Abortion Noise But Fornication Silence

[Father Joe]

SAM ASKS:

Fr. Joe,

I have a question that has been bugging me for so long— why has the
church been fight an apple instead of chopping down its tree? What I
mean by this is, why has the church been campaigning so hard against
abortion when abortion is the fruit of an unwanted pregnancy, most of
which comes from sex before marriage? Why hasn’t any of the clergy
spoken out forcefully against the sex revolution that has so many of
my peers hooked? Please note that I’m 17, and really can’t speak out
against it. I can’t help but feel that if more of the clergy spoke out
against it, most of the abortions would stop. I love the pro-life
movements, but, why aren’t there people doing out the into-chastity
movements? When is the church going to speak out about the
intrinsically evilness of fornication, and lead her teens back to
imitation of the chastity of the Blessed Mother and St. Joseph? When
is the fight for protecting and restoring the former honor of
virginity and innocence recommence?

Thanks for your time.

FATHER JOE RESPONDS:

Dear Sam,

I know what you mean, especially when some of the clergy never preach
about topics that might upset certain members of their congregations.
However, you need to know that this passivity is not everywhere. Many
of us have been waging a good fight against secularism and hedonism
for longer than you have been alive. Certainly, the popes have given
us many encyclicals dealing with the present situation, particularly
Evangelium Vitae. Ideally, the Church must address all the elements
that are an affront to Christian faith and morals.

We speak loudly about the tragedy of abortion while not neglecting the
selfishness and use of artificial contraception that fuels
contemporary hedonism. The sexual revolution took off in the 1960’s,
and while many hit the brakes in the 1980’s in the face of HIV
infection and AIDs, condoms and new drugs against STDs have given
people a false sense of security today.

Many factors are involved: pornography in both its hard and soft
incarnations found in movies, television, magazines and now the
Internet; the degradation of marriage in the face of widespread
cohabitation, fornication and same-sex unions; the rampant use of
artificial contraception (feeding a contraceptive mentality); a
secularism and materialism associated with personal selfishness and an
undisciplined love of pleasure; the ridicule of traditional faith and
values; inappropriate sex education in our schools; increased
vulgarity in public dress and popular entertainment (music and dance);
etc. I think it is important for all of us, teens included, to be
signs of contradiction for others. There are young girls I know who
wear chastity rings. There are young boys and other teens that are
pledging virginity until marriage. Good things are happening, as
demonstrated by so many young people recently at World Youth Day in
Sydney, Australia.

You can make a difference. Please know that there are priests and
others praying for you and all our young people. Ask your parish
priest to talk about chastity at Mass and maybe have a special speaker
at the church youth group meeting. Fornication is a terrible evil.
And, while even married couples might use immoral methods of
contraception, it is true that those who have sex outside of marriage
are very frequent users of drugs and appliances that induce
sterility.

I often warn those who look forward to a happy marriage to do all they
can to remain pure and to avoid fornication. Fornication before
marriage leads to adultery after marriage, a chief cause of breakups.
Once you take sex out of marriage, it is awful hard to put it back in.
Like the old analogy, it is hard to put the cat back into the bag.

God bless you!