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Pope Paul VI, Sexual Harassment, and the Pill: Maybe We Should Have Listened
Really want to rile things up at this year’s Christmas party? Bring up Pope Paul VI’s encyclical Humanae Vitae. That’s the one in which Paul VI shot down the hope that sex was nothing more than a whole lot of fun. He said no to artificial contraception. So be warned. By the time the discussion is over the guests at the holiday bash may want to kill you.
Humanae Vitae is the ultimate offense against the sexual revolution. The Pope declared (can you believe this guy?) that artificial contraception is an offense against God and the laws of nature; that the use of the pill is intrinsically evil, and the result of such means will be the utter collapse of virtually all moral standards.
What a kook.
Except maybe the Pope had it right. At least it kind of feels that way in light of the daily revelations of sexual abuse. It’s almost become a cliché to say that powerful men are forcing women to give it up and shut-up. As the stories go on ad nauseam—and in nauseating detail—it’s worthwhile to ask how we got to this low estate.
Sexual harassment is nothing new, of course. The Book of Genesis tells of powerful men forcing themselves on women:
The Nephilim were on the earth in those days, and also afterward, when the sons of God came in to the daughters of men, and they bore children to them. Those were the mighty men who were of old, men of renown. (Genesis 6:4).
Sound familiar? Harvey Weinstein, Matt Lauer, John Conyers, and countless other men in high places now stand accused of using their power to satisfy their overweening (and bizarre, or used to be) sexual appetites. It’s becoming so regular a feature of the news cycle that it’s almost impossible to watch the news or read the newspaper without having a vomit bag at the ready.
But there’s something particularly vile about the stuff coming out these days. Mona Charen has it right:
…sexual harassment has become grosser than it was a few decades ago. I know of a few women who faced harassment in the 1970s and 1980s (myself included), but honestly, it was practically as polite as a Victorian drawing room compared with the stories we are hearing now about Louis C.K. or Harvey Weinstein or Mark Halperin. Womanizers used to at least make an effort at seduction. Now they seem to act out repellent narratives from porn movies.
I’ve never watched “Mad Men,” but I gather from my wife’s description that the mad men are interested in, you know, actually sleeping with women. They manipulate women but don’t manipulate themselves in front of women. Today’s harassment isn’t Don Draper’s old-fashioned sexual dilly-dallying. These days, onanism in front of the ladies is the source of real satisfaction, calculated to degrade. Weinstein and company don’t even see the women in front of them. Instead, it’s teenage Playboy stuff. For the Harvey Weinstein sort of sexual abuser, actual women are nothing more than breathing dirty pictures–and as easily thrown away. Matt Lauer’s bag of sex toys is the same thing: the focus is on the machine, something inhuman. The women are no more than a techno-tool for base gratification.
Needless to say, there isn’t much romance here.
Paul VI saw the train wreck coming. He warned that artificial contraception would ultimately lead to utter dehumanization of women:
- Responsible men can become more deeply convinced of the truth of the doctrine laid down by the Church on this issue if they reflect on the consequences of methods and plans for artificial birth control. Let them first consider how easily this course of action could open wide the way for marital infidelity and a general lowering of moral standards. Not much experience is needed to be fully aware of human weakness and to understand that human beings—and especially the young, who are so exposed to temptation—need incentives to keep the moral law, and it is an evil thing to make it easy for them to break that law. Another effect that gives cause for alarm is that a man who grows accustomed to the use of contraceptive methods may forget the reverence due to a woman, and, disregarding her physical and emotional equilibrium, reduce her to being mere instrument for the satisfaction of his own desires, no longer considering her as his partner whom he should surround with care and affection.
The essence of Paul VI’s reasoning lies in his understanding that everything in creation has a final cause, which can be loosely defined as a “purpose.” To forget this, to elevate secondary causes like pleasure above the final cause, generally won’t end well. The final cause of a gun is to kill. We forget that at our peril. It’s a remarkably bad idea to juggle a half-dozen six-shooters in front of a live audience. Just ask the audience.
Sex has a final cause too. It’s how people make babies (I hope that’s obvious). Set the babies aside, encourage a sexual free-for-all, and see where that gets you: Abortion, STDs, and Kevin Spacey, to name just a few of the many delights of never having to say no.
