Pro-life Surroundings

The good news is that lately, I have been surrounded by pro-life people. Even people who normally aren't pro-life have been behaving in a pro-life way. It is nearly amazing. It would be unbelievable without hope. I live every day in hope that more people will see that life matters. I look to influence everyone around me to know that without the right to life, no other rights matter, because they do not exist. The right to life trumps all other rights, for all of us.

Marriage Under Fire Yet Again

I have spent so much time trying to defend marriage that I don't have time to write about defending marriage. There are so many marriages going down in flames right now that it is hard to keep up. Most of the ones that I know of, I am not close enough to the couple to really say anything directly. It is often a mutual friend who contacts me asking, "What do I do?" It is frequently the same problems over and over: Boredom, infidelity, pornography, and just plain selfishness. Those problems have always existed, yet before contraception they didn't lead to divorce like they do now. What I find more than anything is people who constantly argue, "It isn't because of contraception!"

This statement makes me more nuts than any other. They are so sure it isn't contraception, yet they really don't know what it is otherwise. They are just sure it isn't contraception. The numbers prove otherwise, yet they don't want to hear it. They just want to continue to believe the lies. It is so frustrating.

Yet, I can see where they are coming from. Contraception masks so many things that it is hard to reveal. They complain about communication, yet they communicate a contraceptive lie with their bodies. But they never know that. They complain that their sex life is non-existent or boring, the very things they were told that contraception would cure. They have no idea that it made their problems worse not better. There is nothing more exciting than discovering that today is THE day, either because you are fertile and want to be, or infertile and want to be. As one NFP teacher says, "I never knew I could become sexually aroused looking at my wife's thermometer."

The problem with contraception is it is a silent killer. It sneaks up and destroys the marriage without ever being identified. It is a murder and the survivors never learn the weapon or date of death. All they know is that a marriage they hoped would last forever, is now cold and dead. Contraception was the unnamed killer. We have to stop it.

Abstinence: Putting Your Money Where Your, er, Mouth Is.

Post-op surgically, by 12 days now. Still healing up. Incisions seem to be healthy, but they do bother me a bit.

So until I am healed, we are abstaining. I know, I know. We NFP Catholics give too much information when it comes to our sex lives. But I wonder. How else do you get the word out that not "everybody is doing it?"

One of my points for NFP is pointing out that a couple who refuses to abstain has less secure ground to stand on when telling a teenager to abstain. After all, many teens really are pretty mature. Many have been emancipated and have raised babies quite well. Before higher education, people married shortly after entering puberty.

But now, we have teens who have been able to reproduce for years being told, "Wait! You can't handle a baby yet!" But they look to the so-called role models in their own lives and the teens say, "Whoop de do, neither can you. What's the difference?"

Well we know, as adults, that teens don't have it nearly as together as they think they do. We currently have an extended adolescence that extends into the mid-20s. They are the age of parents from generations past, but have the maturity level of middle school. Why? Because their own parents grew up with them. Their own parents were so young (mentally and physically) that they raised their children as they finished raising themselves.

If you never have to say 'no,' and never have to sacrifice, then what is there to learn? What have you earned? Nothing. The only thing these younger parents feel they sacrificed was, in fact, their youth! They don't have the tools to teach their children to abstain. They never had to, so why should their kids? They never had to put their money where their mouths were.

I propose: We go back to educating our young people as if puberty actually means something. I propose that we tell them exactly what is going on their bodies. Forget the mystery. Teach them the science! But then in the same breath, let's teach them their inherent value as human beings. Let's teach them that abstaining is difficult, but worth it. Let's teach them that they will have a lot more ahead of them if they don't get tied to an unhealthy relationship.

Let's live our lives with more transparency. If they are going to learn anything from us, we have to put our money where our mouth is. If they have to abstain, we have to prove it is possible. And not only that it is just possible, but that there are rewards for it. Stability, self-esteem, commitment, and communication all have deep roots in abstinence. Let's show them how it is done!

The Definition of Procreative

Here is another post that I wanted to save. Again, it says what I want to say. The indented quote is from someone else. The rest is my response.

We are using science to determine if we are fertile and having sex only when we are not. That, in and of itself, is messing with the way God meant it to be, according to what Catholics say about contraception. We are separating the procreative and the unitive properties of sex.

