Zimmerman, Anthony
261 Articles at Lifeissues.net

From a collection of the works of theologian Fr. Anthony Zimmerman. His website, called the Zimmerman Library, features books, articles, lectures and letters on doctrine, priesthood, marriage, life issues and other topics. Father Anthony Zimmerman, STD is a retired professor of Moral Theology at the Divine Word Seminary affiliated with Nanzan University, Nagoya, Japan. Ordained in 1946, he has spent most of his life thereafter as a missionary in Japan. His doctoral thesis is on Papal Teachings and so-called overpopulation. He attended three World Population Congresses, Belgrade, Bucharest, and Mexico City. He brought Mother Teresa to Japan in 1981 and 1982 to oppose abortion and help the nation to become friendly toward natural family planning. About a million couples, mostly non-Christians, now practice NFP in Japan. He is a member of the Fellowship of Catholic Scholars, of the Society of Catholic Social Scientists, and of the International Union for the Scientific Study of Population.

Articles

Book: Catholic Teachings on Pro-Life Issues

The book presents thoroughly documented orthodox Catholic teachings on contraception, abortion and related pro-life topics, designed especially for seminarians.

Date posted: 2017-04-28

Mary Magdalene and the disciples on Easter Morn

I once had the unforgettable experience of sitting for a long time on a bench just outside the Holy Sepulchre, reflecting on this scene. It was on the very spot where Mary turned to see Jesus. Somehow heaven never seemed closer to me. When Jesus spoke the word "Mary" she came out of her daze, and all the world was right again. You and I await a similar experience. After death, when Jesus greets us and calls us by name, our eternal happiness will begin. This world will be behind us, and we will be enraptured by the goodness and kindness of Jesus, and "my Father and your Father, my God and your God." Eternal rest grant unto us, O Lord.

Date posted: 2010-05-10

The Burial of Jesus

Because Saint John reveals truths about Christ in his Gospel, as though seen "with the eye of an eagle", we have good reason to suppose that he owed special insights about Jesus to conversations with Mary. She who was want to ponder in her heart the mystery of Jesus, must have shared her thoughts at times with John during her latter years.

Date posted: 2009-07-13

Book: Natural Family Planning: Nature's Way - God's Way

This book can serve a very useful purpose in bringing to those who are uninformed a basic knowledge of Natural Family Planning. It can also provide information and assurance that will give new confidence and hope to couples who wish to use the natural methods reliably and effectively. The first section presents the personal witness of married couples who utilize the natural methods, as well as couples involved in the promotion and the teaching of NFP. The second part of the book provides information on the scientific studies that verify the reliability of NFP, and the sociological and behavioral data that provide a sharper insight into attitudes, values and educational approaches. Part three presents the witness of the Catholic tradition, with particular focus on the teaching of recent Popes, the Second Vatican Council, and many Bishops Conferences throughout the world.

Date posted: 2008-12-06

Book: Priestly Celibacy

On the occasion of his golden jubilee in the priesthood the author jubilates over the gift of the priesthood for himself and for all. He provides data that celibacy began with the twelve apostles living in the company of Jesus, and that it has been an unbroken tradition for the priesthood since, not as some wrongly assert, in the 4th or even the 10th century. The book has not been published except on the Internet.

Date posted: 2008-10-17

Fr. Anthony Zimmerman (1918-2006)

Fr. Anthony Zimmerman was a dear friend, a great priest, an enthusiastic promoter of Humanae Vitae and NFP, and a zealous teacher-sharer who worked right up to the end of his life. Fr. Zimmerman WAS and IS and always WILL BE a gift to the Church, leaving behind his writings and his missionary zeal. May his example inspire all members of the Body of Christ and assist us in our efforts. He was truly an NFP giant and had a tremendous love for the Church. He will be missed.

Date posted: 2006-05-25

Invincible Ignorance About Contraception

Whether it be better to instruct a penitent about the evils of contraception, or to leave him in perhaps invincible ignorance, is not a question solved by adherence to inflexible rules. The Confessor endeavors to do what is best for his client in each individual case. The most desired solution is to dispel ignorance if the penitent will convert. But in other cases instructions to an unwilling penitent can do more harm than good - if he thereafter sins with eyes open rather than in ignorance. By and large, instructions about the evil of contraception needs to be done outside of the Confessional rather than within.

Date posted: 2006-05-03

Who were Our Adam and Eve?

We rightly feel familiar with the Adam and Eve of Genesis, whom we honor as our first parents. We assume that their bodies, like ours, were of the Homo Sapiens species. Nevertheless the fossil record provides practically irrefutable evidence that peoples of species other than Homo Sapiens once lived on our planet. We need to come to grips with this hominid history, though it may jar us out of our comfortable complacency. I use the term species in the genetical meaning, namely that reproduction is possible by way of union within the species, but not with members outside of it.


Date posted: 2006-05-01

Blind Chance Alone Didn't Satisfy Darwin

The real Charles Darwin (1809-1882) did not accept blind chance as the engine of evolution, nor did he believe that his theory excludes the Creator. Public school teachers who promote ir-religion with Darwin as front man are foisting error upon a captive audience.

Date posted: 2006-03-14

Radiant Beams from the Gospel of Life

The author comments on issues connected with the Encyclical issued on March 25, 1995, The Gospel of Life. We share in the splendor of God's own life, a hope and a mystery; the culture of death is taken to task for its serious mistaken myths and assumptions. The world has a great future if we live with the truth, with love and with nature. The book has not been published except on the Internet.

Date posted: 2005-11-07

Are "Innate evil tendencies" inheritable?

Our all too evident readiness to sin is the inevitable price that we must pay for the freedom to love God - or to love Him not. It is not at all a nasty novelty implanted into our natures after original sin. Adam and Eve in paradise, even before the fall, were weak toward sin. God placed two trees into the midst of paradise, a tree of life, and a tree of death. Surprisingly, the drama opens with Eve sitting near the wrong tree!

Date posted: 2005-06-12

Original sin and human nature

Alice Von Hildebrand delights us with her defense of feelings in our psychic and spiritual lives, yet she inserts one lone paragraph into her article which she doesn't explain, and which appears to be out of context.

Date posted: 2005-06-12

Human Evolution

Tattersall's book is a happy combination of anthropological science and common sense observations, sans ideological preaching.

Date posted: 2005-06-12

The Primeval Revelation

Summary: Our faith teaches that God revealed Himself to our first parents in an intimate manner, and the revelation was not broken off with original sin (CCC 54-55). The hunter-gatherer peoples who from the time of Adam and Eve until about 10,000 years ago celebrated myths that probably echo this primeval revelation, about the Supreme Being, about the moral law, about heaven and hell. The book relates myths collected by anthropologists.

Date posted: 2005-06-09

Vatican II and Christ's Governance of the Church

As we read the documents of Vatican II, we may feel an exhilarating Presence, the Holy Spirit welling up in our souls like "a fountain of water, springing up into life everlasting" (John 4:14).

Date posted: 2005-06-04

Human Life Education

Summary: Seasoned doctors, parents, priests, teachers provide us with priceless wisdom acquired at the clinic, counselling office, and parenting at home; how women think in contrast to me, how communications between man and woman differ, how to plan the family, sex ed by parental example, how to live with nature to remain healthy and cheerful.

Date posted: 2005-06-04

Evolution and the Sin in Eden

This book brings together into a plausible synthesis what we know about original sin as taught by the Catholic Church, and what paleontologists and philologists can tell us about our Adam and Eve. Doctrine teaches that original sin deprives us of the state of sanctifying grace at birth, which is restored through Baptism. Science appears to point to the actual commission of the sin perhaps 200,000 years ago by a Homo Sapiens couple.

Date posted: 2005-05-24

How Pope John Paul II asked me to edit a book

When Pope John Paul II - may he now enjoy heaven - decided to make natural family planning a major topic for the October 1980 Synod of Bishops, my name came to his attention. That led to my great privilege of meeting him and working with him to produce a book for that Synod whose topic was the family.

Date posted: 2005-04-11

Short Commentary on Matthew, No. 46

Chrysostom, Sermon 38 on Matthew, observes that the words of Jesus point to Himself and to the Father as one in being, that is "to prevent thine imagining two unoriginate Gods. Since, that He was at the same time both begotten, and Lord of all, He declares in many ways, and in other places also."

Date posted: 2005-03-09

Short Commentary on Matthew, No. 45

Sodom had been a very wicked city that God had seen fit to destroy, yet Christ states here that had its people seen the miracles that He was working day after day during His three years of public life, Sodom would not have been destroyed. This implies that the people would have converted.

Date posted: 2005-03-08

Short Commentary on Matthew, No. 44

What is taking the Kingdom by force, asks Chrysostom, (Sermon 40 on Matthew). "All who approach it with earnestness of mind," he responds. Earnestness is the key word.

Date posted: 2005-03-07

Short Commentary on Matthew, No. 43

The last sentence spoken by Jesus, namely that John is the greatest of those ever born of women, yet "the least in the kingdom of heaven is greater than he" has puzzled me.

