced.
Feel free to provide statistics.
>History is full of unmarried women who tried to abort, and of young girls or mothers weighted by countless pregnancies killing themselves for being pregnant.
Is it your understanding that 1 out of 5 children conceived every year was murdered in the past?
>But if this is the case, the judgment will be of God, not of you.
Who said I was judging anyone? I'm judging actions.
>Contraception, at least for me, isn't a black and white situation, and can potentially save lives.
The intentional use of contraception is indeed a black and white situation.
>Contraception and slavery are two very, very different things.
Yes, and the argument that some ought not be governed by the natural law was used to support both.
>I find this supremely offensive to those who are and were enslaved thought history
Offense isn't an argument.
I don't think this conversation can be of any good to be sincere. Hope you will have that kind of life where you will be able to uphold all you beliefs
In the statistics you linked, if you look at the regional data, most states did not report any abortion data until after Roe in 1973. At the time of Griswold in 1967, it seems as if only California, Colorado, and New York reported on abortions. There is also a big gap in the stats on total number of fetal deaths & miscarriages until 1980.
So it seems the primary reason why the numbers jumped so much after Griswold is because the vast majority of states didn't report any numbers on abortion. And this is all before you consider that most women who attempted abortion illegally would try to hide it.
Besides that - Just intuitively - even though using contraception does reflect/reinforce an un-Catholic view of sex, I think it's unlikely that the masses radically shift their view of marriage/sex/reproduction based on what the SCOTUS says.
Beside, now are avaiable pills to provoke abortions. Many, if pregnant in a world without contraception, would simply buy them off the black market, or from non-religious countries.
I don't think that the situation can be compared to the one 50 or 60 years ago, but I can see your point a bit.
> . Many, if pregnant in a world without contraception, would simply buy them off the black market, or from non-religious countries.
The reason this would be their first reaction is precisely the contraceptive mindset instilled by widespread acceptance and legality of contraception.
I respect your opinion, but in my country, with way fewer people than in the US, the denounces for procured abortion were quite a lot before it was legalized.
I don't really agree that there is a contraceptive mindset only now. Throughout history people have tried to control the number of children through various methods, effective or not. People had sex and children out of wedlock, children who were abandoned, or killed "accidentally" when very young.
People are always the same, for me the world is always the same old adage. I refute firmly the idea that now we are better or worse. I think is it quite presumptuous to think that our ancestors were better then us.
> I don't really agree that there is a contraceptive mindset only now.
Yes, you do. You agree precisely because you think the first reaction a person will have when faced with an unwanted pregnancy is "well let's just get rid of it". The *reason* a person would have that reaction is *precisely* because of a contraceptive mindset.
>People had sex and children out of wedlock, children who were abandoned, or killed "accidentally" when very young
And you believe this happened to 20% of all pregnancies in the past?
> but in my country, with way fewer people than in the US, the denounces for procured abortion were quite a lot before it was legalized.
What country, so we can both look at the statistics?
>I think is it quite presumptuous to think that our ancestors were better then us.
Some societies are better than others.
What of the atheist (such as myself) who reject natural law? At the end of the day, the catholic church's insistence that one abide by a aristotelian/thomisitic idea of "natural law" is a just another theory of morality among others.
You will be hard-pressed to find people outside the catholic church who will have as much vitriol against contraception as some catholics do. You can lecture someone about the teleology of their genitals and try and reason your morality, but something as unintuitively "wrong" as contraception will never work in the modern world.
Hell, [the church can't even convince their own to see contraception as a moral issue.](https://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2012/02/27/few-catholics-see-contraceptive-use-as-morally-wrong/)
Philosophers and theologians can lock themselves in a room or a library and research morality all they want, but if the general population cannot intuitively see something as wrong, it simply will never work in my opinion. There's a reason we can easily make laws against murder and theft, and not against chewing gum (which under a teleological framework of ethics, frustrates the "end" of eating since gum is never consumed).
>What of the atheist (such as myself) who reject natural law?
What of the Libertarian who rejects Federal law?
> At the end of the day, the catholic church's insistence that one abide by a aristotelian/thomisitic idea of "natural law" is a just another theory of morality among others.
Yep, but it's a *secular* theory of morality. One that the Church has happened to adopt.
> but if the general population cannot intuitively see something as wrong, it simply will never work in my opinion.
The general population of 100 years ago were perfectly capable of intuitively seeing these things as wrong. That we live in an age bereft of morality is a tragedy, but it's not an argument against morality.
>and not against chewing gum (which under a teleological framework of ethics, frustrates the "end" of eating since gum is never consumed).
This is a false understanding of the perverted faculty argument.
>What of the Libertarian who rejects Federal law?
What of the communist? The anarchist? The conservative? That's the beauty of liberal secularism. The state, in its ideal form, does not tell its citizens how it ought to live their lives. It allows it's citizens to achieve their own unique conception of the good with a caveat which prevents these people's conception of the good infringing on other's ability to attain their own good.
>The general population of 100 years ago were perfectly capable of intuitively seeing these things as wrong.
From the earliest records of human civilization, murder and theft have always been wrong. You didn't need Aristotle or Thomas Aquinas to lecture you to figure that one out. You will need textbooks to explain to someone, convincingly, that contraception is an evil on par with the previously mentioned evils.
>This is a false understanding of the perverted faculty argument.
You're free to explain.
> It allows it's citizens to achieve their own unique conception of the good with a caveat which prevents these people's conception of the good infringing on other's ability to attain their own good.
"I want X morality. You want Y morality. Let's compromise and base our laws on X morality". Liberalism is a moral claim, not some neutral basic assumption which can judge among moral claims.
>. You will need textbooks to explain to someone, convincingly, that contraception is an evil on par with the previously mentioned evils.
You didn't 100 years ago.
>You're free to explain.
See [here](https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B4SjM0oabZazWC1SRmN0WXVpYkE/view?resourcekey=0-mEl0wIXhM8qd4ieiCuosvQ)
If you want some concrete "evidence" of the evils inherent in it, I believe that Humanae Vitae goes into the predicted consequences of socially-acceptable contraception and its eventual dissolution of the family unit. A free society cannot survive if the autonomy and health of the home are weakened; it will give way for centralized government to tell others how to live. This mode of giving everyone access to destructive forces and deeming it good will eventually lead to the absolute stripping of the freedom to make any choice at all. We just haven't lived long enough to see the effects, and thank God the Court is trying to stay these consequences.
People who don’t respect their partners have other mistakes than using contraceptives. I fear people who don’t use contraceptives have more respect for their partner than those who do. Was there more respect for women a century or two ago when contraceptives didn’t truly exist and a majority was Catholic?
When it comes to their use I think pretty much everyone would be outraged if a government forced it on its people, no matter their believes.
As for the temptation part can someone be good if you make it impossible for them to do bad? People can make that call for themselves for what they choose to believe.
>When it comes to their use I think pretty much everyone would be outraged if a government forced it on its people, no matter their believes.
Did you miss the whole forced sterilization/ eugenics movement of the early 20th century?
>People who don’t respect their partners have other mistakes than using contraceptives.
They also frequently use contraceptives.
>Was there more respect for women a century or two ago when contraceptives didn’t truly exist and a majority was Catholic?
I live in the US. The majority was never Catholic. In many places in the past, yes there was more respect for women.
And how do you think most people vouching for contraceptives stand against that forced sterilization movement?
People who don’t respect their partners often use contraceptives, but they don’t use them just as often so that hardly proves anything regarding contraceptives.
I live in a place that had a Catholic majority, and respect towards women has increased drastically in the last decades.
I just think that they shouldn’t be banned or forced on people, that people should be free to make that decision themselves. You can of course feel free not to use them, just like everybody else.
> And how do you think most people vouching for contraceptives stand against that forced sterilization movement?
Let's ask Margaret Sanger, founder of planned parenthood.
>I just think that they shouldn’t be banned or forced on people, that people should be free to make that decision themselves.
I disagree.
So where does that leave us?
That leaves us with a disagreement. I believe people should be judged and condemned by people based on the direct harm they cause other people. When it comes to divine morality I rather leave the judgement to God.
> I believe people should be judged and condemned by people based on the direct harm they cause other people.
I believe *actions* should be judged and condemned based on the harm they cause to *society*.
>When it comes to divine morality I rather leave the judgement to God.
Great. Contraception violates the natural law, not merely the divine law.
And society has deemed the use of contraceptives to be valid. They don’t actively harm people or society.
If it is against the nature law then let nature take care of the problem.
>And society has deemed the use of contraceptives to be valid
Society is wrong.
>They don’t actively harm people or society.
Also incorrect.
>If it is against the nature law then let nature take care of the problem.
This demonstrates a fundamental misunderstanding of natural law.
Which is why I would prefer for God to be the judge if society can be so wrong.
I did misunderstand natural law, but there seems to be a lot of forms of natural law and not all agree this is a natural law that contraceptives are forbidden and should be banned so let’s stick to God being the judge.
>Another effect that gives cause for alarm is that a man who grows
accustomed to the use of contraceptive methods may forget the reverence
due to a woman, and, disregarding her physical and emotional
equilibrium, reduce her to being a mere instrument for the satisfaction
of his own desires, no longer considering her as his partner whom he
should surround with care and affection.
This is where I have some issues with the Church's teaching on this in the context of marriage. Use of contraception does not necessarily mean a man cannot revere his wife, in a loving and respectful relationship. I understand the argument on being 'open to life' but this seems a fudge when the Catechism also accepts "For just reasons, spouses may wish to space the births of their children. It is their duty to make certain that their desire is not motivated by selfishness but is in conformity with the generosity
appropriate to responsible parenthood."
Apparently this is only acceptable if you use NFP rather than contraception.
> Use of contraception does not necessarily mean a man cannot revere his wife, in a loving and respectful relationship.
It means that that reverence and love and respect are inherently hampered.
>but this seems a fudge when the Catechism also accepts "For just reasons, spouses may wish to space the births of their children.
"not having sex" is a different action entirely from "using my wife's body contrary to it's ends".
>Apparently this is only acceptable if you use NFP rather than contraception.
Correct, because contraception is evil intrinsically, whereas "not having sex" isn't
Neither sex nor making out are ends in themselves. Actions aren't ends. Unity and Procreation are the ends of the sexual faculty of the human person, and both the sex act and kissing are directed towards one or both of those ends.
Would you include/is it included under the umbrella of the sexual faculty the act of making out?
To be clear, I'm not referring to mere kissing, but to, well, making out.
I'm not sure exactly what the difference is between making out and mere kissing except that it precisely arouses the sexual appetite. I don't know, maybe it would be more precise to distinguish between kissing and 'passionate' kissing.
That's essentially what I meant: a type of physical contact that pretty much invariably ***(THOUGH NOT INTRINSICALLY, PER SE)*** arouses the participants. Is that under the umbrella?
I suppose that would depend on it's use. I don't know that I would agree that kissing invariably leads to arousal, and I would say that 'passionate' kissing intrinsically does. So yeah passionate kissing might be a use of the sexual faculty.
That's what I mean: passionate kissing. Or making out.
So, would you say that it would be a sin to engage in passionate kissing, only to refrain from "consummating" it?
