A different perspective: ethics and arguments

Have you ever eaten a piece of fruit and looked at the seed, and thought about the possibilities before throwing it away? Have you ever looked at an orange or apple or cherry seed and thought, "If I planted this, and all the seeds that came from it, it could be a grove, an orchard, a forest"? How many trees could be grown with a seed's children and grandchildren and great-grandchildren? I have sometimes looked at a seed in a piece of fruit and imagined a whole countryside planted with its offspring, beautiful and thriving. A seed thrown away has killed a forest that might have been.

I don't think it's possible to understand the Roman Catholic views on birth control without seeing humanity in the same way: good, and thriving, and full of possibility with each new birth.

I'm not here to convince anyone of the Roman Catholic views of birth control. I'm here to say: if we haven't really listened to each other, there are thoughts we might never have. (I sometimes wonder if thoughts are the same way. The seed of an idea, given time, might produce a great many other ideas. But if we don't listen ... if we throw it away ... our hard-heartedness and habitual disrespect might cause us to miss out on a whole forest of ideas. And on a whole forest of friends, while we're on the subject.)