Contraception vs. Natural Family Planning

[LongingSoul]

You wrote “Not sure where the obligation comes from,…”

It is your word from Premise 2 which I posted for reference. Also the couples matrimonial consent includes obligation willingly accepted. (I mentioned that so I don’t know why you did not understand.)

You wrote: "who said the couple are charting and/or aware of their fertility? "

For the logic if there is the intention to avoid pregnancy then it is a factor.

You wrote: “I suspect you are limiting possible outcomes by imagining that the couple always knows their fertility”.

No, I stated it without knowledge, but with intent, this way:

Post #95: The fertility status does not need to be known certainly. Choosing exclusively only times in a month that are thought to be infertile is NFP. To not have that intention means that ***when ***choosing times some must be thought to be more fertile.

Premise 2 does not hold up to this:

Post #101: The logic that defines avoidance for a month is if there are any conjugal acts in a month, and it is the intent is to avoid pregnancy for that month, and no acts in that month are in times thought to be fertile.

I’m assuming that you are living your conjugal life this way but I can’t see you sustaining such an approach for the entirety of your fertile married life. It’s like micromanagement gone wild to make a considered decision from moment to moment regarding sex.

When parents make the decision not to increase their family anymore, they then adopt a pattern of abstinence and embracing that reflects that decision. Of course God may have other surprises for you, but there is nothing flawed or sinful in making that decision between the two of you. The Church teaches that others may not interfere with that most personal decision between couples because of natures part in the thriving and surviving of families. The only thing the Church stresses is the intrinsically evil nature of deliberately rendering sex infertile.

 

[Vico]

You seem to be stuck on the idea that “not avoiding” requires a deliberate choice to choose a fertile time. This is not true, as I thought Post #95 demonstrated in amathematical way.

This appears to be in the “agree to disagree” basket so I want pursue it with you further.

You mean* not *pursue, I believe. Just reflect on what Pope Pius XII wrote on it and you should be able to see the variables required for the “math” include will to avoid and actual conjugal union.
The matrimonial contract, which confers on the married couple the right to satisfy the inclination of nature, constitutes them in a state of life, namely, the matrimonial state. Now, on married couples, who make use of the specific act of their state, nature and the Creator impose the function of providing for the preservation of mankind. This is the characteristic service which gives rise to the peculiar value of their state, the bonum prolis. The individual and society, the people and the State, the Church itself, depend for their existence, in the order established by God, on fruitful marriages. Therefore, to embrace the matrimonial state, to use continually the faculty proper to such a state and lawful only therein, and, at the same time, to avoid its primary duty without a grave reason, would be a sin against the very nature of married life.
Serious motives, such as those which not rarely arise from medical, eugenic, economic and social so-called “indications,” may exempt husband and wife from the obligatory, positive debt for a long period or even for the entire period of matrimonial life. From this it follows that the observance of the natural sterile periods may be lawful, from the moral viewpoint: and it is lawful in the conditions mentioned. If, however, according to a reasonable and equitable judgment, there are no such grave reasons either personal or deriving from exterior circumstances, the will to avoid the fecundity of their union, while continuing to satisfy to the full their sensuality, can only be the result of a false appreciation of life and of motives foreign to sound ethical principles.

~ Address to Midwives, Given by His Holiness Pope Pius XII, 29 October 1951

 

[Vico]

I’m assuming that you are living your conjugal life this way but I can’t see you sustaining such an approach for the entirety of your fertile married life. It’s like micromanagement gone wild to make a considered decision from moment to moment regarding sex.

When parents make the decision not to increase their family anymore, they then adopt a pattern of abstinence and embracing that reflects that decision. Of course God may have other surprises for you, but there is nothing flawed or sinful in making that decision between the two of you. The Church teaches that others may not interfere with that most personal decision between couples because of natures part in the thriving and surviving of families. The only thing the Church stresses is the intrinsically evil nature of deliberately rendering sex infertile.

It does not require moment to moment when there is a just reason to avoid pregnancy. Of course when that is justified, complete abstinence is also justified.

For justification see post just prior to this one.

 

[LongingSoul]

It does not require moment to moment when there is a just reason to avoid pregnancy. Of course when that is justified, complete abstinence is also justified.

For justification see post just prior to this one.

Are you saying that when there is just reasons to avoid pregnancy that complete abstinence is required?

 

[Xantippe]

I’m in the same position as you…suffice to say that my husband and I are DONE having children.

Three back to back pregnancies, tough pregnancies and both of us are unemployed? We’re done.
I drank*the kool-aid about NFP. The Kool-Aid that CCL forces on couples that it’s this wonderful, magical thing that improves your marriage and makes everything just rainbows and butterflies.