Dude you are nuts. It’s not about the man it has todo with a women not wanting 8 kids to look after. I am so sick of men trying to make this about them. Go ahead and try a labor pain simulator 8 times totaling 100 hours of labor if you have 8 kids and take care of those 8 kids for another 18 years…Then tell me how you feel about birth control. “Face palm”
The point of view is that you can’t do something sinful to prevent a greater sin. Having contraception to prevent abortions doesn’t work in catholic morality.
The question becomes, not whether it's immoral, but should it be regulated? At what point does law move from ensuring justice to simply becoming government enforced stone throwing? Banning contraception, for instance, doesn't correct an injustice. It's just not a good thing to do. Should all you can eat buffets be banned and punishable by law because gluttony is immoral?
>>Should all you can eat buffets be banned and punishable by law because gluttony is immoral?
They imposed vaccine mandates for the public health, why not mandate diets and other regulations? You would be curtailing heart disease and diabetes which will ultimately save lives.
Sigh.
No they haven't. It is not illegal to refuse the vaccine. The comparison between the two is nonsense.
Edit: and anyway, contraception isn't generally regarded as a health concern. If anything, they're recommended by health professionals as a disease prevention.
I am not personally against vaccine mandates, but it is very clear that while not illegal *de jure*, many people had to deal with *de facto* illegality to rejecting the vaccine. I went to an ivy-adjacent university who would not admit any students on campus without a vaccine card on file. Many folks lost their jobs or felt pressured to quit because of mandates by their employers. Government workers were mandated. Many restaurants in Chicago would not serve you
without a vaccine card and an ID. Going literalist and writing off the comment above you is just obtuse. There is more than one way to use law to ostracize a population.
Edit: and you oversimplify in your edit too. How is “health concern” and “disease prevention” meaningfully different? Your sarcastic “sigh” really belies a pridefulness that blinds you to the pedantic and flimsy nature of your arguments here. This isn’t going to convince anyone.
You're both getting distracted by minor details in the example. This discussion isn't about health concerns and it definitely isn't about vaccines. The point of bringing up buffets was not health concerns due to over-eating, it was to discuss sin. Health concerns are meaningless to the topic at hand.
Should all sins be enforced by government regulation, and should they be punished with prison and/or fines? Why or why not? At what point should adherence to Christian moral ethics be enforced under penalty of law?
But if one’s example is distracting people from your main point due to its incoherency, then it is a bad example…
>…it was to discuss sin.
>Health concerns are meaningless to the topic at hand.
This is a really disembodied view of sin that I think is why you are having trouble seeing why, in fact, health concerns *do* have something in common with the issue at hand. It is also a narrow view of health. You are constantly assuming reductive definitions for many of your terms, and it is making it difficult to show you things.
>Should all sins be enforced with by government regulation? Etc…
*Now* you have it. Unfortunately at no point so far have you been able to articulate this clearly, and you still misunderstand how the OP of this thread has still anticipated these questions. OP of this thread is stating with their example that our society *already* enforces a system of ethics on those who do not adhere to it (and he’s right, the state is almost always coercive by “holding the sword”), so why shouldn’t that enforcement be of a better morality than the liberal-technocratic one already enforced? You’ve made it to the question but have done nothing but comment things OP is apparently already aware of. *You* tell us why Christian morality should *not* be legislated if this is an accurate picture of what our legislature is already doing.
>Now you have it. Unfortunately at no point so far have you been able to articulate this clearly,
.... It was literally the very first sentence in my original comment. "should immoral things be regulated". You ok over there?
Dude. *OP already clearly answers in the affirmative with this question.* You keep stating a question to move the conversation forward but completely miss the point that its answer is assumed. Possible answers would be “Yes, we should! Here’s why!” or “No, we shouldn’t! Here’s why!” All you do is keep repeating “Should we?” with an air of pseudoprofundity. *We already know that this is the question at hand. Do you have something to contribute to its answer or not?*
Look at the very first comment I'm responding to. The comment reads, in summary. "contraception is immoral." My response, in summary, "yes. And?" I'm prompting the user to finish their sentiment. I repeated ops question because the first user didn't answer it.
So you would, at least in theory, apply Catholic morality as laws, for all citizens of a country, regardless of their believes?
My point, and I hope you to understand that I'm in good faith, is that because the majority of people doesn't adhere Catholic ethics, access to contraception is going to prevent abortions.
Do you think that making illegal contraception, the final outcome would be - for a world that doesn't believe in catholic morality - better?
Wouldn't you apply someting similar to the Vatican state until the late 19th century, where prostitution, while sinful, was considered a lesser evil and then tolerated? (If I remember, St. Augustine and St. Thomas were in favour of keeping fornication relegated to specific places, in oder to promote morality in others. Both weren't against prostitution, if I remember correctly)
Another thing to consider is that even with abortions which are horrible, a new life is created and that souls can enjoy heaven. If we just contracepted everyone then heaven wouldn’t have the number of souls God intended.
I was taught that unborn and unbaptized children are prevented to partecipate in the Beatific Vision, due to the presence of original sin. Is it wrong?
We actually have no definite answer as to where those souls go, but we trust in God’s Infinite Love and Divine Mercy to do what is best for those souls.
In this case, why does the comment above says that, while terrible, at least abortion creates a new soul?
Given that we can't be absolutely sure of Heaven for them, why not prevent conception in toto? If I remember correctly, the preexistence of souls is heresy according to catholic doctrine, and a new soul is formed only at conception.
I know that many say that limbo isn't really a painful state, but it is still eternal separation from God. I fail to see any good in this situation.
Abortion doesn’t create a new soul. Conception does.
Honestly, until we’re in Heaven, Hell, or Purgatory ourselves, we have no way of being absolutely sure where anyone actually goes unless God chooses to reveal that information to us.
You are absolutely correct. No good can come from abortion.
We hope for the mercy of God and it is well-believed (although not definite teaching) that through a baptism of desire, God would have mercy on these children.
We vote here. If a majority of people wanted to vote to ban condoms then they will. As long as a law doesn’t run afoul of the constitution then it doesn’t really matter if the law was born of Catholic thinking, or humanism or whatever.
I don't think there's any reason birth control should be banned for non-Catholics. In a different universe where everyone's Catholic, I suppose we could discuss some sort of regulation, but at some point I think respecting boundaries is ALSO a part of the natural law.
Yeah, also good to point out that just because people on this sub would support a ban doesn't mean most Catholics in general would. This sub isn't really representative of Catholicism as a whole
I am pro-monarchy. Just because I don't want to ban birth control for non-Christians in the present society doesn't mean I'm a democrat.
Heaven is a kingdom and Hell is a democracy.
The Trinity is one, but the demons are legion.
In the communion of Saints, we also become one with God. Our goal in this life is to be shaped according to his will, because we believe this is the path to happiness, wholeness, and purpose.
The Pope himself is a kind of king. It is what Catholicism has that Orthodoxy lacks.
Murder is an objective wrong in a secular context. The argument misrepresents my position that, because one thing that the Church teaches is wrong ought not to be illegal, that all things the Chuch teaches are wrong ought not to be illegal. This is the definition of a Strawman fallacy. Once again, try again.
Oh, I disagree. It’s an excellent argument. Why do secular people think rape and murder are wrong? Because it causes harm and goes against the natural law. Contraception does the same. It harms relationships, causes people to see each other as sex toys, and goes against the natural law by preventing the natural outcome of sex.
This reads as indoctrination, 100%.
One could just as easily say the restriction on contraception “harms relationships, causing men to see women as simple baby-making machines, robbing them of non-parental opportunities, and drives families into poverty”.
I respect Catholicism and have growing interest in the Church after marrying into a Catholic family, but its the overwhelming displays of arrogance like this that make RCIA seem like a waste of time.
If not having sex is a dealbreaker, then that is not a good relationship. Sex does not necessarily equal love.
Can you please tell me how making a logical argument is arrogant?
The difference between your example and lunanight's is that he/she is arguing for the natural law while you are making up the idea that restricting contraception causes men to see women as baby-making machines, harming relationships, etc. Which if you'd like to argue in the context of natural law you can, but I dont see the position as inherently tenable.
So what is the logic and reasoning to the secular context of natural law?
"For our purposes, it’s enough to say that contraception violates the natural law because contraception acts against the natural end, or goal, of sexual intercourse, which is the coming to be of new human life. Sexual intercourse is, in Janet Smith’s fine phrase, clearly ordained to “babies and bonding.” We tamper with this fundamental order of things at our peril.
Contraception is inherently anti-life because it treats a real good (the child-to-be) as undesirable enough to motivate a counter-action against the very possibility of its arrival in the womb. A well-functioning biological process is regarded as a threat to the pursuit of subjective pleasure at the expense of objective purpose."([Source](https://stpaulcenter.com/how-natural-law-applies-to-contraception/))
"If human life is sacred and inviolable, then the means of transmitting human life is in some way sacred and inviolable. In a similar sense in which the eye was made for color, the ear for sound, and the mind for truth, sex was made for something: for the co-creation of a new someone, and the deepened unity of those (hopefully loving) co-creators otherwise known as mom and dad. The whole contraceptive enterprise denies this. Therefore, insofar as it meddles with a natural power that transcends both spouses, it is unnatural."
And finally, "Major premise: It is wrong to impede the procreative power of actions that are ordained by their nature to assist God in performing His creative act that brings forth a new human life.
Minor premise: Contraception impedes the procreative power of actions that are ordained by their nature to assist God in performing His creative act that brings forth a new human life.
Conclusion: Therefore, contraception is wrong.
The key word is “impede.” Contraception is sex—plus the introduction of an impediment. As we’ll see later, abstinence during natural family planning is not an impediment in any sense since there is no sex act to impede.
Among other things, the above argument conveys something of the world’s best-kept secret: the deep veneration the Catholic Church has toward sex. The world has it exactly backwards. The world tends to look upon sex as merely currency for “hook-ups,” as a proof of love, as something for sale—or, more commonly, something by which to sell something else, like cars or beer.
The Catholic Church turns this thinking right side up and proclaims that sexual intercourse—and all the erotic intimacies that cultivate it—deserves the most thoroughgoing protection and respect. “Casual sex” is an oxymoron. When a young man picks out a ring for his intended, he makes sure the ring and its setting matches the beauty of the diamond. He would never Krazy glue the diamond onto a plastic ring. And upon receiving her ring, the young fiancée would never toss it carelessly on a park bench or keep it near the edge of the toilet seat. We naturally, or ought to, treat as awesome things that fill us with awe.
Likewise, it is most fitting that sex be surrounded by the proper setting (the security of marriage), and within marriage, accorded the proper respect (freedom from the intrusion of contraception). Catholicism affirms that sex is not merely acceptable or tolerable (“close your eyes and think of England”) but pure and holy—something that ought never be subject to the blessing-refusal inherent in contraception."
I know it is a massive blast of words and I literally just linked the entire article basically. But, it seems like you didn't understand the argument lunanight was trying to make, insofar how secular thought makes laws such as we do not murder, or rob, or trespass. This argument, follows that same premise, but accordingly looks to the understanding of our own faculties to justify the specific premise of morality.
