It would seem Pope Francis is once again ?stirring the pot of controversy within the Catholic Church.
The pope, who is well known for his extremely frank language when ?discussing divisive topics, has taken on the problem of ?overpopulation.
During an hour-long press conference on the plane ?returning the pope from his trip to Asia and the ?Philippines, Pope Francis established his stance on ?population control.
The holy leader said Catholics should not feel ?obligated to “be like rabbits” in terms of their breeding ?habits and the church’s ban ?on contraception.
Of course, who wouldn’t be thinking about ?overpopulation after visiting the overcrowded land of ?Philippines?
As one might think, this impoverished southeast Asian country is ?being crushed under the weight of its overpopulation problem, which has doubled from 45 to 100 million in the last three decades.
While contraception is completely legal in the ?Philippines, contraception ?carries a stigma along with in society.
Therefore, it isn’t ?difficult to believe that more than 57 percent of all births in the Philippines are unplanned, with 20 percent ?mistimed and 16 percent completely ?unwanted.
It should be noted that the country is predominately ?Roman Catholic.
It is 86 percent Catholic, to be exact.
However, none of these forewarning statistics ?have changed either the pope’s nor the church’s mind when it comes to ?contraception.
Despite the fact that numerous studies show abstinence-only education is positively ?correlated with teenage pregnancy and high birth rates, the pope ?continues to advocate it.
Once again, the pope and his church have chosen to set aside and ?ignore all the data pointing towards abstinence-only ?contraception as a failure to keep pregnancy rates from rising.
And even though I feel that Pope Francis’ heart is in the right place, as I’ve come to notice it usually is, he is still ?allowing the religious dogma of his church to cloud the ?reality of the situation in places like the ?Philippines.
We do not live in some fantasy world where telling people to stop having sex is a ?viable option.
It’s too much fun and teenagers are too drunk on hormones to ever actually take that advice ?seriously.
We have to be ?realistic here.
And while abstinence has been a Catholic Church mainstay for the entirety of its existence, it is slightly ?surprising to see Pope ?Francis so opposed to ?reviewing its relevance in the modern world.
He’s been a pretty ?controversial pope so far, and it would seem as if he wants to reform the outdated customs of the church for the 21st ?century.
Of course, we are only at the beginning of his papacy, and as such we may see Pope ?Francis’ views change on ?issues like contraception.
However, the health and needs of worshipers should trump the church’s traditionalist, ?obsolete view of sex.
As it stands, the church needs to take a good, long look at the facts and ?realize that abstinence-only education has failed ?miserably as a form of ?contraception.
kevsjack@indiana.edu
