Catholic Review Online: Work Ardently and Incessantly…

Last week, H.E. Archbishop Edwin O'Brien posted a column in "Thoughts on Our Church" entitled "Shall We Dance." One poignant segment stated:

Most in our culture, including Catholics, see laws as threatening their freedom, limiting rightful options, interfering with their privacy. No dancing in the street here!

Our theology, on the other hand, sees man wounded by sin and in need of salvation. Divine help comes to us in Christ through the law that guides us and the grace that sustains us.

This week, Archbishop O'Brien, after citing the previous column on the role that law plays in our lives, discusses Humanae Vitae and its implications for today in a column entitled, "Work Ardently and Incessantly." He writes,

And there is more. The dissent which followed Humanae Vitae has itself spawned a generation of Catholic thinkers and theologians who have claimed that not only was the Church wrong about the Pill, it is wrong about sterilization, wrong about masturbation, and wrong about homosexuality and same-sex marriage. And who can deny that the widespread acceptance and promotion of contraception is not largely responsible for cohabitation before marriage and so called “casual sex.” Perhaps the greatest tragedy is the hard heartedness which goes so far as to promote abortion if contraception “fails.”

Ample research increasingly offers objective evidence that “the Pill’s” contraceptive-rights movement that has fueled our sexual revolution has spurred a dramatic increase in divorce, single parenthood and a “fatherless America,” sexually transmitted diseases and, simply, carefree promiscuity. (See, for example, First Things, August/September 2008, “The Vindication of Humanae Vitae,” by Mary Eberstadt.)

This is a "must read!"

For those who are not aware of this, the Archbishop wrote a letter to every Pastor last weekend and asked each Parish to form a Respect Life Committee and made some excellent suggestions on what issues to tackle or steps to take. My Parish received the letter in the weekly bulletin. Bravo, your Excellency!