Benedict rejects prophylactic against stupid decrees

June 18, 2005

Guest Post by Morbo

I never harbored much hope that Pope Benedict XVI would reverse the shortsighted and dangerous anti-condom policies of his predecessor. Recently the pope made it official: no rubbers no matter what.

Meeting with South African bishops at the Vatican, Benedict addressed AIDS, which has decimated the African continent. “Brother bishops,” he intoned, “I share your deep concern over the devastation caused by AIDS and related diseases.”

But he doesn’t share enough to do anything about it other than offer rigid, unrealistic dogma. A moment later, Benedict blasted the use of contraceptives, which, he said, “contribute to a breakdown in sexual morality.”

Continued Benedict, “The traditional teaching of the church has proven to be the only fail-safe way to prevent the spread of HIV/AIDS. For this reason, the companionship, joy, happiness and peace which Christian marriage and fidelity provide, and the safeguard which chastity gives, must be continuously presented to the faithful, particularly the young.”

Ah yes, the “traditional teaching of the church” — the insistence that every sex act must be open to procreation. Under this rule, even if a woman knows her husband is infected with HIV, she’s not allowed to make him use a condom. Is it amazing to me that anyone takes this seriously in 2005, yet millions do — and unfortunately many of them are in the countries that can least afford to.

Anyone care to guess what year some future pope and his bishop buddies will come lumbering into not the 21st century even but the 20th? Being that they seem stuck in the 1400s right now, I say 2500 A.D. But perhaps I’m being optimistic.

Any takers?

even if a woman knows her husband is infected with HIV, she’s not allowed to make him use a condom.

Actually it’s worse than that – according to the church, the husband can’t use the condom even if he wants to.

The church’s ridiculous doctrines on sexuality won’t change as long as their clergy is composed almost completely of “officially” celebate males. The underlying dynamic (whether they’re concious of it or not) is, “Hey, if we don’t get any, why should we care about if you all do?” The callous and unrealistic policies regarding sex could only come out of a ruling elite with no firsthand experience of or stake in the thing they are regulating.

The other point is that the church doesn’t have till 2500 to fix this. They are desperately short of clergy because recruitment is abysmal as a result of the stubborn adherence to a disastrous ideologically-motivated set of policies (sound familiar?) Once the current generation of priests retires, there won’t be enough left to run things.

This kind of lockstep march over the cliff is something top-down organizations (The Catholic Church, the GOP) are pretty adept at.

  • Why does anyone take sexual advice from a man who’s never had sex,(supposedly) and lives his own sexual existence (or non-sexual existence) by laws which he doesn’t even expect his followers to follow (chastity)?

    Would you taking skiing lessons from someone who’s lived their entire life on Miami Beach?

    This dependence on the RC Church for sex-education seems more ridiculous by the day.

  • I’d add that a whole lot of surprise pregnancies have happened to women who practiced faith-based contraception (aka “rhythm”). But you want a date: ok, how about 2030. At that point most of the WW II era Cardinals will be gone, and a younger (everything’s relative) generation of them will be voting.

  • When I was a kid I memorized the Baltimore Catechism. Not all at once, but section by section, in weekly after-school meetings at our tiny local church.

    The catechism is a long list of questions (about God, Creation, the Church, the Commandments, Sacraments, etc.), each followed by a simple, rigid answer. It grew out of the Council of Trent, convened to define Church doctrine and counter Protestant “heresies”. The Roman Catechism (“catechismus” = “oral teaching”) was issued the closing day of the Council, 4 Dec 1563. In 1884 the US Bishops, meeting in Baltimore, issued an English translation of this for school children. By the time I got it, it had over 400 questions.

    Trent was the 19th ecumenical council called to clarify Church doctrine. The first, in Nicea, 323 A.D., was called to define the original, basic Creed. The last one, the 21st, was called Vatican II. There was a long history of doctrinal change (evolution, if you will) prior to the Reformation. The late Yale historian, John Boswell, argued that the Roman Catholic Church was not aopposed to homosexuality during its first thousand years, even approved a number of gay marriages. It’s as if, since the Reformation, it crawled into a hole and pulled the sod in over it. There have been moments (the brief thaw of Vatican II), but for the most part new doctrines have simply further rigidified older ones (e.g., declaring Papal Infallibility, Vatican I, 1870).

