The Slippery Slope to DEATH
Pro-lifers, led by the Catholic Church in the Philippines, have locked itself in a bitter war against the passage of the Reproductive Health law for quite some time now. They have rallied, prayed, and sacrificed much in order to block its passage, but no thanks to dirty and corrupt politics, the government has managed to pass the nefarious bill through deception and manipulation.
For those sitting on the fence, and especially for those who have an ax to grind against the Church, our efforts to block the RH law may seem an absurd pastime, no more than a result of the brainwashing coming from the bishops who have timelocked their flock with an outdated religion. The liberal media is fond of playing this card in order to discredit the Church. From radio programs to print media and even the news on TV, the media has done its share to distort what the Church, specially the clergy, have to say.
While liberals have been relentless in their attacks against the Church, the Church has been relentlessly proclaiming the Gospel of Life, like a voice crying out in the desert. Why does the Church persist on fighting the law? Why is She against the government promotion of contraceptives?
The government can either prohibit, permit, or promote an activity or an idea. Currently, it prohibits drug abuse. It promotes entrepreneurship, hard work and ingenuity, and honesty. Before the RH law, contraceptives were permitted. Logically, this is the most ideal of all situations, a win-win solution for all; those who want contraceptives can avail of it, those whose religious beliefs run counter to the distribution and use of contraceptives can stay clear of it. But with government promotion of contraceptives, everything changes. Everyone is now ‘forced to have a choice.’ Catholic medical practitioners will be hardest hit by the law. Catholic hospitals and schools will have to tow the line. There will be much resentment and resistance from those whose religious beliefs collide with the law. It’s like crafting a law that gives Muslims a choice to eat pork.
Slippery Slope to DEATH
No, not literal death, but what pro-lifers mean by this is Divorce, Euthanasia, Abortion, Total Fertility Control, and Homosexual Unions. It is said that the RH law will open the floodgates for more anti-life laws like the divorce law. And true enough, as of this writing, there were two divorce bills filed:
Divorce battle starts in House;
2 bills filed
By Christian V. Esguerra
Philippine Daily Inquirer
12:41 am | Saturday, January 5th, 2013
House of Representatives. INQUIRER FILE PHOTO
Lawmakers appear to be on a collision course over efforts to introduce a divorce law in the country, with two completely opposite bills pending in the House of Representatives.
Marikina Rep. Marcelino Teodoro has filed an “Anti-Divorce and Unlawful Dissolution of Marriage Act” seeking a “guarantee that no legislation encouraging or facilitating the dissolution of marriage and recognizing divorce shall be passed.”
Another pending bill coauthored by Gabriela Representatives Luzviminda Ilagan and Emerenciana de Jesus seeks to amend the Family Code to introduce a divorce provision, a move floated and supported by no less than Speaker Feliciano Belmonte soon after the House passed the reproductive health bill on third reading.
How will the government’s promotion of contraceptives and sex education be the start of the slippery downward slope for the Filipino Family? Let’s examine the facts.
Divorce
Janet Smith explains why contraception induces an increase in divorce:
“What about the other predictions of the secular world who thought contraception would be so great? What about this prediction that marriages would be better? I think, in some respects, marriages are better, but the divorce rate shows us that there are a lot of very bad marriages, or at least marriages that end because people think they are very bad. In fact, the divorce rate doubled between 1965 and 1975. The divorce rate had been sort-of sneaking up all century long until in the mid 1960′s it was at 25%, and then in 1975 it got up to 50%. And so in a short ten-year period, the divorce rate doubled. There’s a demographer at the University of Stanford named Robert Michael who was kind of intrigued by this, and he wondered why it was that the divorce rate doubled in a ten-year period. And he actually discovered that as the contraceptive pill became more and more available, that line was parallel to the divorce line. In about 1975-1976 when every woman who wanted access to the Pill had it, that’s when the divorce rate leveled off.
