Steven,
I wonder, from your post, if you have ever actually read the primary documents of the Catholic Church on life issues, such as Humanae Vitae, and then discussed them with a priest or theologian who doesn’t have an axe to grind with Rome.
“The Church believes sex not aimed at procreation is immoral and condoms kidnap the potential lives represented by the sperm.”
When you, as Editor-In-Chief of Beliefnet, write such caricaturish and ill-informed representations of Catholic dogma, it leads those who do not know to believe that you represent the truth. The responsibilities of your position call upon you to either know your subject, or defer to one who does.
For the record, the Church teaches that sex, as God made it, and used in accord with His Divine Plan for His creation, is good. God made sex with two, inextricably linked, dimensions:
1. The Unitive Dimension-The pleasurable and loving actions that are meant to bind husband and wife ever deeper in love for one another.
2. The Procreative Dimension-The total giving of the spouses to one another leaves open the possibility (not probability) of generating new life.
Thus, the sex does not have to “aim at procreation” as you say. It would actually be immoral to hold such a view and engage in such a practice, as this would be an inversion of the perversion of sex in marriage by contraception. Whereas contraception is an assault on the procreative dimension, using sex only for procreation is an assault on the unitive dimension. Both are perverse. Both are heretical and therefore sinful.
Your characterization of the Church’s teaching on the right use of sex in marriage as, “adherence to an abstract theological principle,” betrays not a little contempt on your part?
Our Dogmas are not the equivalent of government White Papers, or policy positions. They are the distillation of God’s revelation in the Sacred Scriptures and Sacred Tradition (the writings of the Fathers of the Church, Doctors of the Church, and Councils of the Church arising from the Jewish and Christian Scriptures ). As such, the abstraction lies not in the principle, but is really confusion in the mind of the one not properly informed.
The principle you cite is not one aimed at reducing abortions. The principle is the right use of God’s creation (sex) according to His Divine Plan-one person at a time. The world isn’t in the mess it is in for want of contraceptives-God knows. Contraceptives set up and legitimize abortion, as they inherently are hostile to the transmission of new life. If everyone engaged in the right use of sex, according to God’s wise design, sexually transmitted diseases and abortions would become a thing of the past.
We embrace life and all its goodness, whether planned or not. Nothing abstract about that.

“We embrace life and all its goodness, whether planned or not. Nothing abstract about that.”
Of course, the Vatican doesn’t get to dictate U.S. health policy, despite its best intentions.
From a policy perspective, Waldman’s question is sound. The Catholic/Evangelical alliance creates a bizarre world of wanting to ban not just abortion but also family planning policy. They don’t want unplanned pregnancies ended, but they are also unwilling to back public policy that could prevent unplanned pregnancies. They might was well just be handing out quarters to hold between a woman’s legs and a Bible.
There was a time that this coalition made access to contraceptives illegal in many states. In the post-Griswold world, would they attempt it again if given the ability?

“condoms kidnap the potential lives represented by the sperm”
Mr. Waldman, is this really what the Catholic Church teaches about contraception? It doesn’t sound quite right — perhaps you don’t fully understand the teaching, or slightly misquoted the Catechism or Humanae Vitae.

Michael,
I agree, that the question is a sound policy inquiry in a secular, areligious paradigm. How can Catholics be called upon to support that which we hold to be immoral?
Contraceptives are hostile to the transmission of new life. After all, that’s why they are made. Now, if the contraceptie fails, follow the logic. Why not be allowed to prevent the delivery of new life? Enter abortion.
Pope Paul VI warned in Humanae Vitae that widespread abortion would follow widespread use of contraceptives. Forty years later, with over 50 million abortions in the US alone, we see how prophetic he was.
Catholic policy is a function of Catholic morality. How could it be anything other?

Gerard,
Your criticism of my summary of Catholic doctrine on contraception is fair. In attempting to reduce a complex doctrine to a sentence or two I was too glib. I like your summary. More important, those who are interested should read Humanae Vitae.
However, it doesn’t fundamentally change the point which is that for its own reasons — deep theological reasons — the Catholic Church opposes contraception on moral grounds. That creates a serious dilemma if it turns out that contraception reduces the number of abortions. The Church is quite nuanced in its moral theology. For instance, it’s approach to “just war” balances competing factors. My argument is that their birth control position is in tension with their abortion position.

