A Catholic context

I'd like to respond to Christopher Rakovec's "Losing Amnesty" (Oct. 11) on the subject of abortion and Catholicism. For the record, I strongly disagree with abortion. I, however, cannot condone withholding support from a highly reputable human rights organization on the false assertions that artificial birth control has never been condoned within Catholic tradition and that antagonistic confrontation can produce social justice.

John XXIII threw open many doors within the church by calling the Second Vatican council. However, John's brief pontificate is too frequently delineated by the Council. In 1963, shortly before his death, he called for a Papal Birth Control Commission. After his death, Paul VI increased the commission to 72 participants, including 16 theologians, 16 bishops and cardinals, 13 medical experts, and five women.

This commission spent three years on research, testimony, and discussion. Sixty-five commission members eventually signed the 1966 majority report, arguing that artificial birth control was not evil (and thus, not sinful) and that Catholic couples ought to decide family planning strategies for themselves. One participant, Patty Crowley, was a wife and mother who deeply affected the commission by frank and open testimony about her life experiences as a married Catholic. Only four theologians, two bishops, and one cardinal dissented from this monumental step forward in Catholic social teaching.

So, what happened? The minority of reactionary clergy wrote a dissenting opinion. Both documents found their way into the press by 1967, raising public expectations that the church would soon join the wider Christian community on this issue, especially since the Roman Catholic Church had taken major ecumenical steps in council only two years before. The Anglican Church had allowed limited use of birth control in the Lambeth Conference of 1930, and many, if not most, Protestant denominations had already taken similar positions. Paul VI slammed the door on Catholic social dialogue with his 1968 encyclical "Humanae Vitae." Paul chose to insist on natural family planning alone, blithely disregarding three years of work by dozens of individuals who he had charged with this task. What is the point of creating a commission to study an issue if you will overrule their decision when you disagree?

Let's assume that the pope could legitimately choose to ignore the commission's overwhelming conclusion. We still face the crisis of moral triumphalism - the March for Life represents an attack on people who choose to support Roe v. Wade. Again, for the record, I have attended the march for nearly a decade. Speaking from personal experience, marchers are not storming down Pennsylvania Avenue to win hearts and minds. They are there to intimidate politicians and square off with ideological foes.

This is all the more distressing given the fact that this law's existence is ultimately irrelevant. Prohibition became an opportunity for people to defy federal law; the illegality of drinking in no way dissuaded those who chose to do it. Do current drinking laws impact the social choices of our underage student body? I think not. Why can't we, who feel so strongly about this issue, choose to support Birthright International rather than chant slogans down in Washington, D.C.? From all the money now spent on travel and signs, Birthright, which provides "caring, non-judgmental support to girls and women who are distressed by an unplanned pregnancy," could afford to offer a well-funded alternative to Planned Parenthood, thereby encouraging a society where abortion becomes unnecessary. It's time to face the fact that President Bush is no friend of the Catholic Church, and not simply due to the Iraq conflict. His cuts to welfare have made it far harder for single mothers to survive financially, and this critical decision far outweighs the estimated 300 babies saved annually through his Partial Birth Abortion Ban.

If we stand on principle, let it be a positive one. Inflammatory rhetoric toward organizations like Amnesty International can only feed anti-Catholic hostility and deepen social divisions. If we can alter the cultural ethos of the United States one soul at a time, their position on the issue will eventually become immaterial. We must take economic steps to make the choice against abortions a more practical reality at home and abroad. We must stand with outstretched hands, saying, "We are here with God's love in our hearts, please let us share it."

Aaron Lemmon is a senior in the College of Arts & Sciences.