Please allow me to give a different perspective than the ones already presented here. I speak with the voice of those suffering from infertility.

Let me begin by asking you a question. Would you be willing to look an infertile couple in the eye and say, "You are not being procreative. You are separating the procreative from the unitive?" I would hope not. I would hope that you have more sense than to tell a couple who desperately wants a child that they are not being procreative.

You see objectively, that is what they are doing, by your definition. According to what you have defined as "procreation," they have used science to determine that their act is not going to result in a conception, yet they are still having sex. If your definition of procreation is accurate, then they are doing the same thing as an NFP couple who is making exclusive use of the infertile phase. And by that further logic, you cannot see a difference between what an NFP couple does and what a contracepting couple does. So if I take those points to their logical conconclusion, then the infertile couple is contracepting. Because we know that if A=B, and B=C, then A=C. Correct?

But I would guess then that your answer would be, "No the infertile couple wants to have a baby." True. But that is intent, not means. So that merely changes the why they are having sex, not the when and how. What we are discussing is the objective means of having infertile sex.

But what if instead the definition of procreation is not just a reproductive act? What if being procreative is instead a measurable, act that is defined, (as it is correctly listed in your second post) as an act ordered towards life? Wouldn't that change the above illogical conclusion that an infertile couple is doing basically the same act as a contracepting couple? Wouldn't that say, that no, a contracepting couple has done an act of some kind, deliberately, to disorder the act away from life?

Having suffered through both previous infertility and now having to limit the size of my family through the use of the infertile phases, I can really see both sides of the coin. My health is so bad that there are days that I cannot get out of bed to tend my two children. I have to have people come over and help. I hate that. I would love to be healthy. I desperately wanted to have another child, but it looks like God has a different plan for us. I want more children. Right now. My intent is the desire for children, yet we only make use of the infertile phase. Are you willing to tell me that I have separated the procreative from the unitive?

If you are really interested in the topic I have a list of sources as long as my husband's arm that I can give you. (He's six feet tall. Long wing-span.) Contraception is most certainly discussed, by name, in Scripture. Many, many of the early Church Fathers wrote on the intrinsic evil of contraception. I am more than happy to discuss with you the massive differences between natural infertility and intentional sterility.

Contraception was the topic that brought me fully back home to living a devout Catholic life. My blog is entitled, "Confessions of a Former Contracepter."

Small Victories

I haven't had anything much to say on my topic for a short time. Now I have two small victories to share. Both have to do with overcoming abortion.

The first is about a former director of my nemesis, Planned Parenthood. As usual, I will remain silent on exactly what I think of PP, in an effort to stay charitable. But, a former employee for eight years, a director for two years no less, has left the building! She saw an abortion on ultrasound. She just had to stop helping the abortion industry anymore! She left PP and is now working with Human Life International. And to see further the ridiculousness of PP. They filed an injunction against her. For exactly what, no one knows. But they say they have to "protect their staff." Protect them from what? Me thinks that doth protest too much...

The other victory is over a nun. Yes, sadly, you read that right. It is a victory over a nun for overcoming abortion. This woman, I hesitate strongly in using the affectionate term 'sister' when referring to her, but this woman was working as an escort at an abortion clinic! She was "shielding the clinic's clients from protesters." She had been doing this for years and her order has just let her. Leaving out that it is a complete violation of canon law to assist in abortion while remaining a member of a religious order, she also caused scandal just by being there and being a nun.

Thankfully she is one of those "spirit of Vatican II" nuns and so is on her way out either way. You know the ones. They don't wear habits. They don't like being women. They would rather be priests than nuns. And they don't like anything remotely Catholic. But for whatever reason, she has finally ceased her behavior. Thank God. Protecting women from protesters at an abortion clinic is akin to shielding toddlers from butterflies. The toddlers (and women) are capable of far more damage than the butterflies (or protesters.) Both the women and the toddlers need to be told, "gentle," a lot, ...until they get it.

What Really IS Best for Women?

I was addressing a person who was going back to contraception because she just didn't believe that NFP was "working for her." It led me to all sorts of questions about the way our society learns about reproduction.

So what really is best for women? Is it best that women know little to nothing about the workings of their own bodies? Is it "pro-women's reproductive rights" to have their natural fertility taken away and replaced with steroids? Is it best for women and society as a whole to have these crazy hormones in our water, changing the very fabric of our existence?!