It’s not. It’s stressful and almost unrealistic to abide by. It limits my green-lit days to less then 10 a month. That’s ridiculous.
It forces you to abstain during times when you want your husband the most. Also ridiculous.

The sort of situation you describe is why I think there ought to be more encouragement for couples to get a handle on NFP as newlyweds and have some success with it before getting pregnant. In practice, NFP is a sort of speeding train, and it’s much easier to climb aboard at the station, rather than attempt to climb aboard once it is already chugging ahead. Anybody who has to start NFP for the first time post-partum has my heartiest sympathy.

I would argue that given the difficulty of starting NFP post-partum or while dealing with a household of little children, that newlywed couples do have serious reasons to use NFP until they have a good handle on it. (My husband and I got married in graduate school while each making approximately minimum wage and four years later, after my husband got his first real job, we had our first child. Postpartum NFP has always seemed like wandering around in the fog, and I realize more and more how lucky we were not to have to start with it.)

So, I think one of the best things the Church can do (and remember, we are the Church, too), is to speak up when rigorists try to guilt engaged couples newlyweds out of getting some solid practice with NFP before they start having babies.

 

[Walking_Home]

The sort of situation you describe is why I think there ought to be more encouragement for couples to get a handle on NFP as newlyweds and have some success with it before getting pregnant. In practice, NFP is a sort of speeding train, and it’s much easier to climb aboard at the station, rather than attempt to climb aboard once it is already chugging ahead. Anybody who has to start NFP for the first time post-partum has my heartiest sympathy.

I would argue that given the difficulty of starting NFP post-partum or while dealing with a household of little children, that newlywed couples do have serious reasons to use NFP until they have a good handle on it. (My husband and I got married in graduate school while each making approximately minimum wage and four years later, after my husband got his first real job, we had our first child. Postpartum NFP has always seemed like wandering around in the fog, and I realize more and more how lucky we were not to have to start with it.)

So, I think one of the best things the Church can do (and remember, we are the Church, too), is to speak up when rigorists try to guilt engaged couples newlyweds out of getting some solid practice with NFP before they start having babies.

---

Yes --

 

[LongingSoul]

So, I think one of the best things the Church can do (and remember, we are the Church, too), is to speak up when rigorists try to guilt engaged couples newlyweds out of getting some solid practice with NFP before they start having babies.

I agree with this 100%. And its not just about learning the technicalities, its about developing an attitude of respect towards your god given sexual capacities and learning to defer your desires to the wellbeing of your family. When you marry you are no longer an individual set on satisfying yourself… you are a new person responsible for this brand new creation even before your children arrive.

I think one of the common arguments against NFP is that unless you head down the path of having endless children until menopause, you have to abstain from sex during the time of month you are most desirous of it. I can give the perspective on a person who has only had sex during 5 ovulations in my 52 year life. (Three living children, one stillbirth and one miscarriage). But my answer to that is ‘so what’. When you abstain during ovulation you are aware that in a few days you will be able to have sex again and sure there is not that peak of desire that ovulation produces… but you are not disposed to take care of another child so that party is not for you. God has created that particular party for those couples who’ve come to it looking for a new baby.

Originally Posted by Kelfa28
I’m in the same position as you…suffice to say that my husband and I are DONE having children.

Three back to back pregnancies, tough pregnancies and both of us are unemployed? We’re done. I drank*the kool-aid about NFP. The Kool-Aid that CCL forces on couples that it’s this wonderful, magical thing that improves your marriage and makes everything just rainbows and butterflies.

The kool-aid is the drink that intoxicates people with the belief that consequence free sex is their entitlement. Contraception really is a deadly koolaid in that way. It allows people to behave as soulless animals behave. Instead of esteeming their human capacity to appreciate their bodies part in the miracle of creation… they use their human capacity to devise methods of thwarting nature for the sake of irresponsible bodily pleasure. Consequently, when someone affected by this kool-aid tries to take on the Catholic way of living their sexuality… they naturally feel that they are being robbed of their ‘entitlement’ to whatever sexual conduct they like.

It comes down to developing the right attitude. Going on a detox from that soulless kool-aid addiction and fostering the appreciation of your miraculous capacity to bring new life into the world that is signified each month by ovulation.

 

[Kelfa28]

The sort of situation you describe is why I think there ought to be more encouragement for couples to get a handle on NFP as newlyweds and have some success with it before getting pregnant. In practice, NFP is a sort of speeding train, and it’s much easier to climb aboard at the station, rather than attempt to climb aboard once it is already chugging ahead. Anybody who has to start NFP for the first time post-partum has my heartiest sympathy.

