What if the Church had taught, and the World had listened, to the prophetic voice of Pope Paul VI?
Fifty-six years ago this week, Pope Paul VI released an encyclical that shocked the world. Not because it said something new, but because it not only refused to conform, but openly rejected the spirit of the age.
Change was sweeping across the world in the form of the sexual revolution, enabled by the birth control pill and accompanying loud demands to modernize everything, including the Church’s age-old teachings on sex and marriage. When the Pope released Humanae Vitae, many expected the new encyclical to go along with the times.
Instead, the Pope gave the world a challenge—but also a gift.
In Humanae Vitae—On Human Life—Pope Paul VI reaffirmed what the Church had always taught: that love, sex, and life are intrinsically connected, and that separating them would come with serious consequences. It wasn’t a finger-wagging lecture. It was rather a father’s tender but firm reminder that we are not the authors of life, but stewards of something sacred.
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