Absolutely not! But to really give a balanced look I will say that there is something seriously broken in the NFP movement too. Why on Earth are we waiting until a woman is about to get married to teach her about her body? The only reason that makes any sense at all is because of the concern that people will use NFP knowledge as a way to be promiscuous. I say, "Let 'em!" At least when we were in an era of sex=babies, we didn't have the train wrecks that make up our society right now. I mean really. People have been using old wives tales to "try" to prevent pregnancies since the dawn of time. We aren't going to stop human stupidity.

But by putting the poison of contraception in their hands, the behavior has gone viral. Literally, viral. STD numbers go up with contraception usage, not down. Every " health organization" is going to tell you that isn't true, but talk to any teenager. Most know someone with a disease, or worse yet, a rumor of a disease. The misinformation is as rampant as the behavior.

My sex ed class would horrify most liberals and most conservatives. But that is mostly because those are political positions and have little to do with actual rational thought. My class would be an abstinence only education. The liberals go ape at those words. "It doesn't work!!" they cry. But their definition of "abstinence only" is far different from reality. Abstinence is the one and only 100% effective way to prevent pregnancy (and disease!). All other methods fail miserably.

My class would also involve full education of all contraceptive and abortion methods. Now it would be the conservatives turn to draw their collective breath. But conservatives tend to think that explaining contraception somehow endorses it. Far from it. Contraception is a train wreck, and people ought to know that. The original contraception, "the withdrawl method," is an absolute joke to intimacy, and the "barrier methods" belong in a battle zone. Snipping fallopian and vas defrens tubes violates the Hippocratic oath, "First do no harm." And hormonal contraception? Don't even get me started! We ban steroids in athletics, yet embrace them in half of our population otherwise! The incongruency boggles the mind.

What is really best for women? I will tell you since I have been on every side of this, in actuality, relatively simple problem. I have two children. My son is 5, my daughter, 2. They are learing every day about authentic sexuality. We will never have "the sex talk" in our house. We will never need it. We talk about their bodies as the natural part of who they are. They have a child's vocabulary that will grow as they do. They go pee pee right now. They will learn the word 'urinate' when they can enunciate. They have 'boy parts' and 'girl parts' for now. They will get the bigger words without a blush or embarrassment when they need them.

I fully plan on teaching my daughter exactly what it means to have both 'red show' and 'white show.' The white means you can conceive and the red means you probably didn't. My son will hear it too. They will understand their basic anatomy. They will know the purpose of a prostate long before my son is 40 and needs an exam. They will know the location of the cervix and what it does in relation to childbirth and in relation to fertility.

And most importantly they will learn why men and women are designed as they are. They will know that the complementarity of men and women is the very building block of life. They will know that God is masculine, but NOT male. They will know that it is in both male AND female that we are created in God's image, not either/or. They will know first and foremost their intrinsic value as children of God, and they will learn the intrinsic value of all of humanity from conception to natural death. If that understanding is the true foundation, then building on it isn't really hard at all. The good news is that I don't have to design a big comprehensive plan about this. I rest on the shoulders of giants who have come before me. My ideal education program already exists. Wiser minds than mine have already been here and figured it out.

Thank you Pope John Paul the Great!

Whose mind is closed?

My belief set just got referred to as being a "bigot" again today. I have one major belief that gets this label. I believe that marriage is not something we can redefine as a society. I believe it falls under natural law, and therefore cannot be defined as whatever way the wind blows our society. Since it takes one man and one woman to make a family, I believe that marriage is the definition of that union.

Until someone can explain to me in a clear manner an opposing point of view, I will continue to hold that view. If marriage is not defined as one man and one woman, then the designation of two people in a union is arbitrary. Why only two? If the participants can be changed then the number can too. Others have argued that the aged and infertile couldn't get married based on it being about creating a family. Why not? They are still one man and one woman. The complementarity is still present. Whether or not it can actually produce a child is not the question. It is defining marriage that is the discussion, not whether or not all the parts are in working order. The structure for marriage is one man and one woman. My marriage that still can reproduce is interchangeable with my parents' who are past child-bearing years. It is not interchangeable with two people of the same sex. Complementarity is the foundation of life. The union of that complementarity is called marriage.

