"I, the lord your God, teach you what is for your good". The Letter to the Hebrews [1:1-2] reminds us that God spoke in many different ways in the past, especially through the prophets but, since the first Christmas, God speaks to us through his Son.

When he sent out the seventy-two disciples, Jesus gave them the authority to speak on his behalf: "Anyone who listens to you, listens to me" (Lk 10:16). He repeated this in different words at the Last Supper: "If they kept my words, they will keep yours as well" (Jn 15:20). Jesus ascended into heaven and, in union with the Father, sent the Holy Spirit upon his apostles to give them the courage and authority to bring the Gospel to the world. Hence, we must believe that, through the Church, the Lord our God teaches us what is for our good. Though many people, including even many Catholics, refuse to face the bitter truth, many have for some time realized that Paul VI's encyclical Humanae Vitae was prophetic in that it saw that carelessness about birth control and sexuality in general would bring about a state of affairs where the lack of respect for life would have dire consequence for the human race.