Catholic Leasdership on Abortion

I would like to ask the good Cardinal if he is correct in his assertion that the current teaching of the Catholic Church on human life and abortion is the same as it was 2000 years ago. If so why, why was it the Church refused both baptism and burial in consecrated grounds to non viable fetuses for centuries and centuries. I believe the issue was the assumption that the body was not ensouled until it was viable life outside the womb.

Your other point Frannie, about the definition of fertilization and conception as the time of ensoulment has profound applications regarding birth control. It's a form of creeping infallibility with no concrete basis in any objectifiable truth. We cannot know with any certainty when a person is ensouled. The modern church is going places the earler church was fearful to tread, and they were as sure of their understanding of the material world and the process of procreation as we are today.

http://enlightenedcatholicism-colkoch.blogspot.com

I do not believe that the Catholic Church's stance is unchanged for 2,000 years. Here is a link to the indispensable Catholics for Free Choice web site and they give a historical synopsis in the article.

http://www.catholicsforchoice.org/pubs/cfc_archive/articles/TheHistoryofAbortion.asp

butterfly, I wish you Peace. I will pray for you.

Dear Butterfly,

I'm sorry that you have been so deeply hurt by child sexual abuse. One point of precision - the term should not be pedophiles - almost all victims were post-pubescent, and most were boys, hence there was a strong homosexual component to this as well.

The Boston Globe discussed this:
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But there is one essential element of the scandal that has not gotten the attention it deserves: Most priest abusers are not pedophiles -- adults whose sexual drives are almost exclusively directed toward pre-pubescent boys and girls. Rather, they fall into the category of ephebophiles (from ephebeus, one of the Greek nouns for a post-pubescent youth). Both pedophilia and ephebophilia are criminal, and in the eyes of most religious traditions, immoral.

As the distinction takes hold, it is accompanied by the disturbing realization that most of the reported victims of priest abusers are not children, but teenage boys. A. Richard Sipe, a former priest and author of "Sex, Priests and Power: Anatomy of a Crisis," believes that post-pubescent boys are victimized by priests at a rate that is four times more than post-pubescent girls.

The predominance of male teenage victims raises anew a thorny issue addressed by Notre Dame's Richard McBrien and Andrew Greeley, the sociologist and novelist, almost 15 years ago -- the presence of significant numbers of homosexually oriented men in the priesthood.
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However, to return to your main point: denial of Communion is appropriate only for those obstinately persisting in grave sin. If the enabling bishops truly repented and confessed their sins (a matter known only in the depths of conscience), then they could have been forgiven, and could again receive communion.

So also for those who promote abortion. If they repent and change their ways, they should be readmitted to Communion.

Thomas

Thomas, what difference does it make if the victims were 10, 12 or 14?

Is it less heinous if the victim is 14 than it is when they are 10?
Is it more acceptable if the victim is a teenager instead of a preteen?

And how many victims does there have to be before someone can see that
the behavior is persistant?

Something else to consider, there are a lot of self-righteous people who
claim to be anti-abortion, but who are actively creating circumstances
that cause pregnant women to seek abortions. Their actions promote
Words are meaningless. Politicians teach us that every day. And they
stand in the communion line every weekend saying "thank god I'm not like
them", when in reality, they are the ones causing the problem.

RE:A. Richard Sipe, a former priest and author of "Sex, Priests and Power: Anatomy of a Crisis," believes that post-pubescent boys are victimized by priests at a rate that is four times more than post-pubescent girls.

This may indeed indicate a homosexual orientation in some of the abusers. But pobably more likely is that the young men were available. Child abuse is a crime of opportunity and the clerical culture makes it much more likely that young men would be in close contact (closed doors) with the abusers. Some intergenerational sex may be based on sexuality, but abuse--like rape--is often about power and in this context the gender of the victim is not a critical factor.

Thomas,
I do not personally suffer from child sexual abuse by clergy or anyone else if that is what you are trying to presume, but as a member of the Body of Christ all suffer and are deeply hurt. Do you understand that? The distinctions that you make that delineate what members of the Body of Christ have suffered, whether children pre-pubescent or pubescent are biological distinctions. The sexually abused were for all intent and purposes here children and not adults.

You seem to be alluding that homosexual priest are the reason for sexual assault against children. Not all homosexual priests are or have sexually molested children. Do you agree? However, in all circumstances of sexual abuse the Bishop moved them to another diocese, engaged in a secret cover-up of these crimes, which the hierarchy approved and recommended. My comment addresses this hypocrisy of denying communion to certain members of the Body of Christ while never once have I heard of sexual predator priests or their enabling Bishops being denied communion, ever! There is one set of rules, it seems, for clerics and one set of rules for the laity. Simply stated this is hypocrisy which my comment speaks about.

Your comment only mirrors that of the hierarchy's when you say "if the enabling bishops truly repented and confessed their sins (a matter known only in the depths of conscience) then they could have been forgiven, and could again receive communion." They were never denied Communion Thomas! They were saying Mass and blessing the Communion and handing it out!

For those who promote War, stockpiles of nuclear weapons, they should be denied Communion until they "repent and change their ways."

