What are reproductive ethics? Who decides what they will be? It depends upon whom you ask.
A chance encounter with Conscience, a journal of pro-choice Catholic opinion, introduced me to a very large community of people who think reproductive decisions for themselves lie with themselves.
These, I discovered, are not libertine, anti-institutional, anti-government people on the fringe of society. Rather, they are serious, caring individuals well-versed in the issues of reproduction, contraception, abortion, social health and family life. They include priests and nuns, scholars and teachers, and, of course, parishioners.
Their journal is forthright in announcing its purpose. Its goal, it declares, is to promote sexual and reproductive ethics “based on justice, reflect a commitment to women’s well-being, and respect and affirm the moral capacity of women and men to make sound and responsible decisions about their lives.” Despite the low media profile of this group, the majority of the American Catholic community thinks this way.
About 59 percent of Catholic women of childbearing age practice birth control, essentially the same percentage as the larger American community. In addition, a stunning 88 percent of American Catholics think someone who practices birth control can still be a good Catholic.
This Catholic community must have its emotional struggles, for their decisions run counter to the church they love and counter to efforts of the church hierarchy to have them accept church teachings. Despite proscriptions on behavior, threats of excommunication, denial of sacraments, generous doses of guilt, and that favorite tactic, claims of the infallibility of the church and Pope, these Catholics know that they and they alone will determine their most personal matters.
As one person put it, “Bishops never acknowledge that family planning assistance saves lives and enables women and families to take better advantage of economic and educational opportunities.” Why this disparity? Why this profound difference between Catholic leadership and American parishioners?
Simply put, American Catholics are well-educated. They are conversant with world affairs and trends. In that distinctively American way, they’re not blindly subservient to authority. They know, as the Alan Guttmacher Institute reports, that access to affordable contraception can reduce a woman’s chance of having an abortion by 85 percent. They know that worldwide, unsafe abortions are the leading cause of maternal deaths. They know that pregnancy and childbirth take the lives of 600,000 women each year. They know that unbridled reproduction can be devastating to themselves and the children they do want.
So where does this dissenting majority go from here?
Even more than Americans at large, they support efforts of the United Nations Population Fund to slow population growth. They continue to confront that most patriarchal of institutions, the National Conference of Catholic Bishops. They force public dialogue on public policy, community life, social thinking and teaching, and womens’ health and personal development. It’s quite an ambitious undertaking, but it will determine the quality and character of their lives and the lives of their families.
They will not go quietly into
the night.