Paul VI was vilified for his defense of truth and the lessons of sin. He was arguably the most reviled Pope of the 20th century. But nowadays he sounds more like a prophet than a spoilsport. I would argue that the Blessed Pope was the greatest Vicar of the 20th Century. John Paul II is rightly beloved, but he was also widely admired. Paul VI was scorned, but things have a way of bursting out all over when reality exposes consequences. Over the years I’ve heard many Catholic intellectuals describe Paul VI as a weak Pope. Yeah, right. Maybe they should take note of his enormous courage in reaffirming ancient Church teaching against near absolute opposition. Paul VI had Hemingway’s grace under fire–guts.
I’m not trying to convert anybody here, but the truth is that the Catholic Church has a genius for understanding human nature. She understands that men are driven to seek pleasure and avoid pain–often to the point of catastrophe. As Paul VI explained, human beings require external restraints to help them to reach true happiness. Absent limits, the average human being is liable to sink into utter depravity. To paraphrase Jack Kemp, if you want more of something, make it free.
But don’t be surprised when the gift giver turns out to be one of those Greek guys.
Published in General
I am almost 50 years old; in my entire life, I have never encountered or even heard of anyone remotely like Harvey Weinstein, and most of the people I have been around are far from saints. What we are hearing out of Hollywood, Manhattan, and D.C. is very bizarre to me, and not my experience at all. It’s like those places are on a different planet, or something.
I agree with the Pope that the pill is intrinsically evil, and according to some former employees of Planned Parenthood, it is nowhere near as effective as it is touted to be. I agree that sex outside of marriage is a bad thing, the sexual revolution has been a disaster: I agree with all of that, but I don’t think it’s right to blame Harvey Weinstein’s behavior on the pill, even though the pill is evil, we can’t blame everything on it.
The vast majority of American men live their whole lives without ever sexually assaulting anyone. We can’t blame everything on the culture.
Is this perhaps why the Catholic Church, and the Vatican in particular is crammed to the gills with homosexual men who engage in cocaine-fueled orgies in the Holy See? Darn it. Those aren’t supposed to be going on where people can find out about them! Gay sex is the ultimate contraceptive, after all.
Look: I’m not trying to burst anybody’s bubbles here, but is it just possible that like every other public policy and personal conduct decision, there are both positive and negative consequences that derive from them, and that even though some people misuse this technology that those who appropriately apply them don’t also stand in the company of the devils?
;)
The Pill has also corrupted the children. Young women are guaranteed abortions without their parents’ knowledge, much less consent; while they are forbidden to take an aspirin at school. More of what Feminism hath wrought.
A priest acquaintance of mine used to frequently state, from the pulpit (good for him!), that abortion was the flower, contraception the root. It was his opinion that we would never get rid of abortion as long as contraception was widely used and approved of, because there would always be a need for a “back up” in case the contraception failed. After all, contraception promotes the illusion of consequence-free sex, and if that’s not the case, there needs to be a way to clean up those unintended consequences.
I think you’re missing the point. It was Paul VI’s observation that artificial contraception, which separates sex from its natural end, would lead to devaluation of the moral standards upon which cultures thrive. Harvey isn’t the only guy who does what he did. And I’m not suggesting a direct link in the case of any particular individual. But it is hard to miss the connection between what the Pope predicted and what Mona describes in the increasing creepiness of sexual abusers. AC quite literally un-sexes sex by rendering the act a biological nullity. That is literally dehumanizing, and from the looks of things women are, as Paul said they would, denied the respect to which they are do as women.
Well, first. Paul VI was the first Pope to call attention to what he called “the smoke of Satan” inside the Vatican. He meant homosexuality among many of the clergy. The Church needs to firmly root this out, but there is no arguing that it is deeply entrenched, and the battle to be rid of it will take a very long time. I’m not sure Francis is up to the task, or that he’s even paying it much heed. The laity need to insist that the evil be excised, including withholding contributions to large institutions that aren’t taking a firm and resolute stand against this. Hit ’em in the pocketbook…that will wake up a lot of Bishops. I don’t want to get too much into this on this thread, but the laity has also been fed a load of bunk on sexual matters, has succumbed to sexualization of the culture, and fallen well short of the duty to rid the Church of foul influences. Here’s hoping.
