Once upon a midnight dreary, while I pondered, weak and weary…
Sorry. Couldn’t help it. Edgar Allan Poe has been running through my head. The talk of limiting people is just kind of morose and throw in the name and there you have it. It will all fall into place as you read on.
Lifesite has now posted an update to THE story last week and have clarified they got the original quote, which had sent Catholic new media outlets spinning, wrong: https://www.lifesitenews.com/news/correction-vatican-academy-member-misquoted-in-story-on-pope-francis Here’s the original Peter Raven quote they gave:
Pope Francis has urged us to have fewer children to make the world more sustainable.
And the revised quote:
We need at some point to have a limited number of people which is why Pope Francis and his three most recent predecessors have always argued that you should not have more children than you can bring up properly,
First, Catholic news media…I realize that you’re all in a big hurry to out-scoop everyone else. I get it. It’s kind of your job. That said, can we please stop attributing ideas to the pope when they come from some knucklehead who clearly doesn’t quite understand what the last three popes have actually said?! I’m still seeing “Vatican” at odds with Catholic teaching. One guy on an academy at the Vatican does not the Vatican make. Peter Raven made the comment and I don’t believe it’s ever even been put into writing nor put forth as an official teaching. One idiot, one idiotic statement. It’s important to note that he attributes this to the last three popes and not just Francis. Anyways, that’s the view from over here. It’s not just one outlet. It’s multiple outlets.
Next, even with the clarification, it was a stupid statement. People are acting as if the actual quote erased the stupidity found in the erroneous quote. Bad on Lifesite for getting it wrong and kudos for correcting it but the Catholic Church has never said that we at some point have to have a limited number of people and the latter part of Peter Raven’s quote is not nor ever has been the reasoning for PETER RAVEN’S emboldened and underlined pro-population control premise.
Frankly, the real scandal and news story is that this guy is in the Pontifical Academy of Sciences in the first place. Steven Mosher at the Population Research Institute has done a nice job showing the disaster in the current academy. https://www.pop.org/content/earth-not-%E2%80%9Csick%E2%80%9D-and-mankind-thriving-never Maybe somebody can answer this question for me. Is Peter Raven even Catholic? I seriously can’t find that link anywhere and I consider myself pretty good at Googling. I mean, aren’t there any Catholic scientists out there that might, perhaps, make a better authority on Catholicism AND scientific fact than Raven that might get the last three popes right? Yes, yes. I realize that you don’t have to be a Catholic to be in this academy. The point is to examine all sorts of scientific information free from the influence of race, creed or religion (you can tell the academy was started when science was still based on facts) but if he’s going make a statement on Catholic teaching, might it be helpful if he was one?! Or one who might know the Church’s teaching even if he doesn’t buy it?? Shouldn’t the non-Catholic guy stick to the science thing and stop trying to tell us what the Catholic teachings are? There’s some idea for you.
Peter Raven has an agenda and is twisting the Pope’s (actually the last 3 pope’s) words to fit that agenda. That’s kind of a no-no for the reason behind this academy. It’s supposed to be agenda free. He should be promptly fired, dismissed or however it is that you are told to get lost from an “academy.” Again, it is not a teaching of the holy fathers that we need to limit the number of people. It is their teaching that if you cannot properly feed, care for, etc. your children, you may resort to natural family planning. Does this mean that if you can’t go on a trip you should use NFP? NO! Does this mean if you think there are too many people in the world and Mother Earth is rebelling against us because of that you should use NFP? NO! Does it mean if your children can’t have the latest xbox you should use NFP so that the rest of your children will not be deprived? NO! Should you prayerfully and in consultation with a spiritual director consider using NFP if you are struggling to feed, clothe, and shelter your children? YES! You may still come to the conclusion after prayer and consultation that God is calling you to have more children at the present time and work through the struggle or you may decide to exercise some self-control until such time you can responsibly feed, clothe, and shelter your kids. That’s between YOU and God. I’m pretty sure most of you know this but there’s always the liberal lurkers who are going to try to run with this. Peter Raven is a goof who can’t get past his own bad science and theology.
Before I could get this done, I noticed that Deal Hudson made some of the same points here: http://www.newsmax.com/DealHudson/vatican-peter-raven-pope-francis/2017/03/07/id/777396/ I disagree with Paul Raven = Vatican or Paul Raven = Pope, but it still had some great points. I definitely agree the appointments made to some of the academies are tragic and nightmarish. I hope they will receive an all new makeover with factually correct theological people and, where applicable, factually based scientific people instead if these “scientists” who wouldn’t know the scientific method if it bit them in the behind. You know, the ones who are constantly trying to bend the facts around their hypothesis instead bending their hypothesis around the facts.