    When I was kid it never occurred to me to question any of those Catechism answers, even though I attended public school in a mostly Protestant central CA cow town (on his arrival there our very kindly priest was greeted by a burning cross on the rectory lawn). I spent three of my high school years in a Franciscan seminary without questioning any Church doctrine. In fact, there was very little “intellectual” effort directed that way; as I saw it, the emphasis was on performing the ancient rituals beautifully and in doing good works in imitation of Christ and Francis.

    In college (USF) the Jesuits made an effort to “prove” the doctrines, not just by citing scripture (which was mostly new to me) but primarily through logical reasoning – mostly in imitation of Aquinas’s Christianized version of Aristotle. The only effect that exercise had on me was opening all those beliefs to logical and empirical criticism, and ultimately to rejection, not only of the beliefs but also the hide-bound institution which promulgated them, as it continues to do under Benedict XVI.

    When I was still in college I was home for a rare visit with my parents. They were entertaining about 30 parishoners, mostly friends of my Irish Catholic mother. My dad had perhaps had a few too many and was waxing eloquent on his view of the Church (he was non-academically Rationalist, Jeffersonian to the core). At one point, coinciding with one of those lulls which occur a room full of talkers, he proclaimed, “The only sin the Church seems to know about is Sex, and they preach about that to a bunch of old bats who haven’t been laid in 30 years.”

    Everyone quickly overcame their embarassment and carried on. I privately exploded with joy. Neither Dad nor I knew at the time that he was saying pretty much the same thing a Dutch Cardinal had said years before in explaining why post-WWII European churches were attended only by small numbers of old ladies. Long before Vatican II Leo Jozef Cardinal Suenens questioned the Church’s views on contraception, priestly celibacy, the role of the laity, etc. His views were later squashed by Pope Paul VI.

    I can’t imagine how such rigidly doctrinal churches (I’d include much of Islam, too) can survive this century in anything like their current form. The internet has already exposed thinking people to far more material than I had available to me as a kid or even in college (I had to go to the SF public library to find Russell or Nietzsche, with which to wage my battles in the required Theology classes … I lost, they threw me out). The only future for these organizations (it’s hard to call them churches), it seems to me, is among the poor and illiterate of the planet, and even poverty and illiteracy, I hope, will not last that long. But then that’s why I’m a Democrat.

  • The catholic church has been obsolete for 500 years. If they keep diddling the altar boys, perhaps they’ll finally twaddle off to the dustbin of history.

    peace

  • While the recruitment of new fodder to become priests and nuns in the USA is down to the point that they’ll have only a hollow shell in a decade or two, they’re trying to make up for it by recruiting lots in traditionally nonchristian areas like Africa. Then they import priests from Nigeria and the like to tend the dwindling Catholic flocks here in the USA. Problem is, even as Catholicism gets the air let out of it here, the flocks are flocking to the fundie banners. If I had my druthers I’d leave ’em Catholic, even with a zero like Ratzy at the helm. Instead we’ve got the hordes of sheeple being led by the likes of Dobby & Robertson and their ilk.

    As much as I ponder it, the power of religion in the USA as opposed to other so-called “civilized” countries never ceases to amaze and appall me. Nothing good will come from this compared to the damage that religious lunacy will wreak.

    “The most common of all follies is to believe passionately in the palpably not true. It is the chief occupation of mankind.”  –H. L. Mencken 

  • Fuck them and waiting for them to come round. We need to take the churches down one brick at a time and consign them to ancient history where they belong.

  • What I find interesting about the church is its utter hipocracy on the issues or priests marrying.

    First, If I am not mistaken that was not always the case. I think – though my church history is sketchy – that it was once considered heretical to preacy about celebacy and vows of poverty. Afer all the Borgia childrens father was pope.

    Second, the church will hapily let a convert priest who is married, remain married and become a priest. They will hapily send priests/nuns from Nigeria and others from African and Asian countries to fill they empty church posts when they know good and well that the priests (and nuns too I guess) often have families. The catholic church has a long tradition of incorporating/accepting some local customs if they can make inroads.

    Third, where do they think their future priest/nuns are going to come from. They can get all they want from Africa and Asia but that isn’t really a good answer. It used to be that when you had several children one or more whould be given to the church. That is hapily, no longer the case.

    The Catholic church does itself and its flock no good with their inability see the world for what it is and live in it – than see it for they think it should be.

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