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Freedom or Bondage
by Gerri Laird
(Special to the Herald)
The Washington Post recently carried a story about the "Morning After Kit," which medical advocates have termed "the best kept secret in America." The article touts this item as the "new emergency contraceptive (which) gives women a second chance to prevent pregnancy." How does the "emergency kit" work? First, the woman takes a pregnancy test. If the test is positive, she is instructed not to take the pills since they will have no effect. If the test is negative, she takes two tablets followed by another dosage 12 hours later within three days of intercourse. Women are advised to take Dramamine or Benadryl an hour before taking the pills in order to avoid nausea or vomiting. Other side effects include headaches, sore breasts, dizziness, and delayed menstruation.
Writer Sandra Boodman insinuates that somehow this "kit" will free women from worry after they have engaged in sexual activity. She describes two scenarios to support this belief. In the first situation Boodman relates a story about a 32-year-old female computer programmer who panicked when she discovered that her boyfriend's condom had broken. She realized she might get pregnant. After "freaking out," she "got on the Internet and logged onto the Planned Parenthood web site." Within minutes she had a list of five doctors and five drugstores that dispense "emergency contraceptive pills." The next morning she "made a beeline for a drugstore," so she could "get this taken care of as soon as possible." And where was her boyfriend? He "was still asleep" as she dashed off in the morning in a frenzy.
In the second scenario, a 32-year-old veterinary technician agonized after having "unprotected" sex with her boyfriend. She "woke up the next morning gripped by worry and regret. (The Morning After Kit) was a lifesaver for me," she said. She didn't want to face another abortion.
Where is love in a sexual relationship which seeks to destroy the very product of its own behavior? Women who use their free will to choose contraception and/or sex outside of marriage may experience several unwanted freedoms as well, including: freedom to experience painful side effects from contraception, freedom to contract STDs or AIDS, freedom to encounter the nightmares of a past or present abortion, and freedom to experience rejection when the boyfriend decides to leave. Do women really desire such "freedoms?"
The kit demonstrates just how far we have wandered from the truth about the human person. Women who allow themselves to be used by men through unloving sexual behaviors are in bondage. In the name of liberation, they have unknowingly become slaves to men, to their own passions, and to the pills and gadgets which are the gods they obey in order to minimize the consequences of their actions.
Pope Paul VI warned us about this loss of dignity for women and the subsequent destruction of the family in 1968 when he wrote "Of Human Life." Several of his predecessors also provided advice to women on the importance of maintaining behaviors which respected the dignity of all persons. Pope Pius X recommended that American Catholic women drive out divorce, give prudent counsel in education of youth, and put a stop to the plagues of social life - the sickening license of entertainments, obscenity of books and conversation, and immodest dress.
Pope Benedict XV explained that when women openly depart from the path of virtue, all training by the family or the state is easily destroyed. Pope Pius XI stressed that if women ceased to reign as queens of the home, family life would collapse, and eventually the nation would crash just like a frame building whose foundation and pillars had decayed. Pope Pius XII pointed out that the equal dignity of man and woman cannot be preserved unless the characteristic spiritual and physical qualities of each sex be recognized and respected. He also remarked that, "To live today in our great cities without loss of faith and purity requires no less heroism than was needed in the days of bloody persecution."
Pope John Paul II continuously writes and speaks about the dignity of the human person and has developed a theology of the body and theology of the family. The Holy Spirit is still guiding us through the Church. Ultimately, women (and men) are free to respond as they choose, but the consequences of their actions will reverberate throughout history and throughout eternity.
Laird is coordinator of Project Rachel for
the Diocese of Arlington
Copyright ©1998 Arlington Catholic Herald, Inc. All rights reserved.
This article was published in the Arlington
Catholic Herald,
200 N. Glebe Rd., Suite 607, Arlington, VA 22203; Vol 23, No 41;
dated Oct 15, 1998, on page 5.
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A note from the Web Master:
It is noteworthy and honorable that some folks are willing to stand up for a ban on Partial-Birth Abortion. Let us not forget that Abortion is also murder. We must understand that murder is murder no matter the method. Because one method of abortion seems to be horrible does not justify the other methods. We should be horrified and sickened by any Abortion regardless of the method. The Fifth Commandment spells it out clearly: "Thou shalt not kill." A fetus is a person, a human being with a God given soul. Imagine the pain the Lord must feel when any Abortion occurs. Please contact both of your Senators and Representative, via letter or phone, to let them know how horrified you are that Abortions are legal and to stop Partial-Birth Abortions and all other Abortions as soon as possible.
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