"Having My Baby" - Frustrations in Fulfilling the Dream

Click to see this review on Amazon.com.

A wonderful document is available on the web site of the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops - "Begotten Not Made: A Catholic View of Reproductive Technology." As that document explains, "if a given medical intervention helps or assists the marriage act to achieve pregnancy, it may be considered moral; if the intervention replaces the marriage act in order to engender life, it is not moral." The Church has emphatically pointed out the immorality of such procedures as the so-called "donation" of eggs or sperm, as well as of IVF. This book is completely remiss, in failing to reference the morally acceptable and scientifically phenomenal work of Dr. Thomas Hilgers, the Creighton Model, and NaPro Technology. Ironically, however, it (probably unintentionally) does provides support for what's being said by the advocates of moral means:

"If you are trying to get pregnant, the first thing you need to do is start charting your monthly cycle....Buy an over-the-counter predictor kit..."(p. 24)

"Your body provides a lot of clues....

• you can chart your cycle by monitoring changes in your basal body temperature....


• During your most fertile days....Your cervical mucus..., becomes watery and
  stretchy....


• At the beginning of your cycle, your cervix is low..., firm and closed. As you approach ovulation, it moves up high, softens, and opens slightly" (pp. 26, 27)

"Because assistive reproductive technologies are still relatively new, their long-term side effects on the children they help conceive are unknown" (p. 77).

In regard to fertility clinics, "Government regulation is pretty limited, sot it's up to you to protect yourself" (p. 106).

In regard to foregoing contraceptives, "The prospect of creating a new life together gives your sex life a turbo charge" (p. 134).

The USCCB's "Begotten Not Made: A Catholic View of Reproductive Technology"

(Listen to an interview with Dr. John Hass on ''Stem Cell Research'')

Pope Paul VI Institute

(Listen to an interview with Dr. Thomas Hilgers on ''NaPro Technology'')

The USCCB's "Married Love and the Gift of Life"

A directory of NFP-only physicians
Philadelphia Natural Family Planning Network

"Well Done, Good & Faithful Servant" (4/22/07 submission to the Monitor & the Times of Trenton)

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It Takes a Family, Supported by the Village

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As per Rick Santorum, "Throughout this book, ...I will be discussing different types of 'captial' and how family breakdown - out-of-wedlock births, divorce, cohabitation, and absentee parenthood - has depleted that capital in recent decades. For it sometimes happens that the patrimony we inherit has not been well cared for by the immediately previous generation....The village elders don't seem to understand that a stable marriage is the greatest protection for children and the most powerful energizer of their success....Ten years after a marriage breaks up, research has shown that approximately two-thirds of children report that they haven't seen their father for over a year....Marriage matters because children matter....The conservative solution to the problems of low-income America, is to structure all our programs around the family, to work with the family rather than against it....In developing my understanding of social policy, I have learned a lot from the tradition of Catholic social thought. In that tradition, there is an important concept called subsidiarity, the principal that all social challenges should be addressed at the level of the smallest social unit possible, preferably the family" (pp. 9 - 68).



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The Sanctity of Human Life

(The presentation of the Natural Law is largely based on the work of Germain Grisez:)

The Natural Law & Social Issues

(The presentation of the Natural Law is largely based on the work of Germain Grisez:)