One Mad Mom 
Good article Mad Mom. I currently mad at them because they deleted a few things I said in defense of Dr. Peters and Cardinal Burke against a sedevacantist drone just passing through to take advantage of poor journalistic sense and lack of editorial concern for Truth. You can find out what got deleted and draw your own conclusions at the Discus feed on my comments. https://www.lifesitenews.com/news/cardinal-burke-if-a-pope-would-formally-profess-heresy-he-would-cease-by-th
https://www.lifesitenews.com/news/francis-urges-priests-to-welcome-cohabitating-couples-in-the-style-of-the-g
You’ll have to go to Discus to find out what got chopped. I don’t know if they are still allowing me to post comments on their stuff anymore without it getting screened first. I’m not banned and don’t want to be, but hey, it’s happened before. It’s frustrating enough to make me consider starting my own blog so I can speak my mind against errors when I spot them. Grrrrrrrr…………..God bless. Ginnyfree.
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P.S. If you bother to look up the comments at the Discus site, you’ll see a huge red “Deleted” next to the comments they didn’t like. Yeah, they got more wrong then they should’ve and smeared Cardinal Burke. I can’t sit still for anyone taking shots at him.
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P. P. S. The tone of Father Toner’s article may interest you too. Seems we’re on the same page. This could get interesting. God bless and Mary keep.
Ginnyfree.
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ooooops here’s the link to the article: https://www.thecatholicthing.org/2017/03/11/the-eighth-deadly-sin/
Could Thomas More get tenure on one of our Catholic faculties today? You have to sympathize with orthodox Catholic assistant professors who worry that they’ll lose their jobs if they tell the truth in love. Still, we are warned never to love “the praise of men more than the praise of God.” (John 12:43)
Awesome, ain’t he? God bless again.
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She’s had some good ones lately…they’re all good, actually…
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One wonders if “Peter Raven” is his true name.
As to the Catholic Church: The Church dangles the carrot of NFP to Catholic couples, but what does the Church do when couples actually use this approach to limiting the size of their families? (This is for the 10 to 12 per cent of Catholics who use NFP.) The Church quickly tries to lay a guilt trip on them by saying you cannot use it (NFP) for “selfish” reasons. It does appear to some that there is no pleasing the Church in the area of married sexuality.
We live in a world of scarce resources, and that includes people’s household incomes. Some of us Catholics actually believe that parents not only have a right to limit the size of their families but also the responsibility to do so. Yes, this goes against Church teaching. NFP is great in that it weans couples away from abortifacient devices and regimens and also avoids hormonal side effects of the Pill. But, trying to lay a guilt trip on those Catholics that use it is wrong.
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There’s not guilt trip, Larry. Sin is a reality and guilt come from sin, not the Church.
It all comes down to intent and, as I said, that’s between the couple, their spiritual director and God. There’s a difference between using NFP with a contraceptive mentality and not. Simply using NFP to avoid the harmful side effects of the pill doesn’t change the intent of the person using the pill. People need to change their hearts, not just their methods. If you truly understand the marital embrace and all its beauty, you wouldn’t want to use it with a contraceptive or selfish mindset.
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Yes. But, who is it that comes up short in understanding here – married couples or the Church as to the marital embrace? We have read a Church approved English translation of Humanae Vitae, In it, Pope Paul VI tried to redefine the unitive aspect in terms of the procreative so as to blunt criticism that the Church does not respect both aspects in its teachings (and rules) but always favors the procreative. Married couples’ experiences, and what modern biology tells us (as to how human reproduction actually occurs) affirms the reality that sex within marriage is not just for making babies. (We humans have a non-seasonal drive for and capacity for sex.)
Frequent lovemaking w/o conception will make married persons selfish? Or, frequent lovemaking when conception is not intended will “objective” the wife? Such statements give evidence of the Church’s long held sexual pessimism. (There really is nothing more I can say.)
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Wow! That’s what you got out of Humane Vitae? !
And what are you getting this from? “Frequent lovemaking w/o conception will make married persons selfish? Or, frequent lovemaking when conception is not intended will “objective” the wife? ” I think thou is listening to the anti-NFP crowd with all of these arguments. They aren’t even close to reality.
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Oh dear Larry, some of your conclusions are built on faulty premises. The Church has always spoken in terms of responsible parenthood, always. Lately, some of the terms we use include “NFP.” We use this term because the older term, “the rhythm method,” was done to death and had been so disparaged by ugly Protestant jokes that newer terminology got formulated. Natural family planning is actually as old as families. It is the talk the couple has on dates, about how many and what their names will be. It is the chaste discussion of the birds and bees each parent hands on to their children when the time is right. It is the natural fluctuation in a woman’s cycle that gives times to the rhythms of life. If you’d bother to read the Old Testament, you’d find natural family planning happening all the time, from Adam and Even forward. There is nothing wrong with refraining for a time, even if that time is dictated by financial problems as well as for other problems. I really don’t care for the way you judge the whole Church by claiming that there is no please the Church as we speak of human sexuality. NFP is not a carrot at all. If you have so little respect for yourself and others that you need to trash the terminology used to discuss abstinence from sexual relations and parental responsibility, how can anyone have a rational dialog about such things if all you can do it degrade the terms and judge the Church who uses them? No one in my Church ever laid a “guilt trip” on anyone I know for choosing NFP as a means of taking responsibility for themselves, their sexuality and the wellbeing of their family to be. Can I ask if you are Protestant? God bless. Ginnyfree.
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