Why Women Aren't Chickens

The other day I was watching the movie Jupiter Ascending, and while the romance between the half-wolf good guy and the rags-to-riches damsel-in-distress quickly grew tiresome, I found comedic relief in Jupiter's Russian family members. At one point in the movie [this isn't a big spoiler if you can see through basic plot lines] the uncle finds out that his son was trying to convince Jupiter to sell her eggs and split the money with him. He hits him with a pillow and shouts, "WHAT DO YOU THINK SHE IS, A CHICKEN?!?" at which point I started laughing so hard I woke my fiance sitting next to me. [He didn't think the movie was that great either.]

I was laughing because I thought it was so ironic and I wondered why I hadn't thought of it before. I've recently been seeing ads all over the internet asking me to donate my eggs, but I wasn't witty enough to think of the chicken comparison on my own. But it is so true. Ladies, if one of your friends walked up to you and asked you for your eggs, wouldn't you feel like a hen? Maybe it wouldn't be so bad if it were someone you knew, but what if some business approached you and promised you thousands of dollars if you would give away a part of your body to a complete stranger? There's not so many warm-and-fuzzies in that situation. In fact, if you thought about it long enough, you might connect the dots to something along the lines of prostitution.

Ouch. That name hurts worse than the other. Somehow a person who sells her body for money seems lower than an animal bred for her produce. But do I really have the gall to call those women who sell their eggs prostitutes and hens? Aren't they rather very generous and courageous for choosing to give up a part of themselves? After all, their eggs often go to women who do not have many themselves, or women who know their genes have certain traits that would be unfavorable in a future child. Isn't this a worthy cause, and a far cry from the sexual or voracious appetites of men?

Here's the issue with anyone who tries to make egg donation seem like anything better than old-fashioned prostitution: they are forgetting that the ends never justify the means. Let's say I decided to play Grinch this Christmas and steal most the presents of everyone in my neighborhood. But instead of keeping them for myself, I gave them to the homeless and those living in poverty. Now, giving to the needy is a good deed, but not when it is supplied by stolen goods (sorry Robin Hood). Theft is against the law, and it cannot be justified by a corresponding generous act. Back to egg donation. Selling your body goes against your dignity as a person, which is why the chicken comparison is so accurate. Even though the recipients may be less fortunate, the fact remains that a person should not be treated as means to someone else's end. No amount of financial compensation or encouraging words can make up for the fact that a woman is being used for her body.

So ladies, when you see those ads for egg donations and feel a cringe inside, don't try to reason it away with false ideas of generosity and charity. If you want to be generous and charitable to your friend who wasn't born with as many eggs as you, try talking with her about NaPro technology or even the benefits of adoption. Better yet, just be there for her as a friend. And tell those who would get you to sell yourself: "I'm not a chicken. You can't have my eggs."

The Alternative to You is Nothing

“Now I know why women need sports bras”

If I didn’t know who said this when I first heard it, I would guess it came from a thirteen-year-old girl who was still “becoming a woman”. However, those words came from the mouth of Bruce Jenner, who is not a teenage girl, but a middle-aged man. He is not “becoming a woman” as the media would have you believe, but he is pretending to take on the identity of a woman. His pretense is as transparent as it is offensive. “Now I know why women need sports bras,” tells me that Bruce Jenner doesn’t know the first thing about being a woman. He can give himself a female name, massacre his genitalia, tromp around in high heels and wear tight clothes to reveal his implants, but he will never have the identity of a woman.

The problem with transgender ideology (not to mention “gender theory” as a whole) proclaiming that gender can be altered by a simple surgical procedure (or how you “feel”) is their reductionist concept of traditional male and female identities. This is due in part, to how we see men and women portrayed on a daily basis. Mass media, for example, would have you believe that being a woman is all about the clothes you wear, the products you buy, and the yoga classes you attend. But womanhood is not merely materialistic femininity. We need to take a closer look, and ask ourselves what it means to have the mind of a woman, the heart of a woman, and the will of a woman. When we begin to understand these things, then we are discovering the essence of feminine sexuality. The same thing can be said about men. They cannot be reduced to the jokes they tell, the way they behave, and the jobs they hold. Men and women have completely different (while complementary) identities, and they ought to be respected as something deeper than what we can perceive through the five senses. When we understand the truth of our sexuality, we realize that we cannot attempt to change our gender without changing our level of existence as a whole.

