Bulleye.

...and by that, I mean “bulls-eye.” Eh.

More good sci-fi has been written about wildly wondering virtues than about vices.  In fact, it makes the best sci-fi when our own utopian values are challenged as they get turned on their heads: a perfect society in complete peace and harmony…because of chips in the brain controlling and synchronizing all behavior; a race of people valiantly defending themselves with courage against an aggressive enemy…who is aggressive because the others committed genocide against them; or a nation where every child is healthy…because the unhealthy are aborted or left for dead at birth.

I wonder what would happen if more writers and producers picked up on this and these sorts of questions became the themes of more books and movies.  Do you suppose, faced with these other collapsing utopias, we could recognize the same problems inherent in our own country?

I don’t know.

Beautifully written. This is so true and can be applied to most of the evils of our world. I had considered most of the world’s evils to be simply perversions of good, but this perspective as to the cause of the world’s evils takes it a step further; practically forcing you to look at all human beings as being fundamentally good, while clearly revealing where we have gone wrong and pointing us in the direction of the full realization of all of the virtues and true goodness given to us by God: the Church.
Thank you and God bless! (Happy Easter)

Very well said, and this is precisely the conclusion I drew when watching this video of a family desperate for a baby http://moms.today.com/_news/2011/04/07/6419303-inconceivable-mom-what-my-twins-surrogate-taught-me

They have an overflow of self-giving love, stemmed in holy virtue, but are willing to break all sorts of natural laws in order to have this longed for fourth child.  The consequences along the journey, as the video tells, are straight from science-fiction, and the beaming couple are portrayed as saints for enduring all the self-inflicted pain. (She is implanted with the wrong embryo which upon birth she gives to the biological parents.)  The hardest moment to watch for me is the mother’s reaction to the news that their surrogate has lost their baby.  She looks up to God with her arms outstretched and says something to this effect, “Haven’t we done enough?”  As if God owes them something for not aborting the non-biological child she had implanted in her womb.  As you so aptly put it, a case of “virtues gone wild.”

I think a lot of the terrible evil in the world arises from the desire that man has to create an earthly paradise for all people.  While a noble goal to be sure, earthly paradise or utopia will never be possible in a world filled with imperfect beings.  A personal belief that he/she has the perfect plan to that end coupled with power, can wind up doing great damage to many.  We should depend upon God, not upon the institutions of man.

How much of suffering in the world has been caused by a quest for government-enforced equality of living standards, overriding a need for justice, or even murder of those who have more material possessions?
How many revolutions have turned over governments and murdered those opposing these revolutions in the name of a virtue gone wild?
Absence of God, or quest for a single virtue, ignoring all the other virtues, seems very present in our world.
TeaPot562

Wonderful reflection, Jennifer.  Good intentions wrap many a gruesome action.  It is the ageless desire to be God and act as if we know the answers/ solution to everything.  Ultimately realizing it was just a shortcut to a dead-end.

“A desire for understanding without humility leads to the narrow-minded scientism of many of the new atheists.”

I noticed you did not have a link to an example of this. Does “humility” mean to accept answers to questions without evidence to support those answers? Does it mean to accept the “authority” of a single book and not weigh arguments? Does it mean to accept diseases without searching for cure because God wants us to suffer? Does it mean people should be forgiven for evil acts because that don’t know what they do? To pray for lower gas prices and good health instead of demanding government action?

“Scientism”, as you call it, has the real effect of changing our lives for the better. Science may produce questions that cannot be answered at the time, but religion gives answers that cannot be questioned at any time. Which is more narrow minded?

Adrienne, humility means taking yourself less seriously. Ahem.

Your opinion seems to show that you do not understand our faith. Our fearless blogger, a recovering atheist believer in scientism, has experience as her example.

As for religion, you say it gives answers that cannot be questioned, but if the Church’s answers can’t be questioned, then how can the questions be answered. Christianity welcomes questions, even critical thought, and always has.

You have a point. I do not understand your faith in a creed that not only justifies sexism, racism, and oppression but also convinces its victims to accept their lot passively so they will be “rewarded” in the next life. As for not taking yourself seriously, take another look and see what that means. Ideas and actions may be sanctioned by the church or the bible, but they cause a lot of collateral damage in human suffering. It seems to me that your faith allows you to believe that pro-choice advocates don’t consider the value of an unborn child, that new atheists are arrogant and that people who don’t have hope or faith are somehow at fault because they don’t have the right combination of virtues. The truth is that people want to survive in the best way they can. It doesn’t bother me that your faith allows you to do that, but you have no right to judge the virtues of people to don’t do as you think they should.

Adrienne:  You’ve made quite a claim here.  What evidence do you have that Christianity justifies racism, sexism and oppression? You, yourself have stated that you don’t know much about the faith, so on what basis do you make those accusations against it? other than prejudice?

It seems to me that your faith allows you to believe that pro-choice advocates don’t consider the value of an unborn child,
Another prejudice here.  The assumption behind this statement is that being opposed to abortion is a religious position, based on sentiment and some interpretation of an obscure religious text…akin,...possibly to the Jehova Witnesses’ opposition to blood and organ transfusions. A superstitious position only held by poor, intellectually benighted Christians.  Never mind that pro-life advocates, even religious ones, rely more on ethics and science to argue for the human rights of the unborn child, not religious revelation. In reality, pro-choicers’ advocacy for the ability of a woman to take the life of her child for any reason whatsoever indicates that the life of the child is seen as having lesser value than that of the mother.  That is basic ethics.  If I have the right to kill someone, then my life has greater value.         
that new atheists are arrogant
My faith doesn’t teach me this.  New Atheists do.  They are the ones who make blanket generalizations (such as “Racist, sexist and oppressive”) about a subject they admit to not understanding very well.  That to me is arrogance. Religions are the inspiration and framework of human beings highest thoughts, from “loving your enemies” to the very notion of the infinite.  New Atheists, however, reduce this to “sky daddy fairy tales”.  That is arrogance. 
and that people who don’t have hope or faith are somehow at fault because they don’t have the right combination of virtues.
No Christian believes this. Again this is another prejudice.  Christians believe that the only difference in terms of virtue between the faithful and people of no faith is that we are sick people in the hospital, while they are sick people in the street. All people possess the potential for goodness and depravity in equal measure.  Atheists can be good, and often are, Christians can be terrible and often are.  God is the only one who is all good. The closer we grow to Him in faith the more helps us to overcome our depravities and embrace virtue.

