It
was a very insightful history of the mechanism of dissent leading up to the
actual Winnipeg Statement issued by
Canadian Bishops. Indeed, Msgr. Vincent Foy has provided a courageous and
faithful defense of the Church’s teaching through his many exposés of the Winnipeg Statement since its publication
in 1968.
In
light of the goal
of this Series, what are we to think of that tragic statement of Catholic
Bishops obfuscating—if not contradicting—the age old teaching of the Church on
contraception? Was it really such a big deal? Could the twisting of a single
Catholic doctrine really affect a nation in a truly profound fashion? How much
damage could it cause?
Probably
no better answer to that question can be provided than an article written in
2003, again by Msgr. Vincent Foy, which details the devastation wrought upon
Canada by the Winnipeg Statement.
------------------------------------------------------------
Fifty
Reasons Why The Winnipeg Statement
Should be Recalled
by Msgr. Vincent Foy
December 3, 2003
But you, O Lord, are close;
Your commands are truth,
Long have I known that your will
Is established forever (psalm 119).
This year is the 35th anniversary of the
great charter of life and love called "Humanae
Vitae". It was signed by Pope Paul VI on July 25th, 1968. This year is
also the 35th anniversary of a commentary on that encyclical given by the
Canadian bishops. It was published on Friday September 27th, 1968, at the Fort
Garry Hotel in Winnipeg and was entitled "Canadian Bishops' Statement on
the Encyclical Humanae Vitae”.
The encyclical Humanae Vitae and the Winnipeg
Statement do not say the same thing. The encyclical declares, invoking the
authority of Christ, that contraception is to be "absolutely excluded as a
licit means of regulating birth"(n. 14). The Winnipeg Statement, not on the authority of Christ, but on the
authority of the Canadian bishops, says:
Counsellors may meet others who, accepting the
teaching of the Holy Father, find that, because of particular circumstances
they are involved in what seems to them a clear conflict of duties, e.g., the
reconciling of conjugal love and responsible parenthood with the education of
children already born or with the health of the mother. In accord with the
accepted principles of moral theology, if these persons have tried sincerely
but without success to pursue a line of conduct in keeping with the given
directives, they may be safely assured that, whoever honestly chooses that
course which seems right to him does so in good conscience. (n. 26 ).
While the Church teaches that the
prohibition of contraception is a moral absolute, the Canadian bishops say it
is not. It is the same as saying that there are circumstances in which
fornication and adultery and sodomy are legitimate.
It is evident, both philosophically and
empirically, that the Church cannot survive where the doctrine of Humanae Vitae is not taught and lived.
In the Winnipeg Statement, through sophistry,
are sown the seeds of the destruction of the Catholic Church in Canada. In
truth, because of that Statement, the Church in Canada is now stricken and
dying. There is no hope for a viable and evangelizing Church here until the
teaching of that Statement is cancelled and replaced with the truth.
One other observation is in order. There is
an ungodly similarity between the Winnipeg
Statement and the Statement that started the revolt against the truth about
married love and contraception. Until 1930 all Christian Churches considered
contraception a grave moral evil. In 1908, at a Lambeth Conference, the
Anglican Church reaffirmed constant Christian doctrine in saying it
"earnestly calls upon all Christian people to discontinue the use of all artificial
means (of contraception) as demoralizing to character and hostile to national
welfare". (Resolution 41). The betrayal of truth came at the Lambeth
Conference in 1930. Then it was declared that a couple could use contraceptives
"where there is a clearly felt moral obligation to limit or avoid
parenthood" (Resolution 15). By 1958 the Anglican Church considered
contraception "a right and an important factor in Christian family
life". The Winnipeg Statement is
a near clone of the Lambeth betrayal. Soon after it, countless Canadian
Catholics claimed that the practice of contraception was a "right".
It is not difficult to marshal many reasons
why the Winnipeg Statement should be
recalled. I cite here fifty, but that is an arbitrary number. Many taken individually
and certainly all taken together indict and convict the Winnipeg Statement of the crime of leading our beloved Church in
Canada deep into the Valley of Death.
----------------------------------------------------
1. The Winnipeg
Statement is tantamount to blasphemy. It is God who determines what is
morally good and evil and the Church which authentically interprets the natural
moral law (cf. Humanae Vitae, n.4).
Contraception is to be judged objectively so
profoundly unlawful, as never to be, for any reason justified. To think or say
the contrary is equal to maintaining that in human life, situations may arise
in which it is lawful not to recognize God as God". (Pope John Paul II, L'Osservatore
Romano, Oct. 10,1983)
The Winnipeg
Statement permits the negation of divine law. Is this not blasphemous?
