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Humanae Vitae: Thirty Years of Discord and Dissent
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Humanae Vitae: Thirty Years of Discord and Dissent
Megan Hartman is information specialist in the Communications and Education Department at Catholics for a Free Choice.
On July 30, 1968, the New York Times ran a front-page story announcing the release and publication of a new encyclical (a papal letter to the church as a whole) reaffirming the church's position forbidding all forms of artificial contraception. Running beside that article was a piece on dissent within the church from what had just been codified as official Catholic teaching. The nearly equal coverage foreshadowed the encyclical's destiny as the most divisive pronouncement in recent church history.
For the past thirty years, disagreements, doubts, and questions on the teachings outlined in Humanae Vitae have been widespread and international in scope. Humanae Vitae provokes serious inquiry regarding the church's view of sexuality. It also raises questions about the primacy of conscience, papal authority, infallibility, and the right of Catholics to dissent from noninfallible church teachings.
The struggle with the teaching can be found in every corner of the church. Many theologians teach and speak out on their disagreements with Humanae Vitae, even in the face of spoken and unspoken threats from Rome. Clergy widely counsel couples to follow their conscience in personal decisions about contraception. Some bishops urge reconsideration. Laity dissent from the ban by using contraception and by believing they are acting morally in doing so.
Meanwhile, the reaction from the Vatican has been continued emphasis, even increased emphasis during the papacy of Pope John Paul II, on the "evils" of artificial contraception. While by no means comprehensive, the following chronology provides a sketch of the thirty-year history of questioning and dissent by Catholics from Humanae Vitae. Much of this disputation came just after the encyclical's release to a shocked Catholic world, and the...