Infertile married couple condom use

[Nan_S]

The church has been clear that condoms are not allowed in married couples where one has a disease. The UN for instance has been very outspoken that the Vatican is enabling the spread of HIV because it continues to disallow the use of condoms. They put a barrier between the couple preventing the full gift of self which must occur when the husband gifts his wife during the marital act. The unitive aspect involves the one flesh union of spouses. This cannot be accomplished with a barrier.

One article on HIV and condoms.

lifesite.net/ldn/2006/may/06050502.html

OK, I’ve checked your link. It says nothing about the married or unmarried state of the couple. I then went looking for any source document that states the church rejects the use of condoms by married couples to prevent AIDS transmission between spouses.

What I found was this, the Vatican’s statement Family Values Versus Safe Sex.
vatican.va/roman_curia/pontifical_councils/family/documents/rc_pc_family_doc_20031201_family-values-safe-sex-trujillo_en.html

This Vatican document stresses is the value of pre-marital chastity and marital fidelity as methods to prevent AIDS, and the high unreliability of condoms in preventing AIDS. Unfortunately, the solution advanced relates to disease-free individuals becoming and staying disease-free couples. It also does NOT address the situation of a married couple when one spouse is already diseased and the other is not.

This question posed to me by an RCIA candidate concerned a non-Catholic couple she knew. [Yes, I know that since they are not Catholic the church’s rules are no imposed on them.] However, the RCIA candidate posed the question anyway. “What if the couple in question was Catholic, what would the Church answer?”, and a legitimate question deserves a legitimate answer

Her question: The husband in a certain recently-married couple had a sinful past. He turned from his sinful life, chose to be a Christian, found himself a worthy wife, and they were married. At that time he was medically tested and believed himself to be free of disease. About a year later he was tested again and found to be HIV-positive. This delay in diagnosis is not unreasonable, since the virus can have a long incubation period. As of now, the wife has not tested positive for HIV and may not have contracted the virus. However, since the virus is now definitely active in the husband, continuation of “unprotected” marital relations will almost certainly result in transmitting the disease to the wife.

Humanae Vitae says:
Lawful Therapeutic Means
15. On the other hand, the Church does not consider at all illicit the use of those therapeutic means necessary to cure bodily diseases, even if a foreseeable impediment to procreation should result there from—provided such impediment is not directly intended for any motive whatsoever. (19)

Now, if the couple in question WERE Catholic, what could they do and how could they minimize the risk transmitting HIV to the wife?

1. Get a divorce and seek an annulment? This would prevent her from catching HIV in the future, but would also abandon him in his time of need.
2. Live as married celibates, denying themselves all future access to the unitive benefits of the marital act?
3. Have relations occasionally and use condoms? Although condoms certainly will not prevent transmission of the virus, they can significantly lessen her exposure.

This is a no-win situation. Unfortunately, it’s not a hypothetical situation for this couple. It’s a real-life tragedy. Prayer for the couple is always helpful and appreciated, and will help them deal with their unfolding tragedy, but nothing less than a miraculous cure will fix this problem.

 

[TMC]

But, HV says the act is always unitive and procreative unless you separate the two aspects through your own action.

I don’t think it does. Are you referring to this, from para 12?

This particular doctrine, often expounded by the magisterium of the Church, is based on the inseparable connection, established by God, which man on his own initiative may not break, between the unitive significance and the procreative significance which are both inherent to the marriage act.

I think this is describing how it should be not how it always is. But regardless, we know marital sex is not always unitive. Maybe it is always unitive if approached lovingly and not being loving is an action that seperates the two. If a husband forces sex on his wife against her wishes, even if just by badgering and not in any violent way, but doesn’t use any contraception, do you suppose that is ‘unitive’ is some way? If one spouse used sex as a weapon in their relationship and a constant source of division, is the act unitive?

I am not saying the Church wouldn’t frown on those things, but I don’t think anyone would say that demanding sex from one’s spouse when the other is not interested is ‘inherently evil’, i.e., on the same level of moral action as abortion, torture, murder, and so forth.

 

[Seatuck]

OK, I’ve checked your link. It says nothing about the married or unmarried state of the couple. I then went looking for any source document that states the church rejects the use of condoms by married couples to prevent AIDS transmission between spouses.