2. It is contrary to the first commandment
of God. As the Catechism of the Catholic
Church tells us, Jesus summed up man's duties to God in the words:
You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart,
and with all your soul, and with all your mind. (Matthew
22:37)
We serve God with all our mind when,
enlightened by faith and grace, that mind is conformed to the mind of God
through being conformed to the mind of His Church. In the Winnipeg Statement that conformity is tragically absent.
3. The Winnipeg
Statement is against the second great commandment of God:
You shall love your neighbor as yourself. (Mark 12:31)
In the spiritual order, that order which
concerns itself with eternal salvation, contraception is an act of hate. It is
a grave offence against one's marriage vows which consents to the eternal
damnation of one's spouse.
4. It puts into doubt defined doctrine
concerning the sufficiency of grace. The Council of Trent declares to be
heretical that opinion which says it is impossible to keep God's commandments.
"Humanae Vitae" points out
the sufficiency of God's grace to keep the divine natural law prohibiting
contraception (cf. nos. 20,21). The Winnipeg
Statement says: "A certain number of Catholics----find it either
extremely difficult or even impossible to make their own all elements of this
doctrine" (n. 17). Paragraph 26 implies that the law against contraception
cannot be observed by some.
5. It substitutes the authority of man for
the authority of Christ. The encyclical Humanae
Vitae is given with the authority of Christ (n.6). Bishop Alexander Carter,
President of the Canadian Bishops' Conference in 1968, said: "We faced the
necessity of making a Statement which many felt could not be a simple Amen, a
total and formal endorsement of the doctrine of the encyclical---We had to
reckon with the fact of widespread dissent from some points of his (the Pope's)
teaching among the Catholic faithful, priests, theologians, and probably some
of our own number" (America,
October 19, 1968, p.349). So human authority was substituted for the divine.
6. It has increased tolerance for dissent.
The eradication of the destructive evil of dissent in the Church was the prime
purpose of the extraordinary synod of bishops in 1967. The bishops declared,
concerning all dissent, whether in doctrinal matters, or in pastoral or
liturgical questions: "Those who are rash or imprudent should be warned in
all charity; those who are contumacious should be removed from office". (Ratione habita, October 28, 1967). The Winnipeg Statement undercut the
directives of this synod and make its implementation in Canada practically impossible.
So we have had dissent in Catholic seminaries, colleges and schools. It has
given rise to a dissenting "Catholic" press, e.g. "Catholic New Times", "The Island Catholic News", etc. It
was a factor in the "legitimization" of selling dissenting literature
in "Catholic" bookstores and parish pamphlet racks.
7. It is against Church unity by endorsing
a national morality. Perhaps for the first time since the so-called Reformation
we see bishops passing judgment on the authoritative teaching of the Supreme
Pontiff. In an editorial in the Toronto Catholic
Register regarding the Winnipeg
Statement we read: "It will take weeks, perhaps months, for Canadians
to appreciate and really believe what happened at Winnipeg last week. It has
not happened in the Church anywhere for centuries. And in Canada perhaps for
the first time in our history we can become a truly Canadian Church in the
deepest sense of the word." (October 5th, 1968).
8. Contrary to some, the Winnipeg Statement, is not magisterial.
In the book "Married in the Lord"
(Liturgical Commission, Diocese of London, 1976, 1978) it is asserted that,
concerning statements of national hierarchies, "Their official
declarations are official teachings of the magisterium of the Church" (p.
61). This is false. Bishops exercise their office of teaching only insofar as
they are in communion with the head of the episcopal college, the Holy Father
(cf. Canon 375 of the code of canon law). Canadian Catholics have a right to
magisterial teaching from their bishops on the vital issue of human life.
9. The Winnipeg
Statement has clouded the meaning of collegiality. The claim has been made
that the Statement is collegial. Collegiality exists only in union with the
head of the College of bishops, the Holy Father (cf. Vatican II, Lumen Gentium, n. 21).
10. The Winnipeg
Statement advocates relativism or what is called situation ethics. The
phrase in paragraph 26 "Whoever honestly chooses that course which seems
right to him does so in good conscience" is a cluster bomb attack on
objective morality. What if the course which seems right to him does not seem
right to her? What if his counselor or confessor does not agree with her
counselor or confessor? What if the course which seems right to him or her
kills a human person? Surely this moral relativism cries out for redress.