Consider that both major Twentieth Century atheistic empires in Europe (Nazi Germany and Soviet Russia) were officially atheistic, and claimed to be scientifically based.  Germany’s concept of a “Master Race” was based on the “science of Eugenics”, advocated by a principal founder of Planned Parenthood. (Margaret Sanger). 
Nations that have outlawed slavery and actually try to enforce this are largely those that had converted to Christianity before late stages of the “enlightenment” started ignoring any belief in a God beyond the Deist approach. (Creator to set stuff spinning, but no further interest in what the created beings do).  Slavery still exists in countries on every continent, despite the best efforts of Europeans to outlaw it.
Consider that Christian sects, including the Protestant ones, found many universities and hospitals to tend educational and health needs.  Where have you discovered non-theistic groups donating funds to establish either type of institution?
Ayn Rand’s work expresses a logical (not the only one, but logical) extension of belief in atheism.  She considers selfishness a high virtue.
Adrienne may have picked up some attitudes from Karl Marx’s comment on Christianity, summarized as “Pie in the sky when you die.”  The culture established by the followers of Marx has not led to particularly better living standards than cultures influenced by Christian values.
TeaPot562

Interesting that Christianity is sexist, racist, and oppressive. I’m white, of middle-class birth, always relatively free financially. I am a Catholic. My wife, who is Cajun and Native American and grew up in poverty, is also a Catholic. Sexist, racist? I chose to marry a woman of a different race (and a different sex, of course), and the Church blessed it! Oppressive? How so? On the contrary, the Church has freed me from the chains of sin with which I’ve burdened my self again and again. Some would say that the Church invented sin, but I know how much pain my sins have caused others, I know (and knew) that they are (were) wrong. The Church has freed others, male and female, of every race. The Church gave women rights in more than a few sexist empires. The Church taught that slaves should be treated as brothers. The Church excommunicated those involved in the slave trade. The Church established hospitals and schools for native peoples, and ordered, against secular powers, that natives should be treated with dignity. I don’t see any factual basis for your claims. All I see, as Barbara said, is prejucides. Think really hard? Who told you the Church is sexist and racist and oppressive? Did this person understand the Church? Have you ever honestly sought an explanation for your concerns? Have you given the Church a chance to explain herself?

Barbara: The science and ethics on which you base “pro-life” position existed long before the emergence of Christianity. It is your moral choice that a woman’s life is less valuable than that of her child, no matter if that child was forced upon her by rape or incest, or that bearing the child may kill her. Catholic (as this is a Catholic site, I will limit my comments to Catholicism) doctrine and papal decrees that a woman must agree that her life is less important or face an eternity in hell—and/or excommunication. She is even condemned for using contraceptive means to plan to have a child under the best circumstances for both of them rather than bear a child and watch it starve, be abused by it’s father (if he is there). You have a right to that choice, but there are Catholic clinics that lie about the consequences of abortion to the woman’s health and show hacked up fetuses of late-term abortions as the equivalent currently legal abortions of the first trimester. Science and ethics are abandoned when a woman makes a choice for her own well-being over that of her embryo.
I take your allegory to mean that the church is a hospital that helps sick people to get well, and that atheists have no means of receiving such help. What makes your religion more helpful than any other? Why do I have to accept beliefs I consider immoral in this age because of a fictional event in the past? I have more to say to you and I have replies to TeaPot562, but I have an appointment and must get back to your later.

Jen- probably you feel like part of your ministry is explaining the faith to atheists/agnostics…but it seems like atheists are following you around- prayers for strength!

Jesus offers forgiveness and peace to poor sinners.  Murder, theft, rape, abortion, lies, neglect, selfishness….....nothing is beyond his mercy. Good news for us all.

Every hair on our heads is counted.

I have something incredible, it makes me happy, makes me a better person (better friend, coach, employee, father).  I “judge” less than I used to.  I’m not forcing anyone to agree with me.  Thanks Jen, I’m a big fan. 
Over and out.  ;)

@ Micah, you say the Church don’t you mean Jesus?

@Adrienne (reading your last post) I’m not Catholic, but where in Catholic doctrine does it say her life is less important.  As far as I know it says that ALL life is just as important. Pro-life means to put the SAME value on ALL life.  Catholics practice birth control they just use Natural Family Planning, which I just found out is 97% (some studies say 99%) effective.  Science is often wrong and as believers we leave our lives in the hands of God.  This is a Catholic blog, so the opinions stated here will most likely be from a Catholic perspective.

Great post, Jennifer!  I will be sharing on my facebook page.

@capitalcee, which use of “Church” are you referring to?
@Adrienne, no pro-lifer believes that the life of a baby is more valuable than the life of a mother.  I don’t see how your argument is logical.  If a woman conceives a child and wants to abort that child, how is it valuing the life of child over mother if I am against the abortion?  Both may live.  The situation doesn’t pit one life against another.  It seems to me that you’re just spouting tired, old, disproven (and prejudiced) pro-choice slogans.  Now, if the child’s life puts the mother’s life in danger, admittedly we have a more complicated moral situation, but the fact remains that we may not murder one innocent person to save another.
Don’t begin to make claims about the pro-choice position’s being supported by science.  Things like, “it’s a potential human” (then what is it now, a carrot?  It has human DNA and is an entirely different organism.  Face it, it’s a human.)  Perhaps “it’s a blob of tissue” (yes, I suppose, in the same way that I am a blob of tissue).  What kind of scientific argument is it that uses dubious, imprecise terms to describe something like the start of human life?  On the contrary, pro-lifers allow people to see reality and stare it in the face: ultrasounds, fetal heartbeats, and a consistent teaching on the dignity of every human life.
Compassion for the mother is a virtue, but another virtue gone wild when disconnected from compassion for all life.

The science and ethics on which you base “pro-life” position existed long before the emergence of Christianity
Which ethics were those? The ones that made it allowable during the Roman Empire to leave unwanted newborns on hillsides to die of exposure? One of the things the early Christians sought to change in the culture was to make such acts illegal and unconscionable. 

The problem with your statement on abortion is that it immediately assumes that preventing a woman from killing her unborn child implies that her life has no value.  This is a giant leap in logic which pro-choice advocates frequently make.  If the child’s life has value, then the woman has no right to take that life, unless in the very rare case, that her own life is in danger.  This position holds that both lives have equal value.  The pro-choice position would see the child killed based on the mother’s desire alone.  This position is untenable.  As soon as you take it its logical conclusions it becomes horrifying.  Why, for example, does the right of a woman to end the life of her child not include the right of the mother to smother her newborn in the cradle or drown him in the bathtub? Why does that not include the right of Susan Smith or Andrea Yates to kill their three, four, five or six year olds?  These women decided they didn’t want to be mothers anymore.  Why is their choice criminal, whereas the choice of a woman to kill her child at 35 weeks gestation considered legitimate?

