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The media is quickly spreading word that the Pope supposedly changed the Church's teaching on contraception. I would like to note three things:
1) The Pope has done no such thing. What he actually said is much, much different:
Vi possono essere singoli casi giustificati, ad esempio quando una prostituta* utilizza un profilattico, e questo può essere il primo passo verso una moralizzazione, un primo atto di responsabilità per sviluppare di nuovo la consapevolezza del fatto che non tutto è permesso e che non si può far tutto ciò che si vuole. Tuttavia, questo non è il modo vero e proprio per vincere l'infezione dell'Hiv. È veramente necessaria una umanizzazione della sessualità.
In English:
There may be a basis in the case of some individuals, as perhaps when a prostitute* uses a condom, where this can be a first step in the direction of a moralization, a first assumption of responsibility, on the way toward recovering an awareness that not everything is allowed and that one cannot do whatever one wants. But it is not really the way to deal with the evil of HIV infection. That can really lie only in a humanization of sexuality.
In other words, the Pope is simply saying that a prostitute who uses a condom to avoid spreading HIV is trying to be morally responsible, and that this failed attempt to be morally responsible is at least step in the right direction. He does not mean to say that it is morally good to use a condom.
* The official English translation says male prostitute, but the Italian being 'una prostituta' (both feminine words), there is no grammatical basis for adding the word 'male'. The translator probably adds 'male' because he assumes that only a male prostitute is capable of using a condom, but there are female condoms, so that would be bad reasoning. Based on the use of femenine words, I agree with the idea that the Pope means a prostitute in general (the female word is in this case used generically for both sexes, prostituto being relatively rare) and is just not thinking about the details entailed.
2) The Pope has NOT used his Papal authority in making such a statement. Popes rarely do when they speak in these informal contexts. Needless to say, the statement is not the infallible (or even authentic) teaching of the Catholic Church. It is merely the opinion of a part-time theologian who happens to be Pope as well. As the Holy Father himself admits (in the book that contains the comment in question), "[i]t goes without saying that the Pope can have private opinions that are wrong." To take Pope Benedict's comment on condoms for prostitutes as authoritative Papal teaching is to confuse and identify the person of Josef Ratzinger with the office of Supreme Pontiff.
3) Now that, not only the media, but also theologians and even bishops, are proclaiming to the world the purported good news that the Church has finally opened her mind and reversed her teaching on contraception, and that condoms are now 'OK' in certain cases, we should take time to reflect on the fact that not everything that comes out of the mouth of the Holy Father is said with prudence. It was clearly imprudent of him to make such a statement. The Supreme Pontiff is infallible (and then again, only in certain, limited contexts), but not omni-prudent. This may sound like heresy to a neo-conservative, but the dogma of papal infallibility has nothing to do with prudence. Without detriment to his infallibility, the Holy Father is certainly capable of making errors in practical judgment, as has happened many times in history (e.g., Pope Honorius's case, the Avignon popes, the calling of Vatican II, Pope Paul VI's liturgical reforms, etc.). And this comment on condoms is another clear example of papal imprudence. As has happened with Pope John Paul II's Assisi meetings, papal apologies, kissing of the Qur'an, etc., now Catholic apologists, catechists, ethics professors, and moral theologians will have to work hard for years to undo the enormous damage that this new comment from the Pope is already causing in public opinion.
23 comments:
Good write-up!
Thanks for answering, Dr. R. God bless you guys!
Steph
I'd be very careful calling the Pope a part-time theologian. Or imprudent for that matter. Are we not all adults? Do we really not understand what the Holy Father means? While I appreciate the careful translation from Italian as well as re-iteration on infallibility, why is it that it is precisely in the conservative circles that I often hear as much disrespect as I do in liberal ones?
Dear Kinga,
I do not mean disrespect when I say he acted imprudently or that he is a part-time theologian. He IS a part-time theologian as he does not exercize the profession (theological teaching or research) on a full-time basis. He is engaged full-time in an infinitely higher office, but one that does not make him incapable of holding theological opinions.
Plus, I think the Holy Father can act imprudently, and this comment was imprudent. I mean that in all honesty.
You may disagree, but please do not read bad intentions into my words.
Also, I am not a 'conservative', at least in the common acceptation of that word, but rather a traditional Catholic. (Cf. Christopher Ferrara, 'The Great Facade').
God bless.
PS. I think it is important to point out that it was an imprudent comment (and to defend the possibility and fallibility of Our Holy Father) lest his words cause scandal.
One of the problems with conservatives is that they tend to think that the Pope can do no wrong and everything he says or does has the stamp of Papal authority, such that if he ever affirms a false, scandalous, or dangerously ambiguous opinion, everyone must follow. This is not the traditional Catholic (or, for that matter, correct) understanding of Papal authority and infallibility.
Greetings and thank you for your reply. I realize that the 'condom statement' is going to cause a stir and that it might call for additional clarification. I do not see why it should warrant a scandal, but I realize that it probably will.