Again I will say, and if you have ears to hear please try to hear - illegalizing abortion will not end abortion, but will INTENTIONALLY kill the mother as well as the fetus, or it could ruin the chances for the mother to have more children at another time. Demonstrate you have mercy on these poor women who make the decision to have an abortion and demonstrate you have the capacity to have faith in members of the Body of Christ that when the law says it is legal to do so that we do not decide to have abortions because we believe in Jesus Christ and His law of love.

Promoting War, allowing for stockpiles of nuclear arms, is obstinately persisting in grave sin Thomas. I would believe you were Pro-Life in its most comprehensive and inclusive way if you were to see the bigger picture of the "obstinately persisting in grave sins" of the Republican Party regarding their continued stance for promoting War. You know, they always say they are for "less government" and "less taxes" but somehow after they are in office we, the middle class, are left with the opposite of more government and more taxes as a result of their policies. Corporations and businesses might be paying less taxes and have less government control, but the rest of us working people pay more and more and suffer from their lack of government controls against pollution. I believe you need to make these distinctions about what they are really for and against before voting for Republicans.

Mike Huckabee last night at the Republican Convention told a story which equated the military with supplying the school with the student's desks. It is a persistent lie to equate the military with freedom, and you should know that being a Christian. The military cannot save us or supply us with school desks! It was the hard earned money from working families which supplied those desks to the children in the classroom. It was from their sweat and hard work and taxes that paid for those desks, and paid also for the soldier's uniforms. How can you support a party that consistently lies to the American people?

I would presume that the integrity of the Church hierarchy will lead pedophile enablers such as Cardinal Law and many other Catholic Bishops who hid pedophiles from presenting themselves for Communion, if they support a false 'right" to hide and harbor sexual criminals and not minister to the abused children and their families.

I'm thinking here, Thomas, that one point you are making is that ephebophilia is not so bad because adolescent boys are more savvy than little boys and girls. Another point you seem to be making is that all homosexuals have less self-control than heterosexuals do.

I would disagree to the extent that adolescence is the time that boys and girls are attentive to and learn from the examples set by adults in their lives, particularly respected and widely influential adults, and that setting this criminal example to and with these young people possibly reverberates more widely than does making a younger child a victim. Furthermore, I think the reason there were more homosexual incidents is likely due to its being more accepted that males spend unsupervised time together.

I find it particularly irritating, though, Thomas, that you equate support for legal abortion, which respects a woman's individual responsibility for her moral choices, and ephebophilia. Would you say that because I support keeping abortion legal while dissuading women from resorting to it that I am committing a sin that in some way equates to taking advantage of someone for my own pleasure? Isn't favoring keeping abortion legal more like favoring not having pedophiles and ephebophiles publicly flogged and hanged?

Wouldnt it be nice if the heirarchy had that level of integrity?

I am a therapist and would like to let everyone know that sexual abuse of a male by a male has nothing to do with either party being homosexual!!!! It is sex abuse-and abusers abuse their victim of choice. It has EVERYTHING to do with abuse and very little to do with sex. It is about abuse of power and desire to humiliate and cause pain. It could be male or female and has nothing to do with the abuser's sexual orientation. I am so frustrated with the erroneous idea that just get the homosexuals out of the priesthood and there will be no abuse!!!!

Coolmom,

I dont believe it is erroneous ideology. I believe it is part of something bigger, something uglier that is happening within the magisterial authority of the church.

It is the "lets blame the homosexuals, that way, the laity will be to focused on them to be able to see what we are really doing" agenda. It is the same agenda Hitler used against the Jews in the early 20th century. He used them as scapegoats for the economic problems that Germany was experiencing, used them to divert attention from his real agenda. There is nothing different here, other than a different time, a different group of scapegoats, AND HOPEFULLY, a more educated and enlightened population in general who will not succumb to the Vatican siren song the way the German people did to Hitler.

When one remembers that Ratzinger was in the Hitler youth as a teenager, and knowing what we now know about how life attitudes, ethics, etc are shaped in those years, is it any wonder that we are seeing what we are seeing in the Vatican now?

I hear you acoolmom. I too am a therapist and have also gotten extemely frustrated with the gay scapegoating. In a post higher up the thread Frannie makes the distinction about opportunity. These are crimes of opportunity. Had we not had the exclusive male altar boy system, the statistics might show more proportionality. Of course, this also assumes that the parents of girls would have reacted similarly to the parents of boys. The evidence we do have indicates that they would have under reported relative to sons.

I have to keep reminding myself that the most of the hierarchical statements concerning sexuality have been written exclusively by males who claim no sexuality or sexual experience. It is not written by therapists working directly with abuse victims and the abuse dynamic. Given this it's not hard to see where gay scapegoating makes more sense than the truth of abusive power exercised in an essentially a-sexual opportunistic manner. The fact is the clerical system is all about an institutionalized form of a-sexuality and the abuse of power. This whole scandal hits way too close to home for the clerical system to begin to deal with it effectively. Better to blame gays, than deal with the truth.

http://enlightenedcatholicism-colkoch.blogspot.com