Pro-choicers are interesting to me.  They have complete selective vision.  They get offended by the smallest acts of pro-lifers, whether its showing a photo of an aborted baby or pushing for obligatory ultrasounds and yet completely ignore the fact that they are advocating the right of one person to kill another and can’t see why anyone would have a problem with that (it must mean they hate women and sex, because no one in their right mind would be against the medical dismemberment of vulnerable babies…they would have to be insane)  I know one who got mad because crisis pregnancy centers tried to convince poor women to put their babies up for adoption by wealthier families, and yet killing them is somehow better? Showing a picture of a dismembered baby is worse than killing him? It’s better for a woman to sign the execution order of her child without seeing him first because she may feel compelled not to kill him?

Barbara, now you are the one making blanket statements. You cherry-pick your morals from the bible and ignore the ones you don’t agree with. That is why many Catholics practice contraception in spite of the pope. Just because you can’t comprehend that there are circumstances where a woman who finds herself pregnant does not want to put her life on hold for other than “selfish” reasons like want wanting a career or not wanting the responsibility, or she hates the father, or the baby may have medical problems that will make it more expensive to take care of than anticipated, or any other of reasons doesn’t mean real, caring people don’t face such decisions. And adoption is not always the right answer—people are very choosy about adopting babies of the right color, sex, disposition, etc. People are against gay or lesbian couples adopting children. People who have the love and means to take care of disabled or disturbed children are rare. The screening for adoptive parents is very stringent, while any unfit mother is allowed to have as many children as she can. In an ideal world, all children would be wanted, nourished and raised to be responsible adults. In this world, it is very expensive and many people cannot pay the emotional and financial price. Pro-lifers have distorted vision to. There is a sense among anti-choice arguments that women want to have abortions—a senator in Indiana opposed the exception of rape or incest in the discussion of making abortions illegal because he believed women would pretend to have been raped in order to take advantage of that loophole. Another woman was arrested because she fell when she was a few weeks pregnant and confided to a nurse that she was uncertain about wanting the baby. These pro-lifers are generally against big government regulating the economy but have no problem promoting laws that invade medical or sexual privacy.  Like it or not, motherhood is a burden, and not always a blessing. Maybe you think that faith (your “hospital”) would make it less of a burden and more of a blessing, but your crisis pregnancy centers give false information and force decisions based on shame and fear over reason. You could prevent “crisis pregnancies” and abortions by educating young people about contraception and responsible sexual behaviors—services provided by Planned Parenthood. Instead, there pro-lifers like John Kyl giving statements “not meant to be factual” so lawmakers will stop funding organizations like Planned Parenthood.

Just because you can’t comprehend that there are circumstances where a woman who finds herself pregnant does not want to put her life on hold for other than “selfish” reasons like want wanting a career or not wanting the responsibility, or she hates the father, or the baby may have medical problems that will make it more expensive to take care of than anticipated, or any other of reasons doesn’t mean real, caring people don’t face such decisions

I can comprehend this.  I’ve faced it myself. What I can’t comprehend is why any of these circumstances make killing the child acceptable? (especially the “not wanting to put my life on hold” reason) Babies are hard to take care of, so killing them is better? Adoption is difficult so killing them is better? Why is killing the baby objectively better then finding or providing a loving home for it?  I haven’t said that pro-choicers aren’t caring or don’t struggle with the decision.  I don’t see it as an issue of mere selfishness. (Abortion is almost never a rational decision, but a fear-based one).  But none of this changes the fact that Abortion is still the act of killing a child! This, and this alone, is why I oppose it.  This, and this alone, is the only reason why it should be opposed.  The term “anti choice” is a fallacy.  Mine and most pro-lifers opposition to abortion is not because women are making autonomous decisions about their lives, it’s because they are having their children dismembered, acid burned or delivered and then their brains sucked out. The motives of the mother do not change the nature of the act.  It is the act that is wrong, terribly, terribly wrong. 
 
The fact that some Catholics use birth control is moot.  So what? some vegetarians slip up now and then and eat a hamburger.  Some pacifists lose their temper and take a swing at hockey refs.  Part of being human involves living in a state of struggle between our higher selves and our lower selves, our appetites and our ideals.  It’s not about cherry picking, it’s about trying and failing and getting up and trying again. Anyway your comment to me is based on an ad-hominem (ad-mulieram?) fallacy.  The state of my “morals” is not at issue, nor do you have any idea how I live out my faith in the real world.  You’re making a prejudicial assumption about me based on the fact that I am a Christian and a Catholic, nothing more. I never once mentioned the bible, for example, yet you assume I rely on it alone to “tell me” what’s right and wrong.  It may surprise you that I come to understand right and wrong based on a variety of sources: natural law, instinct, experience, certain philosophers and the greater body of Catholic teaching.
The one issue in which all ethical frameworks intersect is the idea that doing physical harm to another person’s body is a moral violation.  Law establishes this, so too does ethics. Abortion falls under that category of violation.  I don’t need religious revelation to tell me this, although it does.

TeaPot562, thank you for your comment. It got me to look up more information on Margaret Sanger and the origin of Planned Parenthood. I’ve looked at many of the Christian (not a surprise) blogs that feature Sanger as the advocate of Malthusian Eugenics, and that her founding of an organization that promoted birth control for the purpose of reducing the number of diseased, poverty-stricken, overpopulated dependents who were a burden to society. This organization became Planned Parenthood, which today provides women with health care that they otherwise would not be able to afford or obtain. Three percent of its budget provides safe and legal (for now) abortions. It happens that the Nazis came to power in the same period and used Malthusian Eugenics (and Catholicism—Hitler used religion to promote hatred of the Jews and considered eugenics and extermination as the solution). The result was one of the worst genocides in history (but not the last). Sanger is guilty by association. It doesn’t matter that she educated people and helped them make informed decisions about their lives, or that many Christian families benefited from practicing birth control and family planning. She won the respect of W.E.B. Dubois, Martin Luther King, and other prominent Black Americans. She didn’t force anyone to have abortions or be sterilized, although she did suggest the people who were more likely to produce offspring into a life of suffering be offered financial incentive to be sterilized, which I’m sure is abhorrent to many people. Well, good Catholics have been demonized in their time as well, so I will leave the judgement to history. It is the cost of trying to change the status quo. As for Atheist charities, I refer you to the following link: http://beingism.org/community/?q=node/76. If you Google “Atheist Charities” you will find many more articles. Some are considered atheist because they don’t proselytize while providing services, but on the whole they work for these causes based on their own principles, not the laws dictated by a supernatural deity.

