Catholic Bishop ‘Can See the Arguments’ for Condoms in Third World

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Catholic Bishop ‘Can See the Arguments’ for Condoms in Third World

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The highest-ranking Catholic clergyman in England and Wales, Archbishop of Westminster Vincent Nichols, has made the slightest of admissions that he understands why contraception use may seem, well, useful under certain conditions—such as poverty, for example. —KA

Reuters UK:

“I think when it comes to Third World poverty, and the great pressure into which many women are put by men, I can see the arguments why, in the short-term, means that give women protection are attractive,” Nichols said in extracts of an interview released by BBC Radio WM before broadcast on Friday.

“The use of condoms doesn’t lack for champions; there are plenty of champions around giving and distributing condoms. I don’t think it’s the Church’s role simply to add its voice to that but rather, in contrast, to keep saying, ‘If we solve the poverty then consistently we know the birth rate comes down’.”

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By bogi666, April 1, 2010 at 12:08 pm Link to this comment
(Unregistered commenter)

All of the Catholic clergy, whom oppose birth control, should at least adopt children or better yet the Catholic Church should encourage those Catholics to have children and the Catholic clergy will adopt and raise these children BECAUSE THEY THINK IT’S SUCH A GOOD IDEA to have children.

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By Bruce, April 1, 2010 at 11:53 am Link to this comment
(Unregistered commenter)

Yes, the Bishop does suffer from a form of mental impairment - it’s called Catholicism. It’s a very powerful block to rationality, this Catholicism. Much mental energy must be expended to maintain the edifice of “theology” against the onslaught of reality. Giant rationalizations must be constructed, cognitive dissonance must be struggled against.

Why expend the energy? For a feeling of belonging, the promise of a life everlasting in the presence of the living (but unchanging) God, and (in the case of the Bishop) for temporal power.

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By gerard, April 1, 2010 at 11:24 am Link to this comment

Mr.Freeze: I think not! The Archbishop suffers, rather, from a severe case of non-pairment with condoms.
He also leans rather heavily on the fact that birthrate goes down when poverty is eliminated because parents don’t have to have lots of kids so that enough of them will survive to grow up and become beggars and support them when they get old.
Yet he does not seem to mention how many famous art works or gold coins the Vatican might donate toward putting an end to poverty.
Just looking at the surface of it, a good deal less time would be required to use condoms than to eliminate world poverty.
But hey! Why not do both—a.s.a.p.?

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