What I found was this, the Vatican’s statement Family Values Versus Safe Sex.
vatican.va/roman_curia/pontifical_councils/family/documents/rc_pc_family_doc_20031201_family-values-safe-sex-trujillo_en.html

This Vatican document stresses is the value of pre-marital chastity and marital fidelity as methods to prevent AIDS, and the high unreliability of condoms in preventing AIDS. Unfortunately, the solution advanced relates to disease-free individuals becoming and staying disease-free couples. It also does NOT address the situation of a married couple when one spouse is already diseased and the other is not.

This question posed to me by an RCIA candidate concerned a non-Catholic couple she knew. [Yes, I know that since they are not Catholic the church’s rules are no imposed on them.] However, the RCIA candidate posed the question anyway. “What if the couple in question was Catholic, what would the Church answer?”, and a legitimate question deserves a legitimate answer

Her question: The husband in a certain recently-married couple had a sinful past. He turned from his sinful life, chose to be a Christian, found himself a worthy wife, and they were married. At that time he was medically tested and believed himself to be free of disease. About a year later he was tested again and found to be HIV-positive. This delay in diagnosis is not unreasonable, since the virus can have a long incubation period. As of now, the wife has not tested positive for HIV and may not have contracted the virus. However, since the virus is now definitely active in the husband, continuation of “unprotected” marital relations will almost certainly result in transmitting the disease to the wife.

Humanae Vitae says:
Lawful Therapeutic Means
15. On the other hand, the Church does not consider at all illicit the use of those therapeutic means necessary to cure bodily diseases, even if a foreseeable impediment to procreation should result there from—provided such impediment is not directly intended for any motive whatsoever. (19)

Now, if the couple in question WERE Catholic, what could they do and how could they minimize the risk transmitting HIV to the wife?

1. Get a divorce and seek an annulment? This would prevent her from catching HIV in the future, but would also abandon him in his time of need.
2. Live as married celibates, denying themselves all future access to the unitive benefits of the marital act?
3. Have relations occasionally and use condoms? Although condoms certainly will not prevent transmission of the virus, they can significantly lessen her exposure.

This is a no-win situation. Unfortunately, it’s not a hypothetical situation for this couple. It’s a real-life tragedy. Prayer for the couple is always helpful and appreciated, and will help them deal with their unfolding tragedy, but nothing less than a miraculous cure will fix this problem.

Nan, check my posts #20 and #61. Condom use and married couples are mentioned there.

With Regard to therapeutic means. Condoms cure nothing. So they don’t fit the bill for that exclusion. What it does do is allow the use of a perforated condom for use in medical testing but that is all.

 

[Seatuck]

There are some things in here I agree with and some I do not.

I agree that the unitive element is related to the one flesh union, the same union Benedict discussed in DCE, and the same union that Adam and Eve formed. I think its a mistake to try to seperate that from the pleasurable aspect of sex. The pleasure derived from sex is an important mechanism to increasing union. I also agree that this is much more than feeling close, but I don’t think you can have this union without feeling close. It is not something completely different than romantic love or ordinary human warmth and closeness, it is all of those things and more. If you are saying that merely having sex in the proscribed way makes a couple unitive, even if they do not feel love, intimacy and closeness for each other, I would have to disagree.

I understand how contraceptives are said to destroy or inhibit the procreative aspect, when the procreative aspect is otherwise present. I do not see how they have any, or much, effect on the unitive aspect.

I agree that the complete giving of husbands and wives is like the complete giving between Christ and Church. I think that to try to draw physical parallels between the Eucharist and sexual penetration stretches the idea too far.

I have never heard it said that the Holy Spirit was the result of the love between the Father and the Son. I suppose this is a way of thinking of the Spirit proceeding from the Father and the Son.

I agree that there is a lot more out there than the Church documents. I take time to read some when I can, but the stuff on this topic is not high on my list. When you leave the Church documents you also have to remember that, regardless of the author, you are now reading someone’s interpretation. Some are more authoritative than others, of course.

Just want to make myself clear . Those ideas are not my own . They come from Theology of the Body. The Pope dedicated 127 Wednesday audiences expounding on this topic. It might be worth your while to study it. Or to get one of the discussions on it.

