Paul VI vs. Playboy

NCR ^ | July 18, 2008 | Donald DeMarco

[NYer]

In 1986, Brother Don Fleischhacker of Notre Dame University wrote a letter to Playboy protesting that magazine’s fragmented view of human sexuality.

Citing Humanae Vitae, this intrepid Holy Cross religious reasoned that once “the contraceptive mentality is accepted, there can be no coherent objective ground for opposition to homosexual activity.” If the unitive aspect of sex becomes an end in itself, he went on to explain, “There is no essential reason why sex should be restricted to couples of different sexes.”

Recent events have proven that Brother Don was as prophetic as was Pope Paul VI when he penned Humane Vitae back in 1968. For Playboy, however, the letter was treated as an object of ridicule and its content irreverently dismissed: “Brother, you sound like St. Thomas’ lawyer,” wrote the Playboy editor, who went on to bless “both kinds” of sexual relations.

This holier-than-thou posture of Playboy explains why its founder, Hugh Hefner, has declared that he is the most moral human being he has ever met. From the perspective of Playboy, it is far ahead of the Church in the sheer number of wonderful things it deems good, including marriage for same-sex partners. Playboy has surpassed Genesis in its generosity, and out-distanced Mother Church in its magnanimity.

Why is the Church apparently so stingy in its blessings, so confused about good and evil? And how did Hefner get to be so much wiser and more beneficent than anyone in the long Judeo-Christian tradition?

Two problems here warrant attention. One is the difficulty in recognizing evil. The second is the assumption that more is better.

The main problem in identifying the essence of evil is precisely that it does not have an essence, anything solid or substantial that would reveal its malefic nature to an empirical examiner. Hence, evil is not an object at which anyone can point. Evil lies in what is missing.

In order to know what is missing, one must first know what should be there in the first place. Ten football players on the field may look perfectly fine to the casual observer, but to the referee, it constitutes an infraction that warrants a penalty. There is nothing wrong with any of the 10 men on the field. It is the one who is missing that creates the problem.

The realistic basis of Humanae Vitae is what Paul VI refers to as a “total” or “integral vision of man.” Two people who are having sex with each other apart from marriage may believe that they are behaving very morally. But if they have willfully excluded love, any concern for conception or any responsibility for their consequences, their act might have on themselves and others, it becomes clear that what they are doing is deprived of the very factors that are needed to realize this “total vision” of the human being. Moral good does not exist in isolation.

The God of Genesis, after proclaiming that everything he created is good, declared that, “It is not good for man to be alone.” The reason it is “not good for man to be alone,” is that he cannot be good unless he has love for other human beings. Man’s nature demands a communal existence. Hell is where man is truly and finally alone, deprived of love, hope, and happiness.

For the same reason, it is not good for sex to be alone.

The key to moral goodness is that it not be isolated from the factors that give it its wholeness and therefore its total good. Moral goods are always organic. Moral evils are always deprived.

The second problem is associated with the assumption that restricting sex to married couples deprives others of meaningful sexual experiences. Or, in the words of a popular comedian, “Restricting sex to one married spouse is like buying a cable package that provides just one channel.”

Humanae Vitae urges a certain “asceticism” in order to “dominate instinct by means of one’s reason and free will.” Sex must pass from instinct to institution so that it can conform to the “total vision of man.”

Pope Benedict XVI, in his 2002 work, On the Way to Jesus Christ, draws important insights from a passage in the Book of Amos, where the eponymous prophet refers to himself as, “a dresser of sycamore trees.”

Citing a number of scholars, the Holy Father explains that the abundant fruit of the sycamore tree is tasteless until it is cut to let the sap run out, whereby it becomes flavorful. This image can be taken to symbolize the transition from the pagan world of excess to the Christian world of purification and moderation.

The Holy Father writes: “Ultimately only the Logos

himself can guide our cultures to their purity and maturity, but the Logos makes us his servants, the ‘dresser of sycamore trees.’”

The application to human sexuality here is easy enough to see. Because Hefner and his playboys see all forms of sex in the flat perspective of equality, they see no one particular form of sex in its sublimity. They promote the tasteless fruit of unseasoned, indiscriminate sex, while criticizing those who understand something about its purity and passion.

Humanae Vitae reminds us that our true destiny is to be whole persons, and that we must discipline ourselves in order to reach that end.

The humanitarian claims of Hefner are bogus since they are based neither on a proper understanding of the human person nor on a recognition of the practical necessity for virtue.

[NYer]

Donald DeMarco is adjunct professor at Holy Apostles College and Seminary in

[NYer]

“Though it is true that sometimes it is lawful to tolerate a lesser moral evil in order to avoid a greater evil or in order to promote a greater good," it is never lawful, even for the gravest reasons, to do evil that good may come of it (18)—in other words, to intend directly something which of its very nature contradicts the moral order, and which must therefore be judged unworthy of man, even though the intention is to protect or promote the welfare of an individual, of a family or of society in general.”

HUMANAE VITAE

[steve-b]

Man's nature demands a communal existence.

Attempts to create rules suppressing man's individualist nature in order to direct man to a communalist nature bespeak a communalist viewpoint (the nature of which is slightly disguised by the extra letters).

[NYer]

From American Papist

---

Tip: Resources for preaching/teaching Humanae Vitae

Courtesy of Human Life International:

• PREACHING HUMANAE VITAE
• PARISH BULLETIN INSERTS FOR HUMANAE VITAE 40th ANNIVERSARY
• Benedict XVI and Contraception, Part 1
• Benedict XVI and Contraception, Part 2

The 40th anniversary of Humanae Vitae, the papal document which reaffirmed the Church's teaching against contraception, is this July 25th.