11. It teaches an erroneous doctrine on
conscience. The Winnipeg Statement
says, in effect, that in some circumstances one may form one's conscience in
opposition to God's law. Vatican II says that the spouses "must always be
governed according to a conscience dutifully conformed to the divine law itself
(Gaudium et Spes, n.50). The Winnipeg Statement , in rejecting this
teaching, has deformed the consciences of countless Canadian Catholics.
12. The Winnipeg
Statement was not corrected by the "Statement on the Formation of Conscience" of the Canadian
Conference of Bishops of December 1st, 1973. While that was a good statement on
conscience it carefully avoided any mention of the Winnipeg Statement or the question of contraception or even Humane Vitae. The result was that many
texts and marriage preparation courses continued to quote the Winnipeg Statement as though the
Statement on conscience had never been written.
13. The Winnipeg
Statement was an act of disobedience to the Holy See. Just before the
release of the encyclical on human life, bishops were asked through Cardinal
Cicognani, Secretary of State, to stand firm with the Pope in the presentation
of the Church's teaching and "to explain and justify the reason for
it". This mandate of the Holy See was deliberately rejected. As Father
Edward Sheridan, S.J., one of the dissenting "periti" at Winnipeg
wrote: “The Statement contained no general profession of assent to the whole
teaching of Human Life; and nothing that could be interpreted as adding the
local authority of the Canadian Hierarchy to that of the encyclical in
general". (America, October
19th, 1968, p.349).
14. It is not a right pastoral application
of Humanae Vitae. The Winnipeg Statement has been defended on
the grounds that it is only a pastoral application of Humanae Vitae. Bishops have said: “We tried at Winnipeg to make a
pastoral application of the encyclical". But right pastoral application is
always in accordance with the truth, and the Winnipeg Statement is in accordance with a lie: that contraception
is not always a grave moral evil. In truth, the "pastoral application"
of the Winnipeg Statement is a betrayal,
a deceit and a fraud.
15. It is not enough to say: "The Winnipeg Statement needs only to be
properly interpreted". There is no way, if words mean what they say, that
Paragraph 26 can be interpreted in accordance with the Church's teaching on
conscience.
16. Largely as a result of the Winnipeg
permissiveness, Canadian theologians and others have felt free to dissent from
the Church's teaching not only on contraception but on a wide spectrum of
magisterial teachings, e.g. on homosexuality, the ordination of women, on the
fundamental option, even on abortion. Witness the revolt of 63 Quebec
"theologians" against the encyclical Veritatis Splendor in 1993.
17. It has led to discord between bishops
and bishops, bishops and priests, priests and priests, pastors and associates,
priests and laity, husbands and wives.
18. The resulting confusion in Canada over
life issues has been an impediment to evangelization. A Church divided against
itself does not present an attractive model of Christian living.
19. The Winnipeg
Statement has been a major factor in Canada's suicidal birth rate. The
birth rate among Catholics is no higher than among the general population. Once
Catholic Quebec has gone from having the highest birth rate in Canada to having
the lowest, with now the highest rate of male and female sterilization in all
of North America.
20. It has been a major factor in Canada in
the crisis of vocations to the priesthood and religious life. Such vocations
are in general the fruit of parents living their Faith.
21. Directly or indirectly, it has
destroyed or weakened the faith of many Canadian Catholics.
22. Whereas hope and joy should permeate
any commentary on the charter of life and love called Humanae Vitae, the Winnipeg
Statement is sprinkled with expressions of doom and gloom. In paragraph 34
we read: "We conclude by asking all to pray that the Holy Spirit will
continue to guide his Church through all darkness and suffering". Again,
"We, the People of God, cannot escape this hour of crisis,"(ibid.).
It concludes with a quotation from Cardinal Newman: "Lead kindly light
amidst the encircling gloom". It has been the Winnipeg Statement that has brought to the Church in Canada an
encircling gloom.
23. It has, in general, lowered the level
of grace and love in the Church in Canada, leaving countless Catholics open to
the seduction of secular humanism.
24. It resulted in the death of our
Catholic Hospitals. In 1970 a Medical-Moral Guide was approved by the Canadian
Bishops for use in Catholic Hospitals. While it condemned sterilization as a
means of contraception (article 18) and contraception itself (article 19), it
attached this addendum: "Reference should be made to the Canadian Bishops'
documents on the pastoral application of this general directive". That was
the death-knell for our Catholic Hospitals. Soon they went the Winnipeg way,
and were allowing direct sterilization and the prescription of contraceptive
and abortifacient pills and devices for "pastoral" reasons.