Are there positive things about AC? If there are I’m having trouble seeing them. The population is shrinking so quickly, and the number of retirees is rising so precipitously, that before long the younger generations are going to be virtually enslaved. Worse, more and more young people are saying that don’t want to have children at all–20% of young women, according to a Time Magazine article back in January. Thanks to plummeting population, the Western Heritage in Europe is collapsing, perhaps irrecoverably. America is floating down the river in its own leaky boat.
This may be totally at odds with the modern ethos, but we need more kids now and plenty of them.
Are you seriously arguing this? The American population has done nothing but increase – as has world population at a faster rate. We’re the third largest nation in the world. It seems to me that a little bit of birth control in certain areas would produce positive benefits.
I prefer quality over quantity. The undeniable fact is that improving standards of living is accomplished by improvement of human capital, not increases in human numbers. Elsewise, China should have always been the world leader in quality of life.
The nation isn’t likely to be twice as awesome with 600 million people, and I don’t want to find out what that would be like either.
You can think of none? This seems impossible.
You’re a very intelligent man, but are you truly telling me that intellectually, you can see zero positive benefits from it? Perhaps your preferences in this regard and clouding your ability to dispassionately assess the situation.
Which then means “never.” Contraception will never be outlawed, so unless you concede that abortion and contraception are not one and the same in every case, you’re doomed to a life of frustration in this regard.
So does age. What of it?
Well, you and I have decidedly different ways of looking at the world. I don’t look at human beings as “capital,” but as sacred, made in the image of God. And I’m a big happy family kind of guy. I’m afraid I don’t understand the logic in the idea that we should farm human beings and weed out the weak. But that’s classical liberalism and the wisdom of the market.
Yes, world population is rising, but in Africa, Latin American, and and the Middle East. The US ranks 119th in birthrate. Take a look at that chart to see which countries have the highest birthrates. Truth is, while babies born to American citizens will hold us over for a couple of decades, at current trends our work force will be increasingly made up of immigrants. Maybe that’s okay…I rather enjoy the company of others, but we best be prepared for some major culture shock.
As for China, that benighted country tried population control–one child, abortion if you went over the set number, on and on. How’s that working out? Well, the Chinese government seems to think they’ve got a looming crisis on their hands because the population is shrinking. The new two child policy isn’t making up the difference. Japan is shrinking to death. Europe is in a population death march. In the US, the ratio of births to deaths needs to be 2.1 children. It is currently at 1.9. Immigration, not birthrates among US citizens, is the main factor in population increase.I don’t remember which book, but George Gilder observed that rising population was a good measure of economic strength, while a falling population is a sign of very poor health.
We murder a million unborn children every year–about one fourth of all pregnancies end in abortion. “Defectives,” for example children with Down Syndrome, are being aborted out of existence, and we seem to think that’s a good thing. Having elevated material wealth to the King’s Throne, we’re rapidly wiping out his subjects, and in the process robbing the world of the only truly beautiful thing–lots of other folks around us. I’ll take the people over the stuff.
I’m just not worried about population growth. Malthus has been proven wrong so often I’ve lost count. I live in Montana. I can drive north and not see another car for 150 miles. Ever been to West Texas? I once drove 150 miles from Odessa to San Angelo without seeing anyone except a couple of armadillos. Idaho, Wyoming, the Dakotas, Nebraska, Iowa. I’ve been to them all and there’s plenty of room. I’d like to see a whole lot more people around here. We’ve got lots of resources. We just need more people to put them to use.
I love these kinds of comments. Let’s see if I can paraphrase: “You are an intelligent man, surely you cannot be so obtuse as to not see that I am right and you are wrong?” The second sentence is even better: “You’re one of those Catholics, so you are too blind to see how right I am.”
Sorry, I’m not biting.
No, I do not see any good from the use of artificial contraception. But even if there are some, that would be irrelevant. I’m an old fashioned kind of guy. I abide by the ancient ethical rule that one may not use an intrinsically evil act even to achieve a good end. I cannot murder man A to prevent the murder of man B. I can’t rob a bank to but a new Audi. And I cannot use AC to avoid babies.
Oh boy. There is a world of difference between intentionally acting to defeat biology and the natural process through which fertility drops off. I might just as well justify anything on grounds the result was going to happen anyway. I’m just an old country lawyer with fairly limited legal imagination, but I think I’m wise enough to know that arguing to a jury that the murder victim would have eventually died of old age anyway probably wouldn’t have resulted in an acquittal.