The critique of Mr. Waldmann’s position by Gerard is spot on.
Mr. Waldmann assumes a fact not in evidence, namely, that expanded use of contraceptives would reduce unwanted pregnancies and, as a result, reduce abortion. However, he fails to recognize that the increase in pre-marital (and extra-marital) sexual activity resulting from the widespread use of contraceptives (which he acknowledges) and the failure rate attendant to their use (even if used correctly, they are not 100% effective, and many, if not most, young people do not use them as intended) results in substantially more pregnancies than would occur if the rate of pre-marital and extra-marital sexual activity had not been increased as a result of the acceptance of contraception in the first place.
The argument which Mr. Waldmann offers (and which is frequently made), therefore, is based on false premises. As a result, the conclusion is also wrong.

I agree with Steven’s point of the hypocrisy of wanting to stop abortions, but not supporting birth control options for the “lowest” income women. Obama is not advocating paying for birth control for everyone. He is advocating paying for birth control for the population that has the highest percent of abortions.
While the Catholic Church has the right to their beliefs, I would like to see statistics on the Catholic family size difference between now and before birth control pills became available. It has been my observation that the family size is much smaller.

Basicly it boils down to the RCC and those Evangelicals (and others) sticking their noses in what basicly is NOT their business. If I am not a Catholic or an Evangelical then there is no reason they should be telling me that I can’t prevent a pregnancy by any means I choose, or that I don’t have a right to terminate one if I need to. It continues to amaze me that groups can be against contraception, which can help prevent unwanted pregnancies thus fewer chances to abort. The idea that if a person has a contraceptive causes (gasp) unmarried sex is unfounded. Folks don’t NOT have sex just because there aren’t condoms available. Contraception doesn’t cause folks to copulate. Better unmarried sex WITHOUT contraception? Sure!! That’s it…just have kids…someone will take care of them if the woman doesn’t want them. Got news for some folks…not everyone in the world thinks like they do …THANK GOODNESS!

Steven,
Thanks for your response. Again, my prayerful condolences to you and your wife on your father-in-law’s passing.
I do see where you are going in your argument, and yes, our deep and nuanced theological positions can set up seeming self-contradictions. However, I believe that some of this confusion clears in the light of examining whence comes the “problem” of unplanned pregnancies.
Your argument presupposes to a degree that abortion is a legitimate option when sex results in an unexpected pregnancy. That abortion is a legal option does not make it a legitimate one. All consideration of Church teaching must start there.
Next, given the nature of sex, as outlined in my post above, how can the Church advocate anything but the right use of sex, according to God’s wise design? That unplanned, unwanted pregnancies might consequently arise either in marriage or through fornication cannot be used as justification to abrogate Divine Law.
Divine Law has been given precisely to aid us in our spiritual growth, which means accepting in a mature way, the consequences of our behaviors. That includes sex. To offer contraceptives is to short-circuit that process of spiritual growth by first doing violence to the order of God’s creation (sex) and His plan for its right use. Secondly, it short-circuits spiritual growth by removing responsibility for one’s behavior.
If the Church should say yes to contraceptive use, and the contraceptive should fail, then would the Church be justified in suddenly becoming arbitrary in the abrogation of Divine Law by saying no to abortion? Now in pregnancy the Church suddenly reintroduces personal responsibility for one’s actions? What moral credibility would the Church have in such circumstances? Having facilitated the rejection of Divine Law up to the point of unplanned pregnancy, the Church wouldn’t have a leg to stand on.
Would the Church like to see a reduction in abortions? Of course. But the end does not justify the means. We can only get there through fidelity to God, which is the first and highest of all our aspirations. Fidelity is not only an aspiration; it is a Divine Command.
To understand the gravity that the Pope and Bishops understand that command, consider what God says in Deuteronomy 18:18-20
“I will raise up for them a prophet like you from among their kinsmen, and will put my words into his mouth; he shall tell them all that I command him.
If any man will not listen to my words which he speaks in my name, I myself will make him answer for it.
But if a prophet presumes to speak in my name an oracle that I have not commanded him to speak, or speaks in the name of other gods, he shall die.’”
We cannot teach married couples to reject the right use of sex, or singles to fornicate without consequence.
Finally Steven, we do not see an unplanned pregnancy as a problem. We see a child conceived and a soul created by God-true procreation, regardless of the circumstances surrounding that procreation. Therefore, we do not accept abortion. Let’s remove that option from the table and then discuss responsibility and the Church’s role.
God Bless.