I had the pleasure of beginning my marriage about 6 weeks PP…because, yes, I was pregnant before I got married and came into the Church around the same time. I never got the chance to learn NFP because I was pregnant during all of the marriage prep.

So, no…I probably have zero idea as to how my body actually is supposed to operate seeing that I’ve either been pregnant or nursing at every single aspect of my marriage.

I did try though. I took the distance CCL and bought the literature and learned everything I could.
They don’t offer classes in anything but STM where I live. Hopefully we can get a monitor and I can try to learn Marquette. Otherwise…I’m serious…I’ll probably just tell my husband we need to abstain from sex completely for a really long time.

I don’t know how else I can prevent a pregnancy without putting my soul in serious jeopardy.

.

It comes down to developing the right attitude. Going on a detox from that soulless kool-aid addiction and fostering the appreciation of your miraculous capacity to bring new life into the world that is signified each month by ovulation.

Contraception is wrong. I get that. Otherwise I wouldn’t be in the situation I’m in. I’ve never taken any from of contraception during my marriage and I don’t plan to. I want to….I really do. But I won’t because it offends God and the Church.

The Kool-Aid I’m talking about is the feel-good notion that NFP is such a wonderful thing. I know for a fact that CCL only talks about the “goodness” of NFP. How it improves your marriage and brings you closer to God as a couple. It improves your communication and everyone is happier.
Believe me, I subscribed to their newsletter. It’s total rubbish in my opinion. Especially the aspect of nursing.
I looked high and low about what to do if EBF just doesn’t work…even if you follow the rules. My daughter’s pediatrician told me she was a very efficient nurser and was gaining weight right from birth.
CCl’s only response to my questions about EBF not suppressing my fertility like they said?
You must be nursing your baby wrong.

Okay…fine, whatever.

I don’t want sex whenever I want. I don’t knowingly have sex during my fertile period and then complain that I got pregnant. I charted, I followed the rules, I took my temps at the same time every morning, I compared and contrasted and I abstained, to the best of my knowledge, during my fertile times.
I still got pregnant.
How? I really don’t know…I’m not sure what I did wrong. I had a girl friend look at my charts. Her only comment was that it’s not usual for anyone to ovulate as early as I did that month…but the temps and the cervical mucus say otherwise.

No one got back to me at CCL when I emailed my charts and asked for help. That was months ago.

I’m at the point where I’m willing to abstain completely for as long as it takes to assure I won’t get pregnant.

I want a chance to not worry about GD or some other situation that will stress me out about my health and the health of my babies.
I want serious support. The Church doesn’t provide it….at least not where we are.
I’ve brought it up to my priest…he did say that there were people who were training on other methods…but this has been an ongoing thing for awhile…and no results thus far.

Besides…I come from a pretty devote parish. Most of my girlfriends don’t really practice NFP…they just nurse until their fertility comes back and get pregnant again.…and lord knows that is WAY longer then I can keep my fertility away. There children are spaced much further apart then mine are.
And they don’t struggle with constant fertility like I do. I say struggle…there is such as thing to struggle when your fertility only goes away during pregnancy…nursing won’t give me a break.

I’m sorry…I’m just too afraid to become pregnant again. I think I should have a right…Catholic or not….to say that I don’t want anymore children.

I don’t use contraception….I would never consider an abortion if I do become pregnant. Isn’t that enough?

 

[Vico]

Are you saying that when there is just reasons to avoid pregnancy that complete abstinence is required?

No, not required, but justifiable. To make it clearer, if pregnancy is high risk it makes NFP justifiable. If the wife does not want to chance failure of NFP that will be ok because complete abstinence is already justified.

 

[whm]

It’s also stressful when you have a serious (or just…or whatever the terminology is) reason to abstain but you want to be intimate with your husband because it’s a good and holy thing to do….and you aren’t entirely sure what your cycle is doing…and you fear you made a mistake and now you could be pregnant.

I found it easier to understand prior to NFP becoming widely introduce, namely if you don’t want to have a baby don’t have sex. NFP along with all the books on TOB make things much more complicated. TOB speakers/writers talk about how “holy” sex is and how important it is for the relationship etc. NFP promises sex with a lower chance of pregnancy. From what I could tell in the old days (pre 1950 or so), sex was for trying to have babies and avoiding temptation to sexual sins.

Now days it seems like sex is not about trying to make a baby. It seems kind of insane to me some times. We don’t want to have a baby, so lets do the process that is intended to create babies. Lets put sperm inside the woman and hope it doesn’t unit with an egg.

Don’t get me wrong, I acknowledge that the Church allows for the use of NFP to avoid, I just have trouble processing the logic of it all. The more serious the reason to avoid, the more illogical it seems. It really only seems practical for those who have less serious reasons to avoid(i.e. can handle becoming pregnant). For those of us with serious reasons to avoid, abstinence (the old days) makes more sense (to me at least).