Date posted: 2005-03-06

Ambrose: Public Sin, Public Penance

We look to Saint Ambrose (340-397) to learn how a great bishop once dealt with a great politician who had sinned publicly. In matters of religion, said Ambrose, the bishop instructs a Catholic emperor; in that area, emperors do not judge bishops. He matched deeds with words. Two giants met, the one standing tall in the Church, the other tall in statesmanship. The world is better today because of their sterling good example.

Date posted: 2005-02-01

Short Commentary on Matthew, No. 42

We ask: Did John really have doubts, or did he ask the question with tongue in cheek, to give Jesus an opportunity to correct the false ideas of John's own disciples? This is a quizzical passage that gave the celebrated greats among the Fathers of the Church to rise to great heights or rhetoric.

Date posted: 2004-10-05

Short Commentary on Matthew, No. 41

Not infrequently prospective converts in mission territories find it literally true that they must choose between Christ and their family.

Date posted: 2004-10-04

Short Commentary on Matthew, No. 40

The words of Jesus that "a disciples is not above his teacher" must have been a great comfort to the disciples, a sign to them that if they are persecuted, the fault is not theirs provided they proclaim the Gospel faithfully.

Date posted: 2004-09-09

Short Commentary on Matthew, No. 39

In the above passage Jesus classifies the apostles also as sheep. Who, then, are the wolves? They are obviously the enemies of the Gospel, the Pharisees who are the rabbis in the Synagogues, the Sadducees of the existing priestly class, the learned scribes and the rulers who are members of the Sanhedrin.

Date posted: 2004-09-08

Short Commentary on Matthew, No. 38

What the apostles now received from Jesus was no small gift: they were suddenly enabled to cast out devils and to heal every disease and infirmity.

Date posted: 2004-09-07

Short Commentary on Matthew, No. 37

The blind men were of ill repute in the popular understanding, shunned by the people who assumed that their blindness was punishment for sin.

Date posted: 2004-09-06

Short Commentary on Matthew, No. 36

Although Jesus had fasted forty days and nights at the beginning of His public mission, there is no record in the Gospels that He prescribed a rule about fasting to His disciples.

Date posted: 2004-08-18

Short Commentary on Matthew, No. 35

Here Matthew writes about Matthew, in a document destined for the world to see, during all generations until the end of time.

Date posted: 2004-08-17

Short Commentary on Matthew, No. 34

This paralytic must have been in a desperate state, but he had friends who would do anything to help him, a kindness that Jesus did not leave unrewarded.

Date posted: 2004-08-16

Short Commentary on Matthew, No. 33

Storms can be severe on the lake, when cold and therefore heavy air from the Mediterranean crosses over the 1,200 foot high mountains to the west, or descends from the Mount Hermon range to the north, to displace the warm and light air over the 700 feet below sea level of the lake.

Date posted: 2004-08-15

Short Commentary on Matthew, No. 32

When medical doctors hang out their shingles they advertise their specialties for which they have studied and obtained a license: pediatrician, ophthalmologist, orthopedics, gynecologist, neurologist, and down the line. Jesus had never attended medical school, yet He took on every patient they brought and cured all, without drugs, without surgery, also without charge.

Date posted: 2004-08-14

Short Commentary on Matthew, No. 31

The centurion was a Roman commander of a hundred foot soldiers stationed in Capernaum, the metropolis of the area. One would expect that the Jews would be hostile to these occupation troops and especially to their commander, but such is not the case in this event.

Date posted: 2004-08-13

Cloning vs. Parenting

Pope John Paul II, on 20 November 1993, asked governments to protect the human race from danger by laws protecting human embryos: "The embryo has to be recognized as a being subject to the laws of nations, otherwise we are endangering humanity" (AFP-Jiji).

Date posted: 2004-08-05

Church needs own media. NHK a good model

Russel Shaw is absolutely right when stating that "the Church must rely on its own media" for evangelization (March 2003)

Date posted: 2004-08-04

Contraception, like Arianism, threatens the Church

Arianism smothered belief; contraception smothers morals. It is THE problem the Church must deal with today.

Date posted: 2004-07-08

Short Commentary on Matthew, No. 30

Let us put ourselves into the torn clothes of the leper who was now clean. His first impulse would be, I suppose to rejoice and jubilate, like the beggar at the temple whom Peter and John had healed, who went walking and jumping and praising God.

Date posted: 2004-07-07

Short Commentary on Matthew, No. 29

Jesus had warned the disciples during this final part of the Sermon on the Mount to beware of following false prophets. He now tells us to follow a simple rule by which to distinguish true prophets from counterfeits.

Date posted: 2004-07-06

Short Commentary on Matthew, No. 28

False prophets are teaching the young that sex with condoms is safe. The Church teaches that sex is a gift of God to be used according to His eternal wisdom: within marriage and not outside of it....

Date posted: 2004-07-05

Whether Christ Pre-dates Original Sin

Christ, when He comes again in glory, will hand the cosmos over to the Father. Until that dramatic event transpires, it is Christ who holds the reins of the cosmos in His hands. This paper explores whether God made the cosmos for Christ initially, or whether God sent Him into an already existing cosmos to save us from our sins.

Date posted: 2004-07-01

Short Commentary on Matthew, No. 27

Let us respect our bodies, which ought to shine like the sun. Let us not stain the body, which is so beautiful and so great, through brief pleasures. Sin is brief and lasts but a little while; the shame of sin lasts a long time, forever.

Date posted: 2004-06-28

Short Commentary on Matthew, No. 26

Note that Christ, son of Joseph the carpenter, uses a carpenter's image here: if you have a wooden beam in your eye, first get that cleared out of your eye before you try to find the speck of sawdust in the eye of your neighbor.

Date posted: 2004-06-21

Short Commentary on Matthew, No. 25

But God's ways are always more noble, more harmonious, more enriching than are the counterfeit ways of man. The lilies of the field surpass in beauty the splendor of the robes of Solomon; and natural family planning surpasses in nobility the inglorious ways of contraception, abortion, and sterilization.

Date posted: 2004-06-14

Short Commentary on Matthew, No. 24

Whether our intention is good or evil, is not a matter of innate necessity but is the choice that we ourselves make. We are the boss, the one who decides whether to sit under the tree of knowledge of good and evil, or under the tree of life.

Date posted: 2004-06-07

Concupiscence is natural, not due to original sin

The concept that concupiscence is a result of original sin is not likely to be a part of the deposit of Faith that the Church received from the Apostles.

Date posted: 2004-06-01

Virginitas vs Maternitas in Partu

Published in The Fellowship of Catholic Scholars, Summer, 2004. Mary's virginity was not compromised by giving birth to Jesus in the natural manner. Birthing is an essential part of her motherhood, a truth that has not been addressed by proponents of a miraculous birth of Jesus.

Date posted: 2004-06-01

Short Commentary on Matthew, No. 23

We will thank God together for this beautiful gift which He has given us, to be together, and to share the joy of loving God and loving Him in each other.

Date posted: 2004-06-01

Short Commentary on Matthew, No. 22

And why should the people of God invest their lives in following a wisdom which is not of this world?

Date posted: 2004-05-19

Short Commentary on Matthew, No. 21

Is it difficult for man to follow the precepts of the Sermon on the Mount? Christ knows that every man and every woman can do so with His help, so He closes this section with an exhortation: "No matter what the cost, just do it!"

Date posted: 2004-05-10

Short Commentary on Matthew, No. 20

Salt provides flavor, and in that sense, the disciples of Jesus ought to make our world to be a pleasant and enjoyable community to live in.

Date posted: 2004-05-05

Short Commentary on Matthew, No. 19

The Sermon on the Mount is the Christian message in a nutshell. We live in this world, but are not of this world. We accept and even relish our poverty, our tears, our disabilities, our persecutions, for in this manner we celebrate our peace with God here on earth, while we look forward to our blessed rendezvous with Him in heaven.

Date posted: 2004-04-26

Short Commentary on Matthew No. 18

Jesus rose in power, and first of all gave thanks to the Father. He appears to women, faithful followers first, grateful for their fidelity. Then He gradually paves the way to help the apostles to believe. To Joseph of Arimathea we owe the relic of the Holy shroud.

Date posted: 2004-04-21

Short Commentary on Matthew, No. 17

When we celebrate Holy Week we join not only a billion Catholics who form the Mystical Body of Christ here on earth, but also the suffering souls in purgatory and the saints in heaven. Together we recall what Christ did for us and thank Him for His heroic passion and death through which He washed away our sins and reconciled us to Himself and to the Father.

Date posted: 2004-04-20

Short Commentary on Matthew, No. 16

Matthew wants to tell us something here, namely that Jesus expected an absolute and complete response to His call.

Date posted: 2004-04-19

Who were our First Parents?

The author has served us well by first presenting the teachings of the Magisterium, then commenting. I will present data to advance the dialogue where Muller left a challenging question mark: "Homo Sapiens?" on page 509.

