it's the church's fault

By Diogenes ( articles ) | May 25, 2006

"Elton John mourns 60 friends lost to AIDS," reads a headline in the Irish Examiner. His bereavement seems to have affected his powers of observation adversely:

Elton John has lost 60 friends to AIDS including pop pal Freddie Mercury and two members of his own staff. Speaking at a business awards ceremony in London, the superstar attacked the Catholic Church for condemning the use of condoms and urged businesses to help the fight against AIDS.

He said: "I'm devastated to have watched friends I loved very much die from this terrible disease."

Suppose Elton's 60 friends, and their wives, had followed Catholic teaching, i.e., remaining virgins until marriage and faithfully monogamous thereafter. How many of them would be dead of AIDS today? Zero. Had they chosen to follow it, what is the greatest harm that strict adherence to Catholic sexual teaching could have brought them? An adolescence and early adulthood including sporadic discomfort, maybe eight years of jokes at the expense of their stodginess, and, in the worst case scenario, a brood of obstreperous and tasteless children who turn out to be Elton John fans.

Far from painless, but even by heathen standards better than disease and an early grave.