This summer, Xavier University -- one of the oldest Roman Catholic schools in the United States -- will stop providing contraceptive coverage to its employees. Many Catholic colleges already decline to prescribe or cover birth control to their employees and students, though this may change in the wake of the Obama administration mandate to require such coverage under the health reform law. As a professor at a Catholic university, a woman brought up in a Catholic family, and a patient whose doctors ordered me not to become pregnant while undergoing treatment for cancer, I think Xavier is making a mistake.
What's at stake here is not just contraceptive coverage but the value that Catholic institutions place on women's lives. My experiences, and those of my students, make clear that contraception bans will have far-reaching and damaging implications for female students. The U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops' objection to contraceptive coverage (and Xavier's decision to follow suit) suggest a staggering disregard for young women's everyday lived reality, and their futures.
A few weeks into my first semester of teaching, a female student approached me with a doctor's note explaining an absence. I glanced at it and casually observed that it didn't list the doctor's phone number. After class, the student came to my office to offer a tearful apology. She had lied; the note was a fake. She had gone to Planned Parenthood for a pregnancy test and feared the consequences if she had told me the true reason for her absence.
That was 17 years ago. Since then, I have never again asked a student for a doctor's note. I also refuse to separate reproductive health care from my concern for our students' health and wellbeing. Here's why: Access to contraception does not cause students to have sex. A sexually active heterosexual young woman who does not practice contraception, however, does have a 90 percent chance of becoming pregnant within a year. Banning contraceptive coverage will do nothing to alter young women's needs for contraception. It will just make it harder to access and present one more hurdle to overcome in their pursuit of an education.
Students already face daunting economic hurdles in the form of rising tuition costs, staggering student loan debts and their limited earning potential. As two major studies have found, the main reason students drop out of college is because they need money to survive. According to the USDA, rearing a child costs around $10,000 in the first year alone. Residence halls are not designed to accommodate pregnant and parenting students; undergraduate students who have a child typically live off campus. Some suspend their education, while others drop out of school entirely, buckling under the strain of attempting to study, work and care for a child. One study found that nearly two thirds of women who have children after enrolling in community college fail to finish their degree.
To be sure, families are often a reliable source of practical and emotional support, as well as health insurance. But not every sexually active or pregnant student can count on her parents. Too often, families are the site of rejection, conflict and even violence, particularly around issues of sex and sexuality. A freshman confided her guilt about leaving home to attend college because it left her younger sister vulnerable to a stepfather's sexual predations. More than one gay or transgendered student has described being cut off after coming out to their parents. One student's relationship with her father was damaged by his incorrect assumption that her persistent gynecological problems stemmed from sexual activity.
With or without support from home, many students will seek out the contraception they need. Still, the ban contributes to a climate of shame and stigma surrounding sexuality that -- as we learned from victims of the widespread priest sex abuse scandal -- can be incredibly harmful. Fear of disclosure and shame, in turn, can lead to difficulty finding information and services, and the avoidance of needed health care and support. If universities are to succeed in the mission of educating and graduating the students they admit, they must fill in the gaps in care left unmet by dysfunctional or struggling families, not deny that such dysfunction exists. To do otherwise is to fail our students.
The principle of cura personalis (or "care for the whole person"), central to the mission of Catholic schools, does not come with a qualifier that says "unless you are sexually active" or "except if you are a woman." While Catholic social teachings communicate powerful and uplifting messages about the dignity of the human person, the contraceptive coverage ban (not to mention the Vatican's recent rebuke of the American Catholic nuns for not promoting the "Church's biblical view of family life and human sexuality") shouts volumes about women's second-class status in the Catholic Church. This disrespect for the women who are here -- in our midst, on our campuses -- being shown by a powerful minority of conservative Catholics in favor of purported concern for the unborn must be called out for what it is: profoundly unchristian.
Personally, I think the Church's teaching on marriage, sexuality and the family is incredibly beautiful, dignified, and uplifting.