You are hopelessly out of date on this. Absent the fecundity of immigrants, the U.S. Birth rate would be below replacement. Europe, Russia, China and Japan all have huge impending crisis to deal with declining populations.
Peggy Noonan. The Sexual Harassment Racquet is Over
Do you think we have quality now? Have you read Humanae Vitae? Paul VI saw and predicted many of the harms society is suffering today as a result of widespread birth control. This does not, of course, mean that he is right in seeing a causal link. But the fact that he predicted a result in advance and his prediction has been borne out, does suggest that he is worth a respectful read. The tone of your comments in this thread tells me that you haven’t done that.
To taste the sea, one need only a gulp.
When it comes to Catholic teaching on contraception, I don’t need to read every encyclical in order to get the gist. The argument always follows from the authority of God. If one does not respect this notion, many of the underpinnings for such arguments are moot.
Contra Mike, I am more than willing to concede that all decisions have both positive and negative consequences, a la Thomas Sowell. I happily concede that cheap and simple contraception has enabled people to engage in sex they might otherwise not have. Totally granted.
But the notion that contraception hasn’t transformed the world for the better is simply in denial of reality.
Unlike the benighted Middle Eastern nations who treat half of their population as little more that sentient baby-factories, Western Civilization has managed to use the creative and intellectual capacity previously locked up in that half of the populace to its advantage instead.
The amount of human flourishing that has come about as a result of this eminently reasonable decision strikes me as a hugely positive thing.
Meanwhile, African backwaters with per capita GDPs near the bottom of the heap churn out infants at rates of 7-8 per woman to live in miserable conditions in the slums of Nairobi. Europe’s Immigration woes are a direct result of this over-fecund birthrate.
So, let’s talk about Japan. Sure, Japan will have a relatively smaller population. But this is an intentional decision. They’re also maintaining their Japanese character by strict Immigration controls. This is also their choice.
What, precisely is wrong with those choices? They don’t have strongly a growing economy. Well, that makes sense if their population is somewhat smaller. At some point, you’d think Japanese people would go through a baby boom and not simply extinct themselves. That’s not a thing we’ve seen in history.
At any rate, one of the things that makes America special is the fact of its wide open spaces. I don’t particularly care for the notion that California will be one big city from San Diego to San Francisco – hasta la Vista, Conservatism! – and the number of people living here seems like it’s plenty.
Human population literally can’t grow forever. At some point, there probably needs to be an inflection point where our numbers at least stabilize if not shrink a bit. This isn’t inherently wrong.
I would think the notion of tradeoffs wouldn’t be repellent to conservatives.
Debates are like a tennis match. Eventually you have to concede some points. I certainly didn’t say anything like what you accuse me of, but I am asking for intellectual honesty in assessing both sides of the ledger.
So Artificial Birth control made it possible for women to go, unhindered, into the workforce, increasing our workforce participation and work product. Yeay economics.
You say quality over quantity, but the very nature of birth control effectiveness and your definition of “quality” guarantees (and is reality) that highly intelligent couples are the ones not having babies. That includes immigrants in the skilled market of American economics.
The people who are having babies are the ones incapable of leveraging birth control effectively (either via self-control or discipline) or simply don’t care (not counting our religious who went into family planning BIG). These tend to be the lower end of our immigration and native pool. And those immigrants who aren’t at the low end but are reproducing revert to the national average in one generation… Something about women entering the workforce.
Ireland currently has the highest birth rate of all developed countries. It also has the lowest labor participation and is still likely to be majority catholic. Hmmm….
So, by the very definition you consider quality (economic capital), we can show that we aren’t actually producing quality, but rather quantity of poor quality.
Ireland’s economic growth rate has averaged 1.35% annually from 1997 to today.
Ireland is a quagmire economically, so this makes sense.
When I say “improvement of human capital” I don’t mean women simply going to work at any old job in between pregnancies; I mean that women now frequently go to college and end up becoming professionals, earning more over the span of their careers, and yes: having fewer children whom they can afford to educate.
