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Homilies from Called to Give Life

Here are sixteen homilies dealing with morality for married couples and with contraception in particular. They were gathered by Jason Adams for his book Called to Give Life and are offered here for the use of priests and others who might find them useful. The printable version of the homilies (see above) can be opened in Microsoft Word and saved or edited from there. For those who do not have Word, the html text on this page can be copied and pasted into any word processor.

Additional homilies can be found on the God's Plan For Life website on the homily page. That site also offers other important pro-life resources.

"When the disciples got near him, they asked him, 'Why do you speak in parables?' He answered: 'To you has been given the knowledge of the mysteries of the reign of God, but it has not been given to the others. To the man who has, more will be given until he grows rich; the man who has not, will lose what little he has. I use parables when I speak to them because they look but do not see, they listen but do not hear or understand." (Matt. 13:10-13)

Jesus uses parables to teach. Though the parables of Jesus date back two thousand years we find a timelessness about them. As we grow in maturity of faith, we get more insight from them.

We can say the same about the teachings of the Church. For nearly two thousand years the Church has given to the community of believers a body of teachings that helps explain and guide us in living the ways of faith. At times some of us may find difficulty in comprehending why the Church teaches as it does. However as we look back we can see the wisdom of that teaching and why we believe the Holy Spirit guides the Magisterium or teaching authority of the Church.

In July 1968 Pope Paul VI issued the encyclical Humanae Vitae (concerning Human Life). Recall that pivotal year of 1968. In our country the war in Vietnam raged on with no end in sight. Students on our college campuses protested the war and challenged all authority. Our cities burned from racial violence. We witnessed the assassination of men like Dr. Martin Luther King and Robert Kennedy. Riots broke out at the Democratic Convention in Chicago. Lax moral conduct became the sexual revolution. The watchword among youth fascinated by the effects of hallucinatory drugs was, "Tune in, turn on, drop out."

The world witnessed war and revolution. The Soviets invaded Czechoslovakia ending a brief stint with democracy. The cold war raged on as the threat of nuclear annihilation affected our lives. The Church following Vatican II struggled with an explosion of radical changes and ideas. Historians consider 1968 a pivotal year in 20th century history. In this year of turbulence Pope Paul VI issued his papal encyclical on the regulation of human birth: Humanae Vitae. "THE POPE BANS THE PILL" ran the newspaper headlines. Catholics who preferred to get their information from a biased secular press overreacted. In Washington, D.C. some Catholics walked out of Mass at the cathedral as the archbishop tried to explain this complex document. Many Catholics had made up their minds and would not listen to the pope or the teaching of the Church. Now a generation later we can look back and evaluate the wisdom of this teaching.

The document begins with the statement "the most serious duty of transmitting human life, for which married persons are the free and responsible collaborators of God the Creator, has always been a source of great joy to them even if sometimes accompanied by not a few difficulties and by distress."

God is the creator of all life. Married couples collaborate with God by bringing human life into the world. They provide a long term stable environment for the development and nurturing of that life. Raising a family is not easy but at the same time children provide tremendous joy to couples who open themselves to life.

Married couples express their mutual love especially in the marital act, which opens itself to the possibility of new life. These two elements of conjugal love and life are two inseparable aspects of marriage. The problem with the artificial use of birth control is that it separates the sex act from the openness to life. Proponents of artificial birth control argued in 1968 that married couples would experience happier and more stable marriages once they were free of the tension over an unwanted pregnancy. They argued that this would result in fewer divorces. However, in the past generation our divorce rate has escalated to over 50% of all marriages. These same advocates added that artificial birth control would result in fewer out-of-wedlock pregnancies. Today the single-parent mother has become the new poverty class in the U.S. We have millions of babies born out of wedlock despite the easy availability of artificial birth control.

Humanae Vitae did not condone couples in marriage having children without responsibility. Couples could space children: "If, then, there are serious motives to space out births, which derive from the physical or psychological conditions of husband and wife, or from external conditions, the Church teaches that it is then licit to take into account the natural rhythms immanent in the generative functions, for the use of marriage in the infecund periods only, and in this way to regulate birth without offending [these] moral principles."

This method of family planning which employs the natural periods of infertility in the woman's ovulation cycle, often draws snickers from Catholics who recall the old rhythm method. For many couples this method did not work. New methods such as the sympto-thermal method provide couples with a safe means of expressing their love in the marriage act while avoiding an unplanned pregnancy. This natural method differs radically from artificial birth control in its effects and intent.

In NFP the couple chooses to abstain from the marital act when it would not be prudent for them to conceive another child. They do nothing to prevent a new human life from beginning in a freely chosen marital act. They choose to engage in the marital act when the wife is not fertile because this act has purposes other than procreation.

Contracepting couples, on the other hand, choose to engage in sexual union, reasonably anticipating that by doing so new human life will begin. They choose to do something, prior to, during, or subsequent to this freely chosen marital act precisely to prevent this life from beginning. They do not open themselves to the possibilities of new life and remove God from the process.

While the document stresses the cause and effect of the evils of artificial birth control, I find the most prophetic words in the document are, "it is also to be feared that the man, growing used to the employment of anti-conception practices, may finally lose respect for the woman and, no longer caring for her physical and psychological equilibrium, may come to the point of considering her as a mere instrument of selfish enjoyment, and no longer as his respected and beloved companion."

I have seen confirmation of these words in my work with high school girls. Girls feel pressured into premarital sex by both boyfriends and female peers. I recall a junior in high school asking me in front of her class, "Is it a sin to have sex with your boyfriend if you don't enjoy it?" I told her to think about what she asked me. If her boyfriend pressures her into unwanted sex then maybe she should drop him as a boyfriend. If her friends pressured her to prove herself as a woman by engaging in unwanted sex then maybe they are not very good friends.

Women as sex objects rather than as partners in a love relationship goes beyond the high school years. I see it in the ever-increasing tendency for couples to enter into non-commital live-in relationships. Why get married and have children if the sexual aspect of married life can be fulfilled while avoiding any of the responsibilities? We live in a society that avoids long-term commitments. Why commit yourself to someone who will readily meet your needs without such a commitment?

As Catholics the Church asks us to trust its teachings. Humanae Vitae is no exception. Look at the results of the past few decades. We find that over 50% of all marriages in the U.S. end in divorce. Yet in 92% of those divorced marriages we find that either one or both of the parties do not practice their religion. That divorce rate reflects the numbers of Catholics divorcing as well. Studies show that married couples who have a strong religious faith produce marriages with the greatest degree of fulfillment.