Date posted: 2004-04-01

Short Commentary on Matthew, No. 15

The sonorous words that Matthew intones here are like a flourish of trumpets: "The people who sat in darkness have seen a great light, and for those who sat in the region and shadow of death light has dawned." For this was the historic moment when the cosmos turned on its hinges.

Date posted: 2004-03-29

Short Commentary on Matthew, No. 14

God's kingdom on earth must be of another kind. He is not an iron-fisted dictator, but is anointed with the oil of gladness; He is the eternal priest who establishes a kingdom of priests to worship God.

Date posted: 2004-03-22

Short Commentary on Matthew, No. 13

But how tempted we are today to look away from the humble Jesus of Bethlehem and of Calvary, and seek a political leader instead.

Date posted: 2004-03-15

Short Commentary on Matthew, No. 12

Just as adamantly as most Jews distance themselves from Christianity, so also Muslims ideologically shut out the Blessed Trinity from their formula of faith.

Date posted: 2004-03-09

Short Commentary on Matthew, No. 11

The Pharisees were notorious for practicing a religion of outer rituals - cleansing pots and pans - and so pretending to be good by doing these works rather than becoming good at heart.

Date posted: 2004-03-01

Short Commentary on Matthew, No. 10

Let us read passages of the sacred narratives again. They are works of literary art, they are rays of light that beam down to us from heaven. Matthew's story is deceptively simple, with not one superfluous word to dilute the underlying message written by the hand of God.

Date posted: 2004-02-23

Short Commentary on Matthew, No. 09

When we read in the Gospel how Jesus loved to point out the beauty of the lilies of the field, the signs at sunset and sunrise that predicted weather, the instinctive behavior of birds, the weeds mixed with wheat in the fields, we get the impression that Jesus had a very happy childhood, and that His parents loved home-life, and that they had a good relationship with the town folks.

Date posted: 2004-02-17

Short Commentary on Matthew, No. 07

They didn't stand, they didn't bow, they didn't shake hands. They "fell down" and adored the Child whom Mary held in her arms. They fell down before Him because they recognized Him as God, the God who had created them, who had given them their lives, who had made the world in which they live and breathe.

Date posted: 2004-02-09

Short Commentary on Matthew, No. 08

We gladly baptize our children promptly so that Christ can receive them into His friendship and protect them in their innocent years. We grieve with the mothers of the Holy Innocents whom Herod killed so cruelly, and we sympathize with parents today who sorrow for children who departed this life without Baptism.

Date posted: 2004-02-09

Short Commentary on Matthew, No. 06

All of the first followers of Christ were or Jewish origin, of course. The Acts of the Apostles relate the dramatic story how Christ, through Peter, guided the initially reluctant Church to welcome the gentiles into her communion.

Date posted: 2004-02-03

Short Commentary on Matthew, No. 05

Families today have this example to follow. When human powers fail utterly, turning to God and waiting for Him to come to the rescue may be the correct solution.

Date posted: 2004-01-20

Short Commentary on Matthew, No. 04

Matthew and Luke provide us with information about the conception of Jesus, but when reading Matthew we get the impression that he did not yet know what Luke would learn later.

Date posted: 2004-01-19

Short Commentary on Matthew, No. 03

Notice the four women that Matthew lists among the ancestors of Jesus, Rahab, Thamar, Ruth and Bathsheba. Like some of the men who had sinned, three of the women ancestors of Jesus had also been sinners.

Date posted: 2004-01-13

Short Commentary on Matthew, No. 02

Matthew puts Abraham at the head of the human ancestry of Christ, whereas Luke begins with Adam. We gather from this and other passages that Matthew addressed his Gospel directly to his fellow Israelites first of all, whereas Luke directly addressed the people of all the world with the new-found spirit of the emerging missionary Church.

Date posted: 2004-01-06

Positive laws vs negative laws on abortion

May a God-fearing legislator vote for an abortion law that excepts cases of rape, incest, or danger to life of the mother? "Never!" snap some of our best pro-life people, sometimes with a tincture of impatience and shrillness in their voice.

Date posted: 2003-12-31

Short Commentary on Matthew, No. 01

Chrysostom also admonishes his listeners to take interest and to keep in mind what Matthew writes about the ancestry of Jesus, because meditating on these things is good for our salvation.

Date posted: 2003-12-30

Do not look for science in Genesis

A scientist priest teaching us in the seminary told us that if God did not allow evolution to play a natural secondary causality in fashioning the cosmos, then God apparently deceives us.

Date posted: 2003-12-01

Editor, HPR Genesis is not "pseudo-history"

Peace to those who want to read in Genesis a version of cosmic history as well as truths that God proposes for our belief. They will always have a difficult time to reconcile science with the Bible.

Date posted: 2003-12-01

First Joyful Mystery: The Annunciation

The greeting is magnificent, coming from Gabriel, who was sent by God. The Church treasures the greeting, and her members greet Mary every day with the Gabriel's words: "Hail Mary, full of grace."

Date posted: 2003-10-09

Second Joyful Mystery: The Visitation

Saint Ambrose encourages us: "Let Mary's soul be in each of you to proclaim the greatness of the Lord. Let her spirit be in each to rejoice in the Lord... If the soul does what is right and holy, it magnifies that image of God, in whose likeness it was created." The second joyful mystery is super-time to smile to the Lord.

Date posted: 2003-10-02

The Third Joyful Mystery, the Birth of Jesus at Bethlehem

We ponder the mystery with Mary and Joseph, and pray that the darkness of sin and the night of heathenism may vanish before the light of the Word and the Spirit of grace.

Date posted: 2003-09-23

The Fourth Joyful Mystery, The Presentation of Jesus in the Temple

The Fourth Joyful Mystery is a prime occasion to re-dedicate ourselves to the Lord in our vocation of life. With Jesus, Mary, and Joseph, we present ourselves to the Lord anew to be in His service.

Date posted: 2003-09-16

The Fifth Joyful Mystery, the Finding of Jesus in the Temple

The Fifth Joyful Mystery is a shining occasion to pray for family life, for our own and for all families in the world.

Date posted: 2003-09-05

First Luminous Mystery, The Baptism of Jesus in the Jordan

We thank Christ for allowing Himself to be baptized by John, as we pray the First Luminous Mystery. He can say to us: "Been there. Done that." We pray that during this third millennium eventually all nations of the world will become Christians and be baptized.

Date posted: 2003-08-12

Duress and Contraceptive Sterilization

The reply of Fr. Anthony Zimmerman, STD to "The Meaning and Role of Duress in the Cooperation in Wrongdoing," by Prof. Thomas Kopfensteiner, LQ, May, 2003. Duress cannot justify the practice, just as duress was never an excuse to escape martyrdom.

Date posted: 2003-08-01

Second Luminous Mystery, The Wedding at Cana

Does Jesus want us to ask favors through Mary? Decidedly so. This is one of the great points He surely wanted to make at Cana. If we are sometimes overawed to pray directly to Almighty God, Jesus here suggests making an approach through His Mother.

Date posted: 2003-07-14

Third Luminous Mystery, The Preaching of the Kingdom

Christianity gives meaning to life, develops all the human virtues, makes us expect far more than the best of secular life. A Christian life has depth which secular life lacks.

Date posted: 2003-07-07

The Fourth Luminous Mystery, The Transformation on Tabor

May the Fourth Luminous Mystery ever remind us that Jesus is our loving and immortal God who awaits our free faith and love; may it remind us to heed the words of the Father: "This is my Son, my Chosen; listen to him!"

Date posted: 2003-07-01

The Fifth Luminous Mystery: The Last Supper

Holy Communion is an encounter of personal friendship with Jesus. Jesus does not hand out gifts there in an impersonal manner as a social worker might do.

Date posted: 2003-06-12

Penitential services for parishes

Cardinal James Francis Stafford has stated that the current Church crisis is a crisis of parish life, and that, in his judgment this "should lead us to a further exploration of a restoration of the "Ordo Poenitentium" -- the Order of Penitents -- that was present in the patristic Church."

Date posted: 2003-06-01

The first Sorrowful Mystery, The Agony in the Garden

Is someone in deep despair and ready to end the quarrel by divorce? Kneel down and pray with Jesus, 'Not my will, but thine be done.' Then rise and face the situation as He has already done for you.

Date posted: 2003-05-27

Church should develop its own media

How to establish a communications system to carry Catholic culture in the USA?

Date posted: 2003-05-17

One strike for dissent in seminaries

Your belief that erroneous teaching in our seminaries is the key factor in the sexual crimes and sins of our priests is sound logic.

Date posted: 2003-05-01

The Second Sorrowful Mystery: The Scourging at the Pillar

The repair shop of Confession is at our service, as we progressively grow in holiness. We live chastely only through vigilance, foresight, prayer, contrition and penance. If that is God's way for us, we accept it.

Date posted: 2003-04-18

Church and State in Paradise

Would Church and State have been two separate institutions in paradise had it lasted, and would there be contestations?