Barbara, you and I have different moral view points and I suppose that upsets you. You think abortion should not be an option, I think all options need to be considered. There are women who regret their decision to abort, who regret their decision to give their child away, and who regret that they had children at all. There are women who kill their babies because of postpartum depression and there are women who get pregnant because they got drunk. It is not the child’s fault that it was conceived, even if the mother didn’t want to conceive it. More over, no one can tell whether the child will suffer, or be happy, or kill children when s/he grows up. Maybe s/he will be homosexual, or get into drugs, or become an atheist. I stand by my belief that people try to live the best way they can, given the circumstances. I have no problem that you equate even a first trimester abortion as murder under any conditions. If you don’t like abortions, don’t have one. The pro-life movement, however, is initiating policies and laws that will interfere with my medical and financial well-being and those of women everywhere in this country and in the future by lying about contraception, forcing young people to be secretive and uninformed, and taking the role of thought-police in your obsession with women “murdering” their children. More extreme pro-lifers murder in the name of this cause and are applauded. There is an ethical scenario about a lifeboat that can hold only so many people. when it is full, people begin fighting and even killing others desperate to survive as they attempt to board the lifeboat, but if more people get in the boat, it will capsize and everyone will be lost. This is the kind of world we live in, and the death of Christ does not make it any different.

P.S., If the rapture really does happen next month, I will be eating crow!

Micha, congratulations on living in an era where inter-racial marriage is tolerated.  Being married to a woman who agrees and participates in your faith is a great joy. Why is it necessary to tell me her heritage? Would the Catholic church approve if she was a different sex?  I would venture to say that your marital happiness and cooperation is partly due to disregarding some of the pope’s decrees that you don’t find practical or agreeable. We send our sons and daughters to fight our wars, in order to preserve our nation. Perhaps morals change when it’s not a choice of one mother’s child, but a small portion of our population versus our need for oil. Or perhaps you argue that our army is voluntary? Do people have the right to die when they choose? Was it murder when Terry Shiavo’s plug was pulled? What evidence do I need to support my claim that the church is sexist? Read St. Paul, Ask why there are no female priests (or female titles for the same role)? Why are priests forbidden to marry? Why are women supposed to keep silent, why is “obey” the traditional wedding vow? But, as I keep saying, people are trying to live the best way the can. OK, I don’t have the right to judge your choice of what religion (if any) you choose, if it is an informed choice and it gets you through the night. Most Catholics don’t follow church doctrines to the letter, but like everyone else they pick the bible passages that support their morals and ignore the rest. After all, Jesus forgives everything. I am irritated when they use their religion an aegis that makes their beliefs unchallengeable and infallible. Is a criminal who thinks he won’t get caught any better than a criminal who thinks that he will always be forgiven? Both are truly sorry for getting caught, and maybe sorry for what they did, but do either have the right to be pardoned, even if they repent? Criminal law would deal with them equally. A god or pope is not necessary.

Barbara, you and I have different moral view points and I suppose that upsets you. You think abortion should not be an option, I think all options need to be considered.

I’m not upset because we have different views, I’m upset (not really that upset, more like annoyed) because of the patronizing stance you take towards religious people in general and the pro-life position in particular.  You imagine us as somewhat ignorant, intellectually benighted people who don’t “get the real world”.  The pro-life position is a legitimate ethical stance based on deep questions about who is a person, what personhood implies, who has rights and what are their limits.  To you, however, it is a mere religious superstition akin to the JW’s opposition to blood transfusions.  Your putting “murder” in scare quotes demonstrates this.  Yet the question of whether abortion is murder is the center of the issue.  If abortion is the killing of a person, then no justification of abortion is adequate.  Saying “don’t like it, don’t have one” would be the equivalent to saying “don’t like spousal murder? don’t murder your spouse” “don’t like slavery? don’t buy a slave”. Rights are being denied an entire group of people.  Legal abortion is thus a considerable human rights violation. If the unborn child is not a person, then it really is like JW’s opposition to organ donation, a question of individual belief and preference. 

The rest of your post kind of meanders through a series of scenarios, in which suffering is part of life.  It’s true, but isn’t it also part of being human to want to reduce suffering? to defend vulnerable members of society from abuse? An unborn child is probably the most vulnerable human being one can encounter. 

Murdering abortion doctors:  The amount of abortion doctors killed in the last thirty years by pro-lifers have less than 10, murders which, by the way, were denounced by pro-life organizations such as Operation Rescue over and over again.  Check your facts, and most of all, try thinking for yourself instead of spouting off lefty talking points from liberal arts and women’s studies courses.  Why not ask Catholics what they believe and why instead of making assumptions?  Ask Catholic women how their Church treats them and how they feel about it? You would be surprised.  I myself am a convert to the faith, a one-time neopagan and socialist now orthodox Catholic who believes in and practices everything the Church teaches, including the prohibition of Birth Control.  I have experienced remarkable freedom in the Church, not oppression.

TeaPot572, I thought this article might interest you: http://scienceblogs.com/dispatches/2011/04/dont_just_ban_abortion_sterili.php

Barbara, Catholics not only take contraceptives, they occasionally abort unwanted pregnancies too: http://answers.yahoo.com/question/index?qid=20070805145202AAobfQU But so what? Vegetarians occasionally eat a hamburger. Also here is some statistical data: http://answers.yahoo.com/question/index?qid=20070805145202AAobfQU (Yes, there is a National Abortion Federation, but this blog offers unbiased information that is documented by the CDC and other government agencies. It does not preach, it informs). Again, it’s OK by me if you think abortions are murder, but stop spreading misinformation and frightening women who need help. What do you think about parents who have an additional child for the purpose of being an organ or tissue donor for their older sibling? Are you against stem-cell research? Did you stop to consider that freedom you experience is because you live in a democracy established by Deists and agnostics? Don’t you see that these freedoms are being threatened by the lies told about Planned Parenthood and other women’s health care? Check your facts, and most of all, try thinking for yourself instead of spouting off right-wing talking points from conservative, history revisionist theologians. Ask atheist women if they feel free and empowered without religion.