Recent history reflects the fact that many of the warnings the pope mentions in Humanae Vitae have come true. Women have lost their special place as partners in a loving marital relationship and as collaborators in procreation and have found themselves in the unenviable position of sex objects.

Proponents of artificial birth control argued in 1968 that with the fear of pregnancy diminished, women could engage in sex freely without consequences. A generation later we find divorces at an all time high, sexually transmitted diseases ravishing our nation and the effects of broken marriages affecting our youth.

When the Church teaches, we must assume that it teaches what God expects of us. When we choose to go our own way we unfortunately must pay the price for our sins. Those who pay the price are not just those who willingly disregard such teaching but the innocent as well.

Jesus gave to the apostles and the Church the "mysteries of the reign of God." As the Church shares with us these mysteries we recall the words of Jesus: "But blest are your eyes because they see and blest are your ears because they hear" (Matt. 13:16). Over the past few decades, many Catholics in their blindness and deafness have chosen to ignore this teaching of the Church. We can only wonder what our society might be like today if people had listened to that teaching in 1968.

You all just did an amazing thing, and you probably don't even realize you did it. I just proclaimed a Gospel that says, "Jesus said to his apostles, I come not for peace, but for division. Mother shall be against daughter and father against son." And when I finished the Gospel I announced it by saying "The Gospel of the Lord." And you all responded, "Praise to you, Lord Jesus Christ." Praise to you for this reading? Are you crazy?! Thank you, Jesus, for giving us words of division and strife and difficulty! Really? Yes! You proclaimed "Praise to you Lord, and thank you for giving us these words, for proclaiming yourself an object of division, not of peace." But what kind of peace is Jesus talking about? What division does He refer to? Well, it's not the peace that this world knows. We need to understand what kind of peace and division Jesus speaks about today. Our readings wonderfully explain to us exactly what division and peace Jesus is talking about, and it begins in today's first reading.

The prophet Jeremiah. To understand this reading, we must first put it into context. Jeremiah was one called by God to proclaim and speak God's word to His people, Israel. He was called by God while he was still very young. In his early days, Jeremiah, faithful to God's word, proclaimed peace and prosperity and joy to the people of Israel. He was loved by the people and by the king because he spoke words of great comfort and hope to the people. But, as time passed, a new king came to power who was not as faithful to God as was the previous one. At the same time, Israel was invaded by Assyria, so they were living as a people in occupation. The faith of the Hebrews did not agree with that of the Assyrians, and they began to suffer greatly under their oppressors. In order to bring about peace in the land, the king of Israel began to make some concessions to his occupying force. "OK, we'll give in on this point of faith, if you will stop sending invading armies into our territory." "We'll give in on this matter of faith if you will just give us food when we are hungry." In order to bring about peace and stability, the king of Israel gave in on important matters of faith and began to water it down.

Jeremiah witnessed all this and, still faithful to God's word, proclaimed to the king and to all the people of Israel what the Lord God said. Rather than words of comfort and prosperity, Jeremiah spoke words of doom. "O King, you and the entire nation of Israel will suffer greatly and be destroyed for your lack of faith and trust in the Lord God." The king and the people no longer liked what Jeremiah had to say. He was despised because he no longer spoke comforting words, but words of destruction. He was hated by the people because they didn't like what they heard.

So, as we hear in today's reading, they lowered Jeremiah into the cistern so that he might die. They told Jeremiah to stop speaking words of ill, because he was demoralizing the troops who were there to protect them. He refused to be silent because he was speaking God's word. For this, they put him in the cistern to die-because he proclaimed the truth of God's words-and the people didn't like it. Jeremiah, at the beginning of his ministry as prophet, spoke words of truth that the people liked, but once that word became more difficult, they hated him, even though he still spoke God's word. He became a source, not of peace, but of division among the people. This is what Jesus is talking about.

Jesus Himself was a source of division and conflict. The Jewish leaders did not want to hear what Jesus had to say. Yet, He persisted in speaking the truth. He could, at any moment, have decided that the risks were too great, the ridicule too excessive. He could have decided to speak other words, words that were not true, and so save His life. But He knew that He must remain faithful to God's word, despite disfavor, opposition and possible death. We must do the same.

The Church today continues to be a source of conflict and division among the peoples of the world. It is always interesting to watch reactions when the Pope or the Church makes a statement on morality. Many in the world begin to laugh and ridicule the Church, saying things like, "Oh my, those bunch of old men in Rome don't have any idea what reality is. They should just get with the times and leave the Middle Ages-after all, it's the 21^st century! Don't they know that?" The Church, in her pronouncements, becomes a source of conflict and division, not only in the secular world, but also for many within the Church. And yet, she continues to speak what she knows to be the truth. She never concedes to the pressures and influences of society to water down the truth or back away from it because it is too difficult. The Church consistently proclaims the truth.

There are many examples of this. Here's one. Humanae Vitae was an encyclical published some 30 years ago. In it, after consultation with special commissions, his own theologians and the People of God, Pope Paul VI proclaimed (infallibly) that artificial birth control is intrinsically evil and not permissible. Many immediately scoffed and ridiculed the Church and Paul VI for his outdated thinking. However, we have come, in the course of these 30 odd years, to see the truth of what Paul proclaimed. The proponents and supporters of contraceptives had made certain claims. But Paul VI prophetically spoke of them saying effectively, "If you accept as your truth that artificial contraceptives are okay, there are some grave consequences to that error."

For example, the supporters of contraception boldly proclaimed that allowing their use would reduce the number of unwanted pregnancies. Paul VI said no. He has proven to be correct. In a 1996 article in U.S. News and World Report, it was reported that in 1995 there were 1.4 million abortions in this country and 4 million births. Some 25 years after contraceptives were accepted by many in society, the number of unwanted children has not been reduced. When 25% of those conceived are murdered through abortion, have we truly reduced the number of unwanted pregnancies? No, we've just killed them. Paul VI stated that if contraceptives were permitted, women would suffer great harm to their very dignity as persons. The supporters of birth control, on the other hand, predicted that contraceptives would finally give women control and "reproductive rights" equal with that of men. Has this happened? No. Women are now treated with far less respect than they were. Men can now look at women, not as human persons with dignity and honor that should be cherished, but rather as objects of their desires. Women have become mere objects, and not the fully emancipated persons so many predicted. Many women bought this false prediction hook, line and sinker, and now they allow themselves to be treated, not with dignity and respect, but as mere objects-to be used and then thrown away.