Your summary of Catholic doctrine falls short, and manufactures Reason #1′s moral problem. As Pope Paul VI presciently observed, artificial contraception creates the context for the inevitable moral slide into abortion and other grave consequences. He wrote that marriage and society would suffer as the unitive aspect of conjugal love was divorced from the procreative, with the former taking a position of near primacy. The Pope also wrote that sex would become mechanistic, and human beings essentially machines of self-gratification and self-indulgence.
To be sure, Humanae Vitae was not written to discuss the practical consequences of, but to reaffirm the Church’s teachings on artificial contraception. Nevertheless, one can’t help but be impressed with how time confirms his sound reasoning. The family is under attack not only from government planning initiatives and abortion, but also divorce, single-parent household, poverty, increased crime, a debased popular culture that celebrates promiscuity, and legalized homosexual marriage.
There is a series of U.S. Supreme Court cases, beginning with Justice Thomas Cooley’s enunciation in his treatise on “Torts” about the “right to privacy”, that reveals in stark detail how this moral corruption works. These cases show how the application of a rather benign legal concept began with the right of the family to send its children to parochial school, to the family’s right to choose artificial contraception, to the individual’s right to choose abortion, to the right of a child to abortion unfettered by parental controls, to homosexual marriage. Each successive case building on the last for over a century.
It is not condemning artificial contraception that creates unwanted pregnancy leading to abortion. To the contrary, it reduces abortion ab initio by not creating a milieu which promotes it and further moral and cultural erosion.

In other words…women are baby machines and nothing should be done to prevent that machine from producing babies? Sex is only for procreating…as assigned by some divine being who doesn’t have to feed, clothe or raise the child. For sure the priests, bishops, cardinals and certainly Benny (or whoever is pope might be) isn’t going to have to foot the bill. I have often wondered, however, when my Catholic friends only have 1 or 2 children…are they NOT using artifical means to prevent more? Of course they are, because they aren’t being celibate! Those are the thinking Catholics…the practical ones who only have as many children as they can support, and certainly aren’t giving up their sex life or following Catholic Roulette. I have great admiration for them.

I concur with Gerard. Contraception is a mentality as well, not just synthetic hormonal treatment or artificial barrier methods. We maintain the reason for abortions is a misuse of the congugal act meant for a man and a woman in a committed relationship.
And while we’re on the discussion of Quantum Physics and parallel universes, then what if there was a parallel universe where NATURAL Family Planning was statistically proven to be WAY more effective than artificial contraception at preventing unwanted pregnancies? The Guttmacher Institute itself maintains that 54% of women who procure abortions use artificial contraception. What if, say, we could reduce unwanted pregnancy down to 5%?
You’re a consumate middle-of-the-road kind of guy, Steve. I’m sure you’ll hold pro-choicers feet to the fire on this one as well.
http://nfpandmore.org/

Hi Pagansister,
I’ve become a fan of yours ) So, in the spirit of a groupie, allow me a couple of brief responses.
As I mentioned in my first post above, we have twin heresies about sex.
1. That it is only for fun
2. That it’s only for procreating
Both are regarded as sinful perversions of the right use of God’s creation.
As for Catholic Roulette, I’m always fond of saying that the rhythm method is to Natural Family Planning, what a banjo is to a symphony orchestra. For those of us in my circle of friends who use NFP, we haven’t had any surprises. But, then, we approach sex with the understanding that new life may flow from our expression of love for one another, and that we will need to make whatever adjustments we must in order to feed, clothe and raise the child.
As a Catholic who follows the Magisterium, I find these discussions amusing in one sense, tragic in another. Those of us who follow the Teaching Authority of the Church, who use NFP, are usually the ones who have taken the time to actually read the documents on life, such as Humanae Vitae, and thoroughly educated ourselves on NFP. We’ve actually done our homework, and yet usually get portrayed as Neanderthals. Among the contraception-using Catholics, the percentage who have actually read the Magisterial documents and fully educated themselves on NFP are actually quite low.
In the end, it comes down to an assent of faith. Those of us who make that assent don’t do so naively or blithely. It is done in a context of spirituality, with a sense of gravity and full knowledge of the nature of sex and how God wants us using it.
All the Best!

