Hard facts vs hardened wills

Below is a list of plain but hard facts, revealed by world leading scientific experts and by prestigious institutions, against the systematic nationwide distribution of artificial contraceptives.

The following five points seek to address misconceptions about population growth, the spread of AIDs and artificial contraception:

FACT 1: Artificial contraceptives kill children. When does human life begin? At fertilization, when the sperm penetrates the egg. This was the unanimous response of medical experts (including doctors from Harvard Medical School and the Mayo Clinic) at an eight-day hearing of the US Senate.

Do birth control pills and the IUD kill the embryo? Yes, the pill has a secondary “postfertilization effect,” according to the scientific journal of the American Medical Association. The American Journal of Obstetrics and Gynecology pronounced that the intrauterine device brings about the “destruction of the early embryo.”

FACT 2: Artificial contraceptives injure women’s health. Is the pill safe? The International Agency for Research on Cancer in 2007 reported that the pill causes cancer, giving it the highest level of carcinogenicity, the same as cigarettes and asbestos. It also causes stroke, and significantly increases the risk of heart attacks.

FACT 3: The contraceptive lifestyle destroys the family. Will the greater availability of contraception improve the conditions of the family? Contraceptives bring about the downgrading of marriage, more extramarital sex, more fatherless children, more single mothers, according to the studies of Nobel prize winner George Akerlof.

FACT 4: Condoms promote the spread of AIDS. Will the use of condoms lower the rate of HIV/AIDS in a country? It will increase it, according to the “best evidence” in the world, concluded Harvard director for AIDS Prevention Edward C. Green. Availability of condoms makes people take wilder sexual risks, thus worsening the spread of the disease.

FACT 5: The RH bills are based on wrong economics. Is there a correlation between population growth and economic development? “No correlation” is the answer of Simon Kuznets, Nobel Prize winner in the science of economics. Many later studies confirmed this.

Is population control one of the ingredients for high economic growth? No. This is the conclusion of the 2008 Commission on Growth and Development headed by Nobel prize winner Michael Spence. The factors for high growth are leadership, openness to knowledge, stable finances, market allocation, investment and savings.

* * *

Despite these well-founded and researched facts, it is not easy to understand how some individuals continue to maintain an even harder will against them. Perhaps, they are misinformed—though others may have their own agendas—as they sincerely seek ways to solve many problems of society and the world at large.

It is true that these facts do not give a “quick fix” to the serious global scenario painted by poverty, sexual promiscuity, the spread of AIDS and the indiscriminate abuse of the world’s natural resources. They are more like “indicator lights.” They remind us to always consider the innate dignity of the human person, the family and society in the formulation of policies, systems and strategies addressing national and world problems. To disregard them, that is, to cling to stubborn pragmatic solutions, will only result to irreversible and regrettable consequences, which will be suffered by the next generation.

Individuals who either deny or reject these five facts are like those who insist in clinging to the remnants of a failed political experiment of Communism: Cuba. As Communism around the world began to disintegrate as a political system, Castro continued to even bite and chew harder on this hollow ideological bone. Millions have suffered and died in this anti-human experiment. Thousands continue to do so because of a few hardened wills that say, “Communism may have failed in other parts, but Cuba is different.”

Communism failed, even though it was seeking to “solve” certain injustices in society, because it undermined and denied the basic moral truths about man and society: freedom, the common good, the dignity of the person and the family, work and religious beliefs. In fact, any attempt to “better the world,” but denying the truths about man and his dignity is always bound to fail.

The same skewed vision, apparently endowed with a noble intention of addressing poverty, economic and population issues, is sadly magnified in our country by those who are bent on pushing the RH bill. They undoubtedly witness the devastating consequences of RH legislations all over the world. Their results are now being felt and regretted in countries like China, Russia, France, Germany, Italy, etc. Will they simply turn a blind eye at this evidence, and with hardened will say, “That’s the RH bill in other countries, the Philippines is or will be different”?

How much longer will they insist on their views that subtly undermine the truths about man? Will they choose to hang on to their pragmatic solutions, whose irreversible and regrettable effects will be their burdensome legacy to future generations? Once the toll of these five facts have taken their full effect on humanity, will there still be wills left behind to undo the damage? –Fr. Francis Ongkingco, Cebu Daily News