At the present time the Catholic bishops in the United States are also waging a campaign against the Obama administration's contraception-coverage mandate, on the grounds that this mandate would theoretically rob Catholic colleges and universities and Catholic hospitals and Catholic charitable organizations of their freedom of religion. But this campaign highlights the Catholic church's teaching against artificial contraception.
Thus between the CDF's condemnation of Farley's book and the two political campaigns of the Catholic bishops in the United States, the teachings of the Roman Catholic Church regarding sexual morality are being publicized in the United States today.
We might reasonably wonder why the Catholic bishops, including of course Pope Benedict, are so stubborn about the church's teachings regarding sexual morality: no masturbation, no artificial contraception, no legalized abortion in the first trimester, no remarriage after divorce without an official church annulment, no same-sex relationships, no same-sex marriage. Why not change some of these teachings -- or all of them?
We might attribute the stubborn refusal of the Catholic bishops to change these church teachings regarding sexual morality to their religious zealotry. In short, they are religious zealots who are willing to die a martyr's death as a witness to their religious belief in the church's doctrines, regardless of how flawed those doctrines may be. We should wonder if it is ever reasonable for individual people to die a martyr's death as a witness to their religious belief in a doctrine. Wouldn't dying a martyr's death as a witness to their belief in a doctrine show that they do not value their own lives properly?
In the thought-world of Pope Benedict and the Catholic bishops, a significant change in even one of these teachings regarding sexual morality would open the door to change other teachings regarding sexual morality. At first blush, this rationale for not changing even one teaching sounds like a preemptive case of what Albert Ellis refers to as catastrophizing.
But would it be a catastrophe if the Roman Catholic Church were to change its teaching regarding, say, masturbation? In the thought-world of Pope Benedict and the Catholic bishops, it would be because they fear that the church would lose face by allowing such a change after stubbornly advancing this teaching for so long.
Whatever biblical passages the bishops may adduce to support the church's teachings regarding sexual morality, the bishops also draw on the Catholic tradition of so-called "natural law" moral theory. According to this way of thinking, the church's teachings regarding sexual morality are the "natural law" for everybody everywhere.
Moreover, the Catholic bishops imagine themselves to be the successors of the apostles of Jesus. According to this way of thinking, bishops are gifted with special judgment regarding not only sexual morality but also other moral issues and all matters of faith. Because Farley is not a bishop, she has not been gifted in the way that the bishops supposedly have been with this special judgment.
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