Adrienne, just out of curiosity, have you ever actually been in one of those dark, evil, cloak-and-dagger places known as crisis pregnancy centers?  Do you know what goes on there?  A woman enters a brightly-lit room staffed by chatty, maternal woman.  If a woman is in trouble, they offer clothes for her and the baby, food, formula, free health care, a place to sleep, baby paraphenalia, and a free ultrasound, as well as counseling.  They have videos of ultrasounds as well, and models similiar to those used in medical schools.  A doctor does pro-bono work there and performs the ultrasounds.  The women are told they are being prayed for.  They are not co-erced to stay or accept help if they don’t want it.  Women typically go to crisis pregnancy centers because they’re already scared, not because something in the center scares them. 

Hypothetically, if you called Planned Parenthood and told them the birth control they gave you failed, they would say, “sure, let’s make an appointment to take care of that.  Bring $500 and your insurance card.”  They don’t offer pre-natal help, or food, or a place to go. 

If you called a crisis pregnancy center, they would say, “Come on in, what do you need?”

Which place actually offers women more choices again?

Think of it this way:  You, dutiful atheist that you are, believe that a person becomes a person around birth, I assume.  There’s no way I can change your opinion by appealing to church teaching, or the Bible, or any other superstition.  Fair enough.
I’m a Catholic.  There are religions where one is not supposed to have one’s picture taken, because that would steal part of your soul.  I don’t believe that and no appeal to anything short of hard science would convince me not to have my picture taken because it steals my soul.
Women who feel guilty about their abortions aren’t forced to feel guilty.  They inflict that on themselves when something they believe in (religion, science, what have you) appeals something that’s already embedded in their psyches. 

I’m sure if you had an abortion, other than the physical pain, you wouldn’t feel anything about it, because it is outside your belief system.  If you suddenly saw an ultrasound of your baby before it was aborted and you thought it looked like a baby, well, that wasn’t the fault of the ultrasound.  Your mind made that connection, with the help of modern medical technology.  Though no appeal to a god or gods could have touched your mind, that hard science might.  Or, conversely, it might not.  But isn’t it better to have that technology available to make sure women really are fully informed about the choice they are about to make?  Shouldn’t they see the “clump of cells” which may or may not look like a person to them?  Why are you trying to take away information that might help them exercise their right to choose in a meaningful way?
Also, many women feel they must have an abortion because they are abused or broke or lost ... and you would take away crisis pregnancy centers with their free food and free clothes and free counseling and free shelter. 
And crisis centers must be abolished on the off-chance someone will hear or see something that makes them uncomfortable.
That doesn’t really sound like choice to me.

Mouse, have you ever been in a Planned Parenthood clinic? You honestly believe they consider abortion a back-up plan for failed birth control? Do you think they only provide abortion/contraception services and provide no information on adoption options?  That they help pimps keep their !@#$% working? Maybe not all Catholic/Christian CPCs terrify unwed mothers, but consider the Roman Catholic sponsored and financed White Rose Women’s Center: http://www.talk2action.org/story/2006/1/17/11545/4565. This is a non-profit “charity” that is tax exempt and funded by Texas state taxes, if not by U.S. Federal taxes, regardless of individual taxpayers’ religion or lack thereof. Yet pro-lifers charge Planned Parenthood with lying, promoting prostitution and unborn child murder. You may argue that the church has done a lot of good and not be condemned for a few bad practices, yet you refuse to acknowledge any good Planned Parenthood provides and focus on the abortion abortion services that are 3% of their budget. And Hello!- I’ve been promoting scientific technology all along to help women make informed choices about whether they want to keep their baby. Do you think Planned Parenthood doesn’t provide ultrasounds and other services to ensure the health and well-being of pregnant women and their unborn children? Do you think as an atheist I’m against motherhood? We are pro-choice, not anti-life. We know that many women change their minds when they see a baby in an ultrasound and we welcome that choice.

So, you’re using the royal “we” now?
The clinic in my area is completely sponsored by private donations.  Also, as far as my research has indicated, PP only offers to show women ultrasounds when they are required to by law—a law they fight tooth and nail to keep from being enacted. 
And, yes, abortion to many is a back-up for failed birth control—it’s the only way PP supports women who are already pregnant.  They don’t do prenatal care at all.  Or any of the other services that crisis pregnancy centers offer.  Call any of them and ask. 
If you can refer me to prenatal services offered by PP and doesn’t offer abortions, I would be happy to change my opinion of the individual clinics themselves.

Btw, I never said you were against motherhood.  I never said atheists were against motherhood.

I’m inclined to think PP is against motherhood, but I’d be happy for you to change my mind on that.

I went to the link you offered. 
I saw lots of loaded language and an aggressive anti-crisis-clinic bias, but I couldn’t really understand the gist.  White Rose is a non-profit, that gets money from the government as well as from churches.  It offers counseling and information, which all seemed pretty legit to me.
What was your point? 
Was it that the government money shouldn’t go to helping women with crisis pregnancies? 
Perhaps you could start an atheist women’s center to help women in need of prenatal care.  I would be very happy if your could provide a link to one of those.  In the absense of atheist women’s centers, though, I think the government should fund people who take care of scared pregnant women. And since it seems that only religious folks run those, I’m not sure where else the money should go.  Even PP receives govt funding.  Why should poor women be denied any choice except abortion?
Abortion, btw, *is* nearly always fatal to the unborn baby.  That’s the whole point of the procedure.  The scenario of the “failed abortion” where the baby survives is scary, but it happens… and those failed abortions turn into some of the most powerful pro-life speakers around.
You say that you all “welcome the choice” to keep the baby, but how many of you put your money where your mouth is and financially support that particular choice. 
Please link to any non-religious crisis centers that actually help pregnant women keep their babies.

Mouse—Did you read the whole site or just the top part? If you scroll down, you will see the mis-information (lies)they spread. I copied this passage of a sample from the site:
“The risk of breast cancer among the general population of women is now 12 percent.  Among women who have no children it is more like 20 percent.  And among women who have no children and also have one or more abortions it’s probably closer to 50/50.”

“There are a few studies which show that women who have breast cancer and who have a history of abortion not only have a greater incidence of breast cancer, but the cancer grows more rapidly, has more signs of cancers that are harder to treat, is more invasive and is more aggressive.”

This myth was debunked by the American Cancer Society: http://www.cancer.org/Cancer/BreastCancer/MoreInformation/is-abortion-linked-to-breast-cancer

More copy:
From a brochure targeting women of color: “Some upper middle class white females are not reproducing and they are trying to keep other groups from reproducing so they can remain in the majority.”

