Contraception: Why Not?

[ryanmac]

— Part 4/8 —

Scriptures

Gen 1:28, 9:1,7; 35:11 - from the beginning, the Lord commands us to be fruitful (“fertile”) and multiply. A husband and wife fulfill God’s plan for marriage in the bringing forth of new life, for God is life itself.
Gen 28:3 - Isaac’s prayer over Jacob shows that fertility and procreation are considered blessings from God.
Gen 38:8-10 - Onan is killed by God for practicing contraception (in this case, withdrawal) and spilling his semen on the ground. This is known as the Levirate Law - the duty to produce offspring with the wife of a dead brother. But this is not why God killed Onan, since the penalty for that was public humiliation and shunning, not death (Deut 25:5-10). Onan was judged for contraception (sex with the deliberate intent to unnaturally prevent procreation).
Gen 38:11-26 - Judah, like Onan, also rejected God’s command to keep up the family lineage, but he was not killed.
Deut 25:7-10 - the penalty for refusing to keep up a family lineage is not death, like Onan received. Onan was killed for wasting seed.
Gen 38:9 - also, the author’s usage of the graphic word “seed,” which is very uncharacteristic for Hebrew writing, further highlights the reason for Onan’s death.
Ex 23:25-26; Deut 7:13-14 - God promises blessings which include no miscarriages or barrenness. Children are blessings from God, and married couples must always be open to God’s plan for new life with every act of marital intimacy.
Lev 18:22-23; 20:13 - wasting seed with non-generative sexual acts warrants death.
Lev 21:17,20 - crushed testicles are called a defect and a blemish before God. God reveals that deliberate sterilization and any other methods which prevent conception are intrinsically evil.
Deut 23:1 - whoever has crushed testicles or is castrated cannot enter the assembly. Contraception is objectively sinful and contrary, not only to God’s Revelation, but the moral and natural law.
Deut 25:11-12 - there is punishment for potential damage to the testicles, for such damage puts new life at risk. It, of course, follows that vasectomies, which are done with willful consent, are gravely contrary to the natural law.
1 Chron 25:5 - God exalts His people by blessing them with many children. When married couples contracept, they are declaring “not your will God, but my will be done.”
Psalm 127:3-5 - children are a gift of favor from God and blessed is a full quiver. Married couples must always be open to God’s precious gift of life. Contraception, which shows a disregard for human life, has lead to the great evils of abortion, euthanasia, and infanticide.
Hosea 9:11; Jer 18:21 - God punishes Israel by preventing pregnancy. Contraception is a curse, and married couples who use contraception are putting themselves under the same curse.
Mal 2:14 - marriage is not a contract (which is a mere exchange of property or services). It is a covenant, which means a supernatural exchange of persons. Just as God is three in one, so are a husband and wife, who become one flesh and bring forth new life, three in one. Marital love is a reflection of the Blessed Trinity.
Mal 2:15 - What does God desire? Godly offspring. What is contraception? A deliberate act against God’s will. With contraception, a couple declares, “God may want an eternal being created with our union, but we say no.” Contraception is a grave act of selfishness.
Gen 17:16,20; Gen 29:32-33; Gen 33:5; 1 Chron 25:5; Psalm 107:38; Psalm 115:14; Psalm 127:3-5; 128:3-4; Prov 17:6; Is 48:18-19; Jer 29:6; 30:19-20; 33:22; Ezek 36:10-12 - children are a gift from God and a blessing, may they multiply greatly.
Gen 20:17-18; Gen 29:31; Gen 30:2,22-24; Ex 1:21; Joshua 24:3; Ruth 4:13; 1 Sam 1:15; Job 10:8,11; Job 31:15; Psalm 113:9; Ecc 11:5; Isaiah 44:2 - it is God Who opens and closes wombs and causes a conception to occur

 

[ryanmac]

— Part 5/8 —

Matt 19:5-6 - Jesus said a husband and wife shall become one. They are no longer two, but one, just as God is three persons, yet one. The expression of authentic marital love reintegrates our bodies and souls to God.
Matt 19:6; Eph 5:31 - contraception prevents God’s ability to “join” together. Just as Christ’s love for the Church is selfless and sacrificial, and a husband and wife reflect this union, so a husband and wife’s love for each other must also be selfless and sacrificial. This means being open to new life.
Acts 5:1-11 - Ananias and Sapphira were slain because they withheld part of a gift. Fertility is a gift from God and cannot be withheld.
Rom 1:26-27 - sexual acts without the possibility of procreation is sinful. Self-giving love is life-giving love, or the love is a lie. The unitive and procreative elements of marital love can never be divided, or the marital love is also divided, and God is left out of the marriage.
1 Cor 6:19-20 - the body is the temple of the Holy Spirit; thus, we must glorify God in our bodies by being open to His will.
1 Cor 7:5 - this verse supports the practice of natural family planning (“NFP”). Married couples should not refuse each other except perhaps by agreement for a season, naturally.
Gal 6:7-8 - God is not mocked for what a man sows. If to the flesh, corruption. If to the Spirit, eternal life.
Eph 5:25 - Paul instructs husbands to love their wives as Christ loved the Church, by giving his entire body to her and holding nothing back. With contraception, husbands tell their wives, I love you except your fertility, and you can have me except for my fertility. This love is a lie because it is self-centered, and not self-giving and life-giving.
Eph 5:29-31; Phil 3:2 - mutilating the flesh (e.g., surgery to prevent conception) is gravely sinful.
1 Tim 2:15 - childbearing is considered a “work” through which women may be saved by God’s grace.
Deut 22:13-21 - these verses also show that God condemns pre-marital intercourse. The living expression of God’s creative love is reserved for a sacramental marriage between one man and one woman.
Rev 9:21; 21:8; 22:15; Gal 5:20 - these verses mention the word “sorcery.” The Greek word is “pharmakeia” which includes abortifacient potions such as birth control pills. These pharmakeia are mortally sinful. Moreover, chemical contraception does not necessarily prevent conception, but may actually kill the child in the womb after conception has occurred (by preventing the baby from attaching to the uterine wall).

 

[ryanmac]

— Part 6/8 —

Historic Teachings

Protestants
Martin Luther, Lectures on Genesis
“Onan must have been a malicious and incorrigible scoundrel. This is a most disgraceful sin. It is far more atrocious than incest and adultery. We call it unchastity, yes, a Sodomitic sin. For Onan goes in to her; that is, he lies with her and copulates, and when it comes to the point of insemination, spills the semen, lest the woman conceive. Surely at such a time the order of nature established by God in procreation should be followed . . . He was inflamed with the basest spite and hatred . . . Consequently, he deserved to be killed by God. He committed an evil deed. Therefore God punished him . . . That worthless fellow . . . preferred polluting himself with a most disgraceful sin to raising up offspring for his brother.”

“The rest of the populace is more wicked than even the heathen themselves. For most married people do not desire offspring. Indeed, they turn away from it and consider it better to live without children, because they are poor and do not have the means with which to support a household. . . . But the purpose of marriage is not to have pleasure and to be idle but to procreate and bring up children, to support a household. . . . Those who have no love for children are swine, stocks, and logs unworthy of being called men and women; for they despise the blessing of God, the Creator and Author of marriage.”

“You will find many to whom a large number of children is unwelcome, as though marriage had been instituted only for bestial pleasures and not also for the very valuable work by which we serve God and men when we train and educate the children whom God has given us. They do not appreciate the most pleasant feature of marriage. For what exceeds the love of children?”

John Calvin, Commentaries on the First Book of Moses
“I will contend myself with briefly mentioning this, as far as the sense of shame allows to discuss it. It is a horrible thing to pour out seed besides the intercourse of man and woman. Deliberately avoiding the intercourse, so that the seed drops on the ground, is double horrible. For this means that one quenches the hope of his family, and kills the son, which could be expected, before he is born. This wickedness is now as severely as is possible condemned by the Spirit, through Moses, that Onan, as it were, through a violent and untimely birth, tore away the seed of his brother out the womb, and as cruel as shamefully has thrown on the earth. Moreover he thus has, as much as was in his power, tried to destroy a part of the human race. When a woman in some way drives away the seed out the womb, through aids, then this is rightly seen as an unforgivable crime. Onan was guilty of a similar crime, by defiling the earth with his seed, so that Tamar would not receive a future inheritor.”

John Wesley, Explanatory Notes on the Whole Bible
“Those sins that dishonor the body are very displeasing to God, and the evidence of vile affections. Observe, the thing which he [Onan] did displeased the Lord—and it is to be feared; thousands, especially of single persons, by this very thing, still displease the Lord, and destroy their own souls.”

Matthew Henry, Complete Commentary on the Whole Bible
Concerning Gen 38:8-9: “the great abuse of his own body” and “sins that dishonour the body and defile it” which “are very displeasing to God and evidences of vile affections.”

C.S. Lewis, The Abolition of Man
“As regards contraceptives, there is a paradoxical, negative sense in which all possible future generations are the patients or subjects of a power wielded by those already alive. By contraception simply, they are denied existence; by contraception used as a means of selective breeding, they are, without their concurring voice, made to be what one generation, for its own reasons, may choose to prefer. From this point of view, what we call Man’s power over Nature turns out to be a power exercised by some men over other men with Nature as its instrument.”

 

[ryanmac]

— Part 7/8 —

Catholics
Didache, (~50-80 AD)
“[Y]ou shall not practice magiae, you shall not practice pharmakeia, you shall not murder a child by abortion nor kill that which is born”
“magiae” were anti-conception curses and “pharmakeia” were contraceptives.]

Letter of Barnabas, (74 AD)
"Moreover, he [Moses] has rightly detested the weasel [Lev. 11:29]. For he means, ‘Thou shall not be like to those whom we hear of as committing wickedness with the mouth with the body through uncleanness [orally consummated sex]; nor shall thou be joined to those impure women who commit iniquity with the mouth with the body through uncleanness’.”

Clement of Alexandria, The Instructor of Children (191 AD)
“Because of its divine institution for the propagation of man, the seed is not to be vainly ejaculated, nor is it to be damaged, nor is it to be wasted.”

“To have coitus other than to procreate children is to do injury to nature.”

Hippolytus, Refutation of All Heresies (225 AD)
“[Christian women with male concubines], on account of their prominent ancestry and great property, the so-called faithful want no children from slaves or lowborn commoners, [so] they use drugs of sterility or bind themselves tightly in order to expel a fetus which has already been engendered.”

Lactantius, Divine Institutes (~307 AD)
“complain of the scantiness of their means, and allege that they have not enough for bringing up more children, as though, in truth, their means were in [their] power . . . or God did not daily make the rich poor and the poor rich. Wherefore, if any one on any account of poverty shall be unable to bring up children, it is better to abstain from relations with his wife.”

“God gave us eyes not to see and desire pleasure, but to see acts to be performed for the needs of life; so too, the genital ’generating’] part of the body, as the name itself teaches, has been received by us for no other purpose than the generation of offspring”

The First Council of Nicaea (325 AD) – [By the way, this is the council that defined Christ’s divinity]
“If anyone in sound health has castrated himself, it behooves that such a one, if enrolled among the clergy, should cease [from his ministry], and that from henceforth no such person should be promoted. But, as it is evident that this is said of those who willfully do the thing and presume to castrate themselves, so if any have been made eunuchs by barbarians, or by their masters, and should otherwise be found worthy, such men this canon admits to the clergy.”

Epiphanius of Salamis, Medicine Chest Against Heresies (375 AD)
“They [certain Egyptian heretics] exercise genital acts, yet prevent the conceiving of children. Not in order to produce offspring, but to satisfy lust, are they eager for corruption.”

 

[ryanmac]

— Part 8/8 —

John Chrysostom, Homilies on Romans (391 AD)
“Why do you sow where the field is eager to destroy the fruit, where there are medicines of sterility [oral contraceptives], where there is murder before birth? You do not even let a harlot remain only a harlot, but you make her a murderess as well. . . . Indeed, it is something worse than murder, and I do not know what to call it; for she does not kill what is formed but prevents its formation. What then? Do you condemn the gift of God and fight with his [natural] laws? . . . Yet such turpitude . . . the matter still seems indifferent to many men—even to many men having wives. In this indifference of the married men there is greater evil filth; for then poisons are prepared, not against the womb of a prostitute, but against your injured wife. Against her are these innumerable tricks.”

Homilies on Matthew (391 AD)
“*n truth, all men know that they who are under the power of this disease [the sin of covetousness] are wearied even of their father’s old age [wishing him to die so they can inherit]; and that which is sweet, and universally desirable, the having of children, they esteem grievous and unwelcome. Many at least with this view have even paid money to be childless, and have mutilated nature, not only killing the newborn, but even acting to prevent their beginning to live.”

“[T]he man who has mutilated himself, in fact, is subject even to a curse, as Paul says, ‘I would that they who trouble you would cut the whole thing off’ [Gal. 5:12]. And very reasonably, for such a person is venturing on the deeds of murderers, and giving occasion to them that slander God’s creation, and opens the mouths of the Manicheans, and is guilty of the same unlawful acts as they that mutilate themselves among the Greeks. For to cut off our members has been from the beginning a work of demonical agency, and satanic device, that they may bring up a bad report upon the works of God, that they may mar this living creature, that imputing all not to the choice, but to the nature of our members, the more part of them may sin in security as being irresponsible, and doubly harm this living creature, both by mutilating the members and by impeding the forwardness of the free choice in behalf of good deeds.”

Commentary on Galatians (395 AD)
“Observe how bitterly he [Paul] speaks against their deceivers . . . ‘I would that they which trouble you would cut the whole thing off’ [Gal. 5:12]. . . . On this account he curses them, and his meaning is as follows: ‘For them I have no concern, “A man that is heretical after the first and second admonition refuse” [Titus 3:10]. If they will, let them not only be circumcised but mutilated.’ Where then are those who dare to mutilate themselves, seeing that they draw down the apostolic curse, and accuse the workmanship of God, and take part with the Manichees?”

Jerome, Against Jovinian (393 AD)
“But I wonder why he [the heretic Jovinianus] set Judah and Tamar before us for an example, unless perchance even harlots give him pleasure; or Onan, who was slain because he grudged his brother seed. Does he imagine that we approve of any sexual intercourse except for the procreation of children?”

Letters (396 AD)
“You may see a number of women who are widows before they are wives. Others, indeed, will drink sterility and murder a man not yet born, [and some commit abortion].”

Augustine, Marriage and Concupiscence (419 AD)
“I am supposing, then, although you are not lying [with your wife] for the sake of procreating offspring, you are not for the sake of lust obstructing their procreation by an evil prayer or an evil deed. Those who do this, although they are called husband and wife, are not; nor do they retain any reality of marriage, but with a respectable name cover a shame. Sometimes this lustful cruelty, or cruel lust, comes to this, that they even procure poisons of sterility [oral contraceptives].”*

 

[Sinke]

There is ABSOLUTELY nothing biologically factual about your assertion that the sperm are destroyed prior to the fertile time. Actually, it is completely NATURAL b/c that’s the way God designed the human body. A man makes sperm almost CONSTANTLY. Men’s bodies are demand & supply as far as sperm goes (with the possible exception of sub-fertility men). What he uses today will shortly be replaced so he can use it tomorrow! So even if we have relations every day during our infertile times, when the fertile times come the man is going to have produced MORE sperm to satisfy the needs. In other words - with the exception of sub-fertility men - a man ALWAYS has sperm to ‘donate’ to his wife! I advise you to read a reproductive health book about men (not a naughty one, but a biological/medical one).

The fact that man constantly produces sperm could be easily used as an argument for artificial contraception, and has no meaning. While sperm being destroyed after ejaculation is natural, having sex only during times when the sperm gets destroyed is unnatural.

That’s ANOTHER benefit of NFP - we learn (both husband & wife) about how God created our bodies and how they work. Therefore, we can glorify God through our use of His wonderful creation!

Indeed, there are no theological or biological reasons for belief that God created infertile periods of woman’s body for our usage of non-procreative sex.

That happens ANY time a couple has relations in an infertile time. Does that mean that it is wrong for a pregnant couple to have relations b/c the sperm are DEFINITELY going to die & be flushed into the toilet. Again - the procreative nature of sexuality is NOT blocked by NFP.

Nope, the couple can have relations whenever they want. But if they relate only during specific times, only because they want to control birth, then they are controlling the birth by destroying the semen.

God himself designed our bodies the way we experience them. A woman is only meant to be fertile for a short period of time a month. A man is fertile ALL the time. As long as marital relations proceed in their normal order (ie the man finishes inside the woman) and there are no artificial means to harm the sperm or egg, marital relations are ordered toward life. You’re also forgetting that even during fertile times, MANY of the sperm cells are ‘flushed’ and/or die en-route to the egg.

I don’t understand how finishing inside a woman is seen as an end to the case. Talking about NFP, you have relations only during time when the ejaculated sperm will be destroyed and thrown out of the human body. This is what you *wish *to happen, and this is why you don’t have sex anytime you want. Is your wish for such order really normal, and are you really open to life?

You’re also forgetting that even during fertile times, MANY of the sperm cells are ‘flushed’ and/or die en-route to the egg. A man releases millions of sperm cells at every orgasm. It only takes one to fertilize the egg & start new life. Most of the millions do NOT reach their goal. Many get flushed from the woman’s body by natural drainage. Still many more are too weak to make the journey - so they die along the way. Still many more are slightly deformed and cannot even really begin the journey. In other words, in every act of martial relations MILLIONS of sperm cells die - regardless of whether the couple is practicing NFP or not.

The fact that they die because a pair wants them to die, and organizes their sexual life in order for sperm to die, is making NFP a specific case.

 

[Sinke]

Using your “logic”, a married couple would only be able to have intimate relatiuons when they believe the wife is in her fertile time. That is utterly ridiculous.

An old answer, and quite useful. But that is not my logic, and that is not my argument. The only people who are truly open to life are those who simply have sex whenever they feel like it. No condoms, no charts… But this makes trouble with Humanae Vitae, which declared that people can control babies through natural means, ie. you can be closed to life if you are closed in natural way.

One cannot equate NFP, which is based on self-control,a virtue, to artificial contraception which is based on self-indulgence and using another for personal gratification, the opposite of virtuous.

I don’t really see that much difference. If you are using NFP, one would say you consider your spouse a piece of nature. Self-control is a virtue? Of course. However, in this case, you are self-controlling only to block the procreative dimension of sex, and that is not really natural.

You also make the grave mistake in believing that the marital embrace is solely for procreation. It is also for marital unity, a donation of self to the other.

The fact is that Church, up to 20th Century, didn’t like the idea that sex has unitive dimension. When it was introduced, contraception was the problem, since it could easily be allowed- the couple simply tendered unitive dimension on the expense of procreative.

You are going to have to better than that if you want to contradict Church teachings.

You think that I could contradict them if I get better? I don’t think so, the Church teachings are under guidance of The Holy Spirit. But this is not my intention. Far from it.

I simply have a certain distance to some parts of our belief- we learned from History that we sometimes went too far, and you can’t ignore that today we have different theological thoughts compared to past- and these doubts would be here even if I’d ignore them.

However, if you feel like I could harm somebody’s faith, then we should all stop. Thank you in advance for this discussion, and I wish you God’s blessings.

 

[rpp]

An old answer, and quite useful. But that is not my logic, and that is not my argument. The only people who are truly open to life are those who simply have sex whenever they feel like it. No condoms, no charts… But this makes trouble with Humanae Vitae, which declared that people can control babies through natural means, ie. you can be closed to life if you are closed in natural way.

I don’t really see that much difference. If you are using NFP, one would say you consider your spouse a piece of nature. Self-control is a virtue? Of course. However, in this case, you are self-controlling only to block the procreative dimension of sex, and that is not really natural.

The fact is that Church, up to 20th Century, didn’t like the idea that sex has unitive dimension. When it was introduced, contraception was the problem, since it could easily be allowed- the couple simply tendered unitive dimension on the expense of procreative.

You think that I could contradict them if I get better? I don’t think so, the Church teachings are under guidance of The Holy Spirit. But this is not my intention. Far from it.

I simply have a certain distance to some parts of our belief- we learned from History that we sometimes went too far, and you can’t ignore that today we have different theological thoughts compared to past- and these doubts would be here even if I’d ignore them.

However, if you feel like I could harm somebody’s faith, then we should all stop. Thank you in advance for this discussion, and I wish you God’s blessings.

The logic you use in your feeble attemp to defend your poisition is utterly at odds with authentic Catholic teaching.

And no, I did not read your entire post, it was not worth the trouble to read such heresy.

 

[ryanmac]

(Edited)

On that note, Sinke, I’m curious how you would respond to my 8 part email to a friend. After studying this issue from a Protestant, and now Catholic perspective, I’ve become more convicted in the Catholic position. But I’m also interested in understanding why so many Catholics choose to live in opposition to this teaching. Would you mind reading through my email an point out it’s weaknesses? Thanks.

 

[Sinke]

(Edited)

When I find something difficult to understand, I ask, since the Catholic Church is the most powerful organization in the universe, She, as a bride of Christ, will know the answer.

I am a Catholic, and even if I don’t understand something, I will accept the teaching. However, Humanae Vitae doesn’t want to be accepted just because of the authority which signed the teaching, but also because of it’s interpretation of nature, and conclusions based on the natural law. Most of people have problems with this teaching, and it’s time for us, as Church, to search why is this so, and what should we do in order to unite the lost sheep.

 

[Sinke]

(Edited) I really accept the teaching, but I am somewhat puzzled with certain parts. My thinking is that explanations we gave failed to reach people not only because laity has iron heart, but also because we are suffering a huge lack of communication in the Church.

 

[rpp]

We lost too many people in the Church because we proclaimed their questions a heresy.

When I find something difficult to understand, I ask, since the Catholic Church is the most powerful organization in the universe, She, as a bride of Christ, will know the answer.

I am a Catholic, and even if I don’t understand something, I will accept the teaching. However, Humanae Vitae doesn’t want to be accepted just because of the authority which signed the teaching, but also because of it’s interpretation of nature, and conclusions based on the natural law. Most of people have problems with this teaching, and it’s time for us, as Church, to search why is this so, and what should we do in order to unite the lost sheep.

Too many souls have been lost to heresy.

The Church has need for heretic and heresy. The Church is strong only when she identifies heresy and rejects it. When people promote heresy, they are claiming they are smarter than the Church. A person who is earnestly seeking to learn the why of something asks questions, they do not propose heresy.

 

[rpp]

(Edited)

The best source to understand the why contraception is intrisically immoral, and why NFP is permissible in certain cercumsytances, I suggest Christopher West’s book Theology of the Body for Beginners. Believe me, that book is far better than an anonymous Internet forum.

 

[Sinke]

Too many souls have been lost to heresy.

The Church has need for heretic and heresy. The Church is strong only when she identifies heresy and rejects it. When people promote heresy, they are claiming they are smarter than the Church. A person who is earnestly seeking to learn the why of something asks questions, they do not propose heresy.

And how do you call my heresy? All my sentences finish with questionmarks.

Am I smarter then the Church? How could I be, since I am the very part of it, just as you are?

Church is strong only when it is One with Christ- that means, when She shows compassion, intelligence, understanding, when She talks, and when she loves. Each time we lost the stress on this unity with Christ, we lived through a problematic period of time.

 

[ryanmac]

Please settle your differences via private message. I’m reporting all of these off topic posts. (including this one). Either address the arguments (either way) or move on. Stop high jacking the thread with your flame wars. Be charitable please.

 

[Sinke]

Please settle your differences via private message. I’m reporting all of these off topic posts. (including this one). Either address the arguments (either way) or move on. Stop high jacking the thread with your flame wars. Be charitable please.

You are right. In theory, what I have to say might be difficult to label with anything else but “heresy” or “dissent”. Rff is not entirely wrong to be so direct. However, the topic of contraception became extremely problematic in the Church, and direct analysis of arguments can’t harm “either” side. We simply have to be Church.

 

[ryanmac]

That said, Sinke, I’m still very interested in hearing weaknesses you find in my letter to my friend. I’d like to sharpen my understanding of this issue and be better equipped to communicate the Church’s position effectively and compellingly. Thanks for your help.