Date posted: 2003-04-01

The Third Sorrowful Mystery: The crowning with Thorns

The Third Sorrowful Mystery is a good time to ask God to give us the gift of being obedient to His laws, and to forgive us for acting like lost sheep, like the prodigal son. By accepting the crown of thorns, Jesus merited for us the gift of obedience.

Date posted: 2003-03-11

The Fourth Sorrowful Mystery: The Carrying of the Cross

We stand at the roadside with Mary as we contemplate Jesus bearing His cross to Calvary. With each step He takes, He gives us strength to take up our cross and follow after Him.

Date posted: 2003-02-18

The Fifth Sorrowful Mystery: The Crucifixion

The body of Jesus was dead now, but the sacrifice remains to be completed. He will rise again on the third day. He will rise with power. He will gather together again the scattered apostles, and with them He will found His Church.

Date posted: 2003-01-26

Pastoral Work For Contraceptors and the Sterilized

If people do not understand why contraception is wrong, they should obey the Church and switch to natural family planing. Once they made that change to a new way of life, they will be surprised to learn that "obedience is best." They will be more at ease with God, with their partner, and with their children.

Date posted: 2002-12-31

Sanctifying GRACE, What it is, What it does

"Grace elevates us to a new dimension in the cosmic pecking order of what is honorable, what is splendid, what is most near to God's surpassing glory. Grace is the wedding garment that we will wear in heaven.

Date posted: 2002-12-31

How the mind molds the brain

How parents mold the brains of their children, and how our habitual actions affect the brain.

Date posted: 2002-12-31

Human personhood begins at fertilization

Science shows clearly that a new life, a new person, begins at human fertilization. Theologians who teach otherwise depart from science.

Date posted: 2002-12-30

The First Glorious Mystery: The Resurrection

The First Glorious Mystery invites us to reflect on our future life in heaven in the company of Jesus and Mary. Christ's resurrection from the dead gives us a vision of how we too will rise from the dead.

Date posted: 2002-12-15

The Second Glorious Mystery: The Ascension

To us it appears that Jesus departed from our company, but in reality He took us with Him and seated us with Himself at the Father's right hand. For He is the Head of the Mystical Body of which we are members.

Date posted: 2002-11-06

The Third Glorious Mystery: The Descent of the Holy Spirit

In the Third Glorious Mystery, the Descent of the Holy Spirit, we pray with Mary and the disciples in the Upper Room for the coming of the Spirit upon ourselves and upon the Church. For it is the Spirit who enlightens our minds with faith and empowers us mightily with love, as He once did for the disciples on Pentecost Day.

Date posted: 2002-10-14

The Fourth Glorious Mystery: The Assumption of Mary into Heaven

The fourth glorious mystery puts us into direct communication with our own most blessed Mother to whom Christ entrusted us from the cross. A mother is one with whom we can share all secrets, one who listens to whatever we say, one who never lets us wander far from her sight.

Date posted: 2002-09-14

The Fifth Glorious Mystery: The Crowning of Mary as Queen of Heaven

The fifth glorious mystery invites us to celebrate Mary's glory with her and to ask her help in all things that we have in mind and heart, for the Church, for others, for ourselves.

Date posted: 2002-08-21

Absolute Moral Norms preserve the human race

Much as a cliff ends the run of a horse, and oxen flounder in the sea, so also man falters in the sight of God when performing an intrinsically evil act. The tree of good and evil stood tall and ready in Paradise when God displayed it to Adam. God did not ask Adam to trim it or to plant another.

Date posted: 2002-06-02

Human Cloning

Dr. Peeters concludes that 'The human genome is activated by the two cell stage. This makes true human cloning impossible'

Date posted: 2001-12-31

Christ, Key to the Cosmos

The logic of Divine Wisdom is thus deciphered succinctly: if a cosmos is to be, then Christ must be in it; and if Christ is to be, then the Church must be His Mystical Body. The logic invites another conclusion: if the Church defects, then the cosmos will become meaningless for God who will then withdraw His supporting hand and allow it to collapse. The logic motivates us to support the Church so that the cosmos will endure.

Date posted: 2001-12-21

AIDS: Nature carries a big stick

Trust Nature. She is not about to abandon the race to the moral nihilism of those who have different ideas about the family than she has. By imposing AIDS upon Homo Sapiens, Nature demonstrates that she is a stern mother who carries a big stick. She doesn't plead with us, doesn't cajole us, doesn't bribe us. Mother Nature says: "These are my ways. They are good. They are wise. Follow them".

Date posted: 2001-12-01

Couples on the Pill and Holy Communion

Since the Pill began to be sold in 1960, divorces have tripled, out-of-wedlock births jumped from 224,000 to 1.2 million, abortions doubled, and cohabitation soared 10-fold from 430,000 to 4.2 million.

Date posted: 2001-11-01

Contraceptive sterilization in Catholic hospitals is intrinsically evil

I shall first treat about the heart of the matter, why it is in all circumstances intrinsically evil. Thereafter I will expand with up to date information about what sterilization is doing to society.

Date posted: 2001-08-01

Pray the Harvest Master to Send Chaste Laborers

In this writing my observations are directed to those called to priestly celibacy. But in a broader sense they are addressed to each and every vocation to which Christ calls His people.

Date posted: 2001-07-01

At What Moment Did God Create Me?

God created me at the time of fertilization

Date posted: 2001-06-24

Embryos are bigger than their bodies

Embryos are indeed tiny at their inception; so tiny that the naked eye can barely see them even if the viewer knows where to look.

Date posted: 2001-06-01

Promoting NFP in Japan 2001

Janet Kistler instructed me that the content of this article about my NFP activities should be of a biographical nature. With that as an excuse, I will view activities through rose colored glasses, now that I am 83 years old, and 54 years in the priesthood.

Date posted: 2001-06-01

At What Moment Does a Person Die?

The Holy Father has newly described death as "the total disintegration of that unitary and integrated whole that is the personal self. It results from the separation of the life-principle (or soul)from the corporal reality of the person."

Date posted: 2001-06-01

Novel Proposals to Remedy Family Life

When laws gently pressure the citizens and lawmakers with incentives and disincentives in the right places, our currently distorted family life should take on its more natural and beautiful shape again.

Date posted: 2001-04-01

Round Two

Siding with the ladies, Leo XIII tells husbands to shape up: "Husbands, love your wives, as Christ also loved the Church, and delivered Himself up for it, that he might sanctify it."

Date posted: 2001-03-01

Contraceptive Sterilizations in Catholic Hospitals a Disservice to the People an Intrinsically Evil Act before God

I think that contraceptives, and then surgical sterilization, breaks up marriages as surely as a blinding flash of lightning detonates a house-shivering thunder crash a split second later. Society needs to stop this destructive paroxysm of marriage much as it needs to devise protection against AIDS.

Date posted: 2001-02-20

Human Life Before Ensoulment?

The human body shares in the dignity of "the image of God": It is a human body precisely because it is animated by a spiritual soul, and it is the whole human person that is intended to become, in the body of Christ, a temple of the Spirit. "Human souls do not exist before God creates them at the time of fertilization."

Date posted: 2000-12-01

Was Adam Immune from Bodily Death?

St. Thomas, with St. Augustine, held that Adam and Eve were never, at any moment, actually "immune" from physical death.

Date posted: 2000-08-01

Immunity From Bodily Death In Paradise?

We read in Hebrews that Jesus prayed to be saved from death and that God granted His request. He died bodily nevertheless. What inference must we draw from this? I believe it means that God saved Christ from death by raising Him from the dead.

Date posted: 2000-06-02

Christ and Creation

Our conventional theological categories of thought locate God the Son in eternity, to whom we ascribe divine works such as creation; whereas Christ we locate also in time, to whom we ascribe human and divine activities. We do not easily associate in our minds a Christ who worked in eternity even before He stepped into our tiny warp of time.

Date posted: 2000-05-22

"And Husbands, Submit to Your Wives"

The dynamics of mutual subjection, cooperation, service, and love of husband and wife yoked to each other as a couple, do not operate in a grid pattern like computer software. Characters differ, circumstances differ, cultures differ. Yet mutual submission works universally.

Date posted: 2000-05-01

Morals Text Subverts Humanae Vitae

The two volume text is perhaps the best systematic and comprehensive course on Moral Theology for seminarians written after Vatican II, and its pages give testimony to the astounding amount of research and hard work of the author. But the section on abortion and contraception in Volume Two, the part which invites our special attention, is a naked catastrophe.

Date posted: 2000-04-01

The Primeval Revelation and Its Relevance Today

My intention is to advocate that the Primeval Revelation in which God "manifested himself to our first parents from the very beginning" and "open(ed) up the way to heavenly salvation" is alive and well in the human race today. Because God invited our first ancestors "to intimate communion with himself and clothed them with resplendent grace and justice" we find in the Primeval Revelation common ground to share our escatological hopes with peoples of all religions.

Date posted: 2000-02-10

A Million Couples Use NFP in Japan

Words of Mother Teresa to the Japanese nation: I think we should train our children for the future to respect life. By teaching respect for the dignity of life, that life is a creation of God. We teach them that by purity of life and the sanctity of their lives, they will be able to face the future if they use simple means, the natural means that God has created.

