Catholicism, Contraception, Economic Woe

Catholicism, Contraception, Economic Woe March 1, 2009

Interesting perspectives offered without comment on a busy day:

The Church’s stand on birth control is the most absolutely spiritual of all her stands and with all of us being materialists at heart, there is little wonder that it causes unease. I wish various fathers would quit trying to defend it by saying that the world can support forty billion. I will rejoice in the day when they say: This is right, whether we all rot on top of each other or not, dear children, as we certainly may. Either practice restraint or be prepared for crowding.
Flannery O’ Connor

Everything is connected and it may sound absurd to link contraception with the economic collapse, but think about it:

History will look back and decide that artificial contraception was the most radical and earth shattering invention ever devised by mankind. When the link between the sexual act and procreation was broken it not only changed our sexual behavior, it changed everything.

Most importantly, it changed the way we think about ourselves and our actions. The links between our actions and their natural consequences were broken. We began to expect that we could have whatever pleasure we wanted when we wanted and how we wanted and that we could avoid all the consequences of those actions. In sexual behavior it seemed to be so.

We became gods. We could do anything and have anything and we could avoid the cost. Extrapolate this mentality to the economic sphere and you’ll see what I mean. We told ourselves that we could have anything we wanted instantly simply by taking out another loan. If we were the lenders, we insured ourselves against loss in case those loans were not re paid.

The responsibility could always be shifted. The ‘problem’ could always be solved. Paying the price could always be delayed. We could just re-finance. Just as we got instant sexual gratification for free, so we thought we should have everything else instantly for free.
–Fr. Dwight Longenecker, Contraceptives & Economic Collapse

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