Whether one agrees or disagrees, this short essay provides a succinct and powerful explanation of the teaching, while leaving the open-minded reader with a lot of food for thought.
http://allhands-ondeck.blogspot.com/2012/02/contraception-and-catholicism-what.html
If you can't afford contraception, you certainly can't afford a baby. The right's solution: so don't have sex, then. The left's solution: force Constitutionaly protected institutions to violate their morals and become enablers.
Almost every "progressive" policy starts with a lack of personal responsiblility and ends with someone else paying for your choices.
As a sociologist you may be intrigued as the second reformation unfolds.
Hardly constitutes a "thou shalt not pill" ban. The employees get good pay and the church doesn't control what they spend it on.
The plan is rather generous otherwise. Many of us would be lucky to have it, dental and vision and great 401k. So they don;t get the pill? I'd rather have the vision coverage.
Translation: so what, big deal.
But, in a lot of ways the teaching makes sense.
For those who wish to learn more about the Church's teaching on contraception, an excellent commentary and further resource links can be found here:
http://allhands-ondeck.blogspot.com/2012/02/why-catholic-church-opposes.html
http://www.ncregister.com/blog/jennifer-fulwiler/the-contraception-trap/#ixzz1sixRqAcS
Here is an excerpt:
"...it
is only the Catholic Church that is willing to tell women unpopular
truths about human sexuality. Only the Catholic Church dares to remind
us that the human sexual act always carries the potential to create new
human beings, and that we're setting ourselves and our future children
up for disaster when we disregard this most fundamental of truths. It
may not be convenient. It may not be what people want to be true. But it
is true. And knowing the truth is always a prerequisite for freedom.
And
so I find it ironic when contraception is said to allow
anyone to live "freely." Secular culture assures women that they can go
ahead and engage in the act that creates babies, even if they are not
ready to be mothers. They are handed contraception, and told to forget
all about the possibility of parenthood. Then, when the contraception
fails, as it so often does, they find themselves feeling trapped,
perceiving that their only escape is through the doors of an abortion
facility. This, to me, does not look like freedom..."
Fulwiler's
insights are particularly relevant given today's news story from
Reuters: "Women overestimate effectiveness of Pill, condoms."
Story here:
http://www.reuters.com/article/2012/04/27/us-women-pill-condom-idUSBRE83Q11Q20120427
Absolutely spot on! There is nothing "Christian" about the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops when it comes to women. Which is why I no longer identify with the modern Catholic Church.
Duh. Thats what happens when you have sex. You get pregnant.
And I like the fact you're trying to learn about Catholic social teaching, but, based on your final paragraph, you clearly have a lot to learn.
There have been no Ex Cathedra (from the Chair of Peter, or Infallible) pronouncements from the Papacy before or since. That is the great lie that most Catholics believe.
"catholic" means universal. It is a universal church, inclusive, loving, and tolerant. The original church was all of those things. After the first centuries, when the prelates and politicians ruined it, it ceased to be what Jesus meant it to be. That is only my opinion.
Guilt and culpability are ego bound. The ego takes to guilt and culpability like a duck takes to water. Find out why this is so and a whole new reality will evolve in your awareness of reality.
Why is it that organized religions cannot ask themselves on a daily basis; who did Jesus have the most problems with? I.e. hint: organized religion.
Why can't you pay for them yourself? Just eliminate two grande lattes a month and that should cover the pills that you must take.
If you can't accept that a Catholic University does not want to cover any birth control pills or condoms or abortions, etc., then you are free to leave. Get another job at another university that will dole out the $20 monthly pills or be a responsible adult and pay for them yourself. And stop whining.
But again, I am wondering why these people, be it a professor or a university student, who are old enough to be called adults cannot take responsibility for themselves. What happened to the feminist movement? It seems that some women who think that they are liberated cannot fend for themselves.
To a certain extent its part of the growing up experience. In the end its hard lesson for the girl but without proper birth control is can be so much worse.
Why is it the man's fault and never the woman?
Do you understand that you are being demeaning towards women with that line of thought?
Feminism menas taking control of your own life. No one makes you have sex, value system or no value system.