Date posted: 2000-02-04

Pill Users, Pregnancies

In reference to PILL USAGE AND EARLY ABORTION due to failure of babies to implant, learn from the implications of inserts of Pill packs. Since May 1999 the inserts state that the "percent of women experiencing an unintended pregnancy within the first year of use" is 5%.

Date posted: 2000-01-26

Limits of Legitimacy for Use of NFP

I like that phrase especially which states that the limits of legitimacy are in truth very wide.

Date posted: 2000-01-10

Probabilism, Use and Misuse

A dubium juris is a solid doubt whether a law exists that covers this case, or about contents of the law, or about whether it covers this case and binds this person. A person is bound, according to the principle of probabilism of law, only by a certain law. If a doubt remains, the person is not bound.

Date posted: 2000-01-08

The Historical Christ in World Religions

The new Catechism teaches that God made Himself known to our first parents by way of revelation. It is a highly significant truth which we practically ignore in theological discourse. To this the Catechism adds that God promised them a Redeemer. This second teaching indicates that Christ is the Redeemer of all mankind.. There is no room, then, for a novel theory claiming a split between works of the Christ-Logos among non-Christian religions, and the redemptive work of the historical Jesus Christ among Christians.

Date posted: 2000-01-04

Saints Adam and Eve?

Before Vatican II, so I thought until recently, Adam and Eve were celebrated as saints in the Church. St. Michael's Calendar listed their names on December 24th, when Eves and Adams also celebrated name days. Naively, I asked Rome to "restore" the feast.

Date posted: 1999-12-31

Death in Paradise

Political realities had blocked efforts for several decades to assemble a general council of the Church for the purpose of responding to questions generated by the Protestant Reformation. Finally in November 1544 Pope Paul III (1534-1549) called the Fathers to Trent for the 19th General Council of the Church.

Date posted: 1999-12-07

To Civilize the Coming Generation

If we don't head off the contraception stampede, civil life will become increasingly chaotic. There is more sinister malice in massive contraception than at first meets the eye. The ban on contraception is the solid and indispensable pillar on which family life balances itself.

Date posted: 1999-12-01

Zygotes and Embryos are People

The Magisterium of the Catholic Church teaches with unmistakable clarity that from the moment a human zygote has formed we owe it the unconditional respect that is morally due to that human being. The new Catechism declares that a human body is human precisely because it is animated by a spiritual soul (364). In other words, a human body does not begin without a human soul.

Date posted: 1999-11-30

The Long Wait From Adam To Christ

Why did Christ not become Incarnate for Adam and Eve immediately after the gates of Paradise clanged shut behind them? Why did He wait so long? It is a mystery.

Date posted: 1999-10-19

Only God Creates Souls

When humans become parents, they work in a breath-taking partnership with God. God's rules specify that every child has a right to have a father and a mother who are joined in marriage. He made marriage to be the only licit fountain of human life. He accompanies married couples sacramentally.

Date posted: 1999-10-18

Abortion to be Limited Step by Step

This letter takes issue with opponents who do not support restrictive legislation on abortion, who take an "all or none" attitude.

Date posted: 1999-09-01

Condoms Feed AIDS Monster

The old joke about NFP and Russian roulette is no joke when applied to condoms and HIV infection.

Date posted: 1999-06-29

Increase and Multiply or Decrease and Stultify

Professor of Social Science Tadao Yoshida of Meiji University once asked me why Christians have more children than Buddhists and others. Before I could answer, he did so himself. "It's because you believe in heaven. Christians want children to whom they can give the joys of heaven."


Date posted: 1999-06-10

Purgatory: Workshop For Heaven

By no means will any of us enter heaven, or even want to enter there, unless our characters are in perfect shape, and our deficits are paid up in full. Purgatory is the service shop where repair work is done, and where books are balanced.

Date posted: 1999-06-01

In God's image and likeness

If man is God's image, then God is understandably pleased with a man so long as he images God authentically, even though not always not flawlessly. For God's image in man reviews for God His own beholden beauty now captured also on the human mirror.

Date posted: 1999-05-05

Marriage is Permanent

To use a comparison: marriage is not like flying a two-seater airplane around the countryside at will. It is like boarding a scheduled nonstop flight with other passengers headed for a predetermined destination.

Date posted: 1999-05-01

SOPHIA, A Device to Indicate the Fertile Days of a Cycle

Today over a million couples in Japan practice natural family planning without contraceptives. Most of them are not Christians. Good people close to nature sense that this is nature's way and God's way.

Date posted: 1999-04-07

The Wedding in Eden

Mankind lives normally within this supplemental binary bonding. By creating man male and female, God provides a helper to the female as well as to the male.

Date posted: 1999-02-03

Original Sin Does Not Vitiate Human Nature

Our natural drives are reluctant subjects which we must prod, like stubborn mules, up a steep and narrow road toward heaven.

Date posted: 1999-02-01

"Prophylactic" Sterilization Illicit

The temptation to sterilize women en masse at Catholic hospitals is momentarily awesome, overwhelming, intimidating, like a destructive tidal wave poised to strike - a tsunami.

Date posted: 1999-02-01

Condom: Deceptive Policy Against AIDS

As the proverb states, an ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure. This writing concerns itself not with the very worthy apostolate of care for victims of the HIV/AIDS epidemic, but with halting its spread and eventually eliminating it from the human race.

Date posted: 1999-01-01

Why Did Christ Ordain Only Men?

Why agitate for what will never be, especially when the futile commotion disturbs the faith of sensitive believers? Feminists are out there inflaming innocent people with an animus against the Church. That is not exactly what Christ expects of Catholic people in influential positions.

Date posted: 1998-12-01

Catholic Hospitals may not cooperate in evil acts

No Catholic University may conduct IVF practices because IVF is black evil, unyielding to the best of wishful thinking. Ditto for abortion, contraception, contraceptive sterilization, assisted suicide, anything intrinsically evil. Good intentions don't baptize evil acts.

Date posted: 1998-05-01

Human Cloning

Because God crowns every single person with glory and honor, it is His will that every child should be born into a family consisting of a father and a mother joined in matrimony. The child should feel that he belongs there, that parents love him and care for him.

Date posted: 1998-04-19

HUMAN CLONING

Human cloning, moral objections. Success questioned.

Date posted: 1998-04-09

Conferences of Bishops: Mandate to Teach?

Bishops in conference do well to confront their nation with the contents of already formulated Catholic social doctrine, to emphasize the primacy of ethics over politics. But are Episcopal Conferences a likely body to have the gifts needed to develop new social doctrine in response to the needs of the day?

Date posted: 1997-12-01

Contraception is the No.1 Enemy of Marriages

The Lord has a superb plan for marriage. He made it durable, to fit all cultures from Adam and Eve until the angels blow their trumpets. Let the word go forth: "NO CONTRACEPTION, PLEASE!"

Date posted: 1997-12-01

Nullity of Marriage Contested

The Pope recognized that some couples have sufficient reason to avoid having children by using periodic abstinence "even for the entire duration of their marriage".

Date posted: 1997-11-01

Mother Teresa To Doctors And Nurses In Japan

When Mother Teresa addressed mixed audiences of Christians and non-Christians in Japan, she pulled no punches. She spoke, as she said, as Jesus prompted her to speak. Audiences love it. Her awesome power somehow bridged the language barrier.

Date posted: 1997-10-30

All Contraception is Intrinsically Evil

Being myself a retired professor of moral theology in major seminaries, I initially oriented my writing for classroom work. Greatly encouraged by the observations of respected readers, I then revised the text to translate seminary lessons into a more readable form for a wider reading audience. This Chapter deals with Contraception.

Date posted: 1997-02-21

Evolution yes, Darwin no

The contemplation of designed evolution executed by God with creative power is the delight of many scientists.

Date posted: 1997-02-02

My Advice to Seminarians

To be pro-life, stay alive. One secret is good habits and a good routine. Mass, meditation, Scripture, rosary, L' Osservatore Romano weekly. That's million dollar "priest insurance."

Date posted: 1997-01-01

Priestly Ministration in This Life and the Next

For all of us the meaning of life on earth is to grow into the love of Christ and to do his work while it is day. It is on earth where we build up our personality, where we capacitate ourselves for functions in the next life.

Date posted: 1996-06-01

The Pope and Population

The Pope criticizes the fact that "anti-birth policies continue to be enacted" instead of "serious social policies, programs of cultural development and of fair production and distribution of resources." With that he implies that anti-birth policies are not the kind of serious social policies which can really help families.

Date posted: 1996-05-01

Nagasaki Archbishop Proclaims Gospel of Life

Archbishop Francis Kaname Shimamoto of Nagasaki released a strong statement against abortion in a nationally circulated Newsletter on March 2nd. He thereby shattered a conventional taboo in Catholic Japan which frowns on using the "A" word in public. What one retreat master advised is quite typical in clerical circles here: "Priests should better not speak about abortion and contraception."

