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ISSUES: CHRISTIANS AND THE WORLD

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26/11/2010 15:40
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Until I can properly open a LOTW thread, let me park this discussion here first... Also, right now I do not have the time to properly 'format' the post, so I will leave it as in the original post (large blocks of text, which I generally would break up into easier-to-read 'paragraphs'.]

Also, from time to time, check out Ignatius Press's official blogsite for LOTW
lightoftheworldbook.blogspot.com/
which tries to keep up with the flood of commentary about the book.



On the Pope's condom remarks
by Steven A. Long
Professor of Theology
Ave Maria University

endofthemodernworld.blogspot.com/2010/11/remarks-of-benedict-xvi-regard...


The world is currently much exercised by the remarks of the Holy Father in his interview book Light of the World, to the effect that although condom use is not a "moral solution" it may nonetheless for some be a beginning of an awareness of responsibility for the consequences of one's action on others that could eventually lead to genuinely moral reflection. To consider the English translation:

There may be a basis in the case of some individuals, as perhaps when a male 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 towards 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 only really lie in a humanization of sexuality.

Are you saying, then, that the Catholic Church is actually not opposed in principle to the use of condoms?

She of course does not regard it as a real or moral solution, but, in this or that case, there can be nonetheless, in the intention of reducing the risk of infection, a first step in a movement towards a different way, a more human way, of living sexuality.
This is often portrayed as though the Pope is saying that the disordered sexual act of sodomy is morally bad, but condom use, as something incipiently responsible and moral, is nonetheless good. That is precisely what the Pope is not saying. That is why he says the Church does not regard it as a moral solution. He well realizes that condom use introduces no new species in a homosexual act, because no contraception takes place. Rather, the condom use is wholly predicated upon, and willed as a function of, the intention of sodomy, and condom used participates the species of the sodomitic act. Hence the condom use is morally evil, and indeed gravely evil. Janet Smith, who has written penetratingly about this, notes that all that condom use does is make an already gravely evil act slightly less evil, but that the Church is not in the business of directing people to perform grave evils in a slightly better way.

But what, then, of the papal language? Can a gravely evil act really be such that "there can be nonetheless, in the intention of reducing the risk of infection, a first step in a movement towards a different way, a more human way, of living sexuality"? Certainly in the epistemic order, a person who is morally coarse and living sinfully, may in beginning to reflect on the consequences of his action for others and beginning to take responsibility for these, move in such a way that were it to continue he would eventually enter into genuinely moral considerations. If this is what the Pope means, then it is surely defensible, although the language even so seems somewhat rhetorically over-freighted: simply doing an evil act in a way that prevents infection does not necessarily suggest anything other than that the homosexual prostitute does not wish his customer to die, which frankly could be from venal or vicious motives; and if it is from a better motive, the act is still similar to a strangler who gives all his victims the opportunity to make a good act of contrition, and whom he calms and kills in as gentle a fashion as possible: all of which hardly seems to count as "a first step in a movement towards a different way, a more human way" of living. The Church is not in the business of endorsing grave evils when they are "lesser"--because grave moral evil may never rightly be done by anyone. The rhetoric of "first step" towards "a more human" sexuality makes the epistemic motion seem more proximate to the good of a more human sexuality than in fact it is. The "first step" is, in the epistemic order, toward a moral awareness generally speaking, which must be developed and enriched far more in order to constitute any specific movement in the practical moral order toward a "more human" sexuality.

Nonetheless one must give due credit to the "can" of the Pope's formulation--something that expresses raw possibility. And it is true that those who do move from moral evil to moral good, must epistemically at some point begin to be aware of their responsibility, and such a beginning might be found in someone who before had cavalierly exposed others to infection whilst sodomizing, who then tries to minimize the occasion for giving infection. But "first step"? Normally the first step toward a purpose partakes of the genus of that purpose. If the end is genuinely moral, then the use of the condom is not a "first step" any more than the gentler strangler is taking a first step toward a moral way of living and honoring the good of life. The "first step" of the Pope's example must be understood as nakedly epistemic, not in the least moral, but with the possibility that it could lead at some point to the genuinely moral. All the efforts to speak of the instance to which the pope refers as an exceptional case or circumstance for which the Holy Father has distilled the right moral theological understanding seems thus utterly wrong, because the Pope is not saying that condom use is morally good.

Given the refined nature of these reflections, one may also think that the Holy Father perhaps placed too great a weight upon a fragile medium which cannot sustain it--but from the best of motives, the desire to manifest the true nature of the papal service to the world, and openly to engage common questions and inquiries. Further, his words appear far better than Lombardi's explanation of them, which tries to render the entire matter a function of moral theology, whereas part of the Holy Father's treatment is simply and purely epistemic, something that the media probably will never be able to grasp.

