“Protect against pregnancy”      

 “Go in through the narrow gate. The gate to destruction is wide, and the road that leads there is easy to follow. A lot of people go through that gate. But the gate to life is very narrow. The road that leads there is so hard to follow that only a few people find it.” Matt 7:13-14

 I don’t think it’s a coincidence that I found out about porn and the pill on the same day.…I  remember sitting in a upstairs room with my closest guy friends when one of them, I’ll call him Joe, decided to bust out his porn collection. Honestly, the whole experience was pretty horrific. We were just seventh graders and I wasn’t the only one in the room with “virgin eyes”.  It pains me to recall the significant changes I saw in some of those boys afterwards. Joe was already devastatingly desensitized to porn.  He commented on each “chick” like he was at some pub and she was just an appetizer for his lust or a light snack for his vociferous sexual appetite. He even went on to talk about what he wanted to do with some of the girls I knew!  I didn’t understand how or why ANY guy would talk about anyone’s daughter, friend or sister like that and before this incident Joe wasn’t just any guy to me. He and the other boys in the room were meant to be my close friends. But nevertheless I, the accepted girl felt like a scared confused outsider. 

Sex was about babies wasn’t it? At least that’s what I gathered from that eye opening “baby delivery” video back in health class.  That movie didn’t mention anything about “the pill” Joe mentioned in one of his “chick” rants that day. The movie didn’t say anything about what puberty, porn and who knows what else CAN do to an entire building of 11-13 year olds. It could make “friends with benefits” spread like wildfire across a school as curiosity and the desire for sexual and emotional gratification fan its destructive flames.  It could make sex and knowledge of sex extremely cool but make babies, the very natural product of the sexual union incredibly feared. . .

Contraception and “the Pill”

Contraception is "any action which, either in anticipation of the conjugal act [sexual intercourse], or in its accomplishment, or in the development of its natural consequences, proposes, whether as an end or as a means, to render procreation impossible" (Humanae Vitae 14).   It’s nothing  new. It’s been around for ages. For example, Egyptian woman in 1500 BC were said to have created cervical barriers with crocodile dung. Scientists didn’t know much about fertility until recent centuries.  The female egg wasn’t discovered until the 1800s, and female hormones were not discovered until the 1900s. Until then sperm was considered baby matter that needed a womb for safe keeping and development. So as you see contraception goes way back but it doesn’t mean that is was safe or very effective.  You kind of have to know “where babies come from” to keep them from arriving.

Today s booming contraception (birth control) industry is more aware of  “where babies come from”.  They know that a woman’s female hormones not only control the ovulation process but her womb’s overall environment.  This finding led to the invention of hormonal contraceptives like the infamous “pill” which uses synthetic hormones to trick the women’s body out of ovulating.  If the woman doesn’t ovulate her eggs can’t be fertilized.  If however, she manages to ovulate anyway, fertilization still isn’t easy. “The Pill” makes it difficult for sperm to get into the womb by thickening mucous around her cervix.  If however sperm does make it into the womb, and one of his little winners makes contact with her egg, conception occurs. Now we’re dealing with a new human life! Regrettably, this new little teeny tiny person may not have a place in its mother’s womb to rest because of the way the contraceptive alters the lining of the woman’s womb walls.  There’s a pretty high chance she will lose her new baby.  The women may experience a chemically induced abortion without even knowing it.

“Protect against pregnancy”…are you kidding?!

According to the birth control industry potential abortion is just PART of what it means to “protect against pregnancy”!!!  How awful!  We should protect ourselves from dangerous things like sicknesses and violent burglars’ not cute and cuddly babies. And if we were truly concerned with protecting ourselves from children we would be wise to choose abstinence and not a method that includes stroke, heart attack, latex rashes, nausea, breakthrough bleeding, acne, bloating, hormonal flip flops, decreased libido, cancer or inflamed, itchy, irritated sexual organs (ouch).   Trading healthy fertility for destructive counterfeit sexual liberation has its price so let’s not be “Red Herring-ed” out of the most sensible way of avoiding pregnancy when even artists like Snoop Dog and Usher refer to sex as “baby making”... No matter how hard we fight it, abstaining from “baby making” activities is the only 100% way of remaining child free…

Abstinence ain’t easy but it is healthy, cost effective and doesn’t violate the twofold fundamental purpose of sex (which can ONLY be fulfilled within the sacrament of marriageJ) . “The spouses' union [sex] achieves the twofold end of marriage: the good of the spouses themselves and the transmission of life. These two meanings or values of marriage cannot be separated without altering the couple's spiritual life and compromising the goods of marriage and the future of the family.” (CCC 2363)  When we respect the creator, context and fundamental purposes of sex we and up with something way better than media preached booty buddy, one night stand-ed or dating processed sex with pill popping on the side. Mere convenience mentality, or public opinion cannot change the fact that God, the creator of sex places sex within the sacrament of marriage .  When a married couple locks the doors and has sex, they lock the doors because they are sharing in something sacred. They are sharing in the incredibly personal and intimate giving of one completely to the other, and only THAT other.  This holy exchange of love helps them love each other as promised in their wedding vows; totally, unconditionally, faithfully and in a LIFE GIVING way (babies). The married couple renews these vows in body language every time they have sex without barriers or “protection” from God, each other, or potential life. God the author of creation wills new life from this holy love exchange and if new life comes from it, the couple can look upon their child in awe. The child then is not a “feared mistake” but what God intended all along, a welcomed expression of true love J.

Men and woman are wired differently, it’s a beautiful thing. So sure we have all heard about why men tend to be so attracted to images on certain websites. We have heard about the outrageous money that goes into editing woman in magazines. We know that our beloved brothers in Christ are targets of a multi-billion dollar industry that takes advantage of their God given nature, to be visual and physical people.

"You have the right to remain silent and refuse to answer questions. Do you understand?

Anything you do say may be used against you in a court of law. Do you understand?"

This is the very beginning of whats called the Miranda Warning. Its read out to to those suspected of any crime before questioning. It's the law (in Americana) because our legal authorities know that, contrary to popular opinion, ignorance is not bliss when a person is ignorant of their rights.

“With it we bless the Lord and Father, and with it we curse human beings who are made in the likeness of God…this need not be so…” (James 3:9-10).

A womans body can sell a car, smite a grown man speechless and hold a whole room captive. Our bodies can bring comfort and protection or speak volumes. It’s a powerful thing. But what is power? In the body there is what is referred to as the calorie or the kilojoule. Food gives us energy/power (or whatever you want to call it). It’s meant to be used. And if it isn’t used it’s stored. It sits and waits then eventually weighs us down as fat, the body’s highest concentration of stored energy.

Much of my early childhood is a blur. There is an occasional yet very tangible scene here and adventure there, many without dates. But I always remember the whos of those experiences. I’ve got a twin sister at home (very much tied to my heart), as little ones we experienced everything together, from the “no” speech phase to the much more enjoyable “why” phase.

Something reacted inside of me the first time I read those words. It took me a while to get why. “... alive with it rotting.”  That’s what I felt like. I was alive alright, in the literal sense, but throughout that fat chapter in my life I felt as if my being was rotting away. It was, but distraction had the best of me.