Date posted: 1996-05-01

The American Drive to Export Contraception

Academe and the media have so conditioned us to consider that "world population growth" is a threat to our welfare, that we tend to forget the novelty of this worry.

Date posted: 1996-04-17

Responsible parenthood vs responsible government

Report to the 1966 Papal Commission on Birth Control Parents, not governments should decide about the number of their offspring.

Date posted: 1996-04-15

Wives or Sisters?

All of the English versions I have access to translate the text as "wife," which is completely contrary to what Paul qualifies as "sister."

Date posted: 1996-04-01

Grieving the Unborn in Japan

Japanese society, however, in contrast to that of America, allows mothers to grieve for what they do to their unscheduled children; to sympathize with their lost treasures, dispatched from the darkness of the womb to the darkness of the nether world. The ritual grieving brings to the surface the bitter sorrow of lost motherhood and helps them to deal with this trauma.

Date posted: 1996-02-01

Evolution: God's Preferred Pathway For Creating

God laid His plans for the cosmos in the calm of eternity, calculating with precision the long series of secondary cause sequences from beginning to end.

Date posted: 1996-01-01

The Original Revelation Made To Adam and Eve

Can we know more about the specifics of that first revelation made to our common ancestors? Although they lost their original gift of sanctifying grace by sinning, they did not thereby lose their faith nor forget the primeval revelation which they dutifully passed on to posterity.

Date posted: 1995-12-02

Dominus Jesus

The magnificent declaration Dominus Jesus joyfully intones the theme of the Church for the new millennium, resounding ancient truth anew with the authentic harmony of the swinging bells of St. Peters.

Date posted: 1995-08-07

The Logic of Priestly Celibacy

The priest, who is called to Christ's side to be his chosen friend, participates in this priestly function of dedicating the universe to God. Like Christ, the priest is consecrated - set aside from secular purposes - to live the cosmic consecration to God.

Date posted: 1995-04-01

Mary's Silence to Joseph

When human powers alone could not solve their family problem, Mary and Joseph turned to God who rewarded their patience and faith. Families today have this example to follow. When human powers fail utterly, turning to God and waiting may be the correct solution.

Date posted: 1995-01-07

Celibacy Dates Back to the Apostles

Early Church documents of Fathers, Popes, and Councils reveal a commonly held belief that the tradition of celibacy goes back to the apostles. We shall quote and analyze some of the documents.

Date posted: 1994-08-22

Overheated Population Activity in Japan

Learn from the Japan experience. Tone down the anti-baby talk. Don't overheat it in the UN, and in developing nations. Parents will solve their family population problems very well for the most part, if you just leave them alone. Parents are well equipped by nature to want what is best for their families without being lectured to about birth control by Planned Parenthood and UNFPA, and USAID. And in the long run, what parents find to be good for their families will likewise be good for the nation and for the global human population.

Date posted: 1994-08-01

The Coming Population Implosion

The Catholic Church is making rapid strides in Africa, and Protestant Christianity is doing the same, both rejecting polygyny and requiring monogamy among its members.

Date posted: 1994-06-01

A Primeval Revelation

We correctly assume that our Adam and Eve instructed their children about the revelation they had received, and so provided the human race with an original catechesis; this likely included teachings of faith, a primeval form of the ten commandments, sacred rites, and prayer. Human culture was initially based on the primeval revelation, and so fanned out with peoples to all parts of the globe.

Date posted: 1994-02-01

The Splendor of the Truth

Man's behavior is true if it images God's being and wisdom, but untrue if it runs afoul of God's luminous ways. By using freedom truthfully, man can create himself into a scintillating image of the divine Veritatis Splendor.

Date posted: 1993-11-01

Life's Beginnings

Some have written that a human person does not begin at the time of conception when sperm and egg unite, but only sometime later. That is an error. Human life begins at the moment a sperm penetrates an ovum. What follows from that moment is an unbroken continuum of life.

Date posted: 1993-10-01

'Did Jesus Know He Was God?' Revisited

It belonged to the fullness of Christ's mission to know, also with human awareness, supported on the console of His brain with sense perceptible images, that He is indeed the I AM.

Date posted: 1993-09-01

NFP and Population Policies

The Church does not approve government policies which are designed to curb population growth, to reduce the number of babies born to married couples. The choice about the number of children to be born belongs to parents, not to governments.

Date posted: 1993-08-22

I Began at the Beginning

"When did I begin?" queries Rev. Dr. Norman Ford (Linacre Quarterly November 1990). His response: about 14 days after fertilization, when the primitive streak appears. Fr. Ford agrees with the teachings of Humanae Vitae, and therefore "disapproves of interrupting the generative process by aborting preimplanted human embryos and destructive experiments on human embryos" (p. 65) and calls for a debate to allow the truth to emerge. I will try to show that the human individual exists from the time of fertilization, not 14 days later, taking up his arguments one by one.

Date posted: 1993-08-01

Contraception and Fornication

An unnatural act by which a person seeks sexual pleasure from which human generation cannot follow is the worst among the seven species which Thomas lists as offending against the sixth commandment.

Date posted: 1993-04-01

Contraception: Farther My God From Thee

Because God creates human life, because He has arranged that it be received and nurtured within the warm human ecology of a family, all matters which deal with human reproduction fall under the close scrutiny of the divine eyes. And God's close presence cannot but invite reverence from marital partners.

Date posted: 1993-01-13

Purification Before The Beatific Vision

The departed in Purgatory know that the Beatific Vision is not for them before the process of purification is completed. They would suffer more from exposure in the ravishing light than they do in Purgatory.

Date posted: 1993-01-02

Natural Family Planning God's Law Pursues Humanity

Osservatore Romano of 9 December 1992 noted that the Pontifical Council for the Family had invited "50 participants ... great pioneers of various methods: Dr. Josef Roetzer, Drs. John and Lyn Billings, Dr. Thomas Hilgers and Dr. Anna Cappella, together with the leaders of different international movements promoting these methods, such as Dr. Claude Lanctot." Highlights of papers given by individual members follow.

Date posted: 1992-12-11

Naked but Not Ashamed

St. Augustine's nearly 1,600-year-old interpretation of "naked without shame" tends to give us a jaundiced view of the sex drive. If we accept his teaching that the drive we now have is a punishment for the sin of Adam and Eve, do we perhaps think less kindly of God who punishes US for THEIR sin? Even worse, will our determination to cultivate chastity tend to wilt because we are troubled and discouraged by the suspicion that the drive which is now in us is an implanted disorder?

Date posted: 1992-09-01

Author Discounts Mary's Essential Greatness

The Bible presents a Mary who is more than "probably a widow, who does not understand what her son, Jesus, is about ... who is struggling ... and perhaps at times doubting ... (who) like any Jewish mother ... most have had, along with Joseph, hopes and dreams for this remarkable boy. Then came a series of faith-testing crises." In this superficial manner the Writer discounts Mary's essential greatness by giving faint praise.

Date posted: 1992-08-01

How the United States Plans to Impose the Two-Child Family on the World and How the Church Plans to Respond

The program of the Church has no place for "population targets" and the promotion of contraception. Nor does she promote natural family planning for the achievement of demographic objectives. The Church blesses well-ordered large families, and asks parents to be generous to their children by providing them with brothers and sisters. She urges that all married couples and all young people be given access to knowledge about the fertile times of the cycle, and that they be educated in chastity. The signs of the times point to the need of a day of atonement to ask God's forgiveness for humankind's current massive contraception, abortion and sterilization.

Date posted: 1992-07-07

Does the Church Advocate Population Control?

The Church consistently teaches that families are the basic unit of society, and that governments are supposed to serve them, not vice versa.

Date posted: 1992-05-01

A Pat on the Back from God

On the way, a massive explosion ripped through the air. A bomb made a direct hit on the road which went straight to the sisters, about where they would have been had they taken that road. A life saved by an angel?

Date posted: 1992-05-01

Life Hereafter: A Primeval Revelation

Is it true that the Old Testament does not support the idea of an afterlife? Or, on the contrary, do scriptural commentators perhaps miss some of the subtle signals there? Do they "miss seeing the forest because the trees are in the way"?

Date posted: 1992-04-01

Abortion, Though Legal, is not Licit

Merely designating an injustice as "legal" makes it no more respectable than "legal thievery," or "legal arson," or "legal counterfeiting" would be. Call it what it is - pseudo-legal, counterfeit legal, attempted legal, civilly tolerated, non-penalized - whatever; but don't attempt to name that "legal" what God has from eternity made illegal. We dis-educate and confuse people by using the term "legal abortion."

Date posted: 1992-02-24

Divine Providence and Population

We cannot always keep away from anti-population people, they are so insistent. We let them talk, but don't listen to them. We reject contraception, abortion, sterilization completely; we do not need their lectures, and don't need their money. Especially when the World Bank and USAID and UNFPA threaten to impoverish nations unless they contracept, abort, and sterilize citizens, must we do as Timothy says: "Keep away from them."

Date posted: 1992-01-31

Parenting Little Children in Paradise

The Church stands by to help. The good news is that Christ gives us back more grace than we ever lost through original sin. And in such a redeemed world, parenting is a great vocation.

