Bishop Blair: "Upholding the Bond of Love" (Part 3)

Bishop Leonard Blair writes in the September issue of the Diocese of Toledo's Catholic Chronicle:

Upholding the bond of love and life

by Bishop Leonard P. Blair

This is the last of three articles that I would like to offer you on the topic of marriage. In the last two issues of the Chronicle I summarized some of what the social sciences have to say about the serious problems facing marriage today, as well as the great benefits of marriage for the flourishing of the human person and society at large. My article last month was accompanied by a reprint of the chapter on marriage from the U.S. Adult Catechism.

I would be neglecting my duty as a bishop, however, if I did not also address a very significant issue that remains a deep wound at the very heart of marriage and in the consciences of many people. I am referring to the issue of contraception.

Let’s begin with a little history. Until 1930 every Christian denomination was unanimous in its condemnation of contraception. When the Anglicans abandoned this teaching in 1930, and it looked like other denominations might do the same, the Washington Post editorialized that this “would sound the death knell of marriage as a holy institution by establishing degrading practices which would encourage indiscriminate immorality. The suggestion that the use of legalized contraceptives would be ‘careful and restrained’ is preposterous.”

Almost 40 years later, in 1968, when Pope Paul VI reaffirmed the received Christian teaching about contraception, he pointed out some of the consequences of separating intercourse from the procreation of children; namely, a gradual weakening of moral discipline; a trivialization of human sexuality; the demeaning of women; marital infidelity often leading to broken families; and state-sponsored programs of population control based on imposed contraception and sterilization. (cf. Humanae Vitae, 17)

In the years since, we have witnessed the introduction of legalized abortion and euthanasia, an ever-increasing recourse to in vitro fertilization and certain forms of genetic manipulation and embryo experimentation. These developments are closely related, in law and public policy as well as in contemporary culture, to the idea behind contraception, that is, unlimited dominion over one’s body and life without regard for their God-given meaning and purpose.

We are all familiar with the question politicians ask at election time: “Are you better off than you were two or four years ago?” In the 1960s those who were advocating the widespread acceptance of oral contraceptives argued that marriages and families would be so much healthier if couples were relieved of the stress caused by having too many children or being subjected to the stress of sexual abstinence as the only alternative.

Forty years later this rosy promise has been forgotten amid the relentless weakening of marriage and family life. We live in a world of divorce and broken families, cohabitation, “recreational” sex, fornication, promiscuity, pornography and the widespread acceptance of immoral sexual acts. The toll on people’s psychological, physical, social and even economic health is heavy. It should also be noted that many contraceptive societies will face demographic extinction unless they start having enough children to renew their population.

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My Comments:
What an outstanding and orthodox teacher we have as Bishop here in the Toledo Diocese. A man who uses his column to exhort and encourage the faithful to live up to the teachings of Holy Mother Church, rather than using the platform to engage in the sort of introspective naval gazing that goes on in many diocesan newspaper columns across the country.

I know there are those in this diocese who will disagree with me, but we are extremely fortunate and blessed to have Bishop Blair as our shepherd.


Previous Pro Ecclesia posts on this subject:
Bishop Blair: "Upholding the Bond of Love" (Part 2)

Bishop Blair: "Upholding the Bond of Love"

Bishop Blair: "The Gospel of Life Revisited"

Bishop Blair: "Building Your House on a Rock"

Meeting the Bishop - After Action Report

Bishop Blair Teaches: "And With Your Spirit"

Bishop Blair: "What God Joins Together"