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Detroit, Mich., Jul 25, 2018 / 12:16 pm (CNA).- Fifty years after Pope Paul VI issued Humanae Vitae, the landmark encyclical reaffirming Church teaching against contraception, many Catholics still don’t really understand the document and what it teaches.

“The woeful fact is that pathetically few have ever read Humanae Vitae or ever heard a homily or defense of it,” said Dr. Janet Smith, a professor at Sacred Heart Major Seminary in Detroit.

However, she told CNA, “[t]here is encouraging evidence that when they do, they find it persuasive.”

Smith, who is also a consulter to the Pontifical Council on the Family, has written and spoken extensively on the Church’s teaching in Humanae Vitae.

A quarter-century ago, for the 25th anniversary of Humanae Vitae, she released “Why Humanae Vitae Was Right: A Reader” in the hopes of helping people see the wisdom in Catholic teaching.

For the 50th anniversary, Smith is releasing an update of essays, entitled, “Why Humanae Vitae is Still Right.”

“Much has happened in the last 25 years, including the tremendous influence of the Theology of the Body on our understanding Humanae Vitae, and the scientific evidence of the detrimental effects of contraception on women’s health and male/female relationships. While the first volume remains relevant, an update of essays was needed,” she explained.

In Humanae Vitae, Pope Paul VI warned of serious social consequences that would follow if the widespread use of contraceptives became accepted.

Smith said that 50 years have shown the “prophetic power” of Humanae Vitae to be “abundantly substantiated,” with clear connections between widespread contraceptive use and the rise in unwed pregnancy, abortion, divorce, pornography, same-sex unions and transgenderism.  

“When the baby-making power of sexual intercourse is no longer considered a defining feature of sexual intercourse, virtually all sorts of sexual relationships are permissible, providing, I suppose, that they are consensual,” she said.

One common misunderstanding of Humanae Vitae, Smith said, that “it is based upon an outmoded notion of natural law that gives undue weight to simple biology.”

“The fact is that the literally infinitely greater value of human sexual intercourse is the foundation of the Church’s teaching,” she said, emphasizing that human sexuality has a dual purpose: “the facilitating of a lifelong, faithful committed relationship and the participating in God’s creation of new immortal souls – hence the necessity for human sexual relationships to be rooted in marriage, open to new life.”

Another common misconception, she said, is that Catholics may follow their consciences, even against Church teaching, whereas the Church actually says that “freedom to follow one’s conscience is based on the requirement that individuals form their consciences in accord with Church teaching.”

“I believe that few faithful Catholics [who] prayerfully read Humanae Vitae and seek out further instruction should doubts arise would not find the teaching true to God’s plan for sexuality.”

Most Catholics today fail to follow Humanae Vitae, Smith acknowledged. But rather than finding this figure discouraging, she sees hope in a study finding that Church teaching on sexuality is accepted by 37 percent of Catholic women between the ages of 18 and 34 who attend Mass weekly and go to Confession at least once a year.

“In a Church where the teaching is rarely presented and a culture that mocks the Church’s teaching, such compliance is astonishing,” she said. 

And there are other encouraging signs that the Church is working to better reach people with the message of Humanae Vitae, Smith said, such as recent efforts by the U.S. bishops to teach about the issue and encourage priests to do so as well.   

In addition, she said, diocesan family life offices and young seminarians and priests have the training and desire to teach and promote Natural Family Planning, through which a couple uses a woman’s natural fertile and infertile periods to pursue responsible parenthood. Unlike contraception, this method is accepted by the Church because it cooperates with human fertility rather than trying to stifle it.

Smith also noted marriage preparation programs that address cohabitation and contraception, as well as new teaching materials inspired by Theology of the Body, websites with resources and testimonies that are widely accessible, and an increase in faithful Catholic colleges and universities.

“My count indicates there are about 40 conferences being held that feature support of Humanae Vitae in the U.S., not to mention the webinars and likely hundreds of supportive pieces being published in print and online journals and blogs,” she added.

“More of all of this needs to be done, but a tremendous start has been made.”
 
 

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Washington D.C., Feb 3, 2020 / 06:01 pm (CNA).- The United States Conference of Catholic Bishops is decrying a Trump administration order that expands, by six, a list of countries whose citizens are restricted from immigrating to the United States.

The Trump administration on Jan. 31 expanded travel restrictions to include those seeking to move to the United States from Nigeria, Sudan, Tanzania, Eritrea, Burma, and Kyrgyzstan.

“The proclamation restricting immigration further undermines family reunification efforts and will make ensuring support for forced migrants in the designated countries more difficult,” the chairs of several USCCB committees said Feb. 2.

“We respect that there are challenges in assuring traveler documentation and information exchange between countries as a means to ensure the safety of citizens. However, we also believe that ill-conceived nation-based bans such as this injure innocent families…We urge the administration to reverse this action and consider the human and strategic costs of these harmful bans.”

The statement was signed by Bishop Mario Dorsonville, auxiliary bishop of Washington and chairman of the USCCB Committee on Migration; Bishop Joseph Bambera of Scranton, chairman of the ecumenical and interreligious affiars committee; Bishop Jaime Soto of Sacramento, chair of the Catholic Legal Immigration Netowrk, Inc.; Sean Callahan, president of Catholic Relief Services; and Sister Donna Markham, president of Catholic Charities USA.

The formal announcement from the White House stated that each of the six additional countries identified in the January 2020 proposal has deficiencies in sharing terrorist, criminal, or identity information with the United States.

Visas that can lead to permanent residency will be suspended for nationals of Nigeria, Burma, Eritrea, and Kyrgyzstan, while nationals of Sudan and Tanzania will not be able to apply for the “diversity visa” lottery.

Nigeria is the most populous nation in Africa and is approximately 50% Christian.

The United States issued more than 7,920 immigrant visas to Nigerians in the 2018 fiscal year, and of these, 4,525 went to the immediate relatives of American citizens, and another 2,820 to other family members, The New York Times reports. Nigerian immigrants sent back $24 billion in remittances to Nigeria in 2018 alone, the Times reported according to the accounting firm PwC.

The Times reported that nearly 30,000 Nigerians overstayed their nonimmigrant visas in 2018, citing US Department of Homeland Security figures.

The new policy will take effect Feb. 21, the White House announcement said. Immigrants who obtain visas before then will still be able to travel to the United States, officials told The New York Times.

Special Immigrants, whose eligibility is based on having provided assistance to the United States Government, would be excepted from the new policy, the White House said.

The Trump administration’s original executive order restricting immigration was issued Jan. 27, 2017, prompting hundreds of demonstrators to gather at airports. The order was modified and went through several court challenges.

In addition to the countries added in January, the order bars entry of some citizens of Iran, Libya, Somalia, Syria, Yemen, Venezuela, and North Korea. Chad was on the original list, but has since been removed.

Lawyers, advocates for Muslim immigrants, and other critics said the administration’s travel ban still constituted a “Muslim ban” since most of the countries under the ban are Muslim-majority.
The U.S. Supreme Court upheld the travel ban in June 2018, ruling that President Donald Trump was acting within the limits of his authority when he enacted the travel ban on nationals from seven countries.

At the time of the ruling, leaders of the U.S. bishops’ migration committee and religious freedom committee said the travel ban “targets Muslims for exclusion, which goes against our country’s core principle of neutrality when it comes to people of faith.” The Supreme Court “failed to take into account the clear and unlawful targeting of a specific religious group by the government,” the bishops said.

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