Here’s an excerpt from an article about why women cannot be ordained but the ideas in it have something to do with this discussion and why I think you should study it further.You will also see some of the points you have raised here are also hit upon.

**

The Eucharist and Marital Love​

**Ludwig Krug’s drawing portrays another aspect of that realism, and once again, gender is basic to the Eucharist. Pope John Paul II rightly refers to the Eucharist as the source of the Sacrament of Matrimony, which in turn is the source of families and, through families, of the Civilization of Love. There is, indeed, a most intimate connection between the Sacrament of Matrimony and the Eucharist. Jesus’ love is the love of a Bridegroom for his Bride. The Mass itself, as his continuing free acceptance of his death, is a marital act. Indeed, it is the marital act of all marital acts. Unlike other references to the relation of Christ to the Church, such as Shepherd to sheep, King to subjects, and so on, the Bridegroom-to-Bride reference is primary and non-figurative. It is not a metaphor, but a literal statement that Jesus’ love for us is marital. It is, of course, not sexual, not reproductive in a physical way. But the fact of divine marital love tells us something about the core essence of human marital love. Like our Lord’s love for us, human marital love must be completely self-giving, free of any self-seeking - it must be unconditional, gratuitous, faithful, permanent, and given to no rivals. **

****Matrimony, then, as a sacrament, is a causal symbol of that primary, divine marital love. And human marital love is sexual. In fact, sexual intercourse is integral to the sacramental symbol. Those unfortunates who are impotent cannot marry. Couples who have said their vows but not yet consummated them do not yet have a fully ratified, sacramental marriage. They can have their marriage dissolved. And despite the craziness regarding human sexuality that pervades our present culture, the human marital relationship, which is a sacrament of God’s love for us, must have partners of opposite sexes. ****

**Thus heterosexual love is sacred, made so by God in the beginning. It has been made a causal symbol, a sacrament that causes what it symbolizes, precisely by symbolizing it. It becomes truly causal, then, when it is an accurate symbol of the divine marital love of Christ and his Church. And that love reaches its high point in Jesus’ free acceptance of his death, the acceptance that is sacramentally enacted in the Eucharist. Catholic spouses find their love-making truly sacramental when they carry in their hearts the same love that Jesus carries in his Sacred Heart. That love is his free acceptance of his death, sacramentally symbolized in the Eucharist. Thus sacramental sex is one of our seven privileged ways, along with Baptism, Eucharist and Holy Orders, of participating in the inner life of the Three Divine Persons. And it is sacramental precisely as participating in the divine marital love enacted in the Eucharist. **

**God, being a Spirit, transcends sex and gender, and so God’s love is not in any way sexual. The human love of Jesus, moreover, was, and still is, celibate. Yet sex is central to the human symbolizing of such love. The reason has been made clear by Pope John Paul II in his sexual ethics, especially in Love and Responsibility (written nearly a decade before Humanae Vitae, when he was a professor of ethics at the University of Lublin). **

catholic.net/RCC/Periodicals/Dossier/0910-96/article3.html

**

 

[whatevergirl]

There are some things in here I agree with and some I do not.

I agree that the unitive element is related to the one flesh union, the same union Benedict discussed in DCE, and the same union that Adam and Eve formed. I think its a mistake to try to seperate that from the pleasurable aspect of sex. The pleasure derived from sex is an important mechanism to increasing union. I also agree that this is much more than feeling close, but I don’t think you can have this union without feeling close. It is not something completely different than romantic love or ordinary human warmth and closeness, it is all of those things and more. If you are saying that merely having sex in the proscribed way makes a couple unitive, even if they do not feel love, intimacy and closeness for each other, I would have to disagree.

I understand how contraceptives are said to destroy or inhibit the procreative aspect, when the procreative aspect is otherwise present. I do not see how they have any, or much, effect on the unitive aspect.

I agree that the complete giving of husbands and wives is like the complete giving between Christ and Church. I think that to try to draw physical parallels between the Eucharist and sexual penetration stretches the idea too far.

I have never heard it said that the Holy Spirit was the result of the love between the Father and the Son. I suppose this is a way of thinking of the Spirit proceeding from the Father and the Son.