Now, from a purely legal standpoint there is an entirely expanded discussion. The nightmare that individuals currently face in defining next of kin just has to stop. No one should need a lawyer to say, "I designate this person or persons as my next of kin." A small simple filing fee for the document should suffice, and if the designation is reciprocal it needs only one document. I haven't personally dealt with it but there is also talk of people being prevented from hospital visitation, citing "family only." Again, that nightmare has to stop. I know many people who would rather have nothing to do with their "blood family." I know of Catholic converts whose families have authorized treatment completely against Catholic teaching, while a beloved, though unrelated Catholic stood by helplessly. That is the definition of cruelty.

Some would say that civil unions are the answer. (What was the question again?) Oh yes, redefining marriage. Civil unions are just a patronizing designation. Opposite sex people have no business in them either. They are used to mimic marriage. The original still works, a mimic will fail. If the number of people in a civil union is arbitrary, then it will undergo the same argument being foisted on marriage. Where do you draw the line?

That is the root of the entire conflict. Why are there only two people in marriage? I can give you the natural law reason. No one who has called me "closed minded" seems to want to face facts. If it is not one man and one woman, then the designation is arbitrary. There can be no law made, no particular union held as ideal if the line in the sand can be just swept away.

That Celibate Bachelor Knows All About Sex!

I recently started an online discussion with a person who considers herself nearly an atheist. Reading what she writes to me, I don't find her ignorant. It is like speaking to a former version of myself. She believes that the all-male priesthood is debasing to women. She feels that because only males can hold what she believes to be "the highest role," that this has defined women as somehow inferior.

I can tell you exactly what she believes and why because I used to believe that too. I also held a whole host of other beliefs in that same vein. Ironically or not, all of my misunderstandings about Church teaching were all rooted in sexual misinformation. You could even call it my own sexual confusion. My battles with myself, secular society, and the "big bad" Catholic Church all had a sexual undertone to them. It was literally years before I made that connection. I actually thought that I had all of these original ideas!

Then one guy, a priest, started me on the road to a deeper understanding. I would like to say that the one guy was our late Holy Father, Pope John Paul II. But no, I'm not even quite quick enough to have noticed his work on my own. No, it was a priest who taught a class at the Newman Center during college. His name was Father Simeon, God rest his precious soul. He handed out some really great pages. I didn't even know what I was reading at the time. But for reasons known only to God, they spoke to me personally.

Most of what he talked about in the class was about God being outside of time for our salvation. But there was this other message he was sharing. He discussed some amazing talks that had been given by the pope. This was 1993. The talks were from '79-'83. But I knew none of this at the time.

Honestly, really really honestly, I knew absolutely squat about Catholic teaching on sexuality, at the time. I knew secular society's corrupted version of truth: Contraception was good because having babies all the time was a drain on your finances and freedom, so-called "gay marriage" was a denied civil right, Ordination for women was just around the corner, marriage was a license for all the sex you could get, and fornication was a smart way to test drive before you buy. I knew it all and believed it all, and acted on as many parts that applied to me.

And I was born and raised Catholic, by devout, faithful parents. But the message just wasn't there. It wasn't until about 1995 that I really took another look. How I got there isn't nearly as exciting as why I got there. The why is because I needed to know about authentic sexuality. I needed to know Catholic teaching in order to be truly free. There are no words that can express my gratitude. JP2, as we lovingly call him, knew almost as much as there is to know about sexuality.

This celibate man answered each and every one of my objections. He did nothing to convince me. He merely showed me what it meant to be a woman before God. He showed that my womanhood affected my every thought and action. There was nothing I could do to leave my womanhood behind, nor should I. Secular society had long tried to make me abandon my sexuality for some neutered version instead. Secular life sought equality through the sterile. To undo what makes men and women different, has only hurt us. Sameness does not equal equality.

That celibate bachelor in Rome taught me more about being a married woman and a mother than anyone has ever taught me since. God rest his soul. Thank you, Pope John Paul the Great!

When Did it Flip?

Too many people now seem to think that having babies is a bad thing. What I want to know is when did it flip? In most cultures a large family was a sign of great abundance. In other cultures, a big family was a sign of a large farm that needed many hands to do make the work go faster.