Date posted: 1991-12-31

Priestly Morale - Hints from Japan

I would like to offer examples from the Japanese business world which might suggest ways of maintaining good clerical morale.

Date posted: 1991-08-01

What killed Confession?

Is taking the Pill NOT a grave matter? Then the Pope is wrong, and Christ spoke nonsense when he said, "You are the rock on which I will build my Church." We know that Christ spoke no nonsense. He is living Truth. And we know that taking the Pill IS grave matter.

Date posted: 1991-07-01

Natural Family Planning Preventive Health Care

Health care workers, esteemed members of the community, who are already quite familiar with the "rhythms of fertility," have every reason to rally to the side of the Pope; his call for a far-reaching and powerful thrust of the NFP apostolate is new in the Church, is timely, and is a formidable challenge.

Date posted: 1991-05-14

In Defense of Mass Stipends

Provided we instruct the faithful correctly and control abuses, we can draw rich spiritual dividends from this ancient, precious, and ritualized tradition of receiving Mass stipends.

Date posted: 1991-05-01

Beyond Malthus and Darwin

In this article, I will try to show that Darwin distorted nature to fit his ideology, transforming her smiling face to resemble that of a twisted ogre.

Date posted: 1991-05-01

God's Wrath, The Beatific Vision, Contraception

The reason for God's wrath against unredeemed sin will be evident in the light of the beatific vision, in the city where "nothing that is under God's curse will be found" (Apoc 22:3). And: "Wisdom will never be at home with anyone who is deceitful or a slave of sin" (Wis 1:4). In that translucent revelation we will see Truth, Justice, and Love at peace with ourselves; with us whose past sins are repaired by Christ's wounds and transformed into a new creation through repentance.

Date posted: 1991-05-01

Allowing Exceptions in Abortion Laws

We sail together on this ship earth, where original sin was once committed. It is not ours to move back into a world without sin. If we cannot stop all legal abortion at once, let us nibble it down in the meantime as best we can.

Date posted: 1990-12-21

Good Morals Make For Good Families

Heroic virtue - you say? Sometimes God asks that of us. The martyrs responded as they ought. They show us the way.

Date posted: 1990-11-01

How Proportionalism Corrupts Moral Theology

So called proportionalist moral theology and its sundry variations are hailed by many theologians as a valid adaptation of ethical values to the realities of our times.... In this writing I will attempt to show why we cannot accept proportionalist reevaluations because they conflict basically with the perennial code of the ten commandments.

Date posted: 1990-11-01

NFP and Divine Providence

Because many fine Catholics have reservations about natural family planning, we should explain the matter again and again.

Date posted: 1990-11-01

Chastity: The Gift of Priests for Their People

Chastity, then, is a virtue which belongs to the profession of the priesthood. Our celibacy is for the good of the Church.

Date posted: 1990-08-01

Contraception Is Creeping Death

Contraception and divorce are connected.

Date posted: 1990-04-01

How Contraception Differs from NFP

You ask why the Church doesn't continue to teach us to live our married lives and trust in God like she used to teach. Let's start from there.

Date posted: 1989-12-26

Christ - Pantokrator

The Gospel announces in its inimitable style of controlled wonder that Christ raised people from the dead when the occasion called for it. Paul suggests that Christ did even more than raise up people who had died. He implies that it was Christ who decided upon our creation, upon our coming to life in the first place.

Date posted: 1989-12-05

Christ, Primate

Martin Luther taught that a baptized person remains a sinner, but Christ's justice is imputed to him as a coverup. Trent, in 1546, identified the novelty and refuted it.


Date posted: 1989-12-01

The Angelic Doctor and the Birth Control Pill

Thomas and Humanae Vitae. Ban on contraception is necessary for the common good.

Date posted: 1989-11-01

Proportionalism Neuters Moral Theology

If proportionalist moral theology has more validity than the invisible "clothes" which the clever tailor had designed for the emperor, we have yet to learn about it.

Date posted: 1989-09-18

NFP vs. Contraception

NFP works with nature. Contraception is contrary to nature.

Date posted: 1989-05-01

Memorial Services for Aborted Children in Japan

Buddhist memorial services for aborted children have become a major business in Japan; mothers everywhere demand such services at their temples. A few years ago services were not yet available at convenient locations in parts of Shikoku Island, for example, but the people got together and requested such services. By now they are available almost everywhere.

Date posted: 1989-04-01

Pill and Divorce Connection

Editor: Dr. Wenzke (HPR, June 1988) expresses the opinion that the most significant cause of divorce is sexual sins, especially contraception. Well said! We should make this message known to troubled partners before it is too late.

Date posted: 1989-01-01

Pope and religious superiors

It has come about that many religious would like to serve the Church more faithfully, but some superiors prevent this by standing between them and the Church.

Date posted: 1988-12-08

Memorandum on the Apostolate For Natural Family Planning

The Pope sees the apostolate of NFP as one of prime priority now; our blessed Founder always looked for signs of the times, of Divine Providence, to see which apostolate can be most effective; he did not hesitate to change plans to adopt providentially offered apostolates. Now is the time for a vigorous, fresh, imaginative, and effective SVD apostolate for NFP around the globe.

Date posted: 1988-11-29

Obedience at Its Best: Natural Family Planning

Humanae Vitae bids us to promote natural family planning. The availability of the method demonstrates that "a true contradiction cannot exist between the divine laws pertaining to the transmission of life and those pertaining to the fostering of authentic conjugal love."

Date posted: 1988-09-01

Reconciliation for sterilized couples

Dissent inflicts the faithful with spiritual dyspepsia which prevents the Sacraments from giving nourishment.

Date posted: 1988-07-01

Who Committed Original Sin?

All of what is written in the Bible is inspired and is true, of course, but we should not read into it what is not really there.

Date posted: 1988-02-01

Sex Drives and Original Sin

For many centuries Fathers and theologians theorized that lack of control of our sex automatisms is somehow associated with the transmission of original sin. Defective sex propagates a defect-laden offspring, so went the theory. This theory spawned an ambiguity about even licit sex which endured for many centuries. Today we would have to ask a new question: if the original sin is propagated by sexual intercourse, then how are in vitro children affected?

Date posted: 1988-01-02

NHK TV Educates Japan

Besides NHK, there are commercial TV channels in Japan, of course. But NHK stands above them all. It is Japan's communications Olympus. It consistently travels the high road of morals and culture.

Date posted: 1988-01-01

Adam Received Revelation From Christ

If it was our Primate Christ who mediated grace and revelation to our first ancestors, then no members of our Homo Sapiens race should be anonymous Christians.

Date posted: 1987-12-09

Christ Primate Was Not Free To Avoid Suffering

One of the reasons why theologians of the past constructed the Cinderella paradise, and why we are so eager to believe in that construct, is our difficulty in understanding the problem of suffering and evil in this world.

Date posted: 1987-12-05

Newlyweds, Beginning with NFP

The promotion and teaching of the natural methods is a truly pastoral concern, one that involves cooperation on the part of priests and religious, specialists, and married couples, all working in cooperation with the bishop of the local Church and receiving support and assistance from him.

Date posted: 1986-07-09

Marriage: Rejuvenating the Church Through NFP (III)

If the Church suffered a catastrophic depression for the past 25 years, this has been exactly contemporaneous with the age of contraception, a plague of black death within the Church and without.

Date posted: 1986-04-27

Marriage: Workshop for Contraception, Divorce, God's Grace (II)

The prodigal son went through the wrong gate, but came back. If a large part of humanity today is trying the prodigal lifestyle of contraception, it does not mean that the Father is not already waiting to welcome us back home.

Date posted: 1986-04-26

Marriage: Workshop for Holiness (I)

The Church is not a fossilized apparatus which we view from the outside, is not some centrally articulated structure left by a departing Christ to endure through the ages..... Rather the Church is a living organism, walking thru the ages, is ourselves in whom the Church lives.

Date posted: 1986-04-25

Christ: Why Made Man?

St. Bonaventure presents two opinions: the first that the reason for substance of the Incarnation is the perfection of man and of the whole universe, but the reason why Christ came in a passible mode, able to suffer, was sin.

Date posted: 1986-01-07

Conversations with Dr. Meyer on Healing Marriages (III)

An abiding determination to protect the wholeness of the marriage for both, which is central to the successful practice of NFP tends strongly to make the spouses content with each other, to make their love exclusive, and to insulate them against tendencies to graze in other pastures.

Date posted: 1985-06-08

Conversations with Dr. Meyer on Healing Marriages (II)

Can sterilized couples be healed, restored to joy and to full participation in the communion of saints?

Date posted: 1985-06-07

Conversations with Dr. Meyer on Healing Marriages (I)

When Dr. med. Bernharda Meyer sent me her text and asked that I edit it for publication, she confronted me with a rare opportunity but also with a problem. The opportunity was to learn from a practicing psychiatrist insights about real life of married couples which she articulates in a masterful manner.