The difference here is profound. I don’t see that arguments about population growth rate, quality vs. quantity of life, etc. are resolvable given this foundational disagreement. (Incidentally, I myself hold to the belief that we humans are created in the image of God, so my opinions on individual issues are based on that belief in the intrinsic worth of each human life.)
So, I’ve heard this argument before, but not in this context. Know where I’ve heard it before?
Facebook. In what context? Gun control.
You see, to the left, guns are intrinsically evil. It’s something of a religious belief with them which doesn’t grant any concession to the ideas of tradeoffs or fundamental liberties.
Guns are only for killing, and should therefore be banned. They’re evil objects which carry with them the inherent threat of death and have never once been used for good.
Sound familiar?
I never claimed that contraception and abortion are the same thing – they aren’t. To use the analogy my priest friend used, a root is not the same thing as a flower.
The argument follows from the classical liberal concept of virtue. It’s the pre-Christian wisdom that a thing performs best in harmony with its design. Aristotle didn’t know of Christ and yet understood that human beings are designed with logic and purpose. Contraception is wrong because it effects contrary to human nature.
Virtue is order by design. A knife can be used as a hammer, but not well and that will bend it. It can be used as a saw, but not well and that will dull it. The human sex drive can be applied apart from marriage or closed to procreation, but similarly such behavior blunts and damages human relations with repeated action. As the knife can survive the nail, a person can survive flings or a childless marriage. But to habitually stray from God’s design leads to pain, confusion, disorder, and hardened hearts.
Sexual deviances become ever more common, cruder, and more public. Confusion reigns between the sexes today because the ancient concept of roles has been cast aside. Children have weaker attachments to parents, weaker discipline, and weaker protections from political manipulation as so many women choose careers over mothering, placing their kids in communal daycares. Many professional women want to become housewives but cannot because the economy has adjusted to the norm of dual incomes. Many want to marry before 35 or 40 but courtship customs have been mangled by cultural priorities. Western women are not simply more free today, but rather have exchanged some liberties for others.
Certainly, we benefit from women’s equal participation in the workforce, but those benefits are not without costs. Abandoning virtue — abandoning the rules of human nature, which define us as the physical laws define our world — is not always a path to quick and violent destruction. Sometimes without virtue one endures as a lesser thing, short of its designed brilliance. It becomes dull or ugly, marred, ineffectual, all the while oblivious to its real potential. Contraception is contrary to human flourishing.
@mikerapkoch Great post. I am a fellow papist and for all the folks who aren’t down with the universal church due to the failures of some of our representatives to live up to the ideals of the mother church I give you this quote from Hilaire Belloc
“The Catholic church is an institution I am bound to hold divine but for the unbelievers a proof of its divinity might be found in the fact that no merely human institution conducted with such knavish imbecility would have lasted a fortnight”
Maybe the churches rejection of the idea of contraception was divinely inspired.
Explain to me how lack of availability of contraception would have stopped (or reduced the number) the weintstein’s, Trumps and Clinton’s of the world? Is the argument that without AC there would be less women around that these men would have access to?
Aaron, that was brilliantly expressed. Thank you!
Oh this is where you are wrong my friend. Contraception and abortion are intrinsically linked. There has always been contraception it used to be called coitus interruptus, but it wasn’t 100% effective, and well neither is oral contraception. However, the idea of contraception is to eliminate the act of sex with children. Because sex is what makes babies, not broken condoms, not antibiotics that messed up your birth control pills effectiveness, it is the act of sex is what brings life into the world and the proponents of contraception want sex to be about pleasure not babies. Which is why planned parenthood originally pushed for birth control then they realized, oh wait it doesn’t always work, we need abortion. Then the push for abortion. Now that the flood gates are open and all kinds of sex is being had. There is a reason that book of Leviticus is full of rules regarding sex, because sex makes babies and to only pursue the pleasure part with no regard for the consequences it is the children who suffer
As Aaron so eloquently put it above, the position that contraception is a violation of the natural order does not depend upon divine revelation or inspiration. It has to do with the design of a thing, its purpose. Artificial contraception takes a natural, functioning system – fertility – and artificially alters it either chemically or surgically. It’s like taking a healthy, seeing eye and sticking a pencil in it.
Actually, even Protestant churches rejected contraception, up until the Lambeth Conference in 1930.
I think if you read the post carefully, you can answer those questions pretty easily. Still confused? Then read Aaron’s post above.