 

[oolaloola]

I agree with this 100%. And its not just about learning the technicalities, its about developing an attitude of respect towards your god given sexual capacities and learning to defer your desires to the wellbeing of your family. When you marry you are no longer an individual set on satisfying yourself… you are a new person responsible for this brand new creation even before your children arrive.

I think one of the common arguments against NFP is that unless you head down the path of having endless children until menopause, you have to abstain from sex during the time of month you are most desirous of it. I can give the perspective on a person who has only had sex during 5 ovulations in my 52 year life. (Three living children, one stillbirth and one miscarriage). But my answer to that is ‘so what’. When you abstain during ovulation you are aware that in a few days you will be able to have sex again and sure there is not that peak of desire that ovulation produces… but you are not disposed to take care of another child so that party is not for you. God has created that particular party for those couples who’ve come to it looking for a new baby.

The kool-aid is the drink that intoxicates people with the belief that consequence free sex is their entitlement. Contraception really is a deadly koolaid in that way. It allows people to behave as soulless animals behave. Instead of esteeming their human capacity to appreciate their bodies part in the miracle of creation… they use their human capacity to devise methods of thwarting nature for the sake of irresponsible bodily pleasure. Consequently, when someone affected by this kool-aid tries to take on the Catholic way of living their sexuality… they naturally feel that they are being robbed of their ‘entitlement’ to whatever sexual conduct they like.

It comes down to developing the right attitude. Going on a detox from that soulless kool-aid addiction and fostering the appreciation of your miraculous capacity to bring new life into the world that is signified each month by ovulation.

I would like to argue this post somewhat. I think this is a rather harsh criticism. Not all people who use contraceptives or wish to use contraceptives feel entitled to having sex whenever they want. At least for me, it has to do with peace of mind. I want to show love towards my spouse, but I am terrified of being pregnant. I don’t ever want to be intimate with my spouse again, which is a psychological issue that will always be in the back of my mind.

There are a lot of people who use NFP, and are having difficulty using it. Myself being one of them. I am not looking forward to 20 years of going through this every month. It doesn’t have to do with being selfish, a lot of it has to do with the amount of sacrifice that is asked. It honestly seems unreasonable to ask a couple to be abstinent for the rest of their lives, I think. Does it seem fair? I suppose God calls us all to sainthood, and we are asked to sacrifice in this way, but I can see why many people in similar situations are bowing under the pressure, and finding simpler means of dealing with their issues. I don’t think all couples who are struggling with NFP/use contraceptives are trying to be selfish or feel like they are entitled to something. Some of us are trying to do the right thing.

I think we’ve established that my case is somewhat unusual, as even my NFP instructor has said. But some of us are in this situation, where NFP is not helping with the psychological/emotional/physical issues that have arisen. it hasn’t changed our lives, but made it even more difficult. Would using contraceptives/sterilization help with that peace of mind? I can’t really says since I’ve never used them. But the solution that we have been given, i.e. have difficulty with NFP for the next 20 years vs. getting sterilized seems so much simpler to resolve if we were to do the latter.

 

[Xantippe]

There are a lot of people who use NFP, and are having difficulty using it. Myself being one of them. I am not looking forward to 20 years of going through this every month. It doesn’t have to do with being selfish, a lot of it has to do with the amount of sacrifice that is asked. It honestly seems unreasonable to ask a couple to be abstinent for the rest of their lives, I think. Does it seem fair?

Wait–you’re planning on dropping dead as soon as you hit menopause?

Abstinence until menopause is not the same as “abstinent for the rest of their lives.”

 

[oolaloola]

Wait–you’re planning on dropping dead as soon as you hit menopause?

Abstinence until menopause is not the same as “abstinent for the rest of their lives.”

That is true. I did not mean to exaggerate. Sometimes it seems like that in my stupid brain.

 

[oolaloola]

All I am trying to say is that not everything is black and white. I used to criticize people thinking that they used contraceptives/sterilization in a completely selfish way. But I don’t think that anymore now that I’m going through it.

But if I were to go against church teaching, and follow what I really want to do, that would mean that I would be turning against the CC. I can see why a lot of people leave the Church over this issue because I’m tempted to do the same thing. What is more important to me, my faith or my well being? I do feel like the Church has said, “You can’t do this, but if you do this thing we have approved, it will be okay.”

I do get a negative vibe from Catholics when I try to talk about the issue with other Catholics which is probably why the responses here have upset me. Mostly what I’ve gotten is: We can’t really help you" from the Catholic Church and it is discouraging to hear that. I’m not the only one who is experiencing this.