Good Evening, Gerard N.:
As always I enjoyed reading your post.
Believe me when I tell you I admire and respect your loyality to your faith and your willingness to follow NFP.
I think I understand where you are coming from. No way would I consider you a Neanderthal. You are loyal to what you believe…I just happen to disagree with a lot of RCC “rules” if you will. I know I have my expression of “Thinking Catholics” when I mention those who don’t question what is handed down by the Pope etc., but that is my way of separating the total non-questioning members from those who question but still follow what they feel is right. Did that make sense? You, IMO, fall into the questioning but still follow what you think is right regarding the churche’s teaching. OK, I’m stopping now. Hope it makes some kind of sense.
Take Care.

Pagansister,
Makes perfect sense, as always. Thanks for your kind words.
All the Best!

Steven said, “the most recent example being their vocal, and effective, attack on family planning funds in the economic recovery bill.”
I read that the funding will be authorized in another bill – maybe this week.

The funding is going in a separate bill which will probably pass overwhelmingly. The pro-lifers can’t seem to get it through their thick skulls that the moment they attack contraception everyone else’s ears close.

I’m not a Catholic, (and definitely not sympathetic to the RCC POV), but in the interests of accuracy, I believe Mr. Waldman has made some errors in his comments re the RCC position re sex.
1. The church would probably say “we are opposed to *artificial* contraception, since such contraception is not ‘natural’”.
2. At one time I believe the RCC did in fact have the view Mr. Waldman says it has about sex, particularly originating with Paul’s anti-sex views (Galatians? Colossans? something like that).
However, I believe that a check with informed RCC authorities–theologians, rather than bishops or ordinary priests –will reveal that the church is trying to move away from this (clearly ridiculous) position.

Diogenes99,
Paul saw sex in marriage as good. Fornication, he equated with idolatry. Idolatry in the broadest sense is worshipping that which we love more than God. If that happens to be orgasm with whomever, then Paul is dead on.
You have your order of Authority backward. Theologians are scholars who are free to speculate about matters both divine and profane. Bishops are the successors of the Apostles, charged with faithfully handing on the body of God’s revealed Word.
Theologians serve the Church well, when they assist Bishops in synthesizing new situations with Biblical principles. In recent decades, many of these theologians have become dissidents and established themselves as a shadow episcopacy, teaching directly contrarian ‘dogmas’ to those that are declared definitive teachings by the Bishops who, united with the Pope, are the sole Teaching Authority in the Church.
We believe that sex is Holy, and a living component of the Sacrament of Marriage. Dissedent theologians profane that holiness at their own peril on Judgement Day. That’s as Catholic a rendering as you will see in print.

Q. Why would the “Pro-lifers” be “anti-abortion”
and “against family planning and contraception”?
A. Two reasons that come to mind are Biblical:
Reason #1
God’s Covenant With Noah and his descendants
telling them to:
“increase in number and fill the earth”:
Genesis 9:1
“Then God blessed Noah and his sons,
saying to them,
“Be fruitful and increase in number
and fill the earth.”
Reason #2
God’s Offer of Life or Death
and the reason to “choose life”:
Deuteronomy 30:19
“This day I call heaven and earth as witnesses against you
that I have set before you life and death,
blessings and curses.
Now choose life,
so that you and your children may live”
.

Diogenes is correct. The Church favours “natural family planning”, where couples use the rhythms of the female cycle to avoid intercourse at times of month when the woman is fertile. They confess that sex has two purposes – procreative and unitive – but they believe that it is immoral to deliberately separate the two by making it impossible to procreate. Sometimes God does it, but that’s His choice, and we’re not supposed to mess with it. That said, a ridiculously huge proportion of Catholics (including this one) are totally ignoring the rule and using artificial contraceptives.
JosephU: We’ve increased. We’ve filled the earth. Done and done.

Genesis 9:1
“Then God blessed Noah and his sons,
saying to them,
“Be fruitful and increase in number
and fill the earth.”
That’s called human monoculture, and we are in danger of creating precisely that. Any monoculture within a closed system eventually extinguishes itself.

The hypocrisy and twisted logic employed by the RCC is beyond belief.
You have every right to tell Catholics what to do.
You have none, whatsoever to tell me what to do.
Get out of secular law, ex-communicate those Catholics who don’t agree with you, if you must, but stop imposing your twisted, hateful views of women and gays on the rest of us.
The only way to reduce abortion – the only point we agree on as being desirable – is to provide people with the education and means not to have children before they are ready and willing to do so. All other means, especially your cold-hearted hatred of women, have led to back-alley, coat hanger abortions. Always have, always will.
Between the christianists and the Roman Catholics, millions of unwanted children have been conceived and aborted in the US through the years. Your approach leads to more abortion, not less. And you know it perfectly well.
Stop pretending to speak for God and start doing something to lower abortion rates. Treat women as human beings, not brood animals. Treat young people as they really are, horny and incapable of controlling their sexual desires. Let poor people have the pleasure of sex without the consequences of horrid disease and abortion.
Again, what christianists and Catholics do to their own members is fine with me. Just leave the rest of us alone.