He says he can attribute 45% of this increase to increased use of contraceptives. His first observation is that the statistical data show that those who use contraceptives have fewer children and have them later in marriage. And his statistical data show that those who have the first baby in the first two years of marriage and another baby in the next couple years of marriage have a much longer lasting marriage than those who don’t.” (http://www.janetsmith.excerptsofinri.com/)
Another blog explains the link between contraception and divorce, saying that couples who use contraception have a 50% divorce rate, while couples who don’t use contraception only have a 2% rate. (http://nosoulleftbehind.wordpress.com/2007/12/28/the-link-between-contraception-and-divorce/)
In a study made by a group called Physicians for Life, it seems that the Church was correct all along by advocating Natural Family Planning instead of contraceptives. In their study called “Divorce Rate Comparisons Between Couples Using Natural Family Planning & Artificial Birth Control,” the summary of findings told us this.
The results presented from the three surveys analyzed revealed that compared to other women in general and to Catholic women of similar age, NFP users:
- have a dramatically low (0.2%) divorce rate;
- experience happier marriages;
- are happier and more satisfied in their everyday lives;
- have considerably more marital relations;
- share a deeper intimacy with spouse than those who contracept;
- realize a deeper level of communication with spouse;
- have relatively large families with many children;
- are appreciably more religious and attend church more often;
- incorporate prayer more in their daily lives;
- rely strongly on the teachings of the Church, the Bible and Almighty God;
- are personally happier;
- have strong traditional, social, and moral views;
- preserve the family unit more responsibly than the other groups;.
- are unlikely to have ever had an abortion;
- are unlikely to have ever cohabitated;
- are unlikely to work full time;
- are unlikely to be supportive of and to engage in sex outside of marriage; (http://www.physiciansforlife.org/content/view/193/36/)
Abortion
Abortion has been the center of many-an RH discussion from way back. Those who support the bill say that common sense dictates that if the bill does not mention abortion that it will not be part of the bill. Pro-lifers, however, are quick to see beyond the surface and conclude that even if the bill does not support abortion, abortion is really part of the plan.
Logically, it can be explained very easily. To use contraception means to not want any life resulting from the sexual act. However, there is no known contraception that is 100% effective and they will fail at some time or another. The question then is this: if the couple did not want the child prior to the sexual act, hence the use of contraceptives, what will make them want the child after the sexual act, and the contraceptive failed? What is the next logical step after contraceptive failure which led to pregnancy? Termination, of course. And we have not even talked about the abortions caused by abortifacient pills and IUDs.
What do scientists have to say about the connection between contraception and abortion? In a study made by the Population Research Institute:
STUDY DESIGN: Since 1997, representative samples of Spanish women of childbearing potential (15-49 years) have been surveyed by the Daphne Team every 2 years to gather data of contraceptive methods used.
During the study period, 1997 to 2007, the overall use of contraceptive methods increased from 49.1% to 79.9%. The most commonly used method was the condom (an increase from 21% to 38.8%), followed by the pill (an increase from 14.2% to 20.3%). Female sterilization and IUDs decreased slightly and were used by less than 5% of women in 2007. The elective abortion rate increased from 5.52 to 11.49 per 1000 women.
CONCLUSIONS: The factors responsible for the increased rate of elective abortion need further investigation. These results directly contradict the claims made by the Anti-Life establishment, who allege that promoting contraception will reduce unwanted pregnancies, and hence the number of abortions performed.(http://www.pop.org/content/study-links-contraception-and-abortion-rates-spain)
It is interesting to note that even the leaders of the abortion industry themselves have openly admitted the empirical link between contraception and abortion. Malcolm Potts, the first medical director of International Planned Parenthood: “As people turn to contraception, there will be a rise, not a fall, in the abortion rate.” ( Malcolm Potts. “Fertility Rights.” The Guardian, April 25, 1979. )
Judith Bury, coordinator of Doctors for a Woman’s Choice on Abortion: “There is overwhelming evidence that … the provision of contraception leads to an increase in the abortion rate.” (Judith Bury, M.D., Brook Advisory Centre. “Sex Education for Bureaucrats.” The Scotsman, June 29, 1981. Also quoted in Rudolf Ehmann, M.D., “Consequences of Contraception and Abortifacient Birth Control,” Human Life International pamphlet.)