“If you have an abortion:
    (1) You will be more likely to bleed in the first three months of future pregnancies.
    (2) You will be less likely to have a normal delivery in future pregnancies.
    (3) You will need more manual removal of placenta more often and there will be more complications with expelling the baby and its placenta.
    (4} Your next baby will be twice as likely to die in the first few months of life.
    (5) Your next baby will be three to four times as likely to die in the last months of his first year of life.”

“Mild fever and sometimes death occurs when there is an infection from an abortion.  This happens in anywhere from 1-in-4 women and 1-in-50 women.”

None of these statements have any merit. If you did some fact checking you would find peer-reviewed documentation of the real statistics. But what can you expect from an organization that expects you to believe in virgin births, rising of the dead, cannibal rituals and the celebration of a divine father who sires a son so he can be tortured and cruelly sacrificed to save us sinful humans?

BTY, what is it about the terms “general health care” and “women’s health care” don’t you understand? Like most clinics, Planned Parenthood directs patients who need more care to facilities where they can get that care. These facilities may even be Catholic charities. And about babies who survive failed abortions—you may note that they are not killed by anyone who participated. It’s surprising considering that abortion procedures involve hacking the fetus to pieces and sucking their brains out.

No, I would not take away the free food, shelter, etc that CPCs offer to poor women. But I don’t want to pay for the lies and deception or the proselytism that are part of the package. I would demand that they tell the unbiased truth, i.e, not bare false witness, about scientific facts and give the full picture of the choices she has available. Pregnancy is not just a philosophical issue, it is a physical condition that requires medical decisions that should be between a doctor and patient. Why should poor women be denied any choice but to carry a child in spite of what it means to her health and well-being? Why are you trying to take away information that might help them exercise their right to choose in a meaningful way?
And you should talk about putting money where your mouth is. Check out this story about CPCs in Seattle, WA: http://www.atheistnexus.org/group/atheistnews/forum/topics/holy-crap-religious-right. Many CPCs demand the right to federal funding because they are “faith based”. How many people are worried that Obama is not a Christian? As far as I know, Planned Parenthood has not declared any religious motives. I’m sure you hold that against them as well.

Here are some statistics: 
http://www.prochoice.org/about_abortion/facts/women_who.html (Yes, there is a National Abortion Federation, but this blog offers unbiased information that is documented by the CDC and other government agencies. It does not preach, it informs). BTY, I found I accidentally duplicated a link in my reply to Barbara and I shall send a correction immediately.

And why are you offended by the “royal we’? You are making generalizations about all liberals, atheists, Planned Parenthood,and Catholic doctrines you want everyone to embrace. I am replying in kind. If this were an argument about how only you and I feel about the matter then I’d be content to let it go.

Barbara, I apologize for my error. I accidentally duplicated a link instead of pasting the link I intended. Here is the link about reported faiths of women who have had abortion procedures.

http://www.prochoice.org/about_abortion/facts/women_who.html

Adrienne.  I am sorry I haven’t replied to you in a couple of days, I’ve had exams to mark and a crawling 10 month old into everything.  I checked out the link you provided, and honestly I’m not sure what point you were attempting to make with it.  Is it that some Catholics use abortion and contraception? Well, there are two issues in that argument: the first is that the use of abortion and contraception by Catholics doesn’t necessarily make those things any less morally wrong or detrimental to society.  In the 19th Century, almost all slave-owners were baptized Christians, in fact many of them “cherry picked” biblical passages in order to defend it.  This fact didn’t make slavery any less a human rights violation.  The second issue is that many people self-identify as Catholics because they were raised in the faith and see it more along the lines of a family tradition than an avowed faith.  There is an excellent article about this that can be found here: http://www.mark-shea.com/cac.html

You’re conflating me with another poster in some of your comments.  I don’t “spread misinformation”, my only reason for opposing abortion is because it takes the life of a vulnerable, innocent person, which is a fact, not a distortion or lie.  That’s what abortion is designed to do. 
What do you think about parents who have an additional child for the purpose of being an organ or tissue donor for their older sibling?
This question is irrelevant to the discussion.  What does this have to do with abortion being a human rights violation?
Are you against stem-cell research?
I’m against embryonic stem-cell research, not adult stem-cell research.  There is an ethical difference.
Did you stop to consider that freedom you experience is because you live in a democracy established by Deists and agnostics?
I live in a Constitutional Monarchy which was once a former British Colony.  Did you ever stop to think that the very notion of Universal Human Rights was based on Christian principles? Pagans didn’t believe in the equality of all human beings, even the Greeks, founders of democracy, only allowed men of a certain class to vote. 
try thinking for yourself instead of spouting off right-wing talking points from conservative, history revisionist theologians. Ask atheist women if they feel free and empowered without religion.
See, you can’t apply my own words to me for the following reasons: 1. I am more than familiar with the opposite side of the argument, having once been pro-choice and feminist, whereas you consider us to be backward and evil and would never concede that we may have a point. 2. I didn’t spout off any right-wing talking points, but rather limited my argument to the humanity of the unborn child and the ethics or lack thereof of taking its life. and 3.  I have no doubt that atheist women can and do feel empowered without religion.  I felt empowered as a secularist and generally enjoyed my life.  I’ve just found something way way better.  Part of thinking for yourself involves questioning your own assumptions, I did that, and it lead me to see where the other side has it right.  You seem unwilling, however, to question your own assumptions about pro-lifers, or about whether the unborn child has rights.   

I read an interesting article this morning from a former atheist who took a pro-life position while still an atheist.  He describes his frustration with trying to discuss the issue with fellow atheists who kept bringing up religion and making assumptions about his motives.  I recommend checking it out.  There are a lot of legitimate arguments against abortion that don’t rely on religious revelation.  (Note it is somewhat long)
http://www.scifiwright.com/2011/03/godless-and-pro-life/#more-3359

Barbara, I threw your words back at you because it seemed to me that your were supporting your view that abortion is murder with your Catholic faith:

<quote>Why not ask Catholics what they believe and why instead of making assumptions?  Ask Catholic women how their Church treats them and how they feel about it? You would be surprised.  I myself am a convert to the faith, a one-time neopagan and socialist now orthodox Catholic who believes in and practices everything the Church teaches, including the prohibition of Birth Control.  I have experienced remarkable freedom in the Church, not oppression.</quote>