Gerard,
“I wonder, from your post, if you have ever actually read the primary documents of the Catholic Church on life issues, such as Humanae Vitae, and then discussed them with a priest or theologian who doesn’t have an axe to grind with Rome.
“The Church believes sex not aimed at procreation is immoral and condoms kidnap the potential lives represented by the sperm.”
So what? We ain’t all Catholics. Why should the tenets of your church be forced on the population at large, especially in a land that ‘promises’ freedom of religion.
If you think contraceptives are bad, don’t use them. If you belive abortion is bad, don’t have one.
But kindly butt out of our,/B> lives.

“Contraceptives are hostile to the transmission of new life.”
Correct. Not every couple wants to make a baby every time they make love. That’s the point, Gerard. And if you are going to be busybodyish enough to stop people from preventing pregnancies, you’d better dam well butt out of their decision to terminate one.

“Catholic policy is a function of Catholic morality. How could it be anything other?”
Who – other than ssome Catholics – cares what “Catholic policy” is?
And why on earth should it be forced on non-Catholics?

Your Name,
Catholic Doctrine should not be forced on anyone. The policy matter that initiated this conversation dealt with Federal Funds being used to fund contraceptive purchases.
Catholics do not wish to be compelled to pay for that which we believe to be immoral. So from that perspective, we say do what you want in bed. Have fun. It’s your life. Just don’t ask me to buy your rubbers for you. Don’t ask me to support soft eugenics aimed at the poor. Don’t ask me to fund abortions.
Get used to the fact that we are equal citizens and will not shrink from your pugnacity and offensiveness. We will have our say in the public square and we will vote our consciences. Where we believe our government has unjust policy and law, we will work within our democratic system to overturn the injustice.
If there are enough like-minded people who join with us to prevail, the where I come from in Brooklyn, we call that a clue. If we fail, then we gave it our all within the system. That too is a clue, for us.
You’re right that our country promises freedom of religion. When you compel a group through taxation to fund that which they hold to be immoral, you abrogate their freedom.
The solution? Buy your own rubbers. They aren’t that expensive.

Gerard Nadal,
eine Frage, if I may…I don’t quite follow your logic. If, as you say, your only opposition to federal funding of contraceptives is that you don’t want to pay for them, would it not make more sense for you to petition the government for an exemption of your ‘share’ of the tax money which is committed to such enterprises?
Your arguments seem instead, to be directed towards imposing your views upon people like me, the exact same situation – in this case turned around – to which you object.

Hi Panthera,
Eine Antwort, wenn ich kann. You may not follow my logic, but yours is brilliant. If everyone were to petition the government for exemptions from the program of their choice, the IRS would collect $0!!! Move over Obama, you’ve got my vote!!! )
Seriously, great thought, but it wouldn’t fly. I’ve read your many posts and know were you are coming from. My Church isn’t trying to regulate anyone’s behavior. Some have said, rather pointedly that they want the Church out of their bedrooms.
We agree. We don’t want to be in your bedroom. That goes for paying for anyone’s contraceptives, or in the event of failure, their abortions. My Church respects the conscience of the couple. Carefully read Humanae Vitae, which Steven posted.
If you want us out of your bedroom, that should be across the board. Thanks for taking the time to respond. Take Care.

“we [Catholics] say do what you want in bed. Have fun. It’s your life.”
I only wish that were true.
“Don’t ask me to fund abortions.”
Don’t ask me to fund (subsidize0 your religion. The HRCC give up its tax-free status? Not in our lifetime – it simply ain’t gonna happen. Could I please have my tax dollars back?
Get used to the fact that we are equal citizens and will not shrink from your pugnacity and offensiveness.
I consider your church to be immoral, yet I/we am/are compelled to fund it, so I guess we’re even on the abrogation of religious ‘freedom’ (what an ugly word it looks like when you type it, since, as a gay man, I am not given the same religious freedoms you are. (And, btw, I do buy my own rubbers. Too bad Catholics aren’t even allowed to use them – not to prevent STDs, not to prevent pregnancies. Some ‘freedom’.
“My Church isn’t trying to regulate anyone’s behavior. Some have said, rather pointedly that they want the Church out of their bedrooms. We agree. We don’t want to be in your bedroom.”
Isn’t bearing false witness (aka lying) a sin anymore in the HRCC?