I believe that after three decades, we can look back to Paul VI and say, "Humanae Vitae was right! Paul VI was right!" Despite all the negative publicity the Church took for this encyclical and teaching, she nevertheless continued, and still continues, to proclaim the truth that artificial birth control is intrinsically evil. Many in the secular world, and even in the Church, could not accept this. Even prominent Catholic theologians publicly denounced the Church's teaching. But the past several decades have proven that Paul VI was right. The Church, despite all that she suffered, continued to teach the truth.

There are many other examples, just within Humanae Vitae, but there are other teachings of the Church which are just as unpopular in society today, and for which the Church is ridiculed and is a source of division and conflict in our world. For example, the current debate on stem-cell research. President Bush, while he was in Rome, went to see the Holy Father and asked his opinion. I can imagine that Pope John Paul II said to him, "Dub-ya, no! It is morally wrong!" "But how can this be so?", many ask, "There can be such great medical advances as a result of this research." True, there could be, but we must focus on a much more basic concept-the dignity of every human person from the moment of conception. At conception, there is a separate vulnerable and dependant life, which differs from both mother and father. There is a new life, which is present in every embryo. To do research on embryonic stem cells, we must kill and destroy this new life. We must violate every core principle of the dignity of human life. This cannot be allowed. It's a very dangerous area. So, are we not to have scientific progress? Of course we are, but with restraint and respect for life. The question becomes so arbitrary. I have a bad heart; shall we kill our lector who has a good heart in order that I could have it? What about one of our Special Ministers of Holy Communion, how about one of our servers-couldn't I get one of their hearts? The question, who lives and who dies in the name of scientific research or progress or treatment of ills becomes very arbitrary, and very dangerous.

Many other teachings of the Church continue to be a source of conflict and division in the world and in the Church. The teachings on homosexuality, pre-marital sex, cohabitation, capital punishment, euthanasia, the Church's documents on economic justice or the rights of third world countries and indebtedness are all teachings that are ridiculed, at best, if not completely ignored, because the world doesn't like what it hears. Too bad! It's the truth, and the Church will continue to proclaim it, in season and out of season. The Church, I have come to firmly believe, proclaims the truth to us-a truth that, at times, is very difficult to understand and perhaps very difficult to live out-but it is truth nonetheless. These are truths which must be proclaimed. The Church, like Jeremiah, like Jesus Himself, is unwilling to compromise the truth to bring about peace. She continues to be a source of division and of conflict because she proclaims the truth that has been revealed to us.

Let's face it, some Church teachings are extremely difficult. They even cause great conflict and division within us. "How can this be so?" we ask ourselves. Yet the Church persists in proclaiming the truth. I'll be honest, while I was in seminary, I chose to do a concentration in morality, not so that I could boldly proclaim what the Church taught, but so that I, along with the rest of the world, could say, "Oh, come on! We're living in the modern world now not the 1200's!" But, through study and prayer and being open to the Spirit, I have come to believe firmly that what the Church teaches is indeed the truth and we cannot compromise it, or we risk loosing everything, even eternal life. Many of us struggle with issues, with various teachings of the Church, and that's okay, so long as we are striving to understand why the Church teaches as she does. It may take an entire lifetime just to begin to understand something the Church teaches; that's okay. But we must, in all things, seek the truth and strive to live it.

To be in error about the truth is one thing. To know the truth and do or proclaim otherwise is another. We know the truth. The Church proudly and pastorally proclaims the truth-we have it! But do we choose to ignore it? Beware. We are falling into the trap. Like Jesus, like Jeremiah, we must boldly proclaim the truth without fear of what others will say or what will happen to us. We must be signs of contradiction, sources of division and conflict in our world by the way that we proclaim and live the truth in our lives.

Okay, this is extremely serious and difficult stuff, but Jesus, in the beginning of today's Gospel, gives us words of great hope and encouragement. "I have come to bring fire to the earth, and how I wish it was ablaze!" What's He talking about? What fire? Don't you remember the day of Pentecost, when those 12 scared and frightened men gathered in the upper room were filled with the Holy Spirit? "And tongues as of fire appeared over each of their heads and they were filled with the Holy Spirit." Suddenly these men who were fearful for their very lives were out in the streets boldly proclaiming Christ crucified. We were filled with that same Spirit on the day of our baptism and given the same mission of being signs of contradiction, sources of conflict in our world by proclaiming the truth. In the sacrament of confirmation, we were filled with those Gifts of the Spirit (wisdom, knowledge, courage, fear of the Lord) so that we could go out, boldly, and proclaim the truths of Jesus.

Jesus did not come to bring about a peace that is concession and that forgoes truth to get along. Jesus came to bring us the Truth, and it is our mission, as baptized members of Christ's Body, to proclaim and live that truth in our lives. Perhaps as we come forward today, as we come to this altar of sacrifice to be nourished and strengthened by Christ's Body and Blood, we need to pray along with Jesus that the fire of the Holy Spirit would be enkindled in us, and in all the world. We must pray that we will have the courage to boldly speak the truth, to not water it down, to not make concessions, but to live and proclaim the truth in our own lives. May the fire of the Spirit be enkindled in each of us, that we, like Jeremiah, like Jesus, boldly proclaim the truth, no matter what the cost, no matter what the conflict. If we do this, then the world will truly know peace-not the world's peace, but the peace which only God can give, the peace of His truth.

"Woman, How Great Is Your Faith!"

Today we hear about one of the truly magnificent women of the Gospel. She was a Canaanite (a pagan people surrounding Israel) and she had one goal: the healing of her daughter who was gripped by a demon. When Jesus passed through her territory, she pled her case with him. The disciples wanted to stop her, even Jesus seemed to brush her aside: "It is not right to take the food of the children and give it to the dogs."

Here is where we see her true greatness. She could have been discouraged, she could have been sidetracked by a seeming offense and said: "Don't call me a dog." But the word "dog" admits a positive as well as negative sense, like in English we speak for example about a "lucky dog." So she took it in the best sense and said, "Yes, Lord, but even the dogs eat the crumbs which fall from their master's table."

