ENOUGH SELF-CONTRADICTING DEEPITIES TO GIVE ANYONE VERTIGO

In a hopeless attempt to impress with deepities, Jesuit priest Paul Chetcuti ends up confusing even himself, and thus produces an opinion piece riddled with absurdities and self-contradictions.

Chetcuti starts with quoting Scripture, writing “This is now bone of my bones and flesh of my flesh… That is why a man leaves his father and mother and is united to his wife, and they become one flesh” (Gen. 2:23-24). And although he qualifies the quote by telling his readers to “forget the sacredness of this text, the gender issues and the folkloristic simplicity of the statements”, he actually makes matters even worse by explaining that the Bible writer is making two statements: “this is bone of my bones and flesh of my flesh”; and “this is why a man leaves his father and mother (to become) united to his wife, and they become one flesh”. Which is obviously absurd since married couples do not actually become “one flesh”, not even symbolically – both individuals in a marriage retain their autonomy, and true love necessarily includes respect for that autonomy.

However, to make matters even worse, Chetcuti takes a giant leap further, proclaiming that “this (‘one flesh’ unity) flies in the face of the strident claim made by our so-called progressive culture claiming that ‘This is my body!’”, in clear reference – as the heading of his opinion piece illustrates – to the Pro-Choice slogan “My body, my choice”.  And herein lies Chetcuti’s major self-contradiction.

In answer to the Pro-Choice claim that abortion should be permissible because it’s the woman’s body, and so it is her choice, Anti-Abortionists generally claim that the foetus, at whatever stage of its development, is a separate individual with its own right to life. Now Paul Chetcuti comes along and tells us that the foetus isn’t a separate individual…it is one body with the pregnant woman – it is “one flesh”. If taken literally, Chetcuti’s belief would seem to logically support the Pro-Choice position. If taken figuratively, it’s just a deepity with nothing at all to add to the abortion debate.

Chetcuti goes on to tell us that although he is no biologist, he knows that “our bodies can only originate in human parent-bodies with whom we are one flesh”.  He assures us that “this is not doctrine or indoctrination, neither is it faith, belief or custom.  It is pure fact”. Except that we aren’t, and it is no fact at all. It doesn’t take a biologist to know that every person, although created by his parents and built by the combination of their DNA (which obviously produces different DNA in the offspring), is a unique being. This is a fact that even Anti-Abortionists insist upon, the only difference with Pro-Choicers being that the latter, backed by the science, insist that it is only after the foetus attains sentience and consciousness that it may sensibly be considered a person. So, whose side is Chetcuti on?

And this is where Chetcuti clearly shows he is confused by his own deepities. For in the next sentence, he tells us – contrary to his repeated assertions that both the biological parents and foetus are “one flesh” – that parents “are capable of generating a unique, unrepeatable, independent being”. And to add to the confusion, he seemingly takes the side of Pro-Choicers when he adds that “each original being thus begotten is not destined to remain just a clump of cells. Those cells become human when he/she discovers the ability and dignity to say: ‘This is me’”. Is Chetcuti really saying that until the foetus attains self-consciousness, it is not yet human? It certainly seems like he is.

I shall skip the whole paragraphs of non sequiturs and religious hyperbole and conclude with Chetcuti’s sentence before last, where he says that “It is only what we lovingly give that is really ours”. Except that what we give is no longer ours, unless it is shared instead of given. And in any case, this has nothing at all to do with abortion, which Chetcuti’s confused “arguments” mentioned above seem to suggest is both permissible and not permissible at the same time. Yes, obviously this would fall foul of the philosophical principle of non-contradiction. But perhaps Chetcuti is a follower of Tertullian who once exclaimed: “I believe because it is absurd”. Well, rational people certainly don’t.