Your Name,
You bring up some issues that merit further clarification.
First, the RCC’s tax-exempt status is the same one shared by every other religious group and 501(c)(3) organization in the country. The IRS grants these exemptions because these groups do work that would cost the government substantially more if it had to provide the service. Therefore, you are not funding anything. You would be paying substantially higher taxes if these 501(c)(3)’s did not exist and the government were forced to provide the services-such as hospitals, schools, social services, etc
As a gay man, you are as free as any heterosexual to live a life of fidelity to God’s Revelation-or not. I am not compelled by my Church to do or refrain from doing anything. They teach, and I either give my assent of faith, or not. The choice is mine. The same goes for everyone else.
Finally, Steven Waldman has done a great service in posting the Encyclical Humanae Vitae for people’s thoughtful perusal. I don’t ask that you agree with it, but spend some time with it to get a better understanding of what we believe and why-unfiltered by the media.
Peace.

Gerard Nadal,
dachte ich mir schon.
Which is as far as I shall go in a non-English language here. Last time two of us fell into the temptation of writing anything but English on a thread here at Beliefnet, some of the super-fundies got their panties in a twist about it. English being God’s one approved tongue, says so right there in their fundamentalist Bibles.
I certainly do not deny that the Catholic church has participated in some decent activities through various charities.
What troubles me, greatly, is granting tax-exempt status to your Church when you are so directly involved in the political processes as you are. I would like to think that it would also trouble me if the shoe were on the other foot, tho’ I am human enough to doubt it.
We already know that the Church, together with the leadership of the Church of Later Day Saints overstepped the boundaries set out in maintaining tax-exempt status during the Prop.8 fight in California (apart from direct lies of commission for which you should be ashamed).
Given that you are not willing to keep out of politics, I don’t see why you should continue to receive tax-exempt status. You can’t have it both ways. Either you are a social good for all Americans or you discriminate against us.
I did, by the by, read Humanae Vitae back in College. We had to read it in Latin and another European language. Found it just as follow of error then as I do today. A few nice ideas, but mainly based on false precepts.

Hi Panthera,
Reading Humanae Vitae in the original Latin! That’s impressive!!!
I agree that 501(c)(3)’s need to walk a very fine line when it comes to the IRS regulations. Being very involved in my Church, I can tell you that 98% of Catholic priests try to keep well away from direct involvement from the pulpit. However, private citizens within the Church are not only free, but morally obligated to participate in the political process as equal citizens.
I’m sure that your sense of equal justice leads you to be as bewildered as me at how Democrat Politicians are routinely shown during campaign season preaching from Protestant pulpits, and yet get a pass from the media. Curious, no?
All the Best.

Gerard,
“Therefore, you are not funding anything.”
Wrong. All taxes help to fund all religions’ tax-exempt status. You said you didn’t want to fund abortions. I said I didn’t want to fund your religion. Tell me what religion performs abortions? (Or sells condoms, for that matter?)
” if these 501(c)(3)’s did not exist and the government were forced to provide the services-such as hospitals, schools, social services, etc”
I believe ‘the government’ (TM) does fund education (though both miserly and miserably). And I think governments should be funding health care for all citizens. Rather healthy citizens than supporting illegal wars with our tax dollars, imo.
“I am not compelled by my Church to do or refrain from doing anything. They teach, and I either give my assent of faith, or not. The choice is mine. The same goes for everyone else.”
That’s as may be, but it doesn’t address my claim that I am not given the same religious freedoms you are, and that I am compelled to support your religion thru my taxes.
And frankly, I wouldn’t waste my time reading any more of HV in order to “get a better understanding of what we believe and why”. I already understand both what you beleive and why – and I happen to disagree with most of it. My question was (and remains) why on earth should non-Catholics be forced to comply with tenets of a religion to which they do not belong?

RE: Instead, they find themselves in a difficult and paradoxical position: in order to stop abortions, they block policies that could reduce the number of abortions.
This is so because adherence to their rigid, narrow dogma is more important to them that coming to any sort of practical solution that will work for everyone else.
Which in turn illustrates why using one religious group’s views as a basis for forming public policy, is bad policy.