And she received from Jesus his highest praise: "Woman, your faith is great!" And he healed her daughter. Jesus always saw beyond the surface. He knows what is in the heart of each one of us. He sees us not as focus groups, but as persons.

A couple weeks ago a national study tried to lump Catholic women together in a group. The Guttmacher study of some 1000 women who had abortions, said 29% of the abortions were procured by Catholic women. And then they attempted to make a connection between that statistic and the Church's teaching on birth control.

However they downplayed some facts from their own study. A woman who describes herself as religious, that is who practices her faith, whether Protestant or Catholic, is only 25% as likely to seek an abortion as the average. There is a big difference between a cultural Catholic and a practicing Catholic. To use a personal comparison: I might sometimes say I am a "Croatian" because my mom's parents came from that country, but if I meet a real Croatian, I recognize a huge difference.

It is similar between those who call themselves "Catholic" and those who are living and breathing their faith. Now, we don't reject a cultural Catholic, in fact, we're glad they acknowledge their baptism, but we want them to return to the full practice of their faith and start attending Mass; that makes all the difference.

A deep relation to Jesus through the Church he founded is what we offer. As he did for the daughter of the Caananite, Jesus can free us. Jesus did not come to condemn, but to save. That applies even in the case of abortion. Some people have heard that abortion is one of the very few sins that incurs automatic excommunication. That is to underscore its seriousness-the taking of an innocent human life. However, you must also know the priest has authority to lift that excommunication in the sacrament of confession. What is more, in that sacrament Jesus gives not only his forgiveness but deep healing.

Since my return from Peru, I have seen how many of our young people, men as well as women, need that healing. Obviously not just for abortion, but a range of sins which affect our souls as was the case of that young woman gripped by a demon.

Part of the orientation we want to give to our young people is an understanding of their sexuality. Why God created us male and female. Our society is in deep trouble because we have lost that orientation. The terrible plague of abortion which I referred to is one symptom. But I want to be clear. The solution to abortion is not more birth control. In that same Guttmacher study 57% of the women who had abortions were using birth control in the month before they got pregnant.

Those of us who are older can remember when the birth control pill was first introduced in the late 50's. It was presented as the solution to all our biggest problems: overpopulation, unwanted pregnancies, abortions, child abuse, large unhappy families, and above all marital tension between husband and wife. After 35 years of widespread use of the birth control pill and other forms of artificial contraception, I believe we are ready to ask: Is birth control really the solution or is it the problem?

An amazing article came out last month in U.S. News and World Report, not exactly a Catholic magazine. Lionel Tiger who is an evolutionary anthropologist asked why there has been so much family breakdown, male irresponsibility, single parents and abortion since the 1960's. He says the main reason is the massive use of the birth control pill.

There is an alternative. I had the opportunity to take the Creighton University course on Natural Family planning which is offered to doctors, nurses, clergy and NFP practitioners. There have been tremendous advances in Natural Family Planning since the 60s. I hope to say more about that in the future and certainly to share it with our engaged couples and any young married couples. I have also contacted some doctors, women gynecologists right here in Seattle who are willing to work with couples on using natural methods.

When I was in Peru I worked with a married couple and an obstetrician to teach Natural Family Planning. Some 100 couples participated. We also offered a class for young adults, singles, who wanted to be instructors or promoters. Not only young women, but young men attended. Of course the boys could not keep a personal chart as the girls could. So they asked their moms if they could do a chart for them. The course lasted six months and when it was over I asked one of the boys what he had learned. He said to me, "Father, I learned respect for women."

That is what our society needs-and that is what Natural Family Planning promotes. I am convinced that Jesus Christ and the teachings of the Church he founded are the solution to the problems of our society-and our own deepest personal needs.

Like the Caanaite woman we come to Jesus with our needs, with the needs of those we love. If we had her humility, we would also hear Jesus loving words, "Your faith is great. Your prayer is granted."

The Church is a mother to her children, and she will not give them evil gifts. When the People of God cry out: "Show us Jesus Christ! Preach the Gospel to us! Tell us how to attain eternal life," the Church responds, bolstered by her charism of infallibility, with the authentic Gospel entrusted to her by Christ himself. Her goal, like any mother's, is only that her children be happy and fulfilled. Our Lord said: Ask and you will receive that your joy may be full. (Jn. 16.24) He sought to impose no useless burdens on his disciples, but only a light burden and a sweet yoke. Holy Mother Church does not wish to bind up unnecessary burdens either, as the Pharisees did, but she will preach the whole truth, in season and out of season.

This weekend the Church celebrates the 30^th anniversary of a landmark encyclical letter, written by Paul VI, on the regulation of procreation. This document, known as Humanae Vitae, affirmed that God, in his wisdom, arranged that man and woman should cooperate through an act of love with the creation of each new human being. If spouses, consciously and freely, do anything to frustrate the life-giving potential of their married love (that is, by contraception or sterilization), they sin gravely. Today we celebrate the courage of Paul VI in reminding the world of this truth, thanking God for his enlightenment of the Church on this matter. We also pray for the many Catholics who have failed to understand or accept this essential element of the Church's moral doctrine. Many have suspected their mother of giving them a snake when they asked for a fish. Let us pray for these wayward children that the Father give them the Holy Spirit as he has generously promised to do for all who ask!

At the beginning of the 20^th century there was nearly unanimous agreement by religious and civil leaders that contraception was a moral and social evil. In 1930 the Anglican church...wavered and allowed contraception in certain cases. Pius XI reacted immediately with a strong affirmation of the sanctity of marriage, denouncing contraception as directly opposed to it. In the 1960's, Paul VI, while always affirming that he would never consider revising Pius XI's position, undertook a study to see if the new hormonal pills were of a different ethical nature than the contraceptive practices condemned throughout the history of the Church. He declared, 30 years ago yesterday, that they were essentially the same, that is, equally opposed to the sanctity of marriage and the good of the spouses. In so doing, Pope Paul VI opened up for the Church a splendid era of clearer theological understanding of marriage and family and great strides in the development of natural methods of regulating procreation.

It is not possible, of course, nor appropriate to try to explain now the many theological, psychological, social and medical reasons which combine in a sort of symphony to show that Paul VI was indeed speaking on behalf of the Creator and Redeemer of Life when he reaffirmed the unlawfulness of contraception. Rather than present arguments, let us consider the fruit that has come from the general acceptance of contraception, for from its fruits we can know the tree.