God created each one of us, out of nothing, as unique individuals. No matter how much “rebirth” is passed around, the truth is that there has never been anyone like you, nor will there ever be. Furthermore, God loved you into existence – not Bob Alou, your imaginary friend. Your life is so precious, because you were given the gift of existence. You were one of the chosen few that were drawn forth from not-being into being; and you were given a body, and a name. God made you in his image and likeness, but also gave you individuality. You have had your own identity since conception – an identity that you alone possess. We have seen, through the actions of transsexuals, that you can strip yourself of some of your identity. Men who surgically alter their sexual organs cannot really be called women, but neither are they still fully men – hence the term “it” that has so long been applied to transsexuals. When you strip yourself of your sexuality, you throw away a fundamental part of your identity that makes you a reality.  You begin to lose yourself, and you take a step back into the nothing that you came from. This is why a man cannot become a woman, and a woman cannot become a man: because the alternative to “you” is not “someone else”, but nothing at all.

“Be who God meant you to be, and you will set the world on fire.” –St. Catherine of Siena

On the Evolution of Stoning

People aren't judged. Actions are judged; people are rewarded, punished, or condemned. Every morally upright person has a right to judge his or her actions and the actions of those around them as right or wrong. But no one has the right to condemn another person.

First, let's not confuse punishment with condemnation. Punishment is "the state of being made to suffer for wrongdoing." I think the best example of this is spanking a disobedient child. When I disobeyed my mother, she spanked me so I would know there is a consequence for misbehaving. This is justice. It would not have been just if she told me "You're going to hell" every time I did something wrong. That is condemnation. 

To condemn means "to declare to be reprehensible, wrong, or evil usually after weighing evidence and without reservation." When a person condemns another, they are making a statement about the whole person: "Charles Manson is evil." When people say, "Don't judge me," they mean "Don't condemn me." This is a legitimate request - I cannot declare anyone to be completely evil, because I can only know their actions and what they choose to tell me about what they were thinking when they performed those actions. I can never know the entire character of the person, because I cannot be them. I cannot look into their soul and see if they have any goodness in their heart. I cannot perform any scientific tests to prove their moral character. Only God knows the soul, therefore, only God has a right to condemn.

Man tends to play God when he has too much power. This is dangerous, because man is not God - and he will never be as perfect as God. But man's power has been increasing with technology, so much so to where he has given himself the power of determining his own moral truths. When man ceases to follow natural law, he is bound to an abuse of power.

We see this today in what is called "cyber bullying." This destructive behavior has been enabled by social media, which has given every man the power to communicate his thoughts to another person instantaneously, no matter the distance. Man is removed from accountability, because he can silence those who would call on his conscience by simply "deleting" them. This makes him feel as if he were annihilating that person (which even God would not do), when really he is only removing them from his life - without bearing the consequences of the hurt he is causing them.

Man is seeking to throw off the cross of responsibility and increase his power to be the only master of his life - he is becoming Satanic. Cyber bullying is one of many atrocities that have come about in this new age of man. This kind of demonic activity must be rebuked and put to an end. And it must be done by those of us who are willing to fight for the dignity of our brethren.

No man has the right to condemn a man to death. No man (or woman) has the right to abort the lives of unborn babies. And no one has the right to tell my brother to "kill himself." The Hebrews of the Old Testament were criticized for public stoning. But we are worse today. Instead of throwing stones than harm the body, we throw hateful words that harm the soul. 

"Let the one among you who is without sin be the first to throw a stone at her." . . . Then Jesus straightened up and said to her, "Woman, where are they? Has no one condemned you?" She replied, "No one, sir." Then Jesus said, "Neither do I condemn you. Go, and from now on do not sin any more." -John 8:7,10-11