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My in-laws know that I enjoy books on saints, apologetics, and Catholicism and got me this one for Christmas. As is common for me, I'm not reading it in a normal front to back manner but am hopping around the book. I came to the chapter where the protagonist is defending traditional Christian teaching against contraception. He is speaking after the likes of Margaret Sanger (founder of Planned Parenthood) have just advocated their positions. This "debate" occurred in the summer of 1916. It's hard to remember all of the laws on the books at that time prohibiting contraception, put there mainly by the Protestant evangelicals. At that time it was even against the law to send information about contraception in the mail. The author said during his speech:

It is worth while to put into words just what demands the birth-control propagandists make. They want the Federal law abolished that prohibits the use of the mails for circulating information relative to methods of contraception; they want all state laws on the subject abolished; and they want clinics established to carry out their purposes. Mary Tyng, as a "last resort" advocates abortion. In "The Call", the Socialist daily, she says:

"Eventually, I believe that we shall become so enlightened that these unfortunate women will need only to go to a public hospital and say: 'I have become pregnant by accident and should like to have an operation.' in order to get such an operation performed with every precaution and safeguard."

Consequently, the practical outcome of the birth-control propaganda ranges from detestable acts to murder.

At the time he said this people would have thought he was being absurd to connect Planned Parenthood's desire to promote contraception with a hidden desire to promote abortion. For me it was interesting to compare this speech from 1916 to the words of the US Supreme Court in the 1992 abortion decision "Planned Parenthood vs. Casey" which in some sense was a followup and affirmation of Roe v. Wade 20 years earlier:

It should be recognized, moreover, that in some critical respects, the abortion decision is of the same character as the decision to use contraception. [...] For two decades of economic and social developments, people have organized intimate relationships and made choices that define their views of themselves and their places in society, in reliance on the availability of abortion in the event that contraception should fail.

What a shift we made in the 76 years between the two. In one era it was illegal to even send information about contraception in the mail. Later the Supreme Court is defending 20 years of abortion on demand as a societal expectation. Something to keep in mind next month when we hit the 30 year anniversary of Roe v. Wade and the estimated 35 millions U.S. lives taken in its wake by surgical abortion.

But just when I get discouraged by such comparisons, I do come across news that some of the myths of the "free love" movement are starting to crumble. One such story I read was how ultrasounds, especially the new 3-D ultrasounds, are turning women against abortion.

"Ultrasound has become a major force in the country’s abortion landscape. It has galvanized crisis pregnancy centers, which report seeing many more clients since the arrival of the new technology. And it is giving the pro-life cause a new tool to help persuade women to choose life."

Another article I came across recently debunks the myth that non-married sexual relations are more satisfying.

Every few years, someone does a survey to determine who the most sexually satisfied people in America are. And every time, the results are the same. The most sexually satisfied people in America are highly religious married people who saved sex for marriage. [...] The overwhelming lose-yourself-in-the-moment experience happens when a man and a woman are secure in the knowledge that they are safe, that they have nothing to fear, that they are with someone who truly loves them and who will truly look out for what is best for them, forever. They know that they are creating a bond. And they know that it’s okay to create that bond, because the bond will stand. That safety, that abandonment, that total self-donation, is part of the sacredness of sexual union.

You would never know otherwise judging by today's televisions shows.