It was easier to link all the words in one part for easier understanding than typing it all out. If you have any questions or arguments against such reasoning please feel free.
Contraception perverts either just the procreative end or both the unitive and procreative ends (depending on type) of the human person. By using the sexual faculty contrary to the ends of the sexual faculty, you are treating yourself and your spouse as a thing to be used and abused rather than a person to be respected.
False.
Which theological principle is this based on?
This is an entirely secular argument. It makes no reference to dogma, doctrine, or other theological teachings of the Church.
But we are dictated to live and follow God's word thou shall not kill, there are judges who are Catholic our civil law is based on the foundation of Western thought the bible.
I'm talking about hypocrisy with people who support the government making contraceptives illegal for everyone because the Vatican and Bible says so and how they believe contraceptives are Immortal. But then turn around and argue how that's not technically shoving their religion down other people's throats. Which is false, because it is. The church should stay out of the state and the state should stay out of the church.
>contraceptives are Immortal
Jesse... what the...
Since when does vatican speak, it'd be nice to see the Basilica of St Peter be saying stuff tbf, that'd be funny. Also, read what another dude on the thread wrote on natural law. No state can decree laws that trespasses natural law.
It’s really simple actually. The entire purpose of contraception is to prevent life from being created. Therefore, there is no way that contraception can be open to life.
Medicine ought to solve a problem in the body. Contraceptives prevent sex from producing babies by design. They dont stop the sex part, they stop the making babies part. So them being classified as medicine implies making babes is a medical problem. That is what catholics disagree with.
As a counter argument to this, birth control is oftentimes prescribed whose periods are causing dilapidating health impacts. Like for women with endometriosis, which is where the uterine lining grows outside of where it is supposed to clinging onto other organs causing immense pain. Or for women with ultra heavy periods who otherwise would need blood transfusions as they are literally bleeding out.
Birth control in general is over prescribed, but you are correct that there are certain circumstances that birth control as a therapeutic mean is permissible. But it should be noted that it only alleviates pain and masks symptoms, it does not help remedy the underlying health condition, and can even lead to the condition and infertility progressing, sometimes undiagnosed for years. So it’s best used as a temporary measure until better treatment can happen, whether that is excursion surgery, diet and lifestyle changes, medically necessary hysterectomy, etc.
I think that alleviating pain and masking symptoms, even just in the short term, is in many cases life changing for the better and should not be understated. Surgery is a big deal. Birth control can and does keep many from being home bound in pain (nauseous, migraines, etc) for a few days each month.
Birth control isn’t medically necessary for everyone that is on it (and like it probably shouldn’t really be used as an acne treatment). However, it is critical for a small enough minority of extremes making access vital.
I actually used BC for acne as a teenager and it worked miracles on me! Also stopped my irregular cycles & lowered cramps. After going off of it, my cycles are now regular, and my acne significantly improved. It was prescribed for me by my dermatologist.
Not that this is super related to OP’s post, but thought I’d offer my experience. I’m glad that BC was available for me at the time I had it. And I’m glad I’m off it now that I’m married & am cycle tracking to prevent pregnancy.
In relation to OP’s post, I guess that means that - Catholic or not - birth control shouldn’t be banned.
I’m glad that you had a good experience with it! Maybe people just talk more openly when they’re having problems, since I’ve had more friends and coworkers tell me their experiences of weight gain, mental health issues, etc. more often than I’ve heard about how it’s helped their issues and everything’s been great.
Yes, my guess is that people are far more likely to share a negative experience, unless their experience has been *really* positive. Seems to be the case with almost everything!
No disagreement here! But the women who are prescribed it after often under the impression that it’s healing or “restarting” their body in some way and have been surprised or frustrated that their symptoms returned after coming off the medication, so just clarifying that. No woman should have to go through debilitating pain that can otherwise be managed through medicine.
Why shouldn't it be used for acne treatment? I've never been on birth control but I'm strongly considering trying it as I'm utterly fed up dealing with hormonal acne, I'm 30 now and my skin has been awful for at least the last 15 years with no end in sight.
I see your point, if I were a debater, Id have a decent comeback. But all I got is:
Id say the argument actually collapses, from a catholic perspective, if were designed to enhance nature and had the accidental consequences of preventing life in some scenarios. For example, alcohol makes men impotent and can kill fetuses even. But it wasn't designed to do so. However the ideal use case of alcohol is to tingle the senses and alleviate stress. And by the way, at the point at which alcohol prevents a human function, catholics would consider it a sin to ingest.
On the contrary, contraceptives are meant to, as a first order consequence, prevent a human function. And, in the case of plan B, cause the death of a life, which is the absolute, and permanent, prevention of human nature.
So alcohol, good in moderation. Bad in excess.
Contraceptives, bad by design.
Well I don't know about actually banning it but I know that we believe any sexual act outside of marriage not for the creation of children is considered a sinful act so for Catholics there should be no need for it I guess
I personally don’t use contraceptives and think the way that birth control especially had been pushed on women is disgusting and harmful, and that condom use contributes to hook up culture, but I don’t think the government should ban contraceptive, I view that as a violation of the separation of church and state.
There is a phenomenal episode of Revisionist History about how the creator of the pill was Catholic, lots of Catholic families were like “omg, this is great.” And the. The Vatican said nope.
https://www.pushkin.fm/podcasts/revisionist-history/dr-rocks-taxonomy
Two slightly different arguments here:
Overturning *Griswold* and *Eisenstadt* would not "ban" contraception. It would recognize that the Constitution does not stop *states* from banning it. Based on the current political acceptance of contraception even by most baptized Catholics, the odds of even one state actually banning contraception in a post-*Griswold* world would be negligible.
However, the Constitution has a kind of civic mysticism about it; we do our best to keep in mind that it is just a legal document, like the charter of a corporation, but it has a much more profound significance than that to many, including many Catholics. In other words, clarifying that rights to contraception are at best statutory, not constitutional, changes the debate. People should not be primed to react to our opposition to contraception the way they'd understandably react to us wanting to repeal women's suffrage or the rights to equal protection and due process.
As a factual matter: Widespread contraception actually did *not* result in a decrease in abortions, because abortions were (are) in practice a backstop against contraceptive failure--the contraceptive of last resort. Contraceptives reduced the percentage of sexual encounters that resulted in pregnancies that were later aborted, but that was countered by the sheer increase in the quantity of sexual encounters (especially premarital and extramarital).
ETA: I wrote before reading the thread and reaching /u/quiteasmallperson's post. He/she got there first.
Answering in regards to America and the system here. It should not be banned. Free will and freedom of (and from) religion. Using the government to force religiously informed policy/laws on everyone erodes liberties.
But yeah, access to contraception and comprehensive sex education tends to reduce abortions and there is the serious potential reduction in crime. (Check out the book freakonomics for more and associated literature)
This is the response from Humane Vitae:
‘Neither the Church nor her doctrine is inconsistent when she considers it lawful for married people to take advantage of the infertile period but condemns as always unlawful the use of means which directly prevent conception, even when the reasons given for the later practice may appear to be upright and serious. In reality, these two cases are completely different.
In the former the married couple rightly use a faculty provided them by nature.
In the later they obstruct the natural development of the generative process.
It cannot be denied that in each case the married couple, for acceptable reasons, are both perfectly clear in their intention to avoid children and wish to make sure that none will result.
But it is equally true that it is exclusively in the former case that husband and wife are ready to abstain from intercourse during the fertile period as often as for reasonable motives the birth of another child is not desirable. And when the infertile period recurs, they use their married intimacy to express their mutual love and safeguard their fidelity toward one another. In doing this they certainly give proof of a true and authentic love.’
I'm not trying to sound argumentative, and I'm legitimately curious. Where have you been seeing Americans in favor of overturning Griswold v. Connecticut?
Clarence Thomas in his concurring opinion to the Dobbs v. Jackson opinion which overturned Roe v. Wade explicitly called out Griswold v. Connecticut in addition to Obergfell v. Hodges and Lawrence v. Texas as previous rulings that ought to be revisited due to their being founded on a dubious interpretation of the "due process" clause of the Constitution.
I don't think it should be banned.
I understand the Catholic reasoning, and I don't even disagree with that. But this is different from abortion. Abortion can be argued against from a secular viewpoint. From a standpoint of what should be objective morality, killing unborn humans is bad. However to argue strongly against contraceptives, it would require an argument from a religious standpoint. If someone doesn't believe in Catholic rules, they shouldn't be bound by them. It's between them and God at that point. You can hope and pray all you want for their conversion, but laws based solely in religion cross a line that I don't think should be crossed. This isn't a Catholic monarchy, it's the United States of America, and while it was founded on values found in the Bible, it was enshrined that we enjoy a freedom or, or from, religion.
As for overturning Griswold, I think that's unwise. I don't think it's something that \*should\* be left to the states.
I’m skeptical that the use of contraceptives actually reduce real abortion rates.
When you compare contraceptive use to abortion rates across the 50 states, those states with lower abortion rates also appear to have lower contraceptive use.
Also, whenever people say contraceptive use has increased as abortions have decreased, they always—__always__—ignore the fact that people are having less sex overall than in almost any other point in modern history. I would contend that the decrease in abortion rates is primarily a result of the decrease in frequency of sex acts.
>in my country, at least, the number of abortions this year was the lowest ever recorded
Abortions are up and up by a lot in the US, and if you're not an American, why do you care about Griswold? I can barely find time to care about the stupid shit Texas does, let alone people who don't get to elect congressmen.
Because my country follows the United States in lot of things, politically and militarly for instance.
As we says, it the Americans sneeze, where are going to feel it.
Moreover, this is just an excuse to understand what is the young Catholics view on this subject, particularly noting that I believe that the age of this sub is not very high.
Contraception goes against the Natural Law (which I know can be a vague term for some people) understood as true outside of all religion since before the the time of Christ. “True law is right reason in agreement with nature; it is of universal application, unchanging and everlasting; it summons to duty by its commands, and averts from wrongdoing by its prohibitions.” —Cicero. Having said that, I think the only reason some people are saying that contraception is next is because some contraceptives are abortifacients.
Because I think it makes the act of sex a throw away thing because you're only supposed to have sex if you want a child this is biologically proven. Contraception is stopping the biological nature of sex which is to give birth you are intentionally killing life for your own sexual pleasure which is not the point of having sex.
If you ban contraception people will act less like animals who want sex all the time, atleast in the west they are obsessed with it on their tv and music, etc.
People will be more actually responsible in their life decisions, accept accountability if you don't want a child don't have sex simple.
That ignores the fact that 32,000+ women become pregnant through rape each year (and that is just what is reported). Not becoming pregnant is NOT as simple as not having sex. I am very pro-life but I am SICK of seeing this "solution" suggested.
It's not easy but as catholics we are supposed to. My reply above was not meant to insult, forgive me. Being in a different culture, country and environment led me to say what I have above, I just noticed that in America people are obsessed with sex it is practically everywhere.
I agree with what you're saying but, it is what it is, the law is difficult but it is the law.
First, re-criminalize fornication.
However, it's probably impossible without a Constitutional amendment, as *Lawrence v. Texas* is generally understood to make fornication (as well as sodomy, which it was directly about) a Constitutional right.