You also equated a religion that supposedly guides your life with a simple choice like like being a vegetarian—If you slip once in a while it really doesn’t hurt anyone. It seemed to me you were brushing off Pope Paul VI’s 1968 “Humanae vitae” (“On Human Life”) encyclical [which] prohibits Catholics from using artificial birth control (Read more: http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,354867,00.html#ixzz1Kqe4EtrF) and that catholic women who get abortions are forbidden communion (if they choose to confess their “sin” to their priest, of found out by another church member). I was attempting to point out that many times one’s religion is easily outweighed by other other considerations when they need to make a moral decision with life-time consequences. I apologize if I misinterpreted the intention of your statements.
I was also attempting to demonstrate to both you and Mouse that Catholic church organizations promote lies about facts concerning abortion. I’m especially offended by statements such as this: “Some upper middle class white females are not reproducing and they are trying to keep other groups from reproducing so they can remain in the majority.” (Copied and pasted from my reply to Mouse, above). They back their claims as follows (my interpretation):  Margaret Sanger started the organization that became Planned Parenthood, motivated by a an ethical idea proposed by Thomas Malthus, who observed that humans, like other animals, often produced more offspring than could possibly survive on the limited resources available. Racism was even more prominent in the 19th and early 20th centuries and many others also took Malthus’ idea as a justification for killing off people who were a “burden to society”. Sanger promoted education and family planning, Hitler came to power on a wave of antisemitism in Germany and used Malthus’ idea to justify the Final Solution. Therefore, Planned Parenthood is an organization with the (unstated) purpose of getting women of different races to kill their babies so that infertile, middle-class white women (why not white men?)will stay in power. Oh, and scientific theories are evil because mankind might use their knowledge to change “God’s plan”. I can go on for hours, but you get my drift and can probably appreciate why I’m not convinced to take up the faith you chose.
As a scholar myself, I was offended by your suggestion that I did not check facts and was merely repeating sound bites by from my background in liberal arts and women’s studies. I assure you that I do plenty of research and critical thinking, which is why I started adding links to my sources of information. I live in the United States where there is a powerful Christian conservative movement who resent women’s and minority rights and use Christian “values” to justify lying to voters to get elected and then promoting laws and policies for Right-wing agenda. When I fact check their statements and find documented proof that they are lying (“I didn’t really say that” when there is a You-Tube video of him/her saying that.) I hope you can appreciate why I get angry.
As to our differences on the issue of abortion, you contend it is murder and to make myself clear, I contend that it can be justifiable homicide. A woman has the right to make an informed choice and not be told lies and conspiracy theories to convince her sacrifice her health and well-being, and perhaps the well-being of her other children, because of an un-planned, unwanted pregnancy. Planned Parenthood does not force women to have abortions, or offer it as the only service they provide. The country I live in does not have universal health care coverage, because,to paraphrase one senator, like a drug dealer in a school yard,it would make us dependent on health care and less than what God created us to be. Maybe your country has universal health care and women are not faced with terrible economic hardship when they have a baby. It is a lot easier to consider abortion totally unjustified in that environment. You said you chose Catholicism after past experience with neo-paganism and socialism and I salute your informed choice. I hope you appreciate that you had the freedom to explore your options.
Whew! This whole dialogue started with my being outraged by the above article’s contention that New Atheists don’t have the (I find questionable) virtue of humility. Micha says that humility is not taking yourself seriously. I feel it was well worth the effort because if you don’t take yourself seriously, particularly on moral issues like gaining knowledge with scientific method instead of accepting things on faith alone, how can have any self-respect?

Hi Adrienne

Just to clarify, when I made that statement about asking Catholics what they believe I was referring to a couple of statements you made in another response in which you talked about Catholicism being oppressive to women and made assumptions about how Catholics view atheists. I should have made that clearer. I don’t use Catholic teaching to defend the pro-life position to someone who isn’t Catholic for obvious reasons, it not being necessary and not being all that useful. 
Also, in regards to the point about vegetarians, I was using that as an illustrative example of how someone’s actions can be at odds with their ideals, not making an equivalence between the two.  Believe me, I recognize the gravity of life decisions such as abortion.  Abortion, like suicide, is not something that can be undone.  Once the baby is dead, its dead, there’s no unmaking that choice. 
Yes this has been a long discussion, I hope you can understand that people of faith aren’t robots which act based on what “program codes” the bible provides.  Catholicism is a faith that respects human reason, and the sciences, which is what attracted me to it in the first place.

@ Adrienne: “The science and ethics on which you base “pro-life” position existed long before the emergence of Christianity.”

Um, science emerges well after Christianity does.  Hundreds of years, actually. Christian ethics, of course, emerge after, well, Christianity.  Unless you’re imagining another set of ethics undergirds Western ethics.  (But it doesn’t.)

What are you a scholar of, exactly?

@Elizabeth K: Are you one of those “young Earth” believers who think the planet was created by God less than 10,000 years ago? Here is a link to a list of Pre-Christian Greek Scientists: http://www.ics.forth.gr/~vsiris/ancient_greeks/index.html
And here is a link to a history of the scientific method: http://www.scientificmethod.com/sm5_smhistory.html

I got by Bachelor of Science at Loyola University in Chicago, IL—A Jesuit university that did not rewrite history and even had a course on comparative religion. Where did you go to school?

A list of pre-Christian Greek scientists?  One name, Aristotle is a list?  Check out your link again. “The beginning of the scientific method” is hardly the foundation of the science on which pro-life ethics are based, in any case, (though you might be interested to know that it is not just the earliest of Christian documents that specifically proscribes abortion, but several ancient Greek documents as well.  And just think—they didn’t have our advances of science to support them like we do!).Science simply does not predate Christianity. That’s not a religious point of view, it’s a historical point of view.  Judeo-Christian ethics cannot, by definition, predate Christianity.  Even basic Aristotelean observation (which isn’t science) can tell you that. And I could care less where you went to school—you referred to yourself as a scholar, which I found very surprising given your ignorance of even the most basic historical facts. Having a B.S., or a B.A. for that matter, does not make you a scholar.  I assumed you engaged in some sort of scholarship based on your statement (other than history, of course).  And just FYI, even a young-earth Creationist, which I am not, would still be correct in stating that Galileo and Bacon lived after Christ did.

FTR:  I missed your first link with the actual list.  But again, you should review this list as well.  The author, whoever he (she) is, is taking some mighty big liberties with language.