But in our culture, a big family seems to be a sign of lack of education. That is so not true, yet the rumor persists. The biggest turn I see was the roaring '20's. This was a much looser era that was followed by the Great Depression. That is when contraception started becoming mainstream. Funny, our culture thinks our quality of life has improved since the wide use of contraception. Yet families spend less and less time together.

So it seems that there are smaller families, and they are spending less time together. That doesn't appear to be a better quality of life. It just seems like they have fewer people to love.

Nothing to add...

I get to point where I struggle to see the other side of the argument right now. The only thing that makes me a decent person in the eyes of secular society is my ability to see the other person's point of view. If I can state the case for a point I vehemently disagree with, in a way that a person who holds that position would recognize, then it is said I am being balanced and fair.

But right now I just can't. I can't see the other side. I mean nuclear disarmament is a great goal, but it is not even close to accomplished. The Middle East is still at war, even if they are doing a tiny bit better job of communicating without killing each other. But there is still this huge holocaust against the unborn. How is this even possible? How can someone who is consistently against saving infants who survive a botched abortion able to be considered peaceful?

I know I am on the wrong side on this one. At least secular society is trying to convince me that I am. But I just really don't get it this time. The late Mother Teresa deserved this award. She earned every moment of it. But right now I just can't see the other side. I mean, were the other candidates really that bad?

Since I am struggling so much to see the other side of this point of view, I have tried to stay out of it. I really have nothing to add.

Sex makes babies?!?!

Seriously, our culture of death has just gone too far. I rented a movie the other night. For whatever reason I watched the previews on this particular one. Now I know why.

I kid you not, the very first line of the movie trailer is a young girl's voice saying these words, "Most babies are accidents..."

An accident? Really? That is how "far" our culture has come? I couldn't believe those horrible words. But at the same time I have to remember that our culture has such a mentality that sex doesn't make babies, they are shocked when it does!

I mean how do you accidentally make a baby? Honestly. Our contraceptive society has really gone off the deep end when it comes to logic. Sex makes babies. They know that. That is why they wanted contraception; because sex makes babies. Isn't more accurate to say that it is an accident when it doesn't make a baby? After all, fertility is a perfectly healthy state. To contracept is to break it. Contraception is the "accident." Contraception says, "I took this totally normal, healthy body part and broke it." If we take a normal car and crash it into a wall, don't we call that an accident? "Oops. It used to work, and now it doesn't. I accidentally broke it."

Contraception is the accident. Most of the time it doesn't work like "they" say it will. Sex continues to make babies, no matter how many people say that it doesn't. If you don't want to make a baby, don't have sex. It's not like it's rocket science or something.

Favorite AI joke.

Even though I find artificial insemination to be totally against what God's plan is for the human race, it does have one of my favorite jokes on the subject. Movie quote: An expectant mother lies and says she was artificially inseminated (from frozen sperm) to cover up an adulterous relationship. Her mother quips, "Wonderful, now I can tell everyone that I am expecting a 'grand-cicle.'"

The theme of the movie is good in that the woman sees the error of her ways and discovers that her child is best raised with both a mother and a father. Her frightening fantasies of what kind of fathers the men she is dating would make are just hysterical. It is a movie worth seeing. "Look Who's Talking." Older now but still some great themes.

The wonderful part is that the baby is not aborted and treated with dignity and respect regardless of the means of his conception. If only all of society were so 'enlightened.' "Don't do it this way, but once the deed is done, treat that person as he really is, a full person," is the underlying message. A good message overall.

The Wrong Way of Puritanism

Now it can seem like someone who is against pornography would be prudish and lead toward a Puritan way of thinking. For many people this has happened. But sadder still is the person who, raised in a Puritan environment, will rebel and instead go towards pornography. It has been said that Hugh Hefner (I think that is how you spell it, I rather not look it up for concern of what I might find,) it was said that Mr. Hefner was raised in such a puritan environment that he was starving for simple affection. His desires led him to create a huge pornographic industry. How sad that this child was so deprived of simple affection that it led to such an extreme contrast, an industry that is almost entirely devoid of human contact.

It has been said by ones wiser than I, that puritanism and pornography are just two sides of the same coin. If this is true then a child raised in a sexually repressive environment can easily grow into the same kind of lifestyle that someone in a sexually explicit upbringing might join. Sexual abuse of children is horrific, and sexual repression of children is just the other side of the problem. To be prudish does not cure pornography, it only makes the contrast more acute.