The first bad fruit that Paul VI predicted in his letter was promiscuity. Certainly, the last 30 years have seen a dramatic increase in that. Suffice to point out that there is a billboard on highway 895, advertising paternity testing, that asks "Who is the Daddy?" This would have been unthinkable in 1968, but we are not outraged, because we have grown so dulled and deadened by slow increases of immorality.

A related bad fruit is divorce. As soon as the Anglicans allowed contraception in 1930, the divorce rate among Protestants began to rise. A few decades later, when Catholics began to use contraception in significant numbers, the divorce rate among us began to rise, too. Why? The couple cuts itself off from God, the source of love. The man begins to objectify his wife. Her dignity as a woman, the giver of life, is devalued. She feels unloved, and distance between them grows. An authority on love, Mother Teresa, explains: "In destroying the power of giving life or loving through contraception, a husband or wife is doing something to self. This turns the attention to self, and so it destroys the gift of love in him and her. In loving, the husband and wife turn the attention to each other, as happens in natural family planning, and not to self, as happens in contraception."

Mother Teresa continues, mentioning the third bad fruit of contraception. "Once that loving is destroyed by contraception, abortion follows very easily. That's why I never give a child [up for adoption] to a family that has used contraception, because if the mother has destroyed the power of loving, how will she love my child?" And so it is that contraception leads not only to divorce but also abortion. Our present Pope affirms "[T]he popularization of artificial contraception leads to abortion, for both lie-though at different levels-on the same line of fear of the child, rejection of life, lack of respect for the act or the fruit of the union, such as it is established between man and woman by the creator of nature." Technology has now blurred the distinction further so that many products marketed and used as contraceptives actually work by killing newly conceived babies before they can implant. In fact there are many more abortions caused imperceptibly by what is called "contraception" than by surgical means. Thus, tragically, many Catholics have become active cooperators in the culture of death.

Yet there is hope. There are some who have struggled, in Pope Paul VI's words, "against the tide of thought and opinion in a world of paganized behavior." As the Lord surveys the Sodom of our time, he may be able to find "ten just men" amongst it. There are some brave and generous Christians who will always be "the soul of the world," a witness of authentic love in a culture of hedonism and death.

We must convince the world that God has not given his children, through Paul VI, a scorpion when they asked for an egg. He knows what is good for us; he made us. The Church's stand on contraception is not a cold, useless, man-made rule. Rather, Humanae Vitae is part of the Gospel law of liberty; it liberates couples for authentic Christian love. It is possible and joyful to obey for those who have been raised with [Christ] through their belief in the power of God. Let no one think that he cannot fulfill the demands of an authentically human life. As John Paul II encouraged some Indonesian bishops: "Let us never fear that the challenge is too great for our people. They were redeemed by the precious blood of Christ. They are his people... It is he, Jesus Christ, who will continue to give the grace to his people to meet the requirements of his word... what is impossible with man is possible with God." (AAS 71, 1979, p. 1423)

What remains for us is to be what we are: a new creation, a people set apart: "Be not conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewal of your mind," said St. Paul. If you cannot see the beauty of Humanae Vitae: seek and you shall find. If you cannot imagine ever being able to live it: Ask and you shall receive. Never think you have no alternative to sin, but knock and the door will be opened to you.

For many years now, I have been troubled by the manner in which people sometimes enter a restaurant and until recently, I have never understood why. Have you ever noticed what occurs if you happen to park in a restaurant parking lot while another car simultaneously does the same? You have experienced this: the driver of the other car, and his or her party, will have the car unloaded and the party will, without looking at you, walk quickly, while consciously maneuvering to arrive at the restaurant door before you. Once they have reached the door, they ease a bit and casually walk in...before you, of course. Time and time again, I have seen this occur.

The object of the game is getting into the restaurant before the other people so you do not have to wait for a table and can receive your food before everyone else. There is lacking in this, a sense of etiquette, decorum or decency. And why does this "trivial little matter" bother me? Just recently I linked this with a larger trend in our culture, and now I see it as a symptom of something much greater.

We have, as a culture and as an economic system, developed a frightening sense of competition. The people who live in our world are in a desperate mode of heightened rivalry. Why can a man not rush to the door of a restaurant and hold the door for his fellow citizens and allow them to pass first? The answer: because he is in competition with them and he must be careful not to loose his place. Competition is no longer confined to sports or the marketplace. Needless to say, the United States has become quite good at competing. As a nation, we compete to consume a disproportionately large share of the world's natural resources.

As individuals, we compete to make more money in order to acquire a greater portion of goods and services. We compete with each other for fame and prestige. We compete with the clothes we purchase and the make-up we wear. We compete to have the best technological equipment, the best automobiles and the best and largest houses. Simply watch advertisements with a critical eye and see how marketers are manipulating us to compete against one another.

No longer do we see our neighbor as a brother or sister made in the image and likeness of God to be respected and treated with dignity; he or she is a competitor-competing to consume or steal what we have acquired or want to acquire. The implications run deep. Our Holy Father, the defender of all human life, reminds us that:

Rather than embracing the gift of the unborn child, we have come, as a culture, to see the child as a competitor-both on the national level as well as the personal level-"an obstacle to personal fulfillment."

One of the most outspoken promoters of abortion throughout the world has used the United Nations to promote abortion because, as she claims, the world does not have the resources to sustain its population growth. She, and others from our country, have targeted third world countries in particular because we do not want "those people" to consume "our resources." Yet she lives in, not one, but two mansions: one in California and one in Montana. And we wonder, if the world cannot sustain such a great population because of its limited resources, why does she not remove herself from her mansions and freely share the resources she selfishly consumes? Because people have become competitors. She is unwilling to allow life as life may mean the loss of her "things."

Furthermore, if we look past the continuous lies and deceit of the pro-death lobby, we can see on the personal level that the unwanted child is unconsciously perceived as a competitor to his/her own parents. The child competes against the mother and father's own desires, material goods, career plans, financial resources and personal agendas. The killing of over seven thousand weak and defenseless human beings every day because they compete against our own self-centered desires is a crime beyond reckoning.

In addition, children are no longer considered miraculous gifts of God, they have become products. If wanted, these products can be purchased (custom ordered) through artificial reproduction or, if unwanted, they can be aborted or prevented by contraception. A wise man, David C. Stolinsky in an article entitled, "A Nation of Narcissists?" quipped, "Narcissists view their children the way they view their BMW-prized possessions to be shown off. Like the BMW, the kids are pampered but cared for by others, from nannies to daycare providers to teachers, not to mention math tutors and soccer coaches. Many of the joys and pains of having kids are experienced by others. And kids are under pressure to get into the best schools, to provide more grounds for boasting, and to make more money (New Oxford Review, June 2002)."