25. The Winnipeg
Statement was the seed bed which gave birth to the new and disastrous
sex-education courses like "Fully
Alive". In paragraph 33 the bishops said: "Everywhere the problem
of sex education and family life is being studied. And this education is
happily being deepened by scientific research and diffused through the creative
use of mass media…We pledge ourselves to the pastoral priority of encouraging
and promoting these programs whenever and wherever possible".
26. It is corrosive of the authority of
Canadian Bishops. Bishops maintain their divinely endowed authority through
their union with the Holy Father. Deviation from this unity is disastrous to
the bishops' right to be heard and obeyed. Early in the Winnipeg meeting a motion was passed forbidding a minority report. It
was claimed that the Bishops' Statement would be merely a pastoral, not a
doctrinal, one. This erroneous claim was an infringement on bishops' authority
in their own dioceses. The effect of the Winnipeg
Statement was to diminish respect for the Canadian Bishops authority not
only in Canada, but throughout the Catholic world.
27. The Winnipeg
Statement was not corrected, as some have said, by the "Statement on Family Life and Related Matters",
of the Plenary Assembly of Canadian Bishops on April 18, 1969. In that
Statement the bishops said: “Nothing could be gained and much lost by any
attempt to rephrase our Winnipeg
Statement. We stand squarely behind that position but we feel it our duty
to insist on a proper interpretation of the same".
28. The Winnipeg
Statement, in effect, put the Canadian Bishops in thrall to their own
bureaucracy and to dissenting theologians. Fifteen Directors of the Canadian
Catholic Conference signed a petition calling for a "Vatican II
approach". They said that a large number of priests were agonizing
"in acute crises of conscience because of the apparent directives of Humanae Vitae. The "periti" or
so-called experts at Winnipeg were dissenters Fathers Edward Sheridan, S.J.,
Andre Naud and Charles St.Onge. Surely the first requirement of those selected
to advise the bishops should be their fidelity to the Magisterium.
29. Because of their adherence to the Winnipeg Statement, all subsequent
programs of the Canadian Conference of Catholic Bishops, e.g., the Working
Paper: Responsible Procreation, 1983 have
proven fruitless. They have ignored the fundamental cause of most family
problems to-day: the contraceptive mentality
30. It has silenced many pulpits. Many
priests have been hesitant to preach against contraception not only because of
a backlash from parishioners but even from their bishops. At least one bishop
told his priests not to preach on Humanae
Vitae.
31. Some priests were marginalized because
they dared to dissent from the Winnipeg Statement. Assent to the dissent of the
Winnipeg Statement was sometimes
rewarded with promotion.
32. It has unfitted some priests for the
hearing of confessions. It is well known that some priests do not refuse
absolution from the grave sin of contraception even when there is no purpose of
amendment. This invalidates the absolution.
33. It has led to erroneous confessional
directives in some dioceses.
34. In a chain reaction, it has lowered the
level of ethics among Catholic politicians, judges, lawyers, pharmacists,
nurses, hospital staff, teachers and catechists.
35. It has facilitated anti-life and
immoral government legislation, as predicted by Pope Paul VI ( Humanae Vitae, n. 17). It made it more
difficult to discipline nominal Catholics like Mark McGuigan, Pierre Trudeau,
John Turner, and Jean Chretien., who have been principally responsible for the
chasm between Church and State in the area of divine moral law.
36. It has led to an aging society with all
the concomitant negative societal effects, including a disproportionate
financial burden on the shoulders of the young.
37. It has often deprived spouses of
married love. Married love never separates the unitive and procreative nature
of the marital act. With true married love come the joy and the graces which
God showers upon those who are living lives conformed to His will.
38. In a true sense, the Winnipeg Statement permits extra-marital
sex. Marriage consent is an act of the will by which each party gives to the
other, permanently and exclusively, the right to those acts which of their
nature tend to procreation. It does not give the right to contraceptive acts.
These are acts of marital unchastity and infidelity.
39. The Winnipeg
Statement has often pitted spouses against one another. It has been used as
a tool for the seduction of one's spouse into contraceptive conduct.
40. It has led to countless objective
sacrileges. Countless contracepting couples receive Holy Communion with no
purpose of giving up the practice of contraception.