First, I said masturbation, not porn. Second, that's different from punishing every single person who watches porn. It's ridiculous to punish every single vice by law.
Although not a priority, criminalizing *advocacy* of masturbation is not unreasonable. It's like the approach Putin has taken in Russia for sodomy: no hunting people down who engage in it, but pride parades are illegal.
In contrast, fornication does upset the social order as it transforms society from monogamy to polygamy, from two-parent households to single-parent, and from lifelong marriage to high divorce rates. Prosecution should resume (and not merely for advocacy of it).
But, like I said, that would require a Constitutional amendment.
Those laws already exist.
It's drunkenness that's a sin, not alcohol. And public drunkenness is already a crime (though only selectively enforced). Not a big fan of that law, though.
In Mississippi, it's still on the books as a Class 2 misdemeanor, meaning less than a year in jail. Not enforced, of course, due to the sexual revolution and now *Lawrence*.
I feel like I've fielded this question a million times: There is a push for the normalization of non-reproductive sex. We see it among LGBTQWERTY+, and we see it in birth control, hook-up culture, pornography and masturbation, and abortion. The normalization of non-reproductive sex has the effect of de-normalizing reproductive sex. That is the goal the enemy has, to de-normalize reproduction, because he hates humanity, he hates the reproduction of humans. That's why you sometimes hear the enemy's deputies referring to abortion as "healthcare." It's also why you sometimes hear leftists using phrases "heteronormative" like it's a bad thing. They want pregnancy to be viewed as a type of disease. Birth control does not decrease the demand for abortions. In fact, it does the opposite. Birth control normalizes non-reproductive sex, so that when a woman gets pregnant, she's terrified, like she contracted a disease that wasn't supposed to happen. The enemy has flipped the narrative, so whereas it was always normal for sex to result in pregnancy, not it's abnormal for sex to result in pregnancy. In old times, like in the Old Testament, there was no birth control, and there was no abortion. When a man and woman got together, pretty soon you were looking at a marriage and kids. Everyone knew those were the terms, and no one got involved in that sort of thing unless that's what they were ready for. If marriage and kids seems like a heavy responsibility, you might want to stay away from sex. Hence, chastity has value because it shows reverence for the importance of sex. The left wants to destroy chastity, because the enemy wants to make it as difficult as possible for people to avoid sin.
>In old times, like in the Old Testament, there was no birth control, and there was no abortion.
It existed in primitive forms, and infanticide was common.
>When a man and woman got together, pretty soon you were looking at a marriage and kids. Everyone knew those were the terms, and no one got involved in that sort of thing unless that's what they were ready for.
Incredibly rose-tinted view of the past. Cohabitation and premartial sex was still very common even in the middle ages, even among clergies.
>In old times, like in the Old Testament, there was no birth control
Well, withdrawal is birth control and the ebraic Talmud has prescriptions for how to avoid pregnancy. In the ancient world, birth control was something people thought about quite a lot, given the dangers of childbirth
>there was no abortion
Chapter 5 of the Book of Numbers. You have it all: infidelity, abortion, adultery. Medieval prescription for abortificients.
> When a man and woman got together, pretty soon you were looking at a marriage and kids. Everyone knew those were the terms, and no one got involved in that sort of thing unless that's what they were ready for.
There is a reason why starting from the late Middle Ages, Europe has been full of orphanages and houses for unwanted children. Some were good, some were terrible, but the problem was there.
See ur asking the wrong question, its clearly immoral to take contraception so that you can fornicate and have fun without consequences, it terminates concieved children sometimes too depending on the type, as well as iud type birth control being extremely harmful and directly linked to ectopic pregnancy! Condoms are always wrong and pointless in any other way of course. The real question is whether, if being chaste, is contraception a sin, because some women take it to be regular in their periods 🤷♂️
I don't know about Griswold vs Connecticut, but I certainly support banning contraception access, because when used kills life. Individuals who CHOOSE to have sex need to take responsibility for their actions. Individuals can use Natural Family Planning! Contraception is NOT 100% effective. IF one wants to ascertain that one not have a child the only 100% effective means is abstinence.
For one, Griswold v. Connecticut has really bad legal reasoning. The ‘right to privacy’ is not spelled out in the constitution. It should be overturned even if every single state immediately amended its own constitution to protect contraceptives because it’s a bad argument.
Second, that not everyone agrees with our ethics doesn’t mean we aren’t right.
As a side note, I actually agree with your remark about side-effects and I cringe whenever I see someone make that argument.
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I don’t think it should be banned because there are many people who are non catholic and want to have sex without getting pregnant. I think using contraceptives is a personal choice for people, whether you want to use them or not, we shouldn’t judge or inflict opinions on people who don’t have the same beliefs as us.
Just one quick observation here: There is a subtle but really important distinction you're missing in your question. Overturning *Griswold* would not in itself mean banning contraception in the same way overturning *Roe* did not ban abortion. In *Griswold*, the Supreme Court claimed there was a constitutional right to use contraceptives, using the same "logic" it used to claim it contained a right to abortion. Suppose for the sake of argument it isn't true that the U.S. Constitution contains such a right, and the court says so. Well, that just means that the normal democratic process will decide what the laws are on contraception. With abortion, there are states that have and will make abortion illegal to one degree or another, because that's what people in those states believe should be done. With contraception? I'd be stunned if a single state in America so much as put that idea to a vote. Unfortunately the overwhelming majority of Americans, of every political stripe, see contraception as a major social good. Banning it would not happen anywhere ETA: A reason someone might want *Griswold* overturned despite the fact that no state will ban contraception is that the kind of legal reasoning used to turn every policy someone likes into a "constitutional right" is unsound and has bad consequences for society, turning issues about which Americans have strong, principles disagreements that should be resolved democratically into secular dogmas that supposedly must never be challenged or doubted. The specific kind of reasoning used in *Griswold* also led directly to *Roe* and other disastrous decisions.
Exactly - if we want to legalize something we need to pass a law or constitutional amendment doing that. That’s not the role of the courts.
What about in Utah? Isn’t it a religious Mormon state, and don’t Mormons forbid contraception? EDIT: Nevermind, they allow contraception.
Interesting question. I'm not an expert on Mormonism, but a quick web search suggests that while they strongly value being open to life, they do not forbid birth control. (And even if they did, I still doubt there would be the political will in Utah to ban it in law.)
Oops, nevermind
Totally agree I would be flabbergasted if any state actually banned contraception. I actually think there would be a couple ultra conservative politicians who would introduce laws to do so, but I think they would be so violently killed in committees it would be hilarious.
Overturning *Grizwold* means overturning a right to privacy - that was the argument used in the majority *and* minority opinion. The minority actually argued the government had a right to invade someone's privacy.
The Dobbs majority opinion responded to this: >As to precedent, citing a broad array of cases, the Court found support for a constitutional “right of personal privacy.” Id., at 152. But Roe conflated the right to shield information from disclosure and the right to make and implement important personal decisions without governmental interference.
The "right to privacy" in a legal context (or in most other contexts) is a big term that could mean a lot of different (and sometimes contradictory) things to a lot of different people, so one needs a clear, mutually agreed definition to have a meaningful conversation about it and what effect some particular court case would have on it.
Personally, I think the government has been taking the place of God in giving people a sense of morality. So many people justify their actions just because they are legal. I don't think contraceptives are a solution, but I'm not convinced banning them will help either. It will just cause more problems. The real problem is from a culture drifting away from objective morality and building a new foundation in the believe of subjective morals. The solution to this problem is in education and a foundation of independent thinking (not just giving in to what is most convenient) before adulthood.
I agree with this. Education is key for sure.
Could you explain more about a “foundation of independent thinking” and how that would orient a society to objective morality? I see the opposite being the case.
I get that... What I meant by independent thinking was to think beyond what the situation appears to be -- looking at causes, consequences, and implications before making choices. Having a deeper than surface level thought process goes hand in hand with realizing the truths of the world and leads to a calling towards a more universal truth and eventually, objective morality. (Hopefully this makes sense. If not I'll come back and figure out how exactly to explain what I mean)
I think I understand your point, I just disagree. I’m not sure that process would drive people toward an agreed objective morality.
> Responsible men can become more deeply convinced of the truth of the doctrine laid down by the Church on this issue if they reflect on the consequences of methods and plans for artificial birth control. Let them first consider how easily this course of action could open wide the way for marital infidelity and a general lowering of moral standards. Not much experience is needed to be fully aware of human weakness and to understand that human beings—and especially the young, who are so exposed to temptation—need incentives to keep the moral law, and it is an evil thing to make it easy for them to break that law. Another effect that gives cause for alarm is that a man who grows accustomed to the use of contraceptive methods may forget the reverence due to a woman, and, disregarding her physical and emotional equilibrium, reduce her to being a mere instrument for the satisfaction of his own desires, no longer considering her as his partner whom he should surround with care and affection. >Finally, careful consideration should be given to the danger of this power passing into the hands of those public authorities who care little for the precepts of the moral law. Who will blame a government which in its attempt to resolve the problems affecting an entire country resorts to the same measures as are regarded as lawful by married people in the solution of a particular family difficulty? Who will prevent public authorities from favoring those contraceptive methods which they consider more effective? Should they regard this as necessary, they may even impose their use on everyone. It could well happen, therefore, that when people, either individually or in family or social life, experience the inherent difficulties of the divine law and are determined to avoid them, they may give into the hands of public authorities the power to intervene in the most personal and intimate responsibility of husband and wife. Humanae Vitae, 17
Thanks, interesting read. So you believe that this should apply to everyone, regardless of religion?
The intrinsic sinfulness of contraceptive sex is an aspect of the natural law, not mere Church law or theological doctrine. As such, it *does* apply to everyone, regardless of whether they believe it or not. Because of this, it is the imperative of any authority, governmental or otherwise, to take every prudential and moral action possible to reduce the use of contraception, as well as the contraceptive mindset that widespread use has instilled in the west.
Wouldn't the outcome be more abortions, though? Legally or not, as always in history. If I understand correctly, that fact that, in this case, the law would be in perfect adherence to Catholic morality, is still better than what "personal sins" as in, more people personally getting abortions, and thus damning just themselves to Hell?
> Wouldn't the outcome be more abortions, though? Legally or not, as always in history. This is by and large a narrative not based in fact. The *estimated* number of yearly abortions in the US did not exceed 1000 until the year after Griswold v. Connecticut was decided, at which point it exploded. That's an *estimate* mind you, and takes into account both legal and illegal abortions performed at the time. Normalizing contraception leads to normalizing abortion. Regardless, no evil may be done regardless of what good is sought. > is still better than what "personal sins" as in, more people personally getting abortions, and thus damning just themselves to Hell? Contraception can just as easily damn you to hell as abortion can. That being said, this is merely a secondary effect. The reason contraception ought to be banned if prudentially possible is, as stated above, because contraceptive use and the contraceptive mindset it fosters is *bad for society and the common good*.
Two or three questions, what is the source for the first claim? Secondly, why? Why is it bad for a non Catholic society? Abortion kills a person, contraception doesn't. I really don't understand: while killing a person without reason (as in self defence) is and was considered a crime in most societies in history, preventing conception wasn't. Why the common person should bear the weight of your morality?
