Tuesday August 19, 2008
Contraception, Abortion and Sterilisation "Attack the Very Foundations of the Human World": Lancaster UK Bishop
By Hilary White
LANCASTER, UK, August 19, 2008 (LifeSiteNews.com) - Bishop Patrick
O’Donoghue of the northern English diocese of Lancaster, has blasted
the contraceptive mentality that has resulted, he said, in the
dissolution of marriage as an institution, endlessly rising abortion
and divorce rates, depressed and even suicidal children, and ultimately
the degradation of an entire society.
"I am convinced that there must be profoundly damaging consequences for
the family in a country where contraception and abortion are so
wide-spread," he writes in a soon-to-be released document.
Artificial contraception, abortion, in vitro fertilisation,
sterilisation and sex outside marriage, are contradictions to the very
core of what it means to be human, Bishop O’Donoghue argues.
The attempt to demote sexuality to a mere recreation activity, removed
from marriage, has degraded what he has called "the Law of Self Gift" -
the "total physical self-giving which is only possible for a man and a
woman who have committed themselves to one another until death, as
husband and wife."
This Law of Self Gift is, he writes, the "reason why the Church is so
adamantly against sterilisation, contraception, abortion and sex
outside marriage."
"These acts, because they contradict and negate the God given meaning
of the human person, attack the very foundations of the human world."
In his lengthy and comprehensive document that is due for publication
next week, "Fit for Mission? Church", Bishop O’Donoghue writes that
sexuality is "not purely biological, but concerns the innermost being
of each person." He warns that the Church needs to return to the truth
of its teaching on sexuality and traces the increase in abortion and
divorce, as well as depression and mental illness among young people,
to the denial of the truth about contraception.
"These statistics," he says, "reveal the shocking depth and extent of
the suffering and impoverishment of so many families and children due
to the separation of the unitive and procreative nature of sexual love,
and the wide-spread practice of pre-marital sexual behaviour."
Citing official 2006 statistics, Bishop O’Donoghue deplores the 193,700
unborn children killed through abortion that year, including the 2000
children killed who "may" have suffered some kind of disability and the
3,990 abortions carried out on girls under age 16 - the age of consent.
Fewer marriages, fewer children, and children raised in families
without the inherent stability afforded by true marriage has undermined
the happiness of children and ultimately of the whole nation, the
bishop says. He notes the spiritual and emotional malaise of a society
without strong families. More than one quarter of all children under 16
in Britain, he writes, "regularly feel depressed" and between
2006-2007, 4,241 children under 14 attempted to commit suicide.
"No wonder so many children are suffering depression and mental illness
in a country that is such a hostile environment for human life. No
wonder divorce is so prevalent when family life is so often
characterised by a lack of generosity or self-giving love."
The bishop has called on both clergy and laity, especially at the
parish level, to defend and promote the Church's teaching against
artificial contraception and the meaning of sexuality. "We, the
Catholic Church, must be more confident and proactive in presenting our
rich and fulfilling understanding of marriage, sexual love and the
family."
In the larger context of the 92 page document, Bishop O’Donoghue has
asked Catholics for input on what they hope to see in the future of the
Catholic Church in the Lancaster diocese and in England overall.
Bishop O’Donoghue received widespread plaudits from parents and other
Catholics concerned by the erosion of Catholic teaching on diocesan
schools earlier this year when he released his previous document "Fit
for Mission? Schools." In that document he called for all the schools
of his diocese to re-commit themselves to the teachings of the Catholic
Church, especially on marriage, family and life issues.
He asked for crucifixes to be placed in every classroom, for
"sex-education" to be based exclusively on the principles of chastity
and the sanctity of marriage, that schools do no fundraising for
anti-life groups and religious education be based firmly in the
Catechism of the Catholic Church.
This document resulted in his being hauled before a Parliamentary
committee, secularist members of which demanded to know if the Catholic
Church were returning to a previous "doctrinaire" or "fundamentalist"
attitude towards its education system. Bishop O’Donoghue responded that
teaching Catholicism in a Catholic school, their "prime duty",
constituted neither "fundamentalism" nor "proselytism."
Read related LifeSiteNews.com coverage:
UK Catholic Bishop Before Parliament for Insisting on Crucifixes in Every Classroom and Truly Catholic Sex-Ed
http://www.lifesitenews.com/ldn/2008/mar/08031206.html
To contact Bishop O’Donoghue
Phone: (01524) 596050
Cathedral House,
Balmoral Road,
Lancaster, UK
LA1 3BT
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