Tuesday, May 02, 2006

On the Culture of Death (Life?)

Andrew Sullivan | The Daily Dish:

"It is encouraging to see the extreme abstraction of theoconservatism beginning to collide with the reality we all live in. The Pope has commissioned a study to see whether, in a serodiscordant marriage, condoms are morally a lesser evil than infecting your spouse with a serious virus. Yes, they actually need a study to figure that one out. Nick Kristof (TimesDelete) also makes the very important point that in secular, liberal, post-Communist Germany, the abortion rate is a fraction of America's. Hmmm. That couldn't have anything to do with much better contraception availability, counseling and over-the-counter availability of the morning after pill, could it? The great tragedy of the extremism of the current pro-life forces is that they have become de facto pro-death. They allow for the early deaths of hundreds of thousands of people in the developing world by opposing condoms in a health emergency; and they add to the number of abortions in America by making emergency contraception hard to find. In their theological abstraction, the logic is perfect and circular. On the ground, they are abetting death. They need to get a better grip on their own good intentions and see how their extremism has led them astray."

Well put.

1 comment:

Suzanne said...

The Vatican isn't going to change the doctrine on condoms. As it stands, the Church already allows a spouse to SUBMIT to a contraceptive act for a greater good, so long as you express opposition. However, you cannot initiate a contraceptive act. So I think the Church is going to study the boundaries of this doctrine. It's not going to say that couples can just go out and buy a box of condoms. That will still be prohibited. Another possibility is the study of co-erced acts of sex and the boundaries for that teaching, because condoms are allowed for cases of rape.



I suspect Germany has a low abortion rate because it's harder to get an abortion there. It's only legal up to ten weeks. I understand that counseling to dissuade women from aborting is obligatory.