What a wonderful thing it would be if priests would take this opportunity to either re-affirm the teaching to their congregations, or preach about the evils of contraception for the first time from the pulpit!

See also:

Humane Vitae turns 40

If you haven’t already, be sure to check out Mary Eberstadt’s excellent piece from our current issue — viewable online for free — “The Vindication of Humanae Vitae.” In it, you’ll find a comprehensive survey of the current data which, although drawn from secular sources, illustrates the warnings and predictions of Pope Paul VI’s 1968 encyclical almost to the T.

Kathryn Jean Lopez at National Review Online also questions the empty promises of liberation and empowerment that contraception was purported to fulfill for women, and contrasts it with what’s actually followed — largely, a growing degradation of women — which looks remarkably like what Humanae Vitae predicted.

[frogjerk]

Attempts to create rules suppressing man's individualist nature in order to direct man to a communalist nature bespeak a communalist viewpoint

Well I guess "WE THE PEOPLE" is a communist credo then... -sarc

[stuartcr]

What about the innocents that are knowingly killed in wars...or is it OK to kill people that are non-combatants if you are at war? If it is, then it sounds to me that killing people is relative.

[SnakeDoctor]

Are people actually READING Playboy? Why? I’ve viewed the magazine a number of times — never read a word beyond a Rush Limbaugh interview from the 90’s.

H

[Ozone34]

privatio boni

[maryz]

Attempts to create rules suppressing man's individualist nature in order to direct man to a communalist nature bespeak a communalist viewpoint (the nature of which is slightly disguised by the extra letters).

The "communal" of the author is more in line with Aristotle's dictum that "man is a social animal." Even most "rugged individualists" have family, friends, neighbors, though I admit a tiny minority seem to have a taste for really going it alone!

Nothing is more antithetical to this kind of "communal" than communism, which truly isolates the individual: No one knows whether anyone else can be trusted; everyone is expected to turn in parents, children, etc. to the authorities for any deviation.

And you do note that this is a thread in the Religion forum: hard to love thy neighbor if there aren't any . . .

[trisham]

Citing Humanae Vitae, this intrepid Holy Cross religious reasoned that once “the contraceptive mentality is accepted, there can be no coherent objective ground for opposition to homosexual activity.” If the unitive aspect of sex becomes an end in itself, he went on to explain, “There is no essential reason why sex should be restricted to couples of different sexes.”

***********************

Exactly right.

Hefner has inflicted incredible harm and encouraged evil in our culture for many, many years.

[mckenzie7]

I believe that killing innocents in war is not what we are about. It does get difficult at times when the enemy combatants are dressed as civilians or hide behind women and children. We know that this enemy could care less about civilians as they Indiscriminately kill them, theirs and ours.

[stuartcr]

What about collateral damage? It’s pre-meditated, it kills innocents and it is done as a matter of convenience of war. How is carpet bombing cities or sending in missiles not what it’s about?

[Tax-chick]

I’m a little surprised that a Holy Cross religious brother was supporting Humanae Vitae in 1986. (I wonder if the gentleman was 86 at the time.) Bad Tax-chick! Go find some charity!

[EternalVigilance]

The main problem in identifying the essence of evil is precisely that it does not have an essence, anything solid or substantial that would reveal its malefic nature to an empirical examiner. Hence, evil is not an object at which anyone can point. Evil lies in what is missing.

Insightful.

[stuartcr]

Since evil lies in what is missing, how do we know it exists?

What would a non-empirical examination be?

[AnAmericanMother]

"All Hell is smaller than one small pebble of your earthly world: but it is smaller than one atom of this world, the Real World. Look at yon butterfly. If it swallowed all Hell, Hell would not be big enough to do it any harm or to have any taste."

"It seems big enough when you're in it, Sir."

"And yet all the loneliness, angers, hatreds, envies and itchings that it contains, if rolled into one single experience and put into the scale against the least moment of the joy that is felt in Heaven, would have no weight that could be registered at all. Bad cannot succeed even in being bad as truly as good is good. If all Hell's miseries together entered the consciousness of yon wee yellow bird on the bough there, they would be swallowed up without trace, as if one drop of ink had been dropped into the great Ocean to which your terrestrial Pacific itself is only a molecule."

- C.S. Lewis, The Great Divorce

A very quick read, a very readable book, but it contains much to think about. My opinion is that it may be Lewis's best book -- my daughter is sure of it.

[EternalVigilance]

Since evil lies in what is missing, how do we know it exists? What would a non-empirical examination be?

In Romans chapter one we read the answer:

18 For the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men, who suppress the truth in unrighteousness, 19 because what may be known of God is manifest in them, for God has shown it to them. 20 For since the creation of the world His invisible attributes are clearly seen, being understood by the things that are made, even His eternal power and Godhead, so that they are without excuse, 21 because, although they knew God, they did not glorify Him as God, nor were thankful, but became futile in their thoughts, and their foolish hearts were darkened. 22 Professing to be wise, they became fools...

We know what evil is, because we intrinsically know Who God is. We call this "conscience."

Now, this is of course not "empirical." But that doesn't make it any less real, any more than the fact that we've never seen the wind makes the reality of the existence of wind any less real. You can feel it on your skin. You can see the trees bend at its power. You can see the destruction of an F-5 tornado.

Yes, the wind is real.

God is real.

Evil is real.

And when God is missing, evil WILL rush in to fill the void.

But, "where the Spirit of the LORD is, THERE is liberty."

[stuartcr]

Wind can be measured empirically.

Do people of other faiths have this same intrinsic knowledge of God?

[EternalVigilance]

Lewis was a giant.

[EternalVigilance]

As Paul said in Romans one, yes. All men know the difference between right and wrong. Little children know the difference between right and wrong.

But folks choose to suppress the truth.