By itself, the contraceptive pill also acts as an abortifacient, a fact denied by many pro-choice contraceptive supporters. Dr. Walter Larimore, who for decades prescribed the pill, tried to disprove the claim that the pill is abortifacient, only to find 94 scientific studies proving that “post-fertilization effects are operative to prevent clinically recognized pregnancy.” He published his findings in the scientific journal of the American Medical Association, and from then on stopped prescribing the pill.
An objective view of the facts stated above proves, without a doubt, that government promotion of contraceptives can and will lead to abortions.
Total Fertility Control, Homosexual Unions, Euthanasia
When a government promotes the use of contraception, it also promotes population control in the guise of informed choice. The informed choice argument is a weak argument at best. Nobody is restricting information nor the freedom to choose between various family planning methods, least of all the Catholic Church. Though She preaches that Catholics should not use contraceptives, it is doubtful that one would find priests or bishops guarding the local botika in order to prevent anyone from buying pills or condoms. Pope Paul VI correctly prophesied that contraception will lead to governments using it for population control.
Our government’s promotion of contraception is an admission that our leaders do not have the political will to eradicate poverty at its core and address the real issues that exacerbate it: inequitable distribution of resources, oligarchy, lack of education which results in lack of jobs, errors in economic policies, tax evasion, and graft and corruption. Population control is this government’s way to rid itself of poverty by limiting the number of children poor people sire. This mistake goes both ways; lessening the population does little to curb poverty, and a country whose population has been ravaged by government-mandated population control only stands to lose its biggest asset ever: the Human Capital.
The inevitability of the legitimacy and legalization of homosexual unions will be a certainty after contraceptives have become commonplace in society. Contraception takes away the procreative aspect of the sexual act. On a big scale like a whole country practicing contraception, this is a wholesale rejection of life and the life-giving power of sex. If children are no longer deemed necessary nor beneficial in marriage, then what is to stop two men, or two women, from asking that their relationships be recognized by the state? At this stage, there is no stopping the ideology of embracing contraception not merely as a family planning tool, i.e. to delay childbearing, but as total birth control, siring just two, or one, or no children at all, sometimes in the name of environmentalism. Children are thought to be optional – even expendable – in a relationship. After all, there are lots of pets out there which a couple can consider as ‘family’.
Finally, our society would be adopting a hugely anti-life mentality, very much unlike what we used to have in the past where children are thought to be blessings and we still cling to the love of our grandparents. There will come a time when a society’s population pyramid would be inverted, from a vibrant and healthy base of young people to a large, ineffective, and dying breed of geriatrics, with so few of the working younger generation to cope with the larger, grey population. Contraception would have destroyed the idea of respect for life in all its stages at this point. If they can take away the life of the weak and defenseless unborn, they can and WILL take away the life of the weak and defenseless old man.
Why We Fight
This is why we fight the culture of death and remain faithful to the teachings of the Church. In a society that is turning away from God, we are called to be fishers of men in this year of the faith. We preach the Gospel of life because we are all that separates us between a culture of life from a society that embraces death. The future belongs to the hands of those who choose and embrace life.
“Catholic hospitals and schools will have to tow the line.” you mean, “TOE the line”… parang tutulay sa alambre, in other words.
I was heartbroken by the passage of the RH Bill by congress. I hope and pray that the downward spiral of our society into the culture of death be stopped somehow. I continue to pray to Jesus and the Virgin Mary to watch over our country. Sometimes, I feel that your messages are like a teaspoon trying to scoop in order to contain the flood of anti-life messages. Please continue spreading your messages, pro-life philippines. I hope it reaches as many people as possible because I know you will win.
Sadly, the people who are given the power to decide about our future are not given the gift of Holy discernment.
On the bright side, prayer is still the most powerful tool that we can use against all evil….