Date posted: 1985-06-06

NFP: Nature's Way - God's Way

Report presented at the International Congress on "The Philosophy and Theology of Responsible Procreation" held on June 5-7 at the Pontifical Lateran University, Institute of Pope John Paul II for Marriage and the Family, 1984. Updated, May 5, 1991, at the request of Andrew Kiura who said that the family life group in Kenya had used thousands of copies of the 1984 version, which remains essentially unchanged.

Date posted: 1984-06-07

NFP as it is taught in Poland

About 3000 Catholic Family Counseling Centers exist in various parishes of Poland, providing marriage preparation courses and teaching about natural family regulation methods.

Date posted: 1984-06-06

Condom for Rape in Marriage?

We believe that God allows a woman to defend herself against being impregnated by a rapist attacker who is not her husband.

Date posted: 1983-11-01

Why Marriages Disintegrate When Contraception Is Used

WHEN contraception, abortion, and sterilization statistics skyrocket as in the United States, and divorce statistics follow a parallel trajectory, we ask ourselves whether it is possible to have the one without the other. Sexologist Wanda Poltawska finds that among her clients, contraception is associated with a disintegration of their marriage relationship, whereas natural family planning is not.

Date posted: 1983-02-01

Missionaries and apostolate for families

In every age God has special designs for His Church, He asks His chosen ones to read the signs of the times, and to act with wisdom, To understand fully the mystery, the plan He was pleased to decree in Christ.

Date posted: 1982-08-23

The Time Has Come for Pastoral Work in Natural Family Planning

I wish that doubting priests who read this article could meet people like the midwife in Japan who said to me recently: "Natural family planning should succeed in Japan from now on. Women now have three signs to go by: temperature, mucus, the cervix. They can't miss." Thus spoke this non-Catholic midwife in Japan.

Date posted: 1982-07-15

Priests Should Face the Altar

Are priests free, then, to decide about the matter? Insofar as Church legislation is concerned, yes, they are free to face the altar in the traditional manner, or to face the people according to the recent innovation.

Date posted: 1982-03-01

How to Achieve Voting Power for Families

Nature, however, expects man who is guided by reason and directive natural inclinations, to understand life as he lives it forward. When man ignores nature's teachings, nature automatically strikes back as if trying to bring man back to his senses. Perhaps this is what AIDS is all about.

Date posted: 1982-02-01

Letter to the Holy Father: Contraceptive sterilization is a great problem in the Church

My criticism is not against any doctrine of FAMILIARIS CONSORTIO. This is a gift of God, and we must treasure it. But follow-up work is needed to help so many people who have tied themselves up into a pattern of life from which it is now difficult to extricate themselves.

Date posted: 1981-12-26

Population Explosion? Don't Lose Your Calm

The history of the world is a story of younger and vigorous populations elbowing aging nations - people tired of life - off the stage. But even in declining and dying nations, we see families and groups who survive and inherit the future. We see that North America and most of Europe are now experiencing a very low birth rate, below the replacement level; it means that the population structure is aging. Despite the national trends, however, there are vigorous families who enjoy life and believe in a future. And they are having children. They win inherit the land when the anti-population people are off the stage.

Date posted: 1980-11-01

Ogino's Discovery in his own words

This in an important paper, consisting of 92 pages and 9 charts, including 6 heliotype charts. Space does not allow us to print the entire paper; we re-produce here a part of the second section. The essential part of the historic paper is posted here because many have asked me about it.

Date posted: 1980-10-12

Ban Against Missionaries From Becoming Bishops

I believe that it would be better for Japan if a majority of the Bishops would be foreigners during this present time, when Catholics constitute only 0.3% of the large population. And this should remain the policy in force until 10-15% of Japan is Catholic.

Date posted: 1980-08-01

Why I Like to Promote NFP

When a husband learns more about the cycle of his spouse, and how her body functions, he tends to be more understanding towards her.

Date posted: 1980-05-16

Open Letter to Participants in the 1980 Synod of Bishops

The natural family planning movement looks to the development of personal values and attitudes and provides medically-sound instruction for responsible parenthood. This statement follows immediately after the recommendation that "Catholics oppose with renewed vigor ... particularly the unspeakable horror of abortion."

Date posted: 1980-05-01

Natural Family Planning Has Missionary Dimensions

The public acceptance of the idea that families should, have no more than two or three children, and that additional births must be avoided through contraceptives, has also prejudiced Japan's public acceptance of abortion on a grand scale during the past 30 years. The Japanese are not so naive as to think that contraceptives have to work all the time; so they permit abortion as a necessary back-up measure for the anti-birth policy in force.

Date posted: 1978-12-31

Sterilization for contraceptive purposes in Catholic hospitals

"Dr. William E. May's article condemning sterilization for contraceptive purposes (HPR, August-September 1977) rings clear and sweet for the most part, like a church bell. But towards the end, when he allows "material cooperation" by Catholic hospital administrators in some cases, there is only dissonance and confusion. Shortly after my article, the distinquished Professor May wrote to the author that there had been a misunderstanding. Dr. May is an outstanding light of the Church whose many publications serve with distinction the cause of orthodoxy and pro-life.

Date posted: 1978-06-01

A Theory on the Nature of Original Sin

The writer wishes to state from the beginning that he would have no confidence in anything he writes or proposes, if it were not in harmony with the truths established by the Magisterium.

Date posted: 1977-04-15

Chastity, The Art of Living Beautifully

Our Christianity will yet prove its strength and durability where ever its adherents activate in themselves the energies of self-control in sexuality.

Date posted: 1975-06-15

World Population Conference Bucharest 1974

Through the kind efforts of the Randy Engels Foundation a group of pro-life people from various countries came together at Bucharest to attend the Forum associated with the World Population Congress August 19-31, 1974. We debated at the Forum, and had access to Congress Sessions as well, and became fast friends as we experienced the hardships and peculiarities of life behind the iron curtain in a communist country.

Date posted: 1974-08-19

Japan's 22 year experience with abortion

A liberal abortion law was passed by the Diet in 1948; it was amended in 1952 to eliminate the requirement that the reasons for performing an induced abortion be examined, thus permitting the "designated" physician to perform the operation at his own discretion. The stated conditions are that the fetus "is unable to keep its life outside of the mother's body" (Art.2) and that the physician judges that "the mother's health may he affected seriously by continuation of pregnancy or by delivery from the physical or economic viewpoint" (Art.14,4). The consent of the person in question or of the spouse is required (Art.14).

Date posted: 1970-11-14

Bible Readings as Material for Sex Instructions

I have offered for your consideration the suggestion that religion teachers, school teachers, and parents might be able to recapture the initiative in providing education in matters related to sex for the new generation, if Bible readings are made the basis for many and widely used courses of religious instructions.

Date posted: 1969-05-31

Attempt to amend abortion law in JAPAN 1968

The abortion law was amended to make abortion illegal once the baby is viable outside the womb, but was not amended to exclude economic or health reasons. Babies are becoming scarce in Japan with the years.

Date posted: 1968-07-13

Sow Birth Control and Reap Abortion

Abortion follows birth control promotion

Date posted: 1966-12-01

Testimony to papal commission on birth control

Father John Sasaki, Kobe, Japan (Submitted to members of the Doctrinal Committee, Papal Commission on Population and Family Problems, 1966. Prepared with the help of Fr. Zimmerman.)

Date posted: 1966-04-01

Measures to Cultivate Family Life

The articles appeared monthly during January-November 1965, and there is one of April, 1966. Some are now quaint and outdated, but they open a view on affairs as they looked 35 years ago.

Date posted: 1965-12-31

Testimony Papal birth control commission

The following is submitted for use of the Members of the Doctrinal Section, in reference to paragraph "Nature and Artifice with Regard to Man.

Date posted: 1965-11-07

A Proposed Mass Technique to Promote Fuller Utilization of Human Resources in Developing Countries

This is one of the papers contributed for the United Nations World Population Conference, 1965. It is reproduced as submitted and the views expressed are those of the author.These papers are for distribution to participants only.

Date posted: 1965-09-10

Legal Abortion: Like Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde

Father Zimmerman believes that population problems in Asia and elsewhere can be attacked only by developing the economy and strengthening family life. When this is done, he believes, there will be a natural stabilization of population.

Date posted: 1965-06-15

The Contraceptive Pill Outlawed in Japan, 1965

Dr. Monte Jay Meldman, psychiatrist, reported in the journal of the Academy of Psychosomatics recently that both husbands and wives can undergo changes in attitude when the wife starts using oral contraceptive.

Date posted: 1965-06-15

Japan's birth control policy

Japan was in serious social and economic difficulties during the years immediately after World War II. Responsible leaders became convinced that a policy of birth control would preserve and promote national welfare.

Date posted: 1965-05-01

How Birth Control Propaganda Triggers Abortion Explosion

A hush-hush part of Japan's birth control experience is the abortion epidemic.

Date posted: 1964-12-31

Postwar family life in Japan as Seen from the Catholic Viewpoint

Heavy handed government promotion of birth control.

Date posted: 1964-06-30