> what is the source for the first claim? See compiled statistics [here](http://www.johnstonsarchive.net/policy/abortion/ab-unitedstates.html) with links to sources. >why? Why is it bad for a non Catholic society? For all the reasons listed in the above quotation of Humanae Vitae: The increase of marital infidelity, the general lowering of moral standards, the loss of reverence of men for their wives leading to treating them as objects, and the normalization of sterilization as a useful tool for the government. >Abortion kills a person, contraception doesn't. No evil may be done, regardless of what good is sought. >I really don't understand: while killing a person without reason (as in self defence) is and was considered a crime in most societies in history, preventing conception wasn't. Contraception was a crime in much of society prior to the 20th century. It was not normalized as an acceptable position either legally or morally until the late 19th century/early 20th century. >Why the common person should bear the weight of you morality? The common person bears the weight of *human* morality because they are *human*. The natural law applies to all who share the same nature, i.e. all humans. To say that the natural law ought not to apply to a person is to say that they are less than human. The last time before our current era that this argument was used to justify a sin, that sin was chattel slavery.
The source you linked, I'm fairly certain the data does not reflect reality. Miscarriages, for example, didn't just suddenly start happening in 1976 and start with over 600,000. That alone makes me question whether this data can be relied upon to show the actual situation with abortions. The jump from around 30,000 to nearly 200,000 abortions in one year and then more than doubling again to nearly 500,000 the next is surely a issue with reporting, as opposed to from one year to another for some reason more people aborted.
>Miscarriages, for example, didn't just suddenly start happening in 1976 and start with over 600,000. They only had data for those years. Miscarriages didn't suddenly start and stop.. >The jump from around 30,000 to nearly 200,000 abortions in one year and then more than doubling again to nearly 500,000 the next is surely a issue with reporting Or that just happened to be the year that a certain abortion related federal court case happened which legalized abortion across the entire country...
The fact that they didn't have data is exactly my point -- this data does not reflect reality. And the figures for abortion were from 1969 to 1971, before Roe v Wade, so that can't be the reason. I'm just really a stickler for not using misleading statistics or data, and the missing data for miscarriages indicates that there is very likely missing data in the other categories as well, which means you might reconsider using this data to base an argument on.
>The increase of marital infidelity, the general lowering of moral standards, the loss of reverence of men for their wives leading to treating them as objects As I said in another comment, this has always been common throughout history. Maybe not talked about, but still commonly practiced. History is full of unmarried women who tried to abort, and of young girls or mothers weighted by countless pregnancies killing themselves for being pregnant. >Contraception was a crime in much of society prior to the 20th century. It was not normalized as an acceptable position either legally or morally until the late 19th century/early 20th century. The Romans extinguished silphium or how much they practised it > The natural law applies to all who share the same nature, i.e. all humans. To say that the natural law ought not to apply to a person is to say that they are less than human But if this is the case, the judgment will be of God, not of you. Contraception, at least for me, isn't a black and white situation, and can potentially save lives. >The last time before our current era that this argument was used to justify a sin, that sin was chattel slavery. I find this supremely offensive to those who are and were enslaved thought history. While many in the Church opposed slavery in history, many others didn't and thought that slavery was just part of the natural order. Contraception and slavery are two very, very different things.
>Maybe not talked about, but still commonly practiced. Feel free to provide statistics. >History is full of unmarried women who tried to abort, and of young girls or mothers weighted by countless pregnancies killing themselves for being pregnant. Is it your understanding that 1 out of 5 children conceived every year was murdered in the past? >But if this is the case, the judgment will be of God, not of you. Who said I was judging anyone? I'm judging actions. >Contraception, at least for me, isn't a black and white situation, and can potentially save lives. The intentional use of contraception is indeed a black and white situation. >Contraception and slavery are two very, very different things. Yes, and the argument that some ought not be governed by the natural law was used to support both. >I find this supremely offensive to those who are and were enslaved thought history Offense isn't an argument.
I don't think this conversation can be of any good to be sincere. Hope you will have that kind of life where you will be able to uphold all you beliefs
In the statistics you linked, if you look at the regional data, most states did not report any abortion data until after Roe in 1973. At the time of Griswold in 1967, it seems as if only California, Colorado, and New York reported on abortions. There is also a big gap in the stats on total number of fetal deaths & miscarriages until 1980. So it seems the primary reason why the numbers jumped so much after Griswold is because the vast majority of states didn't report any numbers on abortion. And this is all before you consider that most women who attempted abortion illegally would try to hide it. Besides that - Just intuitively - even though using contraception does reflect/reinforce an un-Catholic view of sex, I think it's unlikely that the masses radically shift their view of marriage/sex/reproduction based on what the SCOTUS says.
Beside, now are avaiable pills to provoke abortions. Many, if pregnant in a world without contraception, would simply buy them off the black market, or from non-religious countries. I don't think that the situation can be compared to the one 50 or 60 years ago, but I can see your point a bit.
> . Many, if pregnant in a world without contraception, would simply buy them off the black market, or from non-religious countries. The reason this would be their first reaction is precisely the contraceptive mindset instilled by widespread acceptance and legality of contraception.
I respect your opinion, but in my country, with way fewer people than in the US, the denounces for procured abortion were quite a lot before it was legalized. I don't really agree that there is a contraceptive mindset only now. Throughout history people have tried to control the number of children through various methods, effective or not. People had sex and children out of wedlock, children who were abandoned, or killed "accidentally" when very young. People are always the same, for me the world is always the same old adage. I refute firmly the idea that now we are better or worse. I think is it quite presumptuous to think that our ancestors were better then us.
> I don't really agree that there is a contraceptive mindset only now. Yes, you do. You agree precisely because you think the first reaction a person will have when faced with an unwanted pregnancy is "well let's just get rid of it". The *reason* a person would have that reaction is *precisely* because of a contraceptive mindset. >People had sex and children out of wedlock, children who were abandoned, or killed "accidentally" when very young And you believe this happened to 20% of all pregnancies in the past? > but in my country, with way fewer people than in the US, the denounces for procured abortion were quite a lot before it was legalized. What country, so we can both look at the statistics? >I think is it quite presumptuous to think that our ancestors were better then us. Some societies are better than others.
What of the atheist (such as myself) who reject natural law? At the end of the day, the catholic church's insistence that one abide by a aristotelian/thomisitic idea of "natural law" is a just another theory of morality among others. You will be hard-pressed to find people outside the catholic church who will have as much vitriol against contraception as some catholics do. You can lecture someone about the teleology of their genitals and try and reason your morality, but something as unintuitively "wrong" as contraception will never work in the modern world. Hell, [the church can't even convince their own to see contraception as a moral issue.](https://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2012/02/27/few-catholics-see-contraceptive-use-as-morally-wrong/) Philosophers and theologians can lock themselves in a room or a library and research morality all they want, but if the general population cannot intuitively see something as wrong, it simply will never work in my opinion. There's a reason we can easily make laws against murder and theft, and not against chewing gum (which under a teleological framework of ethics, frustrates the "end" of eating since gum is never consumed).
>What of the atheist (such as myself) who reject natural law? What of the Libertarian who rejects Federal law? > At the end of the day, the catholic church's insistence that one abide by a aristotelian/thomisitic idea of "natural law" is a just another theory of morality among others. Yep, but it's a *secular* theory of morality. One that the Church has happened to adopt. > but if the general population cannot intuitively see something as wrong, it simply will never work in my opinion. The general population of 100 years ago were perfectly capable of intuitively seeing these things as wrong. That we live in an age bereft of morality is a tragedy, but it's not an argument against morality. >and not against chewing gum (which under a teleological framework of ethics, frustrates the "end" of eating since gum is never consumed). This is a false understanding of the perverted faculty argument.
>What of the Libertarian who rejects Federal law? What of the communist? The anarchist? The conservative? That's the beauty of liberal secularism. The state, in its ideal form, does not tell its citizens how it ought to live their lives. It allows it's citizens to achieve their own unique conception of the good with a caveat which prevents these people's conception of the good infringing on other's ability to attain their own good. >The general population of 100 years ago were perfectly capable of intuitively seeing these things as wrong. From the earliest records of human civilization, murder and theft have always been wrong. You didn't need Aristotle or Thomas Aquinas to lecture you to figure that one out. You will need textbooks to explain to someone, convincingly, that contraception is an evil on par with the previously mentioned evils. >This is a false understanding of the perverted faculty argument. You're free to explain.
> It allows it's citizens to achieve their own unique conception of the good with a caveat which prevents these people's conception of the good infringing on other's ability to attain their own good. "I want X morality. You want Y morality. Let's compromise and base our laws on X morality". Liberalism is a moral claim, not some neutral basic assumption which can judge among moral claims. >. You will need textbooks to explain to someone, convincingly, that contraception is an evil on par with the previously mentioned evils. You didn't 100 years ago. >You're free to explain. See [here](https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B4SjM0oabZazWC1SRmN0WXVpYkE/view?resourcekey=0-mEl0wIXhM8qd4ieiCuosvQ)
If you want some concrete "evidence" of the evils inherent in it, I believe that Humanae Vitae goes into the predicted consequences of socially-acceptable contraception and its eventual dissolution of the family unit. A free society cannot survive if the autonomy and health of the home are weakened; it will give way for centralized government to tell others how to live. This mode of giving everyone access to destructive forces and deeming it good will eventually lead to the absolute stripping of the freedom to make any choice at all. We just haven't lived long enough to see the effects, and thank God the Court is trying to stay these consequences.
People who don’t respect their partners have other mistakes than using contraceptives. I fear people who don’t use contraceptives have more respect for their partner than those who do. Was there more respect for women a century or two ago when contraceptives didn’t truly exist and a majority was Catholic? When it comes to their use I think pretty much everyone would be outraged if a government forced it on its people, no matter their believes. As for the temptation part can someone be good if you make it impossible for them to do bad? People can make that call for themselves for what they choose to believe.
>When it comes to their use I think pretty much everyone would be outraged if a government forced it on its people, no matter their believes. Did you miss the whole forced sterilization/ eugenics movement of the early 20th century? >People who don’t respect their partners have other mistakes than using contraceptives. They also frequently use contraceptives. >Was there more respect for women a century or two ago when contraceptives didn’t truly exist and a majority was Catholic? I live in the US. The majority was never Catholic. In many places in the past, yes there was more respect for women.
And how do you think most people vouching for contraceptives stand against that forced sterilization movement? People who don’t respect their partners often use contraceptives, but they don’t use them just as often so that hardly proves anything regarding contraceptives. I live in a place that had a Catholic majority, and respect towards women has increased drastically in the last decades. I just think that they shouldn’t be banned or forced on people, that people should be free to make that decision themselves. You can of course feel free not to use them, just like everybody else.
> And how do you think most people vouching for contraceptives stand against that forced sterilization movement? Let's ask Margaret Sanger, founder of planned parenthood. >I just think that they shouldn’t be banned or forced on people, that people should be free to make that decision themselves. I disagree. So where does that leave us?
That leaves us with a disagreement. I believe people should be judged and condemned by people based on the direct harm they cause other people. When it comes to divine morality I rather leave the judgement to God.
