In the name of the father, and of the son, and of the holy spirit. Amen. Last night, on sixty minutes, which I suppose some of you saw, and if you didn't, I cannot review it. A great part of it was given over to this matter of test tube babies. And it was chiefly a debate between a professor.
It's all taken place in England, in London. Who was defending something that would be the same as our pro life movement. And he was very much against this idea of a test tube baby. You know what that is? It's the fertilization of an ovum in some kind of a tube or a test tube.
And then the fertilized ovum is then replaced in the uterus, and the woman then produces a baby. Oh, that's what the idea is. And it's being done. There's been about a thousand of these babies born. Now, for every one of those fertilized ovum or ovum, which succeeds in producing a baby, which is the aim and the objective.
You may have any number of fertilized ova, which are either purposely destroyed. Purposely destroyed as being unnecessary and useless or it doesn't work. Now, the professor, the pro life man, well, this calling, he was defending the idea that you have a human being from the very moment of fertilization of an oval. Which of course is the solid Catholic doctrine and which is beyond all dispute. That is as Catholic doctrine.
You may reject it, you can't say that that is not the teaching of the church. This is my point. Even if you take a full page advertisement in the New York Times. There is absolutely no ambiguity in the doctrine of the holy Roman Catholic church. That from the first moment of fertilization of an ovum, we're talking about the human species.
You have to treat that as a human being, as a special and separate creation of God, which becomes human by the infusion of a soul. The church teaches you have to treat it as a human being from the very first moment of fertilization or conception. Word conception you see doesn't have much meaning when you're using a desk too. Not much romance in that. Now, on the other side of this, I want to tell you this professor, whoever he was, did a very fine job.
He was impressive. But the poor man, all he had to talk about was principles. Principles, abstractions, abstractions. On the other side, of course, you understand that with everything on sixty minutes, this was completely unbiased. On the other side, what did you have?
You had this one doctor, but there were others, but there was one protagonist. And from time to time, you see, here we have coming out these gorgeous little babies, toddlers, just about able to walk when children are probably their most lovable. Beautifully dressed. Then he says, with without the test tube these beautiful children would not ever exist. These infertile families could not have children.
Now, how much persuasive force can you put behind abstract principles on the one hand, and little gorgeous little children running around with little ribbons in their hair just beautiful. Who's going to win that argument? And the whole thing wound up, as you all know it, with a real climax. The doctor comes on and he says, is it is it is it He didn't course The word moral hardly He never used the word moral. That didn't come into his vocabulary.
All he said was that surely the end does justify the means when you have such products as these. And he points to these two darling little children. Now, who in the world's gonna win that debate? Even Reagan couldn't win that. Now, is what you call you see, unbiased, unprejudiced reporting.
But there's no way you could report this that would give due weight to principle because as Cardinal Newman said, he took him a whole page to do it. That when you have, and this happens in our daily lives. Remember, every time we have a temptation to sin, we're facing this kind of a situation. You don't commit sin in the abstract. Sin is committed in a concrete actual situation.
You don't choose evil because it's evil. You don't commit sin because you want to choose evil. These are the some of the basic ideas. So when we're actually in a situation where we have to make a choice, what is the choice? It's God's law or the church's law, Thou shalt not commit adultery.
Thou shalt not steal. All of these things, the whole 10 commandments or what have you. These are abstractions. And on the other hand, we're immersed. We are enmeshed.
We are involved. Every our senses, our passions, our emotions, they are all involved. And they're all leading us where? To make the choice for what is concrete, for what is actual, for what is beautiful, for what is good as we see it. Because remember, we always choose the good as we see it.
So, which one we as Newman said, which one's going to win out? Only thing can save you is the grace of God. Now, I want to come back to something. Once you admit in a in any moral situation that the end justifies a means. Let me get the professor And with absolute logic, but remember, logic's no good today.
One of the worst things you can be accused of is being logical or consistent. I'm not this is true. This is against you. This is your third strike. But when that professor said, what you're doing, when you're using these human embryo which have been fertilized, when you're using them deep freezing, they can keep them for five hundred years.
There was one of the babies that had been deep frozen for I don't know how many months. When you use these oak that have been fertilized, and then they are destroyed. When you use them for experimental purposes in Eugenics, you're doing the same thing that the Nazis did in their concentration camps. Oh, of course, the doctors said this is absurd. Oh, you know, you don't rig them a row.
But the professor is right. He's absolutely right. But it's a matter of logic. And, of course, that makes him about 99% wrong. Remember, the church has always been accused of being too logical.
The first thing Newman did was to throw out Aristotle. I mean, the first thing that Luther Did I say Luther or Newman? I meant to say Luther. Now, when you take in any moral situation and you say that an end justifies the means, you're throwing out morality. Let's not talk about morality.
You're talking about pragmatism. You're talking about the world that we know, and we are living in a pragmatic world. Don't ever mistake it. We're not living in a world of principle. Does it work?
Does it pay? Does it fulfill my life? Does it make me happy? Just recently, tell you it was it was this doctor brothers, the psychologist whom I'll have a lot of admiration. But she and her daughter were on a some kind of a show.
And the daughter was asked, did your mother ever instruct you about your dating? In other words, how do you deal with men? And the daughter who's a teenager said, no, my mother never did. All she ever did said that any choice I make, she will love me and she will support me. See, no moral principle at all.
None. Darling, I want your happiness. You do what you have. You choose your lifestyle, and you can depend on my support and my love. Doesn't make any difference either.
No moral principles. Does it work? Does it complete your life? Very recently, I had an incident where the woman, the wife with husband two children simply said, I have a right to my life and she walked out. This is the age you're living in.
The idea of a compulsory moral principle that come hell or high water holds under all circumstances. In other words, an absolute. That is rejected today. And it's being rejected in the Catholic church by these people calling themselves Catholics. So, we're not throwing stones, folks.
We're throwing boomerangs. And so, you've got to come back to this. You take that thing last night. It was you cannot fail but being impressed. You couldn't fail but being persuaded how beautiful this is when you see a young couple that couldn't have a baby for seven years having this gorgeous little child in their arms.
Who can resist that? And here's another thing they did. They showed you a fertilized ovum almost upon practically upon its impregnation by the sperm. And what is it? What is it?
Then you compare that to this one year old toddler walking around. And you're gonna tell me that that little blob that I can practically only see under a microscope that looks like a just a drop of water. You're telling me that that's a human being and it's got to be treated like that child? Yes, I'm telling you that. And the Catholic church is telling you that.
And the church is telling you that in the name of God's law. But when you see the two, how can you resist throwing your vote for you know which one? So, is our this is your problem. This is my problem. That we've got to make God real in our lives.
And if there's not love of God, which is stronger than the love of yourself, because this is what it boils down to. Remember, pragmatism is just another form of hedonism. You cannot see God. The choices you have to make which come times are fearfully hard choices. Hard choices.
There's no fun or games in it. You are on the cross. All this talk about you know this life of being following Christ being so lovely and that you're no comfortable. It's ridiculous. Ridiculous.
I'm wearing red vestments today because saint Simon and Jude gave their lives for a principle. In the name of the father, the son, and the holy spirit. Amen.