The Root of Pornography

As I read about a friend's neighbor in the paper I am reminded of some important truths. A husband and father is in jail now for child enticement. Rightly so. He communicated online with someone he thought was a 13-year-old girl and sought to have sexual contact. It was a sting operation, thankfully. He was actually communicating with police. He didn't get to claim another victim thanks to the vigilance of caring people.

I read the online comments and people were saying all of the things that one normally says about a pedophile, including some names I can't even mention here. But as I read I wondered how many of those people normally defend the production and viewing of pornography of adults? The common idea is that adults who engage in pornography do so willingly. Basically, defenders of adult pornography draw their line because of consent. They say an adult can consent.

But I am here challenging that premise. One singular piece of evidence proves pornography defenders completely wrong. The question to ask is WHO are these adults who become pornographic "artists?" The answer: nearly ALL are survivors of some form of childhood sexual abuse. I won't quite go out on the limb and say absolutely ALL simply because there will always be the person who denies it. I will state that again: nearly ALL pornographic performers are themselves victims of childhood sexual abuse. Look it up! How are they able to consent when that ability was taken from them at a very young age? Adult pornography is simply continued exploitation of men and women who were robbed of their childhood.

Those who view adult pornography are reaping the harvest that the pedophiles before them have sown.

Miscarriage

A good friend of mine had a miscarriage last week. She has struggled to conceive so this was profoundly rough on her. I have been doing what I can to support yet trying to keep my distance in other ways. I don't want to try to make her mourn on my terms. I see that in others around her and I know I have that same capacity. We all do. We say, "Oh my gosh get over it!" somewhere in the back of our minds. WHY??

Because in this culture of death we are all affected by the idea that a baby in utero is not "quite a baby yet." This person, is the size of a grain of rice. We, as a culture, have determined worth by size. A football player must be huge, a model must be tall and skinny. A baby must be baby-sized to be considered a person.

But the real answer is that science just keeps catching up with natural law. As science gets better and better, we will know sooner that a life exists. As science gets better and better we will be able to have an image of a developing baby like any other real-time photo. As science gets better and better we will be able to help even the most at risk pregnancies carry to term. And as science gets better and better it will be realized that the womb is a sacred space; the best possible environment for a baby to grow. Because science will never surpass the natural design.

As we begin to escape the culture of death we will start to see the sanctity of life. And finally women, and men, mourning a miscarriage will be treated with the respect they deserve. They will be given a full acknowledgment of a death in the family. We will give them them the love and support they so deserve. To those who say that the Church has enmity to science, they couldn't be more wrong. The research constantly proves the design. So I say to the real scientists, (not the ones who oppose ethical research) but to the scientists I say, "Please keep the research coming." We will all benefit. Life begins at conception, and science keeps proving it over and over.

We are not the sum total of our parts. We are more!

I just finished viewing some funny pictures on the web. Many of them were oh so funny! But I noticed a disproportionate amount of pictures were of women having their bodies ogled and generally putting themselves in sad situations. Those were not funny at all.

Here's an open-ended question. Who told these women that were worth only the sum total of the their body parts? I say it is open ended since there isn't a real answer. They were told by everyone at one time or another. I know, because I had one of those bodies, for a great many years. I spent more time trading on my looks than developing my character. For whatever reason I decided that my character wasn't enough. I have no answer. No one sat me down and said that I was all about my body. It just evolved. And my body, as a whole, wasn't even "traffic stopping" perfect. But the sum total was. I had the parts, and I had a mixed understanding of modesty. I covered everything, but I covered myself in a way that said "unwrap me," not in a way that said "my beauty is the strength of my heart, and my ability to love."

When I was plain I got ignored. When I was "hot" people listened to my message. Funny, after marrying a chef and having babies, I am no longer "hot," yet my message is better. I love more deeply and more freely. I was even told, more than once, that my old message was more palatable since it was wrapped in a pretty package.

My message has improved and my looks have aged. Those who matter listen to my message now. All of those people who "heard" my old message are long gone. Oh how I wish I could talk to my younger self and save her so much heart-ache! Those who matter want to know YOU, not your body! They are the ones who stay for good.