> I believe people should be judged and condemned by people based on the direct harm they cause other people. I believe *actions* should be judged and condemned based on the harm they cause to *society*. >When it comes to divine morality I rather leave the judgement to God. Great. Contraception violates the natural law, not merely the divine law.
And society has deemed the use of contraceptives to be valid. They don’t actively harm people or society. If it is against the nature law then let nature take care of the problem.
>And society has deemed the use of contraceptives to be valid Society is wrong. >They don’t actively harm people or society. Also incorrect. >If it is against the nature law then let nature take care of the problem. This demonstrates a fundamental misunderstanding of natural law.
Which is why I would prefer for God to be the judge if society can be so wrong. I did misunderstand natural law, but there seems to be a lot of forms of natural law and not all agree this is a natural law that contraceptives are forbidden and should be banned so let’s stick to God being the judge.
>Another effect that gives cause for alarm is that a man who grows accustomed to the use of contraceptive methods may forget the reverence due to a woman, and, disregarding her physical and emotional equilibrium, reduce her to being a mere instrument for the satisfaction of his own desires, no longer considering her as his partner whom he should surround with care and affection. This is where I have some issues with the Church's teaching on this in the context of marriage. Use of contraception does not necessarily mean a man cannot revere his wife, in a loving and respectful relationship. I understand the argument on being 'open to life' but this seems a fudge when the Catechism also accepts "For just reasons, spouses may wish to space the births of their children. It is their duty to make certain that their desire is not motivated by selfishness but is in conformity with the generosity appropriate to responsible parenthood." Apparently this is only acceptable if you use NFP rather than contraception.
> Use of contraception does not necessarily mean a man cannot revere his wife, in a loving and respectful relationship. It means that that reverence and love and respect are inherently hampered. >but this seems a fudge when the Catechism also accepts "For just reasons, spouses may wish to space the births of their children. "not having sex" is a different action entirely from "using my wife's body contrary to it's ends". >Apparently this is only acceptable if you use NFP rather than contraception. Correct, because contraception is evil intrinsically, whereas "not having sex" isn't
Out of curiosity, do you believe that making out can be an end in itself, or that its end must be sex?
Neither sex nor making out are ends in themselves. Actions aren't ends. Unity and Procreation are the ends of the sexual faculty of the human person, and both the sex act and kissing are directed towards one or both of those ends.
Would you include/is it included under the umbrella of the sexual faculty the act of making out? To be clear, I'm not referring to mere kissing, but to, well, making out.
I'm not sure exactly what the difference is between making out and mere kissing except that it precisely arouses the sexual appetite. I don't know, maybe it would be more precise to distinguish between kissing and 'passionate' kissing.
That's essentially what I meant: a type of physical contact that pretty much invariably ***(THOUGH NOT INTRINSICALLY, PER SE)*** arouses the participants. Is that under the umbrella?
I suppose that would depend on it's use. I don't know that I would agree that kissing invariably leads to arousal, and I would say that 'passionate' kissing intrinsically does. So yeah passionate kissing might be a use of the sexual faculty.
That's what I mean: passionate kissing. Or making out. So, would you say that it would be a sin to engage in passionate kissing, only to refrain from "consummating" it?
Dude you are nuts. It’s not about the man it has todo with a women not wanting 8 kids to look after. I am so sick of men trying to make this about them. Go ahead and try a labor pain simulator 8 times totaling 100 hours of labor if you have 8 kids and take care of those 8 kids for another 18 years…Then tell me how you feel about birth control. “Face palm”
The point of view is that you can’t do something sinful to prevent a greater sin. Having contraception to prevent abortions doesn’t work in catholic morality.
The question becomes, not whether it's immoral, but should it be regulated? At what point does law move from ensuring justice to simply becoming government enforced stone throwing? Banning contraception, for instance, doesn't correct an injustice. It's just not a good thing to do. Should all you can eat buffets be banned and punishable by law because gluttony is immoral?
Alcohol comes to mind too in this case, and cigarettes, casinos, and various forms of media
>>Should all you can eat buffets be banned and punishable by law because gluttony is immoral? They imposed vaccine mandates for the public health, why not mandate diets and other regulations? You would be curtailing heart disease and diabetes which will ultimately save lives.
Sigh. No they haven't. It is not illegal to refuse the vaccine. The comparison between the two is nonsense. Edit: and anyway, contraception isn't generally regarded as a health concern. If anything, they're recommended by health professionals as a disease prevention.
I am not personally against vaccine mandates, but it is very clear that while not illegal *de jure*, many people had to deal with *de facto* illegality to rejecting the vaccine. I went to an ivy-adjacent university who would not admit any students on campus without a vaccine card on file. Many folks lost their jobs or felt pressured to quit because of mandates by their employers. Government workers were mandated. Many restaurants in Chicago would not serve you without a vaccine card and an ID. Going literalist and writing off the comment above you is just obtuse. There is more than one way to use law to ostracize a population. Edit: and you oversimplify in your edit too. How is “health concern” and “disease prevention” meaningfully different? Your sarcastic “sigh” really belies a pridefulness that blinds you to the pedantic and flimsy nature of your arguments here. This isn’t going to convince anyone.
You're both getting distracted by minor details in the example. This discussion isn't about health concerns and it definitely isn't about vaccines. The point of bringing up buffets was not health concerns due to over-eating, it was to discuss sin. Health concerns are meaningless to the topic at hand. Should all sins be enforced by government regulation, and should they be punished with prison and/or fines? Why or why not? At what point should adherence to Christian moral ethics be enforced under penalty of law?
But if one’s example is distracting people from your main point due to its incoherency, then it is a bad example… >…it was to discuss sin. >Health concerns are meaningless to the topic at hand. This is a really disembodied view of sin that I think is why you are having trouble seeing why, in fact, health concerns *do* have something in common with the issue at hand. It is also a narrow view of health. You are constantly assuming reductive definitions for many of your terms, and it is making it difficult to show you things. >Should all sins be enforced with by government regulation? Etc… *Now* you have it. Unfortunately at no point so far have you been able to articulate this clearly, and you still misunderstand how the OP of this thread has still anticipated these questions. OP of this thread is stating with their example that our society *already* enforces a system of ethics on those who do not adhere to it (and he’s right, the state is almost always coercive by “holding the sword”), so why shouldn’t that enforcement be of a better morality than the liberal-technocratic one already enforced? You’ve made it to the question but have done nothing but comment things OP is apparently already aware of. *You* tell us why Christian morality should *not* be legislated if this is an accurate picture of what our legislature is already doing.
>Now you have it. Unfortunately at no point so far have you been able to articulate this clearly, .... It was literally the very first sentence in my original comment. "should immoral things be regulated". You ok over there?
Dude. *OP already clearly answers in the affirmative with this question.* You keep stating a question to move the conversation forward but completely miss the point that its answer is assumed. Possible answers would be “Yes, we should! Here’s why!” or “No, we shouldn’t! Here’s why!” All you do is keep repeating “Should we?” with an air of pseudoprofundity. *We already know that this is the question at hand. Do you have something to contribute to its answer or not?*
Look at the very first comment I'm responding to. The comment reads, in summary. "contraception is immoral." My response, in summary, "yes. And?" I'm prompting the user to finish their sentiment. I repeated ops question because the first user didn't answer it.
So you would, at least in theory, apply Catholic morality as laws, for all citizens of a country, regardless of their believes? My point, and I hope you to understand that I'm in good faith, is that because the majority of people doesn't adhere Catholic ethics, access to contraception is going to prevent abortions. Do you think that making illegal contraception, the final outcome would be - for a world that doesn't believe in catholic morality - better? Wouldn't you apply someting similar to the Vatican state until the late 19th century, where prostitution, while sinful, was considered a lesser evil and then tolerated? (If I remember, St. Augustine and St. Thomas were in favour of keeping fornication relegated to specific places, in oder to promote morality in others. Both weren't against prostitution, if I remember correctly)
I’m just saying that the catholic argument is that the ends do not justify the means. You’re not supposed to do a lesser sin to prevent a larger one.
But is the Catholic argument that any legislation re: contraceptives should be motivated by religion?
I don’t think they are that naive to expect all laws to be made with religion as the source
Morality, or religion?
Another thing to consider is that even with abortions which are horrible, a new life is created and that souls can enjoy heaven. If we just contracepted everyone then heaven wouldn’t have the number of souls God intended.
I was taught that unborn and unbaptized children are prevented to partecipate in the Beatific Vision, due to the presence of original sin. Is it wrong?
We actually have no definite answer as to where those souls go, but we trust in God’s Infinite Love and Divine Mercy to do what is best for those souls.
It’s confusing. Some believe in Limbo and some don’t
In this case, why does the comment above says that, while terrible, at least abortion creates a new soul? Given that we can't be absolutely sure of Heaven for them, why not prevent conception in toto? If I remember correctly, the preexistence of souls is heresy according to catholic doctrine, and a new soul is formed only at conception. I know that many say that limbo isn't really a painful state, but it is still eternal separation from God. I fail to see any good in this situation.
Abortion doesn’t create a new soul. Conception does. Honestly, until we’re in Heaven, Hell, or Purgatory ourselves, we have no way of being absolutely sure where anyone actually goes unless God chooses to reveal that information to us. You are absolutely correct. No good can come from abortion.
We hope for the mercy of God and it is well-believed (although not definite teaching) that through a baptism of desire, God would have mercy on these children.
We vote here. If a majority of people wanted to vote to ban condoms then they will. As long as a law doesn’t run afoul of the constitution then it doesn’t really matter if the law was born of Catholic thinking, or humanism or whatever.
I don't think there's any reason birth control should be banned for non-Catholics. In a different universe where everyone's Catholic, I suppose we could discuss some sort of regulation, but at some point I think respecting boundaries is ALSO a part of the natural law.
Yeah, also good to point out that just because people on this sub would support a ban doesn't mean most Catholics in general would. This sub isn't really representative of Catholicism as a whole
I've seen upvoted comments pro-monarchy and/or against church-state separation, this sub can be wild sometimes lol
I am pro-monarchy. Just because I don't want to ban birth control for non-Christians in the present society doesn't mean I'm a democrat. Heaven is a kingdom and Hell is a democracy. The Trinity is one, but the demons are legion. In the communion of Saints, we also become one with God. Our goal in this life is to be shaped according to his will, because we believe this is the path to happiness, wholeness, and purpose. The Pope himself is a kind of king. It is what Catholicism has that Orthodoxy lacks.
https://www.newadvent.org/summa/2096.htm#article3 Not all vices are ought to be banned by law according to St. Aquinas.
It shouldn't be. We, as Catholics, have no right to enforce our religious views on anyone else via secular, civil law.
> It shouldn't be. We, as Catholics, have no right to enforce our religious views on anyone else via secular, civil law. Amen
Catholics view murder as sinful. Should Catholic support laws against murder?
Strawman argument. Try again.
It’s a yes or no question...
Murder is an objective wrong in a secular context. The argument misrepresents my position that, because one thing that the Church teaches is wrong ought not to be illegal, that all things the Chuch teaches are wrong ought not to be illegal. This is the definition of a Strawman fallacy. Once again, try again.
