Ella Logan (1913–1969) was a Scottish-born singer and actress who was famous in American pictures and early television. When she performed for the GIs in Italy, she kept one rule with iron-clad resolve: There would never be anything in her show the least bit off-color. She wore simple dresses intended to remind the soldiers of their sweethearts, wives and sisters.
Ella Logan
One night in Naples, the theater was packed. Many of the men attending had just returned from the front line. They were so fresh from battle that they were on edge, dirty and, in some cases, even bloody.
After Ella made her usual little speech at the end of her act, a tall GI with a Gary Cooper–like persona walked up to her on the stage. Pointing at the microphone, he asked, “Can I talk into that thing?” The soldier still had his helmet on and looked exhausted.
Ella was apprehensive because a man in that GI’s condition might say or do anything. Looking up at him, she stood beside him at the microphone. He put his hand on her shoulder and began to speak to her before the absolutely silent 5,000 men present in the auditorium.
“Miss Logan,” he said into the microphone, “you don’t remind me of my wife or sister. You don’t even remind me of my mother. Do you know what you remind me of?” Ella trembled as she waited for the soldier to answer his own question. He said, “You remind me of an angel.”
He bent over and kissed Ella on the forehead. Then the lanky soldier walked down the steps, up the aisle and into the darkness. While he walked away, no one in the crowd broke the silence. Ella ran into her dressing room and cried tears of joy.
Ella Logan understood the virtue of modesty. She not only understood that immodest dress is a violation of God’s Sixth Commandment, but after this incident, she also understood that modesty earns far more respect from men than trying to look “sexy.”
Sexualized Culture
The Adventures of Ozzie and Harriet
We live in a sexually saturated society and culture. Progressive-thinking people tell us that this isn’t the Ozzie and Harriet era anymore — that we are liberated from those old stuffy rules of propriety and etiquette. It’s true that business, communications and technology change with progress, as do styles in architecture or automobiles. But God’s laws never change.
Today, we flaunt our sexuality, making ourselves as appealing to the opposite sex (and sometimes the same sex) as possible. Men often dress as if they’re going to a picnic, no longer looking like gentlemen. Women typically dress as though they are trying to get every man’s attention, even at church. It’s time they realized that immodesty is a violation of God’s law and take Ella Logan’s example to heart.
Christ’s Commandments
The Sixth and Ninth Commandments are, respectively, “You shall not commit adultery” and “You shall not covet your neighbor’s wife.” They are usually discussed together by moral theologians and catechists because they both deal with human sexuality. The Sixth Commandment deals with external sexual purity; that is, the things we do. The Ninth Commandment deals with interior sexual purity; that is, the things we think.
The Sixth Commandment obliges us to be pure and modest in behavior, both when alone and with others. It forbids impurity, immodest behavior and everything that leads to impurity. Some of the sins committed against this commandment are adultery, fornication, contraception, homosexual activity, prostitution, premarital sex, masturbation and pornography.
Fornication is sexual intercourse between an unmarried man and an unmarried woman. Adultery is sexual intercourse between two persons, at least one of whom is married. These are always objectively mortal sins.
Contraception is also always gravely sinful as well because it rejects chaste married love and defies God by wanting to increase pleasure while avoiding the God-given responsibility of procreating children. Furthermore, the irresponsible use of sex through contraception leads to a lack of respect for sex itself, the marriage partner as a person and human life. Its use has contributed immensely to the Culture of Death, just as Pope Paul VI predicted in his 1968 encyclical Humanae Vitae.
The most common contraceptive is the birth control pill, simply known as “the pill.” Contraceptive pills are morally, ethically and medically evil. Research has proven that such medication often causes premature death in women.
It not only works to impede the conception of children but it is also proven to be an abortifacient, destroying life in the womb. Indeed, it has been scientifically proven that all chemical contraceptives are abortifacients. By using the pill, many women have unknowingly and unintentionally aborted children they didn’t even know they had. Furthermore, the use of contraceptives, including the pill, typically leads people into other immoral sexual activities that pave the way to eternal punishment in Hell.
Natural Family Planning
There are, however, natural methods of birth control that of themselves do not offend God if used for unselfish reasons. Natural family planning refers to several methods that are objectively in conformity with the biological harmonies God has impressed upon human nature. These methods use no chemicals or gadgets. They are based on sound scientific knowledge, and they are completely harmless, reliable and healthy.
If NFP is used correctly for serious moral reasons, it can be morally and religiously acceptable. NFP must only be used when married people have serious and legitimate motives for spacing out births. Some serious reasons for spacing out births may come from physical or psychological conditions of the husband or wife or from grave external conditions. However, selfishness is a sinful motive.
I’m a convert to Catholicism, and my parents weren’t at all religious. My father was a selfish man who didn’t even like children, and most certainly didn’t want to be bothered by them. Don’t misunderstand; my father loved both of us kids, but he never wanted the responsibility of being a dad. I recall him telling me once that he wouldn’t take $100 million for me, but that he wouldn’t give a plug nickel for another just like me.
When I was a little boy, I also recall overhearing my mother telling some of her friends that I was a mistake. She meant that I was unplanned, but that isn’t how the little boy heard and understood it. What sort of message does that send to a kid? Worse, these attitudes demonstrate the “throwaway” attitude artificial contraception promotes in the thinking of married couples.