I agree that there is a lot more out there than the Church documents. I take time to read some when I can, but the stuff on this topic is not high on my list. When you leave the Church documents you also have to remember that, regardless of the author, you are now reading someone’s interpretation. Some are more authoritative than others, of course.

Regarding the bolded part…I would say that contraception probably inhibits unity between a couple…because contraception is a fear mechanism. I used oral contraception in my marriage out of fear of getting pregnant…it’s hard to be completely united, when we’re also in fear (of something happening–pregnancy). That’s my take, anyways.

 

[Seatuck]

TMC

I coudn’t post the whole excerpt I wanted to. Please go into the article to read what comes after the part I was able to fit in.

Now I know why folks around here use 3 posts in a row to fit information in. Very Frustrating.

You said

I do not see how they have any, or much, effect on the unitive aspect.

I think you really need to do some more study to understand this. The marital act has a sacramental theological meaning. Any contraceptive behavior gets in the way of this theological meaning.

 

[Scottgun]

Regarding the bolded part…I would say that contraception probably inhibits unity between a couple…because contraception is a fear mechanism. I used oral contraception in my marriage out of fear of getting pregnant…it’s hard to be completely united, when we’re also in fear (of something happening–pregnancy). That’s my take, anyways.

That’s an excellent take. As Mark Shea says, A culture of death is a culture of fear.

 

[KathleenElsie]

Do you think that would seem to mean that sex among those in menapause or were infertile for other causes not justified?

As I have known women that have conceived that were considered infertile for whatever reason your premise is wrong. All is possible with God.

 

[paperwight]

‘All is possible with God’? Well yes and no. He could make a uterus grow back after a hysterectomy but it’s unlikely, isn’t it.

 

[Scottgun]

Yeah it’s unlikely, as one would expect miracles to be.

Every now and then I get a pro-contraception argument that says that what’s the difference since God can over-ride a couples use of contraceptives (breaking condom or dud pill or something) and make a child if he wants to? I replied that by this logic I should be able to point a loaded gun at an innocent person, pull the trigger, and if God doesn’t want me to kill him, he’ll jam the gun.

 

[KathleenElsie]

‘All is possible with God’? Well yes and no. He could make a uterus grow back after a hysterectomy but it’s unlikely, isn’t it.

There is no “no” to it. “All is possible with God.”

Miracles do not always happen that is why they are called miracles and not daily occurrences.

A Miracle Baby Is Born In Canada

Tuesday, September 27, 2005 | 12:43 PM
ONTARIO, Canada – Baby Emily is a miracle baby to her family. When she was conceived for some unknown reason the fertilized egg attached itself to the outside of the uterus.
Emily grew squeezed in between her mother’s liver and bowels. When she made it to the 33-week mark, doctors performed emergency surgery and took her out.
Emily had clubfeet and dislocated hips, but doctors say she’s healthy and should be just fine. There is a one in 10 million chance of something like this happening.
… abclocal.go.com/kabc/story?section=nation_world&id=3482408

As I said miracles happen. Pray for them and remember all prayer is answered. Someitmes the answer is yes and sometimes it is no. Sometimes it is answered now or maybe in 40 years. All in God’s good time.

 

[Nan_S]

Nan, check my posts #20 and #61. Condom use and married couples are mentioned there.

With Regard to therapeutic means. Condoms cure nothing. So they don’t fit the bill for that exclusion. What it does do is allow the use of a perforated condom for use in medical testing but that is all.

Seatuck,

Thank you for the post references - I hadn’t noted them before. Some interesting reading there. So it seems the controversy and argument rages on, about whether it is licit for married couples to use condoms to lessen the risk of AIDS transmission between them.

On the one hand, the links you gave have discussions very well laid out which argue that condom use to lessen the risk of transmitting disease is not licit, even when the couple is unquestionably infertile. Thomas J. Nash, William E. May, and Fr. Joseph Jenkins are all respected speakers with well reasoned arguments deferring to traditional, conservative theology.

On the other hand, of the authors you cite, none of them are official spokesmen for the Vatican. Nor are they able to cite any official Vatican source addressing this specific question. And even now the Vatican has still remained mum on the question. Your May 2006 article by Thomas Nash hoped for a such an official statement and one is still not forthcoming. Curious.