Still - teaching and research do not make someone a theologian. Theology is not really a profession in this sense. Teaching and research can fashion someone into a scholar, but not a theologian. I would like to stress that the present Holy Father is a theologian: his learning, his commitment, his life's work, and his office as the Pope make him a theologian.
I wish this idea of a theologian would come up in better setting rather than a contraception (mis)statement - I think it's worth exploring.
Best regards,
Kinga
Now I think you're using 'theologian' in an equivocal sense. I'm using it in the standard academic sense, whereas you are using a more profound sense of the term.
When I said he was a part-time theologian and that he has his own theological opinions, I mean that in the academic sense. He is Pope, but that doesn't take away his role as a mere theologian. In other words, just because he is pope, that does not mean he cannot give a non-binding theologian's opinion. That is what he is doing in this book and what he and John Paul II did in similar books (e.g., Crossing the Threshold of Hope, Ratzinger's Report, etc.). The main point is that those are not authoritative statements of doctrine, regardless of how high their position is in the Church.
"There may be a basis in the case of some individuals, as perhaps when a prostitute* uses a condom, where this can be a first step in the direction of a moralization, a first assumption of responsibility, on the way toward recovering an awareness that not everything is allowed and that one cannot do whatever one wants. But it is not really the way to deal with the evil of HIV infection. That can really lie only in a humanization of sexuality."
Yes, this is profound. Let's make other applications, for instance when a mass murdering cannibal uses a napkin to wipe the corner's of his face is the first step to moralizing the act. No wait, using a napkin to wipe food off one's face isn't intrinsically evil like using contraception. No parity there. What about this notion that using contraception to avoid disease is a first step to moralization? Is animal fear the first step to a moral act? Is the prostitute really an altruist or rather a fearful pragmatist that uses this instrument to further bestial behavior? Ah, I have a parity. The human sacrifice of the pagans was a praiseworthy effort in the attempt to worship a false god -- the first step in realizing that a god should be worshipped and the picking of a particular victim was the realization that we can't have everything we want. Or I wonder if we can look at this from the aspect of social justice. The prostitute is simply trying to earn a living and the 'tools of the trade' are simply to make ends meet.
This is a disaster, the word on the street is that the Pope is approving condoms for homosexual prostitutes.
Perhaps its not the fault of the Pope's that there's a world so willing to misinterpret but that is the way the world is.
Can anyone explain how an intrinsically evil act could be considered as a step to 'moralizing' the act itself? I think this small statement reveals much about the destructive mind of the Pope and neo-modernists in general. Reality is inverted to serve the god of humanity.
Anonymous,
The prostitute who uses a condom to prevent infecting his customers with AIDS is, expressed formally, a case of the following: an agent P who commits an immoral act a that, besides harming P, also harms another person on two counts, H1 and H2.
Suppose P habitually performs a without caring about the harm done to the other person.
Suppose one day P's conscience stars showing very limited signs of activity, and tells P (erroneously, to no surprise) that perhaps he should use means m to prevent harm H2.
Suppose m is intrinsically evil, but P does not know that--whether his ignorance is culpable is irrelevant.
Suppose P thinks (erroneously) that he is doing less harm by using m than by not using it.
Before his moral conscience spoke, P was performing a and voluntarily causing H2, whereas now he is trying to prevent H2.
This new circumstance can be seen as a subjective attenuating circumstance, one that reduces he culpability of P by a negligibly small degree.
The point that the means employed, m is objectively immoral is beside the point, because we are simply judging the subjective disposition of P, not the objective morality of the exterior act (or object).
In the end, the culpability of P is still great; the use of m does not in any way justify a. In fact, even if m were morally neutral, it would not justify a.
I believe that is, in analytic terms, what the Holy Father is saying. It is, in the strictest sense, true.
Yet this is a minute theological point that has no place in a popular book as The Light of the World. It has its place in the scientific field of moral theology, in the confessional and in spiritual direction, not in the popular media, which, of course, is very much willing and able to blow it way out of proportion. Like most of the nuances of sexual moral treatises, this one is just too much to handle for the simple-minded as they are very capable of causing scandal. There is a good reason why invariably ALL books on sexual ethics before the middle of the Twentieth Century were written in Latin.
That is a chimerical analysis. All men intend a good end in every act, every evil intent is accidental. Thus, if we were to extend the Pope's fanciful subjectivism, one could assert that all sin, all moral evil can be viewed paradoxically as the beginning of 'moral awakening'. I grasp the obvious notion that considered in itself, abstracting from the act, that the intention to avoid disease could be considered altruistic. So to a fornicator who desires to have children or the thief who steals at night to avoid being caught so as not to disgrace his good name. The problem is that such noble intentions, if they truly exist, are vitiated by the evil object. In the concrete, this device actually facilitates the evil act. They desire to engage in moral evil and use a device in order to accomplish this end in order to avoid adverse biological consequences. Consequently, far from a noble desire to humanize sex, this device is rather an expression of the clever use of technology to order to accomplish a disordered end. The Pope has managed to invert all moral science.
