Planned Parenthood Promotes Promiscuity, Vatican Charges

The Vatican’s senior official on families today accused Planned Parenthood of “encouraging promiscuity” and criticized feminism in a speech to the U.S. Roman Catholic hierarchy.

Cardinal Edouard Gagnon, president of the Pontifical Council for the Family, applauded Roman Catholics who fight against the Roe vs. Wade decision of the U.S. Supreme Court allowing abortion.

But he charged that in the United States some forms of ministry to divorced Catholics have “degenerated into dating services.” He urged caution in granting annulments, saying that in allowing women to help decide such cases “we have to be careful that their tender hearts do not play tricks on them.”

In Chicago, the acting president of the Planned Parenthood Federation of America, David J. Andrews, said Gagnon “is absolutely right” in suggesting that the group opposes the church’s position on birth control.

Andrews said Gagnon’s speech reflects “the desperation of a church trying to come to grips with the issue of sexuality and with the fact that people the world over rely on effective methods of birth control and want to keep abortion services safe and legal.”