Is it not time to heed the voice of St. Elizabeth Anne Seton who said, "live simply, that others might live?" Is it not time we cease looking at our brothers and sisters and sons and daughters as competitors for our resources or products to own, and begin to love them as we love ourselves-just as Jesus taught us?

The mystery of parenthood is not difficult to discern. A child comes into our life to crush our selfishness and makes us more human-loving, generous, patient, kind and selfless humans. When the baby begins to cry at 3 AM, a parent learns selflessness, just as I learn selflessness when someone is dying at the hospital at 3 AM. Parents learn selflessness when their six-year-old wants him or her to read her a book, just as I learn selflessness when a teenager wants to go to Confession after I've already heard two hours of confessions. And parents learn selflessness when money must be saved for college or for insurance for the children, just as I learn selflessness when financially limited by my attempt to live simply like Jesus.

I learned a valuable lesson in my last parish. Every Sunday after Mass I was greeted by a man named Doug who was mildly mentally handicapped. Most people today would consider him a drain on society, not contributing to the welfare of the state and worse, competing for the resources that we desire to consume. Many people like Doug are aborted every day-their parents not willing to subject themselves to the trials of raising a special needs baby for such "little" reward.

Doug, to the shock of his family, had a massive heart attack and died suddenly. It was tremendously difficult for his family and friends and the day of the funeral saw a church packed with people: the largest funeral I had witnessed during my time as a priest. Men and women alike outwardly mourned Doug's passing.

The conclusion is not hard to draw. In the eyes of the world, Doug did nothing but consume our precious little resources. But if Doug, indeed, contributed nothing to our culture, our economy, or our society, he certainly taught a huge number of people how to love. In a sense, he was an apostle of love, and the day he was buried, his disciples came in large numbers to say good-bye.

We can learn from Doug that all people are made in God's image and have infinite value and to compete against our brother or sister is to reject all that Christ Jesus revealed to us. As an old Dominican priest once impressed upon me, "be generous with God," he whispered as if telling a secret, "and he will be generous with you." No better way to summarize the calling of parents, priests or any worthwhile vocation.

Closing of the Conference on Humanae Vitae

July 21, 2001

Dear Friends in Christ,

Thirty-three years ago, this month, the birth of Humanae Vitae, Pope Paul VI's definitive encyclical on the transmission of human life, was not accomplished without pain and suffering. I remember well, the travails that our Mother, the Church, went through as this child of wisdom made its way into a world already set on a course of opposition and rejection.

I was Chancellor of the Archdiocese of Washington at the time, and as events unfolded within a few days, I realized that the Church, both the Faithful and the Clergy, and that I myself, would forever be changed by the publication of this momentous and decisive document.

For it was no surprise, but still a great disappointment, when within a day of the publication of Humanae Vitae, more than sixty priests of the Archdiocese of Washington, announced, by publishing it in the Washington Post, their opposition to the teachings of the Holy Father, of the Church, of the magisterium, and we must believe, of the Holy Spirit.

The Cardinal Archbishop of Washington, Patrick O'Boyle, with no happiness about it, called me into his office, and said, "We cannot let this go by. Call every one of the priests named in the protest. Tell them I am suspending their faculties to celebrate the Sacraments, and let them know that I am ready and anxious to speak with each of them individually."

It was undoubtedly one of the hardest moments he had ever faced, and in assisting him at this difficult moment, it was also a moment in time that changed me - for it left upon me the scars of battle, scars we must and will win, if we engage to defend the Church against her opponents, and if we strive to win back, those who have set themselves against the Church and her God-given teachings.

The Church struggles still with the difficulties of putting Humanae Vitae into practice, and part of the reason we are here is to pray for the guidance of the Holy Spirit as we attempt, in our own time, to make this teaching a more accepted and vital part of the Church's ongoing life and mission.

But even Pope Paul VI, in his prophetic wisdom, possibly did not see all the trends, all the movements, all the individual perversities that were to be raised against the sanctity of life in the years since he spoke so forcefully against the comparatively simple sin of artificial contraception.

The evolving disregard for the conception and generation of life, has been, in large part, responsible for even more outrageous acts against life in other phases of its existence. Abortion and euthanasia, the front and back doors of the house of the culture of death, have now opened to reveal rooms of more insidious evil, harbored between these two portals of hell. Eugenics, genetic engineering, cloning, embryonic stem cell research; these are the inevitable progeny of man's arrogant assumption of the management of life, which began with the pro-contraception movements.

Where can it lead from here? We can only wonder, and acknowledge the aptness of the old prayer, which describes the "wickedness and snares of the devil," and admit that the genius of man, when turned to evil, is indeed amazing, and true to the nature of original sin, diabolical as well.

But for the Church, for Catholics, for all spouses who live in the family of the Church, and who wish to make peace with their consciences, Humanae Vitae is far more than a prophecy and a recollection of what could and what did go wrong. Humane Vitae is in fact, the roadmap to marital sanctity and marital stability-and more-it is the map which will ultimately lead to a better world, at least for those who follow its guiding lights.

In this Sunday's Gospel, we hear of a decisive moment in the lives of our Lord's disciples, not a moment of conflict limited to Mary and Martha, not just our Lord's solution to the anger of Martha and perhaps the satisfaction of Mary, but a moment of decision for all Christians. Which is to be the most important focus in life-living a life in service to goodness, or living a life in service to the Lord? The two seem close, and in some cases, seem to be the same thing. But they are not. Ethical people are good people-and we get along with them, respect them, and live with them in peace. But Christians are people who are ethical because they are the Lord's. The goodness which brings salvation comes from devotion to the Lord. Goodness in and of itself saves no one. Christ did not say, "Do good, and that will take care of your sins." Christ said, "You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul and with all your mind... and love your neighbor as yourself." It is clear that love of God must come first, and then the rest will follow.

