Trent Horn explains why replacing one evil with another, such as contraception for abortion, is not morally acceptable, and why doing so is ineffective in fostering a culture that values the unborn.
Transcript:
Host: Let’s go to Kalima in Portland, Oregon listening on Mater Dei Radio. Kalima, you’re on with Trent Horn.
Caller: Hello, guys, I appreciate your show and I listen to it as often as I can.
Host: Well done. Good taste.
Caller: I have a question, I guess it’s all kind of been tied as far as contraception goes, because I understand our Catholic theology–I’m actually attending RCIA, the local parish here, so soon to be, you know, chosen, among the chosen–but I do have a question: As far as abortion, and people who aren’t Catholic that don’t necessarily believe as much as we do in life, and the thing to see of marriage and that sex is for procreation and procreation a search for those who are married, how do we convey…I don’t know, kind of effectively–I guess, how do we get people to our side, so to speak? Because I would obviously–abortion shouldn’t exist, it shouldn’t be a thing that should be legal, and I think in my state of Oregon it’s legal through all eight month which is–nine months, which is atrocious. So is there no moral ground, then, for proposing contraception in place of abortion for people who are not Catholic? Like, is that a moral stance we can take?
Trent: No, it’s not, because what we would be doing here is, we’re answering one evil with another. For example, that would be like saying, “Well, let’s try to answer child molestation by giving pedophiles child pornography instead.” And I’m not–and it’s just an analogy, I’m not saying people who support abortion or contraception are pedophiles. It’s an analogy that to answer one evil with another evil, that is not the how the Church should approach these issues.
And I’m also skeptical of this method working, because I know people say, “Well if you give people contraception, there’ll be less unintended pregnancies and less abortions.” My thoughts on that would be as follows: First, the goal of the pro-life movement, the goal of the Catholic Church on this issue is to restore the right to life of the unborn. And so the problem here is that giving contraception doesn’t change people’s attitudes to see the unborn are worth valuing, that they deserve a right to life. It doesn’t contribute to that in any way.
Second, if anything, it may devalue that. It may cause people to think that, you know, the unborn don’t matter as much. I was at a university once and a student said, “Why aren’t you passing out condoms?” And I said, “Well, there’s condoms at your campus health center.” He said, “Yeah, but that’s, you know, 200 yards away from here, I don’t want to walk that far.” So you see that, but in promoting contraception we’re promoting an anti-life, anti-responsibility mentality towards children, a contraceptive mentality that leads to an abortive mentality, and I talked about that a little bit in my book, Persuasive Pro-Life, which you can always check out to see more.
But thanks for calling, and we’ll pray for you in your RCIA process. Keep moving towards the truth.