"Towards a new morality" was the headline in a British Catholic weekly recently; the article was supposed to be a sophisticated explanation of Pope Benedict XVI’s highly publicized remarks on the use of condoms in a book-length interview entitled, Light of the World, by journalist Peter Seewald.
Curiously, the article doesn’t even begin to support the exaggerated heading. Moreover, the question about the morality of condom use in the context of the current global AIDS problem, while discussed quite frankly by the Holy Father, was "answered" confusedly or inaccurately by the secular media (which elected to focus on just this one issue covered by the Holy Father in hardly two pages of the 219-page book).
On the question of contraception, no "new morality" was proposed, nor is there any movement "toward a new morality." Yet the way in which Benedict’s comments in Light of the World have been misread or misreported has occasioned a 21 Dec., 2010, corrective "Note" by the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith. The intent of the Holy Father in the book, it said, is quite clear; specifically "to rediscover the beauty of the divine gift of human sexuality and, in this way, to avoid the cheapening of sexuality which is common today."
The CDF "Note" stresses that the Pope was not primarily speaking about conjugal morality or about the moral norm relating to contraception. This norm, it said, "belongs to the Tradition of the Church" and was summed up by Pope Paul VI in his encyclical, Humanae Vitae. Paragraph 14 reads: "also to be excluded is any action which either before, at the moment of, or after sexual intercourse, is specifically intended to prevent procreation – whether as an end or a means."
Pope John Paul II, in his Apostolic Constitution Familiaris Consortio, elaborated on Paul VI’s magnificent encyclical by emphasizing that the language of conjugal communion, by God’s design, reflects two dimensions: the love-giving or unitive aspect, and the life-giving or procreative. Attempting to separate one dimension from the other amounts to redesigning the divine purpose, and hence is contraindicated.
Regarding the Holy Father’s remarks in Light of the World (p. 174), the topic addressed differs from the topic of conjugal union. In the interview, the issue pertained to prostitution, which, the CDF "Note" reminded, has always been viewed in terms of Christian morality as gravely immoral. (See Vatican II, Gaudium et Spes and the Catechism of the Catholic Church, No. 2355.) "The practice of prostitution should be shunned," the "Note" continues, "and it is the duty of the agencies of the Church, of civil society and of the State to do all they can to liberate those involved from this practice."
Owing to the epidemic of AIDS, moreover, the global problem of prostitution has intensified in its deadly physical and emotional consequences. Thus, the CDF "Note" affirms that those who are aware of being infected with HIV, "apart from committing a sin against the Sixth Commandment, are also committing a sin against the Fifth Commandment – because they are consciously putting the lives of others at risk through behavior which has repercussions on public health." In a situation such as this, Pope Benedict clearly affirmed that "the provision of condoms does not constitute ‘the real or moral solution’ to the problem of AIDS, and also that ‘the sheer fixation on the condom implies a banalization of sexuality’ in that it refuses to address the mistaken human behavior which is the root cause of the spread of the virus."
In the above context, Pope Benedict granted that the use of a condom by some "with the intention of reducing the risk of infection" could be "a first step in a more human way, of living sexually." However, this must be understood in accordance with the Pope’s earlier statement that such an act is "not really the way to deal with the evil of HIV infection."
Nor can the Pope’s words be "interpreted" according to the theory of the "lesser evil." For one thing, this Traditional theory rests on the premiss that an action "which is objectively evil, even if a lesser evil, can never be licitly willed." Hence, Benedict did not state, as has been alleged, that prostitution with use of a condom can be elected as a lesser evil. Prostitution itself is necessarily a moral evil and must be shunned.
Solutions to AIDS cannot licitly be based on, or linked to, immoral actions. Any behavior that "cheapens sexuality," the CDF "Note" concludes, must be condemned. As Benedict remarks in Light of the World: "this is why the fight against the banalization of sexuality is also part of the struggle to ensure that sexuality is treated as a positive value and to enable it to have a positive effect on the whole of man’s being." (p. 119)