Your post on the Judaism issue was a good summary, where did it go? Did they get to you too???!!!
I agree that the act is hopelessly vitiated. And in fact, the contraceptive means introduces a new malice that was not there before.
But since the Pope is not denying that, one cannot accuse him of saying something false. Not that he is incapable of saying something false (my Judaism comment--it is now a new post, by the way--shows that). But in the condom comment he is not saying something false.
I am on your team--believe me--but I do not think that my analysis was chimerical.
Not all ends are good, by the way. Only the ultimate end. Some ends are evil. Aquinas' example is almsgiving for the sake of vainglory, which is evil on account of the end, not the object.
The man who uses a condom in order to prevent harm to his neighbor is not beginning to 'moralize' the sex act at all, he simply doesn't wish to do that kind of harm to his accomplice. This kind of thinking has nothing to do with beginning to see the goodness of sex. If anything, it is an even further expression of contempt for it. The robber who does not desire to murder his victim can't be considered anything positive with regard to morality. It's just that his depravity hasn't reached such heights. I understand your analysis and I shouldn't have called it chimerical. I simply deny its relevance.
I understand that the interviews were in German, and that the German published version does indeed speak of a "male prostitute," unlike the Italian.
I wonder what the reaction has been in Italy, and whether the seeming mistranslation into Italian has modified the discussion of Benedict XVI's comments.
Do you concede that the use of M in your example cannot even logically be construed as asserting a moral view upon A? The only inference that can be drawn is that the moral agent understands H2 as an evil that they do not want to impose upon another. At this point, nothing can be stated with regard to A because it is an entirely separate end. In the concrete moral realm, as a matter of fact, the use of M implies a yet further denial of the end of A, which is exactly the opposite of the moral analysis of the Pope. So the only "moral awakening" in the Pope's scenario is the fact that the moral agent does not wish to do his neighbor that particular kind of harm. The understanding of the 'sex act' itself is an entirely separate question. I think that is the essence of the problem if my summary made any sense.
for a similar, but more critical take on the situation: http://athanasiuscm.blogspot.com/2010/11/much-ado-about-latest-vatican-gaffe.html
My God, this is so Catholic! Having a good new after decades, and then some people saying:
"These weren't his words"
"He didn't mean that"
"Not yet condom freedom"
"He can be wrong"
"He is wrong"
etc.
Boy, Popes have made blunders in history. This Pope had some unfortunate words about Muslims some years ago, but never a lot of cranks went up in the net saying that he can be wrong. Now, that for a special miracle moment in History he finally says something that has meaning and opens hope for millions of Catholics (for those who are not Catholics, couldn’t bother less with Catholic quirks, antics and moral theology) some killjoys come out to say that THIS TIME he can be wrong. How dishonest, how sick!
Dear (last) anonymous,
We traditionalists have been saying he's wrong all along! And we agree with you that it's about time that main-stream (neo-conservative) Catholics come to the realization that he can be, and is often, wrong.
You should read Ferrara's The Great Facade for a different take on Catholicism.
A couple of problems I see with the Pope's comments -
Male/Male relationships - A condom is not contraception, however male/male relationships are sinful and should not even be discussed in this way. To do so makes them seem like legitimate relationships. Condoma cannot make a sinful act less sinful in this case. The act is abominable no matter what. In addition, the use of a condom here in order not to spread Aids really has nothing to do with gaining a little morality. It is a way to escape the consequences/punishment for sin. These relationships are more prone towards contracting Aids, and those who already have Aids may be punished with jail for knowingly spreading it, so they use a condom to protect themselves (and others indirectly). So they basically find away to commit a very immoral act without suffering the consequences. Condoms make it easier for them to do so and to do so more often. I guess we are to assume that humans are nothing more than animals without reason, incapable of restraining themselves - they must have sex and cannot help it so we have to help them do it safer?
Next, for the male/female relationships - married or not - condoms are a form of contraception and are wrong. As for using them to stop the spread of Aids - the same comments from above would stand here, too. So we woulod have the sin of fornication for those not married, plus the use of a condom on top of it, and again no restraint because we are appearantly animals and must have s*x at will? Is that correct? Again, condoms make it easier to sin in this case - they do not show an awakening of any sort. They encourage selfishness and lack of control.
It is highly unlikely that the use of a condom shows that someone is showing signs of increased morality but more likely increased selfishness.
Oh, let's not forget that even in the secular world of immorality, there are 'ethics' to immorality. Using a condom is one of their ethics - hardly an awakening to faith or morality.
Hello,
What can you say about these posts? Why is Contraception Necessary outside Marriage?
Moral Exemptions in Contraceptive Use: What the Pope Really Meant?
The Morality of giving Emergency Contraceptives to Victims of Rape
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