For the record, I am not suggesting that condoms are completely effective in preventing disease. They fail, even when properly used. I am also not suggesting that condoms can cure disease. However, birth control pills are licitly used by women to prevent future recurrence of certain medical conditions as well as being used to effect initial cures. If, therefore, birth control pills can be used to prevent disease in a woman known to be succeptible, why are condoms treated differently?

About the only things I feel I can do are to humbly thank God that the particular RCIA inquirer who posed this question to me is not the one whose spouse is infected, and to pray for the other couple whose spouse is infected.

 

[Newbie2]

As I have known women that have conceived that were considered infertile for whatever reason your premise is wrong. All is possible with God.

I didn’t state that as a premise, but as a question.

 

[seekerz]

Seatuck,

For the record, I am not suggesting that condoms are completely effective in preventing disease. They fail, even when properly used. I am also not suggesting that condoms can cure disease. However, birth control pills are licitly used by women to prevent future recurrence of certain medical conditions as well as being used to effect initial cures. If, therefore, birth control pills can be used to prevent disease in a woman known to be succeptible, why are condoms treated differently?

Excellent question, and one I’m sure theologians are struggling with today.

 

[Seatuck]

Seatuck,

Thank you for the post references - I hadn’t noted them before. Some interesting reading there. So it seems the controversy and argument rages on, about whether it is licit for married couples to use condoms to lessen the risk of AIDS transmission between them.

On the one hand, the links you gave have discussions very well laid out which argue that condom use to lessen the risk of transmitting disease is not licit, even when the couple is unquestionably infertile. Thomas J. Nash, William E. May, and Fr. Joseph Jenkins are all respected speakers with well reasoned arguments deferring to traditional, conservative theology.

On the other hand, of the authors you cite, none of them are official spokesmen for the Vatican. Nor are they able to cite any official Vatican source addressing this specific question. And even now the Vatican has still remained mum on the question. Your May 2006 article by Thomas Nash hoped for a such an official statement and one is still not forthcoming. Curious.

For the record, I am not suggesting that condoms are completely effective in preventing disease. They fail, even when properly used. I am also not suggesting that condoms can cure disease. However, birth control pills are licitly used by women to prevent future recurrence of certain medical conditions as well as being used to effect initial cures. If, therefore, birth control pills can be used to prevent disease in a woman known to be succeptible, why are condoms treated differently?

About the only things I feel I can do are to humbly thank God that the particular RCIA inquirer who posed this question to me is not the one whose spouse is infected, and to pray for the other couple whose spouse is infected.

Birth control pill are being used to treat disease that is already in progress. It isn’t taken by healthy women who don’t have any sign or symptoms of disease.It is being taken to halt progression not prevention from what I understand. You also won’t find any Vatican statements approving the pills use in that way. HV was written long before the pill was used that way and referred to hysterectomy and such. Many moralists think it is a stretch to use the pill in such away without abstaining from the marital act. Or at least to make the attempt to be ensured that breakthrough ovulation has not occured. Also many Catholic NFP only doctors have repeatedly stated that there is no disease that the pill must be taken for . For the purposes of this discussion the pill isn’t being used to prevent a disease from being transmitted from one person to another as is the case with the condom use. We have a method for that . It is to abstain. We have the grace from God to achieve such heroic virtue in married couples when there is a grave reason to abstain from that aspect of marital love.

The Pontifical Council for the Family- A Vatican Agency- has been outspoken in this discussion and has taken heavy criticism from the UN, the press and other organizations. Not really sure why you say no one from the Vatican is speaking out.Cardinal Trujillo is on such person villified by the press for contributing to the spread of HIV by his insistance the the church cannot support condom use.

 

[Nan_S]

Birth control pill are being used to treat disease that is already in progress. It isn’t taken by healthy women who don’t have any sign or symptoms of disease.It is being taken to halt progression not prevention from what I understand. You also won’t find any Vatican statements approving the pills use in that way. HV was written long before the pill was used that way and referred to hysterectomy and such. Many moralists think it is a stretch to use the pill in such away without abstaining from the marital act. Or at least to make the attempt to be ensured that breakthrough ovulation has not occured. Also many Catholic NFP only doctors have repeatedly stated that there is no disease that the pill must be taken for . For the purposes of this discussion the pill isn’t being used to prevent a disease from being transmitted from one person to another as is the case with the condom use. We have a method for that . It is to abstain. We have the grace from God to achieve such heroic virtue in married couples when there is a grave reason to abstain from that aspect of marital love.