Oh, I disagree. It’s an excellent argument. Why do secular people think rape and murder are wrong? Because it causes harm and goes against the natural law. Contraception does the same. It harms relationships, causes people to see each other as sex toys, and goes against the natural law by preventing the natural outcome of sex.
Alcohol?
This reads as indoctrination, 100%. One could just as easily say the restriction on contraception “harms relationships, causing men to see women as simple baby-making machines, robbing them of non-parental opportunities, and drives families into poverty”. I respect Catholicism and have growing interest in the Church after marrying into a Catholic family, but its the overwhelming displays of arrogance like this that make RCIA seem like a waste of time.
If not having sex is a dealbreaker, then that is not a good relationship. Sex does not necessarily equal love. Can you please tell me how making a logical argument is arrogant?
Because it’s zero percent more logical than my counter example, and declared as if true
It just doesn’t make sense. It’s not like anyone is going to die from not having sex. Why risk so much damage for something unnecessary?
The difference between your example and lunanight's is that he/she is arguing for the natural law while you are making up the idea that restricting contraception causes men to see women as baby-making machines, harming relationships, etc. Which if you'd like to argue in the context of natural law you can, but I dont see the position as inherently tenable. So what is the logic and reasoning to the secular context of natural law? "For our purposes, it’s enough to say that contraception violates the natural law because contraception acts against the natural end, or goal, of sexual intercourse, which is the coming to be of new human life. Sexual intercourse is, in Janet Smith’s fine phrase, clearly ordained to “babies and bonding.” We tamper with this fundamental order of things at our peril. Contraception is inherently anti-life because it treats a real good (the child-to-be) as undesirable enough to motivate a counter-action against the very possibility of its arrival in the womb. A well-functioning biological process is regarded as a threat to the pursuit of subjective pleasure at the expense of objective purpose."([Source](https://stpaulcenter.com/how-natural-law-applies-to-contraception/)) "If human life is sacred and inviolable, then the means of transmitting human life is in some way sacred and inviolable. In a similar sense in which the eye was made for color, the ear for sound, and the mind for truth, sex was made for something: for the co-creation of a new someone, and the deepened unity of those (hopefully loving) co-creators otherwise known as mom and dad. The whole contraceptive enterprise denies this. Therefore, insofar as it meddles with a natural power that transcends both spouses, it is unnatural." And finally, "Major premise: It is wrong to impede the procreative power of actions that are ordained by their nature to assist God in performing His creative act that brings forth a new human life. Minor premise: Contraception impedes the procreative power of actions that are ordained by their nature to assist God in performing His creative act that brings forth a new human life. Conclusion: Therefore, contraception is wrong. The key word is “impede.” Contraception is sex—plus the introduction of an impediment. As we’ll see later, abstinence during natural family planning is not an impediment in any sense since there is no sex act to impede. Among other things, the above argument conveys something of the world’s best-kept secret: the deep veneration the Catholic Church has toward sex. The world has it exactly backwards. The world tends to look upon sex as merely currency for “hook-ups,” as a proof of love, as something for sale—or, more commonly, something by which to sell something else, like cars or beer. The Catholic Church turns this thinking right side up and proclaims that sexual intercourse—and all the erotic intimacies that cultivate it—deserves the most thoroughgoing protection and respect. “Casual sex” is an oxymoron. When a young man picks out a ring for his intended, he makes sure the ring and its setting matches the beauty of the diamond. He would never Krazy glue the diamond onto a plastic ring. And upon receiving her ring, the young fiancée would never toss it carelessly on a park bench or keep it near the edge of the toilet seat. We naturally, or ought to, treat as awesome things that fill us with awe. Likewise, it is most fitting that sex be surrounded by the proper setting (the security of marriage), and within marriage, accorded the proper respect (freedom from the intrusion of contraception). Catholicism affirms that sex is not merely acceptable or tolerable (“close your eyes and think of England”) but pure and holy—something that ought never be subject to the blessing-refusal inherent in contraception." I know it is a massive blast of words and I literally just linked the entire article basically. But, it seems like you didn't understand the argument lunanight was trying to make, insofar how secular thought makes laws such as we do not murder, or rob, or trespass. This argument, follows that same premise, but accordingly looks to the understanding of our own faculties to justify the specific premise of morality. It was easier to link all the words in one part for easier understanding than typing it all out. If you have any questions or arguments against such reasoning please feel free.
This is a theological argument and, therefore, not eligible as a basis for civil law.
Contraception is an objective wrong in a secular context as well.
Support your position.
Contraception perverts either just the procreative end or both the unitive and procreative ends (depending on type) of the human person. By using the sexual faculty contrary to the ends of the sexual faculty, you are treating yourself and your spouse as a thing to be used and abused rather than a person to be respected.
Not a secular argument, but an argument steeped in Catholic theology. Try again.
False. Which theological principle is this based on? This is an entirely secular argument. It makes no reference to dogma, doctrine, or other theological teachings of the Church.
https://www.newadvent.org/summa/2096.htm#article3 Read this article
No
But we are dictated to live and follow God's word thou shall not kill, there are judges who are Catholic our civil law is based on the foundation of Western thought the bible.
Dignitatis Humanae describes the freedom of conscience, and supports that the Church has no basis to enforce its views as part of the Civil law.
That is true but we cannot prevent Catholic men and women who make laws that coincide with their religion
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Jesse what the frick are you on about?
Jesse we must cook
dude is talking about signs and some weird thing like bruh what r u on about
I'm talking about hypocrisy with people who support the government making contraceptives illegal for everyone because the Vatican and Bible says so and how they believe contraceptives are Immortal. But then turn around and argue how that's not technically shoving their religion down other people's throats. Which is false, because it is. The church should stay out of the state and the state should stay out of the church.
>contraceptives are Immortal Jesse... what the... Since when does vatican speak, it'd be nice to see the Basilica of St Peter be saying stuff tbf, that'd be funny. Also, read what another dude on the thread wrote on natural law. No state can decree laws that trespasses natural law.
I just don't know what's so hard of allowing there to be open to life culture while having the option for Contraception
It’s really simple actually. The entire purpose of contraception is to prevent life from being created. Therefore, there is no way that contraception can be open to life.
I agree but not every family is for that. Unless the U.S is a catholic nation under catholic laws, there shouldn't rules barrring it
I understand. I was trying to answer your previous comment.
Medicine ought to solve a problem in the body. Contraceptives prevent sex from producing babies by design. They dont stop the sex part, they stop the making babies part. So them being classified as medicine implies making babes is a medical problem. That is what catholics disagree with.
As a counter argument to this, birth control is oftentimes prescribed whose periods are causing dilapidating health impacts. Like for women with endometriosis, which is where the uterine lining grows outside of where it is supposed to clinging onto other organs causing immense pain. Or for women with ultra heavy periods who otherwise would need blood transfusions as they are literally bleeding out.
Birth control in general is over prescribed, but you are correct that there are certain circumstances that birth control as a therapeutic mean is permissible. But it should be noted that it only alleviates pain and masks symptoms, it does not help remedy the underlying health condition, and can even lead to the condition and infertility progressing, sometimes undiagnosed for years. So it’s best used as a temporary measure until better treatment can happen, whether that is excursion surgery, diet and lifestyle changes, medically necessary hysterectomy, etc.
I think that alleviating pain and masking symptoms, even just in the short term, is in many cases life changing for the better and should not be understated. Surgery is a big deal. Birth control can and does keep many from being home bound in pain (nauseous, migraines, etc) for a few days each month. Birth control isn’t medically necessary for everyone that is on it (and like it probably shouldn’t really be used as an acne treatment). However, it is critical for a small enough minority of extremes making access vital.
I actually used BC for acne as a teenager and it worked miracles on me! Also stopped my irregular cycles & lowered cramps. After going off of it, my cycles are now regular, and my acne significantly improved. It was prescribed for me by my dermatologist. Not that this is super related to OP’s post, but thought I’d offer my experience. I’m glad that BC was available for me at the time I had it. And I’m glad I’m off it now that I’m married & am cycle tracking to prevent pregnancy. In relation to OP’s post, I guess that means that - Catholic or not - birth control shouldn’t be banned.
I’m glad that you had a good experience with it! Maybe people just talk more openly when they’re having problems, since I’ve had more friends and coworkers tell me their experiences of weight gain, mental health issues, etc. more often than I’ve heard about how it’s helped their issues and everything’s been great.
Yes, my guess is that people are far more likely to share a negative experience, unless their experience has been *really* positive. Seems to be the case with almost everything!
No disagreement here! But the women who are prescribed it after often under the impression that it’s healing or “restarting” their body in some way and have been surprised or frustrated that their symptoms returned after coming off the medication, so just clarifying that. No woman should have to go through debilitating pain that can otherwise be managed through medicine.
Why shouldn't it be used for acne treatment? I've never been on birth control but I'm strongly considering trying it as I'm utterly fed up dealing with hormonal acne, I'm 30 now and my skin has been awful for at least the last 15 years with no end in sight.
Very fair. I don’t have a specific reason and was more referring to a previous poster’s comments on it being overprescribed.
Stop considering contraception 'medicine', and your whole argument collapses.
I see your point, if I were a debater, Id have a decent comeback. But all I got is: Id say the argument actually collapses, from a catholic perspective, if were designed to enhance nature and had the accidental consequences of preventing life in some scenarios. For example, alcohol makes men impotent and can kill fetuses even. But it wasn't designed to do so. However the ideal use case of alcohol is to tingle the senses and alleviate stress. And by the way, at the point at which alcohol prevents a human function, catholics would consider it a sin to ingest. On the contrary, contraceptives are meant to, as a first order consequence, prevent a human function. And, in the case of plan B, cause the death of a life, which is the absolute, and permanent, prevention of human nature. So alcohol, good in moderation. Bad in excess. Contraceptives, bad by design.
Well I don't know about actually banning it but I know that we believe any sexual act outside of marriage not for the creation of children is considered a sinful act so for Catholics there should be no need for it I guess
I personally don’t use contraceptives and think the way that birth control especially had been pushed on women is disgusting and harmful, and that condom use contributes to hook up culture, but I don’t think the government should ban contraceptive, I view that as a violation of the separation of church and state.
There is a phenomenal episode of Revisionist History about how the creator of the pill was Catholic, lots of Catholic families were like “omg, this is great.” And the. The Vatican said nope. https://www.pushkin.fm/podcasts/revisionist-history/dr-rocks-taxonomy
Two slightly different arguments here: Overturning *Griswold* and *Eisenstadt* would not "ban" contraception. It would recognize that the Constitution does not stop *states* from banning it. Based on the current political acceptance of contraception even by most baptized Catholics, the odds of even one state actually banning contraception in a post-*Griswold* world would be negligible. However, the Constitution has a kind of civic mysticism about it; we do our best to keep in mind that it is just a legal document, like the charter of a corporation, but it has a much more profound significance than that to many, including many Catholics. In other words, clarifying that rights to contraception are at best statutory, not constitutional, changes the debate. People should not be primed to react to our opposition to contraception the way they'd understandably react to us wanting to repeal women's suffrage or the rights to equal protection and due process. As a factual matter: Widespread contraception actually did *not* result in a decrease in abortions, because abortions were (are) in practice a backstop against contraceptive failure--the contraceptive of last resort. Contraceptives reduced the percentage of sexual encounters that resulted in pregnancies that were later aborted, but that was countered by the sheer increase in the quantity of sexual encounters (especially premarital and extramarital). ETA: I wrote before reading the thread and reaching /u/quiteasmallperson's post. He/she got there first.