Such a moment of decision is reflected in the teachings of Humanae Vitae. Plenty of seemingly responsible husbands and wives decide, on their own, that for the good of everyone involved, they must limit the number of lives they will conceive, and that the easiest, most practical way of doing this is by artificial contraception, the unnatural interruption of the act of conception. To do this is to commit the fault of Martha-to put convenience, to put material considerations, to put comfort above the first duty of marriage, which is, to love and serve God by doing His will. And His will, as expressed by the Church, under the guidance of the Holy Spirit, is not to interfere unnaturally with the generation of life. Humanae Vitae is the blueprint for incorporating the will of God into the life of Christian marriage. And the fruits of such obedience are beautifully laid out by Pope Paul VI, when he writes:

Dear friends, these are beautiful promises, but they are promises based on the truth of God. Therefore, they can and do come true, not without difficulty, as Pope Paul reminds us, nor "without the help of God, who upholds and strengthens the good will of men."

May this conference, may the efforts of all who have joined in planning and attending it, may the example that you, our Catholic husbands and wives, set by the way you live your own marriages, and above all, may the help of God, we constantly implore, reinvigorate in our local Church an awareness and appreciation for the great gift of Humanae Vitae, Pope Paul VI's finest and most enduring effort on behalf of the People of God, the Holy Catholic Church.

And may the fruits of tranquility and peace, harvested in your hearts and your homes, by surrendering to the sharp sweetness of God's law, bring new life, new compassion, and new wisdom to the world around us.

This we pray, in our Lord's name. Amen.

We are now in the first Easter Season of the New Millennium. After the great Jubilee Year of grace, we are still reflecting upon the significance of Easter and all that God has done for us through the life, death and resurrection of His Son. We know that remarkable things lie in store for us. With six billion people alive today, and with the advantages of education, science and technology, we have every reason to believe that the 21^st Century will either be a time of heightened religious experience or a time of great peril.

The events of Holy Week and Easter reaffirm God's original plan for us. Jesus came into the world to overcome the damage caused by our sin, the damage caused by our choosing evil over goodness, by preferring our ways over God's ways. We had fallen into a pit out of which we were unable to climb. This necessitated that the Son of God Himself come into our world as one of us, that He teach us how to live this life well, that is, to live the Christian life, and eventually that He lay down His life for us. Remember, Jesus died for our sins once and forever. Christ's body was important for him in His Resurrection and in our Redemption. This tells us something about the importance of our own bodies.

As human beings, we need to understand our condition as a person who has a body. Our bodies are very important. By means of our body, we are present to the world, and the world is present to us. There was never a time when we were absent from our bodies. Our bodies have a definite life cycle which everyone experiences.

We also know that our bodies are gifts to us from God, just as is human life and good health. We are expected to understand our bodies, our bodied condition as a bodied person. We must learn how to respect our bodies and cooperate in allowing our bodies to assist us in living our lives in this world well. We are talking here about God's plan for human life, human love and human family.

We usually take good health for granted, and then begin to abuse it. Take, for example, the gift of taste and eating. We know that we must eat in order to nourish our bodies. Eating is also a very social event. Mealtimes are times when families and friends come together to strengthen their bondedness. Tasty, succulent food enhances the meal.

But if the pleasure of eating becomes an end in itself, if we eat just for the sake of eating, then very soon we do real damage to ourselves and to our bodies. Obesity results, in most cases, from abuses of the body. Wealthy nations have a real problem with obesity. God's plan for eating is that we eat a well-balanced diet and use moderation. Eat for a purpose; don't make the purpose of life mere eating.

In a similar way God has a plan for our fertility and human sexuality. It is important to remember that our bodies and all that they contain are God's gift to us. We had nothing to do with the designing of our bodies; it was strictly God's plan. Parents have relatively little to contribute to the essential physical design of their child's body.

God most assuredly has a plan for our fertility and human sexuality. It is a very good plan. As intelligent and responsible human persons, we are able to know God's plan, to appreciate its goodness, and then to freely choose to live by it.

God's plan includes allowing us to be co-creators with Him, and to provide a means of close bonding between a husband and wife. Although our sexuality provides great pleasure, pleasure is a "companion good" and not the chief focus. Like eating, or drinking, or any other physical activity, sex can be abused. And if the conception of a new human person is involved, a person endowed with our own human dignity, then terrible harm can be done. If a person can be hurt badly by being used as an object for someone's gratification, then there is nothing trivial about sexual behavior.

Our world is very confused about God's plan for fertility and human sexuality. Some people think that they can make up their own rules and define sex anyway they want. It is just a matter of preference or choice. Something like ordering items from a menu in a restaurant. They think this, despite the fact that the human person is the only thing God created for its own sake. "In His own image He made them male and female" (Gen 1:26). Only a person lives forever. Only a person can love and be loved. Only for the sake of a person with such dignity would God send His only Son into the world to atone for our sins by his own suffering and death.

My brothers and sisters, as we move into the new century we are encouraged to be a people of hope and expectation. We know that we have the potential of doing great good. We know that we have received many blessings from God, and that He expects great things from us-even difficult things.

We know that most of the problems on this earth are of our own making, and that we can both correct what is wrong and build up what is good and helpful to others. This requires that we learn God's plan for love, life and the family. It means the total gift of self by a man to his wife, and the total gift of self by a woman to her husband. This means no sex before marriage, and total fidelity within marriage. It means no abortion, sterilization or contraception. It means acquiring the virtue of chastity.

St. John Chrysostom suggests that young husbands should say to their wives: "I have taken you in my arms, and I love you, and I prefer you to my life itself... I place your love above all things, and nothing would be more bitter or painful to me than to be of a different mind than you" (CCC 2346).

Pope John Paul II speaks of fertility as part of mutual self-gift and enhancing the dignity of the human person: "The innate language (of the marital embrace) expresses the total reciprocal self-giving of husband and wife. Contraception is an objectively contradictory language, namely, that of not giving oneself totally to the other. This leads not only to a positive refusal to be open to life but also to a falsification of the inner truth of conjugal love, which is called upon to give itself in personal totality" (FC 32, CCC 2370).

God wants what is best for His sons and daughters. He never asks the impossible-just the plain difficult. Chastity is a difficult virtue; it always has been. Chastity always benefits our marriages, our families, and the wider culture. The absence of chastity always brings great harm and misery to everyone it affects.

I encourage you, at the dawn of a new century and the new millennium, read the encyclical Humanae Vitae. It has a clear formula for happiness and well-being for everyone.

