Common sense says, "Don't bother arguing with someone named 'Ron Mexico'" (see Proverbs 26:4 for general guidelines), but I'm inclined to think that, sadly, his brand of south-of-the-truth, insulting nonsense is more than commonplace:
Catholics claim opposition to all birth control. You didn't need to follow the latest dust up between between President Obama and Catholicism, Inc. to know that much. But every last Catholic, it seems, has grossly misinterpreted the particulars of that particular divine mandate.
The most god-awful form of contraception, which gets condom usage confused with taking communion, is voluntary, intentional abstinence. At least condoms fail once in a while.
Do Catholics claim opposition to all birth control, if by "birth control" is meant controlling the number and occasion of conceptions and births? Not according to the Catechism of the Catholic Church, which Mr. Mexico has likely never touched, let alone opened, read, or considered:
A particular aspect of this responsibility concerns the regulation of procreation. For just reasons, spouses may wish to space the births of their children. It is their duty to make certain that their desire is not motivated by selfishness but is in conformity with the generosity appropriate to responsible parenthood. Moreover, they should conform their behavior to the objective criteria of morality ...
Periodic continence, that is, the methods of birth regulation based on self-observation and the use of infertile periods, is in conformity with the objective criteria of morality. (pars. 2368, 2370)
The regulation of births represents one of the aspects of responsible fatherhood and motherhood. Legitimate intentions on the part of the spouses do not justify recourse to morally unacceptable means (for example, direct sterilization or contraception). (par. 2399)
Read the entire section from the CCC. Perhaps Mr. Mexico is unaware that contraceptions are not the only means of regulating procreation. However, judging from the argument he makes next, he's not concerned to much with facts or fairness:
So these folks, these pro-life traditionalists, would have us believe the cells constituting a fertilized egg have crossed the magical Rubicon into complete human being. But an unfertilized egg is nothing? ...
I almost understand the argument that those few fertilized cells should be considered a full-fledged person because of their potential to become an actual person. But by that reasoning, every egg has every bit as much God-given potential. ...
God did His job. He set the table for life. The Lord left it in your hands, creating a person even before you elected to flush it out. With a middle school understanding how basic biology functions, it is a conscious decision for a Christian female to decide that egg, her son or daughter, will never see a rainbow.
Using simple pro-life logic, the funeral that is menstruation is simply an indication she did not choose life, but opted for a pre-term abortion.
Once again, Mr. Mexico tries mightly to force Catholics be defend a position they don't hold and is contrary to science and logic. Catholics believe that human life begins at conception, that is, in scientific terms, "with the union of an oocyte and a sperm during fertilization" (The Developing Human Being, by Keith Moore, and T.V.N. Persaud; 7th edition, 2003). That belief is upheld and presented in numerous textbooks and books about embryology. There's also the fact that a woman has, on average, about 400,000 potential eggs, of which some 480 or so "will actually ever be released during her reproductive years". Needless to say, even Catholic families don't have 480 children, even if some which they could!
But this is rather beside the point since the Church's teachings about regulating births has to do with openness to life, which of course involves conjugal relations between husband and wife, and the rejection of contraceptives, which violates and hinders the marriage act. Saying that a woman who allows any of her eggs to go unfertized is somehow implicated in an abortion is idiotic and demonstates a failure to grasp elementary school biology and plain common sense. But, then, this is how it works so often with the Mr. Mexicos of the world: despising Catholicism, they assume it to be completely wrong and backwards, and so feel free to use any and all facile nonsense to attack it. It is about destruction, not truth. Unfortunately, in a world given to a hatred of moral truth and a love for facile nonsense, this inchoate barbarism often finds receptive minds. "The simple acquire folly, but the prudent are crowned with knowledge" (Prov. 14:18).
Related Ignatius Insight Articles and Book Excerpts:
• • The Truth About Conscience | John F. Kippley
• The Case Against Abortion | An Interview with Dr. Francis Beckwith
• Abortion and Ideology | Raymond Dennehy
• Contraception and Homosexuality: The Sterile Link of Separation | Dr. Raymond Dennehy
• Human Sexuality and the Catholic Church | Donald P. Asci | Introduction to The Conjugal Act as a Personal Act
• Who Is Married? | Edward Peters
• Marriage and the Family in Casti Connubii and Humanae Vitae | Reverend Michael Hull, S.T.D.
• Male and Female He Created Them | Cardinal Estevez