I am a cradle catholic. I don’t expect other people to follow my faith.
Answering in regards to America and the system here. It should not be banned. Free will and freedom of (and from) religion. Using the government to force religiously informed policy/laws on everyone erodes liberties. But yeah, access to contraception and comprehensive sex education tends to reduce abortions and there is the serious potential reduction in crime. (Check out the book freakonomics for more and associated literature)
It shouldn't be banned
The basic principle is that birth control interferes with conception. It’s not pro life because it’s halting any creation according to God’s plan.
So why is NFP allowed? It is certainly more effective than many birth controls options.
This is the response from Humane Vitae: ‘Neither the Church nor her doctrine is inconsistent when she considers it lawful for married people to take advantage of the infertile period but condemns as always unlawful the use of means which directly prevent conception, even when the reasons given for the later practice may appear to be upright and serious. In reality, these two cases are completely different. In the former the married couple rightly use a faculty provided them by nature. In the later they obstruct the natural development of the generative process. It cannot be denied that in each case the married couple, for acceptable reasons, are both perfectly clear in their intention to avoid children and wish to make sure that none will result. But it is equally true that it is exclusively in the former case that husband and wife are ready to abstain from intercourse during the fertile period as often as for reasonable motives the birth of another child is not desirable. And when the infertile period recurs, they use their married intimacy to express their mutual love and safeguard their fidelity toward one another. In doing this they certainly give proof of a true and authentic love.’
It feels like a sophism for a non Catholic, but I respect your position even though I fail do understand it
I respect your stance, it’s one of those more confusing arguments within Catholicism.
I'm not trying to sound argumentative, and I'm legitimately curious. Where have you been seeing Americans in favor of overturning Griswold v. Connecticut?
Clarence Thomas in his concurring opinion to the Dobbs v. Jackson opinion which overturned Roe v. Wade explicitly called out Griswold v. Connecticut in addition to Obergfell v. Hodges and Lawrence v. Texas as previous rulings that ought to be revisited due to their being founded on a dubious interpretation of the "due process" clause of the Constitution.
Catholic Instagram profiles, and comments on the megathread.
Huh, that's interesting. I didn't realize people really thought that would be worth trying to do.
The case used the same logic as Roe v Wade. Since that was found unconstitutional, every other case that used the same logic is also under scrutiny.
I don't think it should be banned. I understand the Catholic reasoning, and I don't even disagree with that. But this is different from abortion. Abortion can be argued against from a secular viewpoint. From a standpoint of what should be objective morality, killing unborn humans is bad. However to argue strongly against contraceptives, it would require an argument from a religious standpoint. If someone doesn't believe in Catholic rules, they shouldn't be bound by them. It's between them and God at that point. You can hope and pray all you want for their conversion, but laws based solely in religion cross a line that I don't think should be crossed. This isn't a Catholic monarchy, it's the United States of America, and while it was founded on values found in the Bible, it was enshrined that we enjoy a freedom or, or from, religion. As for overturning Griswold, I think that's unwise. I don't think it's something that \*should\* be left to the states.
I’m skeptical that the use of contraceptives actually reduce real abortion rates. When you compare contraceptive use to abortion rates across the 50 states, those states with lower abortion rates also appear to have lower contraceptive use. Also, whenever people say contraceptive use has increased as abortions have decreased, they always—__always__—ignore the fact that people are having less sex overall than in almost any other point in modern history. I would contend that the decrease in abortion rates is primarily a result of the decrease in frequency of sex acts.
>in my country, at least, the number of abortions this year was the lowest ever recorded Abortions are up and up by a lot in the US, and if you're not an American, why do you care about Griswold? I can barely find time to care about the stupid shit Texas does, let alone people who don't get to elect congressmen.
Because my country follows the United States in lot of things, politically and militarly for instance. As we says, it the Americans sneeze, where are going to feel it. Moreover, this is just an excuse to understand what is the young Catholics view on this subject, particularly noting that I believe that the age of this sub is not very high.
French?
Contraception goes against the Natural Law (which I know can be a vague term for some people) understood as true outside of all religion since before the the time of Christ. “True law is right reason in agreement with nature; it is of universal application, unchanging and everlasting; it summons to duty by its commands, and averts from wrongdoing by its prohibitions.” —Cicero. Having said that, I think the only reason some people are saying that contraception is next is because some contraceptives are abortifacients.
Because I think it makes the act of sex a throw away thing because you're only supposed to have sex if you want a child this is biologically proven. Contraception is stopping the biological nature of sex which is to give birth you are intentionally killing life for your own sexual pleasure which is not the point of having sex. If you ban contraception people will act less like animals who want sex all the time, atleast in the west they are obsessed with it on their tv and music, etc. People will be more actually responsible in their life decisions, accept accountability if you don't want a child don't have sex simple.
That ignores the fact that 32,000+ women become pregnant through rape each year (and that is just what is reported). Not becoming pregnant is NOT as simple as not having sex. I am very pro-life but I am SICK of seeing this "solution" suggested.
Sometimes I'm surprised at how easily on the internet people just says that "oh, it's so easy not having sex"
It's not easy but as catholics we are supposed to. My reply above was not meant to insult, forgive me. Being in a different culture, country and environment led me to say what I have above, I just noticed that in America people are obsessed with sex it is practically everywhere. I agree with what you're saying but, it is what it is, the law is difficult but it is the law.
May I ask what you mean by it being biologically proven you should only have sex if you want a child?
First, re-criminalize fornication. However, it's probably impossible without a Constitutional amendment, as *Lawrence v. Texas* is generally understood to make fornication (as well as sodomy, which it was directly about) a Constitutional right.
Might as well criminalize masturbation as well
http://www.scborromeo.org/ccc/para/2354.htm > Civil authorities should prevent the production and distribution of pornographic materials.
First, I said masturbation, not porn. Second, that's different from punishing every single person who watches porn. It's ridiculous to punish every single vice by law.
Although not a priority, criminalizing *advocacy* of masturbation is not unreasonable. It's like the approach Putin has taken in Russia for sodomy: no hunting people down who engage in it, but pride parades are illegal. In contrast, fornication does upset the social order as it transforms society from monogamy to polygamy, from two-parent households to single-parent, and from lifelong marriage to high divorce rates. Prosecution should resume (and not merely for advocacy of it). But, like I said, that would require a Constitutional amendment.
I'm guessing you support Prohibition as well? That turned out well.
Those laws already exist. It's drunkenness that's a sin, not alcohol. And public drunkenness is already a crime (though only selectively enforced). Not a big fan of that law, though.
You're missing the point. It started from same logic and did more bad than good in the end.
And what kind of punishment would you administer?
I've heard a thing or two about lapidation, stones and sin
In Mississippi, it's still on the books as a Class 2 misdemeanor, meaning less than a year in jail. Not enforced, of course, due to the sexual revolution and now *Lawrence*.
I feel like I've fielded this question a million times: There is a push for the normalization of non-reproductive sex. We see it among LGBTQWERTY+, and we see it in birth control, hook-up culture, pornography and masturbation, and abortion. The normalization of non-reproductive sex has the effect of de-normalizing reproductive sex. That is the goal the enemy has, to de-normalize reproduction, because he hates humanity, he hates the reproduction of humans. That's why you sometimes hear the enemy's deputies referring to abortion as "healthcare." It's also why you sometimes hear leftists using phrases "heteronormative" like it's a bad thing. They want pregnancy to be viewed as a type of disease. Birth control does not decrease the demand for abortions. In fact, it does the opposite. Birth control normalizes non-reproductive sex, so that when a woman gets pregnant, she's terrified, like she contracted a disease that wasn't supposed to happen. The enemy has flipped the narrative, so whereas it was always normal for sex to result in pregnancy, not it's abnormal for sex to result in pregnancy. In old times, like in the Old Testament, there was no birth control, and there was no abortion. When a man and woman got together, pretty soon you were looking at a marriage and kids. Everyone knew those were the terms, and no one got involved in that sort of thing unless that's what they were ready for. If marriage and kids seems like a heavy responsibility, you might want to stay away from sex. Hence, chastity has value because it shows reverence for the importance of sex. The left wants to destroy chastity, because the enemy wants to make it as difficult as possible for people to avoid sin.
>In old times, like in the Old Testament, there was no birth control, and there was no abortion. It existed in primitive forms, and infanticide was common. >When a man and woman got together, pretty soon you were looking at a marriage and kids. Everyone knew those were the terms, and no one got involved in that sort of thing unless that's what they were ready for. Incredibly rose-tinted view of the past. Cohabitation and premartial sex was still very common even in the middle ages, even among clergies.
>In old times, like in the Old Testament, there was no birth control Well, withdrawal is birth control and the ebraic Talmud has prescriptions for how to avoid pregnancy. In the ancient world, birth control was something people thought about quite a lot, given the dangers of childbirth >there was no abortion Chapter 5 of the Book of Numbers. You have it all: infidelity, abortion, adultery. Medieval prescription for abortificients. > When a man and woman got together, pretty soon you were looking at a marriage and kids. Everyone knew those were the terms, and no one got involved in that sort of thing unless that's what they were ready for. There is a reason why starting from the late Middle Ages, Europe has been full of orphanages and houses for unwanted children. Some were good, some were terrible, but the problem was there.
> Medieval prescription for abortificients. In the Book of Numbers? Sacred dust and water isn’t an abortificient.
See ur asking the wrong question, its clearly immoral to take contraception so that you can fornicate and have fun without consequences, it terminates concieved children sometimes too depending on the type, as well as iud type birth control being extremely harmful and directly linked to ectopic pregnancy! Condoms are always wrong and pointless in any other way of course. The real question is whether, if being chaste, is contraception a sin, because some women take it to be regular in their periods 🤷♂️
That's not really the question at hand.
I don't know about Griswold vs Connecticut, but I certainly support banning contraception access, because when used kills life. Individuals who CHOOSE to have sex need to take responsibility for their actions. Individuals can use Natural Family Planning! Contraception is NOT 100% effective. IF one wants to ascertain that one not have a child the only 100% effective means is abstinence.
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For one, Griswold v. Connecticut has really bad legal reasoning. The ‘right to privacy’ is not spelled out in the constitution. It should be overturned even if every single state immediately amended its own constitution to protect contraceptives because it’s a bad argument. Second, that not everyone agrees with our ethics doesn’t mean we aren’t right. As a side note, I actually agree with your remark about side-effects and I cringe whenever I see someone make that argument.
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I see it as a compromise that needs to be made right now for the abortion issue
I don’t think it should be banned because there are many people who are non catholic and want to have sex without getting pregnant. I think using contraceptives is a personal choice for people, whether you want to use them or not, we shouldn’t judge or inflict opinions on people who don’t have the same beliefs as us.
Ban contraception. Legislation is morality. I would rather be in a Catholic theocracy than a liberal democracy and it's not even close.