Catholic Replies
Editor’s Note: Noting that today’s “cancel culture,” with its toppling of statues and burning of churches, “is a metaphor for self-loathing rather than reason,” Fr. George Rutler of the Church of St. Michael in New York City said in his weekly bulletin that “we are now in a spiritual combat as monumental as World War II. In 1944, when the Nazis demanded that the Americans surrender during the Battle of the Bulge, Brigadier General Anthony McAuliffe replied, ‘Nuts!’ The vernacularism was unfamiliar to the Germans, and so another message was sent: ‘Du kannst zum Teufel gehen’ — You can go to the Devil.
“No victory is secured by kneeling to the enemy. Those who do will be the next in line for the guillotine. The Holy Church has the best translation for ‘Nuts’ when proclaimed in defiance of the Anti-Christ: ‘I believe in God, the Father Almighty’…”
Q. My question concerns contraception and unmarried couples. There is no question that any contraceptive that can also cause an early abortion (e.g., the Pill) is immoral. Nor can a married couple use contraceptives because they destroy the unitive as well as the procreative aspects of marriage. However, with unmarried sex, does the use of a condom or other non-abortifacient method compound the sin or make no difference? What is the Church’s teaching on this? — C.M., Missouri.
A. We’re not aware of a specific Church teaching on unmarried couples using contraceptives. However, the Bible and the Church have clearly taught that the sexual act between unmarried persons, known as fornication, is, in the words of the Catechism, “gravely contrary to the dignity of persons and of human sexuality which is naturally ordered to the good of spouses and the generation and education of children. Moreover, it is a grave scandal when there is corruption of the young” (n. 2353).
This act is so evil, said St. Paul, that no unrepentant fornicator will “inherit the kingdom of God” (1 Cor. 6:9). So sex between unmarried persons puts them on the road to Hell, whether they use contraceptives or not.
As you mentioned, the sin would be compounded if the couple used an abortifacient, such as the Pill or an intrauterine device (IUD), since it could cause an early abortion. But even using a condom can lead to more sexual activity since a couple may think, falsely, that condoms always prevent pregnancy. They don’t; they have a significant failure rate. Furthermore, they don’t prevent contracting a sexually transmitted disease. So while condoms may not make fornication a greater sin, they can make it a more frequent sin.
Q. Our current president, for all his faults, has done more for the pro-life cause than any previous president. To quote him: “Every child, born or unborn, is a holy gift from God.” St. John Paul II could not have said it better.
The president’s actions have been consistent with this statement. And yet he will be opposed by a man who, although claiming to be Catholic, not only vigorously advocates for abortion at any stage of pregnancy and wants to codify Roe v. Wade and force Americans to pay for abortion, but also outspokenly supports same-sex “marriage,” even conducting a ceremony at the White House himself. Can any other considerations outweigh this travesty of a record for a Catholic considering a vote for Joe Biden? — C.B., Minnesota.
A. No, says Fr. Frank Pavone, national director of Priests for Life, who called upon “all of my fellow patriots who embrace pro-life and conservative principles to put aside, as much as possible, all other activities and to make it their first priority, as it will be mine, to re-elect President Trump, to give him a Republican House and Senate, and to elect Republicans on the state and local level as well.” He said that this is “not the canonization of a party; it is simply the recognition of who our friends and enemies in the political realm are at this point in time.”
A Democrat victory on November 3, said Fr. Pavone, would “bring the holocaust of abortion, paid for by taxpayers, to unprecedented levels, taking away every restriction, even on infanticide; it would destroy our nation, bringing us socialism and open borders; it would replace law and order with mob rule and depleted law enforcement; it would deprive the Church of the freedom to conduct her mission and instead subject ministries to oppressive mandates, as Biden has already promised; it would destroy the family and any public protection for it; it would ruin our economy, ensnare us in destructive international agreements, and allow China to pursue its destructive agenda; it would fill the courts with judges who tear up the Constitution rather than apply it; it would roll back the protections President Trump has put in place for the consciences of health-care workers, students on campus, and children who want to pray in school.”
The pro-life priest said that “this is a spiritual battle and no less than a civil war. We have to be all in, publicly, unapologetically, and with crystal clarity.” He criticized Church leaders who “try to intimidate and silence those of us who are not afraid to pass moral judgment in matters of politics, and to name the enemy. It is a disgrace, and it is time for believers to take matters into their own hands, link arms and hearts with fellow believers, and engage in new and creative ways to proclaim and apply the Gospel teachings to this moment in history.”
Q. From what I understand, the Catholic bishops have stated that abortion is the preeminent issue. This being the case, why do we seldom hear the word “abortion” mentioned at Mass, not even in the Prayers of the Faithful? Also, from what I have read, Catholic Relief Services contributes to pro-abortion organizations. If this is true, then we should not take up collections for CRS, should we? And Catholic newspapers should not run CRS advertising, should they? — R.C., Massachusetts.
A. It is true that, at their semiannual meeting in November 2019, the U.S. bishops approved a voting guide for the 2020 elections that declares abortion to be “our preeminent priority” because “it directly attacks life itself, because it takes place within the sanctuary of the family, and because of the number of lives destroyed.” At the same time, the bishops said that “we cannot dismiss or ignore other serious threats to human life and dignity, such as racism, the environmental crisis, poverty, and the death penalty.”
A couple of bishops, Robert McElroy of San Diego and Blase Cardinal Cupich of Chicago, objected to classifying abortion as a preeminent issue, and the vote to keep this language was 143 to 69. So the fact that one-third of the bishops did not consider abortion a preeminent issue may answer your questions about why abortion is seldom mentioned at Mass.
As for Catholic Relief Services’ penchant for supporting groups promoting contraception and abortion, which has been convincingly documented by Michael Hichborn and his Lepanto Institute, you are right that parishes should stop being mandated to collect money for CRS until this situation is reversed. The problem is that the U.S. government is giving Catholic entities hundreds of millions of dollars for “social justice” work, and the bishops are reluctant to bite the hand that feeds them.
Every time Hichborn releases evidence that CRS is directly involved in promoting the use of condoms to teens and children as young as 10, the agency responds by saying that it takes such “inconsistencies with Catholic teaching” very seriously and will “take immediate corrective action.” It says that CRS participates in humanitarian initiatives with “a wide range of groups” that include institutions whose practices are “not always consistent with the full range of Catholic teaching.”
In an interview with LifeSiteNews in March 2020, Hichborn said that he is skeptical of the CRS response. He said that “CRS claims that it takes immediate corrective action when ‘errors’ are discovered. But CRS had this information a full year ago and did NOTHING about it, and failed to explain why its documents were promoting condoms. I gave CRS the information on their condom-promoting documents, and I told them about the abortion- and contracepting-promoting documents on the website they manage, called OVCSupport.org. Not only was nothing done, but in December of last year [2019] — just two and a half months ago — CRS published another set of documents aimed at encouraging adolescents to use condoms.”
He said that “CRS speaks out of both sides of its mouth.”