Easter means that we are called to be a people of hope and expectation. We have every right to be optimistic about the future. Indeed, we can be victorious in the struggle between good and evil. We can live a life pleasing to God and beneficial to ourselves. We can keep the Commandments and live the Christian life. This means everyone, since God's call to holiness is universal. His call to holiness is given to everyone, to every culture and to every walk of life. In short, we are all called to become saints, a people who are very close to God.

26 May 2002

This is Trinity Sunday. Following Ascension Thursday and Pentecost, it brings together the involvement of the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit in our salvation. Remember: all three persons of the Blessed Trinity are involved with us, and we with them.

God is the most profound of all mysteries. He is the creator of the entire universe, all that exists. He created all the angels. He created the human race, beginning with our first parents, Adam and Eve. God is one. Christianity is monotheistic, not a polytheistic. But within the one Godhead there are three persons. Three persons in one God. In his full grandeur and complexity, God exceeds our limited vision and our poor understanding. But God has given us ways and means of knowing something about Him. The Father sent His Son among us as one of us. Jesus, in turn, taught us about the Father. And now the Holy Spirit helps us understand the full meaning of Jesus' words.

One very good way to explain the Holy Trinity today is to think of a communion of persons. We know something about what it means to enter into a communion with another person. We make the gift of ourselves to a friend, and accept the gift of our friend to us. There is a sharing of hearts, of minds, of wills, of our very person. Marriage, as God designed it, is the clearest example of this: the husband makes the total gift of himself to his spouse. She accepts his gift, and then offers the total gift of herself to him. And he receives her, appreciating the rich significance of the gift of her person to him, a communion of persons.

Apply this now to God. Among the three persons of God, there is a total communion of love and life. The love of the Father and the Son issues forth in the person of the Holy Spirit. The love, life and creative energy among these three divine persons becomes one dynamic communion, one God: a communion of three persons in one God.

The Vatican II document, Gaudium et spes, speaks about God's design for the communitarian nature of the human vocation: "The Lord Jesus, when praying to the Father 'that they may all be one ... even as we are one' (Jn 17:21-2), has opened up new horizons closed to human reason by indicating that there is a certain similarity between the union existing among the divine persons and the union of God's children in truth and love. It follows, then, that if human beings are the only creatures on earth that God has wanted for their own sake, they can fully discover their true selves only in sincere self-giving" (24).

My brothers and sisters, I want to relate this "communion of persons," and this "making the gift of self" to our situation in these times. The recent sex scandals by some clergy are forcing us to re-examine God's plan for us as bodied persons. We recall that God alone designed human nature, and that He alone designs the moral order. He alone determines what is right and what is wrong.

I am going to talk about God's plan for human love and life, about chastity, and about violations against God's plan, especially contraception and sterilization. You probably have not heard these topics discussed before from this pulpit, or for that matter from other pulpits. And for that we priests are guilty in the negligence of our duty to teach clearly God's plan for human love and human life. I ask you now to forgive us our negligence in performing our duties.

This is a time for all of us to return to the basics about our sexuality, about the fact that we are bodied persons. The natural attraction between a man and a woman (Adam and Eve), the desire to become "one flesh" is good and noble. But this desire must be expressed according to God's design for human love and life. The only proper place for sex is in marriage. Outside of marriage sex is wrong and sinful. It violates God's plan for human love. Similarly, within marriage, God also has a plan. That plan calls for making the total gift of self from one spouse to another, a total sharing of one's self with one's spouse, a communion of persons. This sharing includes our fertility. Sex and fertility go together. We cannot hold back part of the gift and pretend we are giving and receiving the full gift of self.

When we reflect upon the nature of conjugal love, we soon realize that it is both unitive (love-giving) and procreative (life-giving). True love is always life-giving in one way or another. I am a celibate, but my love for you and for others is always life-giving. Contraception and sterilization always go wrong by withdrawing the total gift of self, by attacking the goodness of our fertility and considering it something evil to be destroyed, by refusing to be open to the gift of a new life.

The encyclical Humanae Vitae predicted the tragic results of widespread contraception: a weakening of moral discipline; a trivialization of human sexuality; the demeaning of women; marital infidelity; state sponsored programs of population control; the introduction of legalized abortion and euthanasia, the idea of unlimited dominion over one's body and life as seen now in genetic manipulation and embryo experimentation.

The teaching of Humanae Vitae honors married love, promotes the dignity of women, and helps couples grow in understanding the truth of their particular path to holiness. It is also a response to contemporary society's temptation to reduce life to a commodity.

My brothers and sisters, on this feast of the Blessed Trinity, I encourage you to learn more about God's wonderful plan for human life and human love, about marriage and family. Learn why men and women are the only creatures on earth God wanted for their own sake, and why we can fully discover our true selves only in sincere self-giving.

I encourage you to get a copy of Humanae Vitae and study it. It is a very clear statement of God's plan for human life and human love. I encourage you to learn about Natural Family Planning (NFP), God's way and nature's way of exercising responsible parenthood. NFP helps couples discover something of the richness of their being bodied persons, made "in the image and likeness of God."

Jesus gives a very stern warning this morning when He says that if he refuses to listen even to the Church then treat him as you would a gentile or tax collector. In other words Jesus was telling us if we refuse to listen to his Church, then we're in big trouble. There is one particular moral issue in which surveys, at least, show that many Catholics don't think or act in accordance with the teaching of the Church and that is rather unfortunate indeed. As a priest, of course, following the warning given by the prophet of today's first reading, I have to warn you that on this particular moral issue, many Catholics are off base. They are doing what is wrong and wicked.

Now, what is this moral issue? Probably a lot of you think Father is going to talk about abortion. No, I am not. I am going to talk about an issue which is more fundamental than that, which is morally evil, which opens the door to abortion in our country. It is a moral issue which I think is probably the most important issue today. This evil has done more to undermine our society and our Church than any other. It is so important, in fact that I am going to devote many homilies in a row to this topic. So by now you are probably wondering what is this moral issue?

Well, to introduce it I want to give a little quiz. It is a 3-question true/false quiz. Just answer on your own to yourself; don't shout out the answer.

No Christian church ever accepted contraception as morally permissible before 1930. Is that true or false?

A Protestant legislature, for a largely Protestant America, passed the anti-contraceptive laws of 19th century America, true or false?

The leaders of the Protestant Reformation were strongly opposed to unnatural forms of birth control, true or false?

Let's be honest. How many answered "true" to all 3 of those? That is correct, all 3 are true. It is a his