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Leave Me Alone!

Thread ID: 18068 | Posts: 3 | Started: 2005-05-02

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Walter Yannis [OP]

2005-05-02 12:08 | User Profile

[URL=http://www.catholicexchange.com/vm/PFarticle.asp?vm_id=1&art_id=28392&sec_id=54570]Leave Me Alone! [/URL] 05/02/05

Here’s the deal,” they said. “We want to do something — it’s something we know you don’t approve of — but we are adults. We want to do this thing in private. Only with other consenting adults.”

They continued, “Look we won’t bother you. All we want is privacy: to have sex with whatever other adult we want to have sex with or to have an abortion. Why should our consciences be dictated to by you? Who are you to try to control our behavior when what we are doing won’t even affect you? It is our private business. We just want to be left alone.”

That is what they said. Remember?

We had a hard time with that one. As a society, we do think people should be free to regulate their private behavior and we aren’t too big on imposing the conscience of one person on another, especially where “consenting adults” are concerned. Camel, tent, nose.

“Now look you,” they said, “we have rights, you know. We are consenting adults and we have a right to exercise our rights wherever we darn well please. So who are you to stand in our way with zoning restrictions or community standards? If you don’t want an abortion clinic in your neighborhood or you don’t want to rent a room to homosexuals, too bad. What we do behind closed doors is our own business. We are consenting adults and it is our own private business what we do. Just leave us alone.” Camel, tent, neck.

“But, hey look here,” they said, "it isn’t really fair that privacy should belong only to those who can afford abortion, or afford to care for a non-marriage ‘partner.’ This is a right we are talking about, after all. Remember, we are consenting adults and we have rights and if we can’t afford to exercise our rights, well then we will just have to use your tax money or dip into the insurance pool. But don’t you dare complain, because we are consenting adults and remember it is our own private business what we do.” Camel, tent, forelegs.

“You have a lot of nerve,” they said, “to continue to teach your children that what we are doing is wrong. After all we are consenting adults. Who are you to say that what we do is wrong? We are just going to have to get into the school system and make sure that your children are taught that these things are our rights. While we are at it, we will teach then that they have a right to these things too. After all, they are almost consenting adults.” Camel, tent, belly.

“Now, you’d better listen to me. I am not asking you; I am telling you. I don’t care what your religion is. I don’t care what your personal beliefs are. You will teach what I tell you to teach. You will dispense whatever killing medicine I tell you to dispense. What’s that? You say you are an adult and you don’t consent? Well, then we will take care of that.” Camel, tent, hindquarters.

As we lie on our backs in our sleeping bags and watch the camel amble away dressed in our tent, we might ponder the new language of privacy and conscience that has nosed its way into our moral discourse.

A “conscience clause” used to be something that prevented a man from being forced to do something which would go against his conscience and cause him to feel guilty. That was the motive behind “conscientious objector” status for military service, for example.

The new conscience clause operates quite differently and oddly in that guilt is no longer even a considered factor. No one argues that unless he is allowed to follow every base desire, he will experience the accusation of his conscience. Rather the new “conscience clause” says, “I judge it as morally right to do whatever my conscience allows, therefore any attempt to limit or control my behavior constitutes the imposition of a foreign conscience upon my personal autonomy.” Notice that the argument is not made that being prevented from carrying out the action in question will create a guilty conscience; rather conscience has become nothing more than shorthand for “whatever I want to do.” The moral language has not even degenerated fast enough to keep abreast of the dissolving concepts.

Privacy has always been an important idea related to conscience, because it is in the private thoughts of the inner person that the voice of conscience accuses or excuses. But as the use of “conscience” has been perverted, so too has the use of “privacy.” Privacy now simply means, “Leave me alone to do… whatever.” Whatever, regardless of how public the consequences, and regardless of how many others have to be forcibly conscripted in cooperating with me for me to do it.

First they came for the pharmacists. No, really. Pharmacists may seem unlikely candidates for being front-line troops in the war against the culture of death, but what is going on with pharmacists across this country demonstrates that the “right of choice” really means the right of coercion. Illinois Governor Rod Blagojevich issued an emergency regulation a couple of weeks ago to force pharmacists to fill prescriptions for birth-control pills and the abortifacient “morning-after pill.” This is in spite of an Illinois statute — Illinois Health Care Right of Conscience Act — which allows Illinois health care providers to not participate in medical services about which they have a moral objection. This debate has widened now to nearly 2 dozen states where legislators are considering bills that will either grant pharmacists the right to refuse to dispense certain drugs on moral grounds, or that will require pharmacies to fill any legal prescription.

As we gaze up at the night sky, we might ponder some of the latest news from Europe. Family doctors in Belgium, where euthanasia has been decriminalized, can procure a "kit" containing the necessary materials for killing one of their patients in the privacy of his own home. The kits are available at 250 pharmacies throughout Belgium.

© Copyright 2005 Catholic Exchange

Mary Kochan, Senior Editor of Catholic Exchange, was raised as a third-generation Jehovah’s Witness. She is a member of St. Theresa parish in Douglasville, GA and she is homeschooling four of her grandchildren. Her tapes are available from Saint Joseph Communications.

Stigmata

2005-05-02 22:41 | User Profile

[QUOTE=Walter Yannis]All we want is privacy: to have sex with whatever other adult we want to have sex with or to have an abortion. [/QUOTE]Unfortunately, your own Catholic clergy can't seem to stick with adults, rendering all of its moral proclamations null and void: