contraception

[maryjk]

Really? there are only 5-6 fertile days in the month. Thats a lot of “downtime”

1. My biggest concern is that most of the Catholics on this thread have said that “abstinence” during the fertile period is not a form of avoiding becoming pregnant!
   Why then is “abstinence” rarely if ever observed outside period?

My comment was in response to yours.

My husband and I didn’t have sex last night. I am also not fertile. So are we abstaining?

What if we don’t have sex tonight?

Do you really think that abstinence outside of the fertile period is rare?

If so, how long do you have to abstain for it to be considered abstinence?

 

[silicasandra]

You missed the point of her post. It’s not about having sex at a young age; I’m pretty sure it’s a response to your earlier question here:

There are lots of times women reach that time in their cycle when they’re most fertile and likely to “provide a child for God” but deliberately avoid that moment. One reason is that they’re too young (age 12) for marriage and maybe 10 years of those fertile moments could go by before they are married. The point is, this isn’t birth control and that was what Silicasandra was getting at. Women who forego sex altogether during those points in their cycles aren’t contracepting…if they do have sex and block fertilization by means of pills, diaphragm, condoms, etc, then that’s contraception.

Exactly.

 

[Rence]

Are you seriously suggesting that a husband and wife making love is a lack of self control and dishonouring the body or god? Sex is a good thing within a marriage and sex between a husband and is wife is the only sexual act that is never condemned in scripture. Even St Paul tells us that when a husband and wife feel the need for sex that we should go and act on that passion so that we can get it out of our system and get back to serving god! He never suggests that the act of love between husband and wife is a lack of self are no passages in scripture telling husbands and wives to abstain other than during menstruation.

No, husband and wife making love is NOT a lack of self control and dishonoring the body or God. That’s just silly. The simple fact of the matter is the Church has two requirements of sex that really sets the foundation for everyone (married people, divorced people, single people, gay people, all people). The unitive property is required always, and the procreative property is required always. Both are required. Every time. The unitive property is present when two married people come to together in the marital embrace. The Church teaches that artificial birth control interferes with the unitive property, and so doesn’t allow it.

 

[thewanderer]

So what you are saying is that when the moment is reached in your cycle when you are most likely to provide a child for god, you deliberately avoid that moment by an act of your own will and deny god that child, this is not birth control? this is not considered a sin?

I think you misunderstand Church teaching on this. I know that the way a lot of Catholics talk it makes it sound as though the Church is against controlling whether and when you conceive children, but that is actually not at all the case. The Church does not say that it is wrong or sinful to use prudence and reason to determine whether and when to have children, in fact, it says the exact opposite, we are to practice responsible parenthood. The problem is not at all with the idea of avoiding children at any given point in time, but with the method used to avoid children. There is nothing wrong with abstaining for the sake of avoiding kids because you are still respecting the nature of the sexual act. You see that when you are fertile sex naturally results in conception, and instead of acting to change fertile sex into infertile sex, thus changing and thwarting the nature of sex while fertile, you respect the fact that sex at that point in time would likely lead to pregnancy, and, since it would be imprudent to become pregnant, you decide to refrain from taking the action that would lead to pregnancy. The problem isn’t avoiding children when it would be imprudent to have them, the problem is changing and thwarting the nature of sex. Does that make more sense?

 

[Blue_Horizon]

No, husband and wife making love is NOT a lack of self control and dishonoring the body or God. That’s just silly. The simple fact of the matter is the Church has two requirements of sex that really sets the foundation for everyone (married people, divorced people, single people, gay people, all people). The unitive property is required always, and the procreative property is required always. Both are required. Every time. The unitive property is present when two married people come to together in the marital embrace. The Church teaches that artificial birth control interferes with the unitive property, and so doesn’t allow it.

Nicely put Rence.
The only fine tuning I would add is re your last point.
(a) ABC primarily thwarts the procreative end (not property) of the conjugal act and therefore splits it off from the unitive end. The unitive end is still present (though it may be weakened). it is the separating of the two ends that explains why contraceptive acts are disordered.
(b) Contraceptive acts are disordered because of the separation of these two ends and not really because of anything “artifical” in the means chosen todo that. (Nor is anything good just because it is “natural”) Withdrawal is equally reprehensible as a form of birth control.

 

[Rau]

Wow, what a confused thread this one is! Scant respect for the meaning of words even.

**Didascalia **asserts that NFP or rhythm method, when applied to avoid pregnancy, is contraception. I can understand why a “loose” use of language would conclude that, but that’s why we need to define words to be able to communicate sensibly.

The feature that distinguishes NFP (or Rhythm method) from contraception is that in applying the former (for purposes of avoiding pregnancy), we don’t “mess with” the sex act - we just abstain from it. A few posters suggest that this act (or non-act!) is an affront to God, or not being “open to life”. This is a nonsense! We are not bound to have sex on any schedule, and no more bound to have it during fertile periods than non-fertile. Being “open to life” does not mean - “take every opportunity to produce a baby”! It just means - don’t “mess with” the sex act so as to prevent a conception.

**BurningBush **asks “what is the most common time for Catholics to abstain for religious reasons”. This question as posed makes no sense. There are no religious reasons for a validly married couple to abstain from sex. One abstains for practical reasons - perhaps one’s partner is not well, too tired etc., (and this could be anytime during the month), or during menstruation, or because at this time the chance of pregnancy is high, and the couple is not ready for another child at this time. BurningBush’s observations that contraception opens up more days for sex with reduced chance of pregnancy is accurate. However, the failing of the contraception approach is that it involves “messing with” the sex act.

To BurningBush’s other questions:

1. It is not a sin to use NFP to control family size for economic reasons as you outline.
2. You ask: “Is it a sin to deny NFP is for birth control and instead call it abstinence for god?” I think there is some confusion in the question. NFP is evidently a means to regulate births - to avoid pregnancy, or to optimise the possibility of pregnancy. It is not “abstinence for God”, but perhaps one could say that by accepting the abstinence (rather than popping a pill and going for it), one shows respect for God and the method of creating life which he has shared with us.
3. Your last comment / question is: “My biggest concern is that most of the Catholics on this thread have said that “abstinence” during the fertile period is not a form of avoiding becoming pregnant!
   Why then is “abstinence” rarely if ever observed outside period?” I’m not sure anyone has said what you claim. Abstinence (during fertile periods) may well be adopted for that purpose - what has been said is that abstinence is not “contraception” - this distinction was explained above. Abstinence during other periods may occur for other practical reasons (eg. my spouse is feeling tired, or whatever).

 

[Mystic_Aviator]

Cardinal Patrick Hayes in a Christmas pastoral letter sent to his people in New York to be read from the pulpit on Sunday December 18, 1921:

“Heinous is the sin committed against the creative act of God, Who through the marriage contract invites man and woman to co-operate with Him in the propagation of the human family. To take life after its inception is a horrible crime; but to prevent human life the Creator is about to bring into being is satanic. In the first instance, the body is killed, while the soul lives on: in the latter, not only a body but an immortal soul is denied existence in time and in eternity. It has been reserved to our day to see advocated the legalizing of such a diabolical thing.”