Making Sense of Bioethics: Column 197 : Eugenics, Forced Sterilization, and Protecting the Mentally-Challenged

...the solution should never be direct sterilization but tailored care that addresses their specific mental health situation...

Rev. Tadeusz Pacholczyk, PhD—Director of EducationNovember 30, 2021Human Sexuality, Birth Control and Contraception, Disabilities and the Disabled, Eugenics, Sterilization

Making Sense of Bioethics: Column 150: The "Bitter Pill" of False Liberation

The Church’s ageless but countercultural teaching on contraception respects and uplifts women. It supports them in an authentic feminism that esteems their fruitfulness in marriage not as a defect, but as a real gift.

Rev. Tadeusz Pacholczyk, PhD—Director of EducationDecember 30, 2017Human Sexuality, Sex Education, Birth Control and Contraception, Premarital Sex

Making Sense of Bioethics: Column 129: Catholics and Acceptable Uses of Contraceptives

…while the Church has always taught that marital acts of contraception are morally wrong, the use of contraceptives can sometimes be acceptable within certain other contexts outside of consensual conjugal acts.

Rev. Tadeusz Pacholczyk, PhD—Director of EducationMarch 30, 2016Birth Control and Contraception

Making Sense of Bioethics: Column 106: A Path of Renewal for the Catholic Sterilized Couple

Even though a reversal may not be feasible or obligatory, the repentant couple may nonetheless become aware of the need to order their sexual activity and appetites in the face of their original sterilization decision and its extended consequences.

Rev. Tadeusz Pacholczyk, PhD—Director of EducationApril 30, 2014Birth Control and Contraception, Sterilization, Marriage

Making Sense of Bioethics: Column 092: Debating Birth Control in the Public Square

If it is true that contraception is often harmful to individuals and families, to marriage and to women’s health, then it clearly has broader public policy implications, and is, objectively speaking, not merely a “personal matter.”

Rev. Tadeusz Pacholczyk, PhD—Director of EducationFebruary 28, 2013Law and Ethics, Birth Control and Contraception

Making Sense of Bioethics: Column 091: The Pill as Health Care?

The Pill, when chosen strictly for these contraceptive purposes, fails the test of being healthcare because it does not heal or restore any broken system of the human body. On the contrary, it actually breaks a smoothly working system — the reproductive system — by disrupting the delicate balance of hormonal cycles regulating a woman’s reproductive well-being and fecundity.

Rev. Tadeusz Pacholczyk, PhD—Director of EducationJanuary 30, 2013Birth Control and Contraception

Making Sense of Bioethics: Column 080: Nickels, Dimes and Family Size

At times, then, our justifications for avoiding a pregnancy may merit further reflection and scrutiny on our part.

Rev. Tadeusz Pacholczyk, PhD—Director of EducationFebruary 29, 2012Birth Control and Contraception, Natural Family Planning (NFP)

Making Sense of Bioethics: Column 076: "To Give or Not to Give" – That is the Marital Question

She wondered whether it would still be allowable for her to engage in marital relations with her husband after the vasectomy. When one spouse is involved in this so-called ‘abuse of matrimony,’ the other is placed in an awkward situation

Rev. Tadeusz Pacholczyk, PhD—Director of EducationOctober 30, 2011Birth Control and Contraception, Sterilization

Making Sense of Bioethics: Column 071: NFP and the Telos of Sex

In natural family planning, on the other hand, they are not directing any countermeasures towards the fertility of a specific conjugal act; the natural order and telos of the act is respected.

Rev. Tadeusz Pacholczyk, PhD—Director of EducationMay 30, 2011Birth Control and Contraception, Natural Family Planning (NFP)

Making Sense of Bioethics: Column 044: Verbal Engineering and the Swaying of Public Conscience

...sophisticated verbal engineering was necessary, since nobody could reasonably expect the abortion ethic to advance by saying, ‘Let’s kill the kids.’ Many things simply cannot be achieved when it is clear to everyone what is going on; obfuscation is essential.

Rev. Tadeusz Pacholczyk, PhD—Director of EducationFebruary 28, 2009Law and Ethics, Natural Law, Universal Morality, Abortion, Birth Control and Contraception, Conscience

Making Sense of Bioethics: Column 043: “A Future Pregnancy Would Be Too Risky…”

...refusing to compromise our sexual faculties through vasectomies or tubal ligations, promotes important personal virtues within marriage and properly respects the God-given and life-giving designs of our own bodies.

Rev. Tadeusz Pacholczyk, PhD—Director of EducationJanuary 30, 2009Birth Control and Contraception, Sterilization, Human Sexuality, Natural Family Planning (NFP), Pregnancy Complications

Making Sense of Bioethics: Column 038: Sex and Little Pills: Viagra and Birth Control

Viagra and birth control serve two very different purposes, and each one has its own unique ethical considerations. Viagra, at a minimum, treats an actual dysfunction, while birth control does not. In fact, one might say that Viagra fixes a broken system, while birth control breaks a perfectly working system.

Rev. Tadeusz Pacholczyk, PhD—Director of EducationAugust 30, 2008Birth Control and Contraception, Homosexuality and Gay Marriage, Viagra

Making Sense of Bioethics: Column 025: Contraceptive Contradictions

... marital sexuality is all about loving someone totally and unreservedly, giving and receiving totally, and not holding back who we are for ourselves. It involves a unique language of total self-giving.

Rev. Tadeusz Pacholczyk, PhD—Director of EducationJuly 30, 2007Birth Control and Contraception, Human Sexuality, Sex Education

Making Sense of Bioethics: Column 021: Thinking About Sex and Marital Surrender

The inner structure of human sexuality thus includes this central and discernible meaning: that the root origin of new human life is meant to ultimately lie beyond our own direct determination...

Rev. Tadeusz Pacholczyk, PhD—Director of EducationMarch 30, 2007Human Sexuality, In Vitro Fertilization, Parenting, Birth Control and Contraception

Making Sense of Bioethics: Column 012: Conundrum with Condoms

Indeed, true love is violated right at its core in marriage any time we choose to use condoms, even for ‘good reasons.’

Rev. Tadeusz Pacholczyk, PhD—Director of EducationJune 30, 2006Birth Control and Contraception, Sex Education, Condoms, AIDS and HIV

“Making Sense of Bioethics” CMS