@Elizabeth K: OK, you made a lot of comments before you realized you missed my first link. I’ll let them go. However, your argument about how Judeo-Christian ethics cannot, by definition, predate Christianity.” is circular. You are basically saying that you have Judeo-Christian values because you are a Judeo-Christian. By definition, scientific method is
“A systematic approach to solving a problem by discovering knowledge, investigating a phenomenon, verifying and integrating previous knowledge. It follows a series of steps that evaluates the veracity or the feasibility of a prediction through research and experimentation from where the information obtained will be used as a basis in making conclusions.” (I copied the quote from :http://www.biology-online.org/dictionary/Scientific_method. but Google “scientific method” and you will find similarly worded definitions) It wasn’t mentioned as a formal term until the late 17th century, so in that sense it was established after the rise of Christianity. I don’t usually like to use Wikipedia as a reference, but this article: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_scientific_method, is a reasonable summary of the general view of the history of scientific method.
If you care to read more, here is a link to a history of the relationship between science and religion written by a 19th century history professor: http://cscs.umich.edu/~crshalizi/White/#med-7 Yes, it’s an old book, but you get your ethics from an older one.
Also, I think you mean you couldn’t care less where I want to school, not that you could.
Please explain what you mean by the “big liberties” with language in the first link. What did I miss?

Actually, I probably could care a little bit less, if I really tried. :).

Look, I’m really not trying to be snarky and argumentative, even though I obviously am.  I think in reviewing this we’re not actually talking about the same things. So here’s my take, as clearly as I can make it, because you’re misunderstanding what I wrote:  you made a comment to the effect, as I understood it, that a poster here based her pro-life position on ethics and science, both of which (you said) predated Christianity.  My point divorced, first of all, the ethics question from the science question.  I was addressing them as separate entities.  So as far as ethics goes, there isn’t just one monolithic thing we call “ethics”.  Certainly there are classical ethics, there are also situational ethics.  But my point was simply that the poster in question bases her pro-life position on what’s commonly understood as Judeo-Christian ethics.  It isn’t circular to say that Judeo-Christian ethics must post-date Christianity; it’s also not true to say that all understandings of ethics are synonymous.  In fact, the ethics of what we understand to be Western culture are primarily, and predominantly, based on a Judeo-Christian worldview—NOT a pagan worldview, even that of the ancient Greeks.  This is for a very simple historical reason—which is that, aside from the monks who preserved the texts from Vikings and vandals after the fall of Rome (when chaos, essentially, sweeps Europe), Greco-Roman texts, including those that dealt with ethical issues, were virtually unknown until the Renaissance.  And yes, one could argue (and should) that Aristotle influenced someone like, say, Aquinas, but the classical worldview is always being subsumed into the Christian worldview and can’t be considered purely pagan in any sense.  This is also why I made the argument about science:  yes, one might loosely call an ancient Greek who observed the skies as an early “physicist” (though I wouldn’t, and this is what I mean by fast and loose with language).  But again, until the Renaissance, there’s no systematic scientific approach developed towards the natural world (as you acknowledge above). To get back to the initial point—you told a poster that “The science and ethics on which you base “pro-life” position existed long before the emergence of Christianity.”  I’m not sure what the implications of this argument were meant to be, though I could probably guess.  My point is simply that this statement is in error—that neither the science NOR the ethics upon which she bases her pro-life position predate Christianity.  Also, I’m not clear on how my drawing my ethics from two thousand years of tradition lends ethos to a text on science and religion from the nineteenth century.  I actually know quite a lot about both the nineteenth century and the relationship between science and religion.  I wouldn’t take White’s book as scripture, if I were you.  White is emerging from what were essentially the culture wars of the Victorian period, where Biblical literalists were in battle royale with both Darwinists and German Bible scholars alike.  While certainly not without merit, his work is also polemical (he wants to divorce Cornell, and other universities, from the constraints of being religious institutions) and certainly doesn’t give the entire picture of the relationship between science and religion.  The fact is, the relationship is much more complex—most of the pre-19th century scientists we admire were, in fact, Christians.  Jesuit universities, which as I’m sure you know emerged to teach the masses in the 1600’s, have long been breeding grounds for scientific inquiry.  Romanticism, to name only one secular movement, is far more anti-science than Christianity is or has been.

@Elizabeth K: I stopped getting notices of replies to this thread and that is probably one reason for the confusion in the thread of questioning if the church was anti-learning. I consider romanticism another, less rigid form of religion. I don’t take a White’s paper as scripture, I was just citing an example from the time when intellectuals were more free to rebel against Christian-based politics. (BYW, Biblical literates are still fighting a battle royale against science, though I don’t know if they are working so hard against German Biblical scholars.)  There is no question that the ancients exposed unwanted/unhealthy babies to die, or that they killed, raped and pillaged in war—that is another ancient practice that has stood the test of time. The church didn’t really get intolerable to me on this subject until science figured out the mechanism of conception (fertilization) and the pope defined human life starting at that point. (Who is to say a woman miscarries a child every month she isn’t pregnant?) Infant death was common and they did not have any means, as we do, to prevent most cases. Not to say they didn’t morn the death of children, but they had to accept that it happened and move on. So do we.
If you have the time, I have two other videos that might interest you:
A lecture on the logical perception of faith: http://www.atheismtv.com/blog/2011/05/putting-faith-in-its-place/
And, on a lighter note, a perception of the history of human thought: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=06O9SzPQGno&feature=player_embedded#at=13
Both are a little over 10 minutes.
A big argument on the problem of evil is going on in the OBL thread.

Thanks for the reply—what’s OBL?

never mind—I just got it (duh).

What a strange title for a ‘Catholic’ discussion.  Why isn’t the title, “Vices Gone Wild”?  The title gives the appearance of abhorrence for virtues.  Why are titles that focus on sin so common in N C R?

Barbara said, “The fact that some Catholics use birth control is moot.”  Birth controlling has its own punishments and one of them is that it fails.  Planned baronhood knows this in spite of dishing them out like candy especially to teens.  It increases the killing of unborn babies.  Birth controlling methods do not keep the users safe from sexually transmitted diseases and once again Planned baronhood knows that treating this sometimes deadly diseases will be another source of business to them.  Planned baronhood fails to advise the users of the serious consequences of cancers related to its use whether it a pill or a condom – both put the users at risk of cancers once only found in old people.  Holy Mother the Church teaches it is a sin for married couples to practice birth prevention.  The Vatican 2 church went silent on this major topic.  The presbyters fail to mention or remind their flock that it is sinful to frustrate the conception of life.  No, birth controlling is far from being a ‘moot point’ for it will not only often fail but the users’ souls are at risk for their compromises.  Many little children will not be seen around their kitchen tables because of birth controlling.