Given the massive misunderstanding and malappropriation of the pope's words, a brief clarification from the Pontiff himself would be inestimably helpful, making clear a) that condom use in sodomitic sex partakes of the evil species of the disordered act, and is not morally good but morally evil--not because it introduces a new species, since there is no contraception, but because the condom use is wholly and formally predicated on the willing of the evil act and so is contained within the species of that act; b) that the sense in which the use of a condom might signal an awareness that could become moral, is epistemic not moral, but that some such an awareness can and indeed must be occasioned by something in those who recover moral equilibrium. Surely the cognitive pre-history of such development from immoralism to moral responsibility has unexpected sources having to do with awareness of the nature of responsibility and of the consequences of one's action for the good of others. Hence concern to minimize infection could be such a factor for someone.

Of course, there are many who wish to use the lines of the Holy Father to promote a different agenda, the agenda of permitting condom use in all sorts of "exceptional" cases, including, according to Sandro Magister, the use of condoms by spouses who are HIV positive. Hence he writes "A use that Catholic moral doctrine already acknowledges--on a par with recourse to condoms by spouses when one of them is infected with HIV--but is publicly approved of by a pope for the first time here." But the Church has never "approved" of such a "recourse to condoms by spouses when one of them is infected with HIV". This is pure fiction, albeit fiction which some in the Church would like to manipulate into the Church's teaching. Would it be a mistake to see those at L'Osservatore Romano who made this small part of the Pope's book public before the date of the coordinated release with other publishers that they had agreed to honor, as consciously seeking to promote an agenda?

Lombardi speaks of the Pope as clarifying what appears to be a problem in moral theology, as addressing: "an exceptional situation in which the exercise of sexuality may represent a real risk to the life of another person. In such a case, the pope does not morally justify the disordered exercise of sexuality, but maintains that the use of the condom to diminish the danger of infection may be 'a first assumption of responsibility', 'a first step in a movement toward a...more human sexuality', as opposed to not using the condom and exposing the other person to a fatal risk."

Lombardi then goes on to speak of "numerous moral theologians and authoritative ecclesiastical figures" who "have maintained and still maintain similar positions". He is, in other words, reading the Holy Father as providing a casuistry of an exceptional case, and then pointing toward unnamed but authoritative figures whose ineffable nimbus of authority seconds the papal motion. This seems to me neither close to the meaning of what the Holy Father actually wrote, nor in the least helpful. Indeed, if in the interview he gave, this is what the Holy Father intended, then I would be inclined to say: this is an interview, not an act of the magisterium, and this is an error. But I do not believe that the Holy Father thought of himself as developing a moral theology of condom use, nor addressing condom use in general--he says expressly the contrary, which Fr. Lombardi acknowledges. Further, the Holy Father says that condom use is "not...a real or moral solution". Why, then, does Lombardi depict the Holy Father as addressing the morality of an exceptional situation--"an exceptional situation in which the exercise of sexuality may represent a real risk to the life of another person"--when nowhere does the Pope present himself as providing a casuistic treatment along these lines?

Lombardi also notes that the Holy Father has said to him that his example could have extended to a female prostitute:

I asked the pope personally if there was a serious or important problem in the choice of the masculine gender rather than the feminine, and he said no, that is, the main point — and this is why I didn’t refer to masculine or feminine in (my earlier) communiqué — is the first step of responsibility in taking into account the risk to the life of another person with whom one has relations.

Here, of course, there is a contraceptive species added to the act; and this makes all the clearer why the Pope's point is directly epistemic and only remotely moral. It also shows how dangerous it is to start speaking of these as "exceptional" situations and promulgating dubious moral judgments of them. Nonetheless, the same point obtains: epistemically, a female prostitute too might become more aware of consequences to others and responsibility, which followed all the way out lead toward moral modes of engagement. But it alters nothing of the moral evil that constitutes the acts being performed. To treat the lesser evil as a moral good, to speak of it in terms of an "exceptional situation" in which somehow because of its epistemic implications for possible moral consciousness it is therefore good, is a great mistake. This is a mistake toward which Lombardi's comments seem to verge.

Finally, was it prudent, given all that we know about the media, for the Holy Father to have given such an answer? In one sense, perhaps not, because the antecedent understanding of basic elements of Catholic life necessary in order not to read the prose wrongly, is predictably too great for the journalistic medium--or for the average reader, even the average academic reader--to bear. Further, such interviews can, given the difficulty in delimiting positions comprehensively in such a format, set off accidental depth charges affecting the magisterium. And, in fact, books of papal interviews are not acts of the magisterium. Yet the answer in question is part of the Holy Father's effort to engage genuine questions, and the book is profound and beautiful. It is a shame that those with agendas other than that of the Church should contrive to make the book known first and most universally solely in terms of a difficult formulation easily misunderstood. But the more general witness of the book will still be given. We should be thankful for a Pontiff who is willing to take risks in witnessing to the truth. Especially if he issues further clarification, this will indeed have proven a "teachable moment". But it is also instructive to consider how much wider the frame of reference of Benedict the XVI is by comparison with most of our contemporaries, and how essential this is both for the task of understanding what he has to say and for fathoming the gravity of his words.
[Modificato da TERESA BENEDETTA 26/11/2010 15:40]
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