41. Through its tolerance of contraception,
the Winnipeg Statement has led to a
lowered respect for women. In the words of Humanae
Vitae, through contraceptive practice husbands "come to the point of
considering her (the wife) as a mere instrument of selfish enjoyment, and no
longer as his respected and beloved companion" (no.17).
42. Many good couples who have been
faithful to the Church's teaching, often at the expense of great personal
sacrifice, have felt betrayed and unsupported by their shepherds.
43. The Winnipeg
Statement has often made right teaching of Natural Family Planning more
difficult. Natural Family Planning is often taught without moral evaluation or
reference to the "grave" cause required for its practice.
44. The Winnipeg
Statement has been responsible for many childless homes and deprived
countless children of brothers and sisters.
45. The Winnipeg
Statement has deprived countless children of proper role models.
Contracepting parents cannot give their children a right example of chastity
and self-giving.
46. It has been the cause of many marital breakups.
Contraceptive practice is spiritually an act of mutual hate. The subconscious
dynamisms of the contraceptive relationship erode mutual love and respect. A
true coroner's report on the break-up of many marriages would read: "Cause
of Death: the Winnipeg Statement".
47. It has been the cause of invalid
marriages. To exclude the right to have children, whether for a time,
indefinitely or forever, whether on the part of one or both parties, or by
mutual agreement, invalidates the marriage. Numerous couples have invoked the Winnipeg Statement to assert a
"right" to exclude children and have brought this intention into a
defective marital consent.
48. The Winnipeg
Statement has not only adversely affected married life in Canada but in
many other countries. One example was the neo-modernist book "Christ Among Us", by ex-priest
Anthony Wilhelm. It approvingly quoted the Winnipeg
Statement. Before its Imprimatur was removed by order of the Holy See in
1984, 1,500,000 had been sold throughout the world. In 1968 there was an
immense diaspora of the Winnipeg error by such periodicals as Time magazine, the Tablet, America, the National Catholic Reporter, Commonweal, and Catholic Mind. In Australia, it was promoted by a book called
"Catholics Ask", by Father
Bill O'Shea.
49. The Winnipeg
Statement does not distinguish between abortifacient and non-abortifacient
contraceptives. It has led to the killing of countless persons through
abortifacient pills and devices.
50. Even the principal author of paragraph
26 of the Winnipeg Statement
recognized its deceptive wording. In a private letter dated June 15, 1995, the
late Cardinal Carter wrote: "I am not prepared to defend paragraph 26 (of
the Winnipeg Statement) totally. In a sense, the phraseology was misleading and
could give the impression that the bishops were saying that one was free to
dissent at will from the Pope's teaching".
-------------------------------------------------------
Fifty reasons have been given why the Winnipeg Statement should be revoked.
There are many more. In truth their number is legion. There are as many reasons
as there are persons who have been infected or may yet be infected with its
deadly virus.
In the final analysis, the Winnipeg Statement is evil because it is
a betrayal of the Truth- the Truth about Life and Love.
Christ said: "I am the Truth". He
also said: "For this I came into the world, to give witness to the
Truth" (John 18; 37). He entrusted the Truth to His Church, to be
transmitted through Peter, the Apostles, and their successors. So St. Paul
could say: "The Truth of Christ is in me" (2 Corinthians 11;16). So
the Truth about Life is taught in the first century in the Didache. So in 1978, Pope Paul V1 would say three times, in
confirming Humanae Vitae in his last
sermon in St. Peter's: "I did not betray the Truth".
We are considering here the most
fundamental of all Truths—that dealing with Life and Love. Pope Paul II
expressed this verity in these words:
The promotion of the Culture of Life should be the
highest priority of our societies. If the right to life is not defended
decisively as a condition for all other rights of the person, all other
references to human rights remain deceitful and illusory (February 14, 2001).
Put flesh on the Winnipeg Lie, make it
operative, and it turns into a Frankenstein’s monster capable of destroying the
family, society, and the Church. That is now a work in progress. We have seen
how civil society is corrupted by contraception. In Canada first came the law
allowing the sale of contraceptives, then abortion, then the licensing of
widespread pornography, and now the betrayal of homosexuals by the blasphemy of
homosexual "marriage". All of this came about with the complicity of
nominal Catholic politicians.
We ought to pray for our bishops, by divine
providence successors to the Apostles and guardians and transmitters of the
Truth of Christ. The great majority of living Canadian bishops had nothing to
do with the Winnipeg Statement. May
God strengthen them to reject it. Catholics justly beg that the Truth of Humanae Vitae be taught in Canada,
because it must be taught and known and loved before it is lived.
