Catholic leaders are speaking up and opening the debate on contraception use as the Zika virus spreads, especially in Latin America. Since the rates of brain damage among newborns are also rising in the region, most of them firmly state that women should accept microcephaly as some kind of a mission and warn them against using contraceptives or having abortions.
Representatives of the Roman Catholic Church expect Pope Francis to address the issue during his first trip to Mexico, a country that has seen an increase in Zika cases. Rev. Thomas Rosica, the English-language media attaché to the Vatican’s press office, said that it was not clear whether the Pope would actually talk about the situation as reported by the New York Times.
However, he did affirm that the Vatican and Francis were very aware of the gravity of the epidemic and the threat it poses to public health, but he said they were waiting to see the reactions of local churches in the affected countries.
Still, Father Rosica said there were no realistic expectations of the church promoting or teaching on abortion or contraception. He remarked that the Zika epidemic represented “an opportunity for the church to recommit itself to the dignity and sacredness of life, even in very precarious moments like this”, according to the New York Times.
In Brazil, the most affected country of Latin America, secretary general of the National Council of Bishops Leonardo Ulrich said contraceptives were not a solution to the problem and that the church would not change its position.
He advised couples to practice chastity or use “natural family planning”, which consists of women monitoring their menstrual cycles so they know exactly when to abstain from sex in order to avoid pregnancy.
Other Catholic leaders are also urging people to use this method by citing a 2007 study published in Science Daily, which shows that natural family planning can be as effective as birth control pills as long as it is used properly. On the other hand, the United States Department of Health and Human Services reported that the failure rate for this method is 25 out of 100 women, whereas it is five out of 100 for birth control pills.
To date, no vaccine for the Zika virus has been developed and microcephaly has no cure. The Zika epidemic has been declared an international public health emergency by the World Health Organization, which advised governments to allow women full access to a wide range of contraceptive options and safe abortion services permitted by law.
Source: New York Times
TO ALL CATHOLICS
I urge all Catholics to take heed. The Catholic church does not have YOUR best interest in mind.
It only cares about ITSELF.
If you have a child born with zika because you listened to the church and didn’t use birth control
If you have AIDs because you listen to the church and didn’t use a condom
If you are poor and have 8 children and a 9th on the way because you listened to the church and didn’t use birth control
The church is not going to take care of you.
The church is not going to raise your child
The church is not going to sell any of it’s land and art treasures to help you.
It’s no wonder that all the countries of the world where Catholic influence is strong ARE ALL POOR COUNTRIES.
And that all the RICH countries of the world are NON Catholic countries that offer access to birth control and abortion
Recently
the Pope visited Chiapas…one of the poorest states in Mexico. The
Pope railed against the rich for not helping the poor. But the pope did
not rail against the Catholic Church for causing poverty with it’s
birth control opposition.
Catholics. You are at a crossroad.
Either you follow the Catholic church down the road of poverty and
disease…or you take control of your own reproductive rights and decide
what is best FOR YOU AND YOUR FAMILY
Amusing…. use of pesticides is ‘not environmentally sound’, use of the genetically modified mosquito or the sterilized mosquito is ‘too scary and interfering with nature.’ So what to do?
Why, the Margaret Sanger way, of course! Kill the babies. No one care about that, right?
Why is the Catholic Church always determined to be so wrong-headed? Contraceptives were invented to help family planning, and opposing them is just as wrong as opposing transfusions or any other modern medical practice. Microcephaly isn’t a gift from God. In earlier, far more religious times, children born with such defects were seen as spawn of Satan, and were left to die. Preventing such births is the right thing to do.
No, I am not Catholic, nor am I anything, but this is not about me. Its about unborn children who will suffer because they were exposed to a virus that could have been prevented via barrier contraception. I find it astonishing that the “church” can take such a position in this day and under these circumstances. I guess being wrongheaded can, in fact, become tradition…..and if you are an old guy hiding under a robe, this IS tradition. In reality, its just sad….and wrong.