Sadly, we even have dissention between doctors regarding the medicinal use of BC pills. Yet I know personally of Catholic and non-Catholic women who resorted to their use, not for contraceptive value, but because they were the only effective method to bring medical conditions under control. They continue to take the BC pills even after they are free of symptoms and diseased tissue, because they are known to be prone to recurrence of those medical problems. HV was written after BC pills were widely available; it’s hard to believe that the insightful author of such a thoughtful, prophetic, and well-ordered document would not image that BC pills might have a medicinal value.

We know, though, that “breakthrough ovulation” DOES occur when women are on BC pills, and that one effect of BC pills is to prevent the implantation of fertilized eggs in the womb. With that in mind, the best answer I could give to my RCIA candidate was that a single woman who has resorted to BC pills should never have marital relations (sinful for a variety of reasons). A married woman who is using BC pills should still practice Natural Family Planning and abstain from relations during her fertile phase, so as to prevent creating a new life unawares and immediately aborting it. Further, since BC pills regulate cycles so strictly, the time when “breakthrough ovulation” could occur is fairly easy to predict, making the necessary period of abstinence easy to p(name removed by moderator)oint.

The Pontifical Council for the Family- A Vatican Agency- has been outspoken in this discussion and has taken heavy criticism from the UN, the press and other organizations. Not really sure why you say no one from the Vatican is speaking out.Cardinal Trujillo is on such person villified by the press for contributing to the spread of HIV by his insistance the the church cannot support condom use.

vatican.va/roman_curia/po…ujillo_en.html
Cardinal Trujillo’s statement was that pre-marital chastity and marital fidelity are the only truly effective methods of preventing the spread of AIDS. He also says that those who disregard the necessity for chastity and fidelity and instead offer a panacea of “safe sex” through condom use are lying; condoms do not and never could stop the spread of AIDS. Worse, they make the believers in that lie even more succeptible because they ultimately take unnecessary risks through ignorance and wind up infected.

No, unfortunately Cardinal Trujillo did NOT address the issue of whether married couples may or may not use condoms when one spouse is infected and the other is not. That is a different issue than the one he addressed. In this latter question marital fidelity will not prevent the wife from getting infected. Condoms ultimately won’t either but they may prevent it for a time, whereas ordinary marital relations will almost certainly result in the wife being infected fairly quickly.

 

[Newbie2]

A married woman who is using BC pills should still practice Natural Family Planning and abstain from relations during her fertile phase, so as to prevent creating a new life unawares and immediately aborting it. Further, since BC pills regulate cycles so strictly, the time when “breakthrough ovulation” could occur is fairly easy to predict, making the necessary period of abstinence easy to p(name removed by moderator)oint.

Isn’t “Natural Family Planning” on birth control pills a contradiction in terms?

 

[Listener]

Birth control pill are being used to treat disease that is already in progress. It isn’t taken by healthy women who don’t have any sign or symptoms of disease.It is being taken to halt progression not prevention from what I understand. You also won’t find any Vatican statements approving the pills use in that way. HV was written long before the pill was used that way and referred to hysterectomy and such. Many moralists think it is a stretch to use the pill in such away without abstaining from the marital act.

I just wanted to point out an error in this statement. I got my first job in the early 1960’s, long before Humane Vitae was written. I had young married co-workers who were on the pill. Although I wasn’t married yet, my doctor put me on the pill because of severe disabling problems with my period. (Yes, I remained a virgin, in case you’re wondering). This was still several years before Humanae Vitae. The reference to “curing bodily diseases” in Humanae Vitae referred to both the pill and also, of course, hysterectomy. Many of you probably don’t know this because you weren’t born yet.

 

[Nan_S]

Isn’t “Natural Family Planning” on birth control pills a contradiction in terms?

Not when you realize that ovulation still occurs under certain situations, such as missed pills, antibiotic treatment, unusual stress, or illness. A woman on BC pills could actually ovulate several times a year without ever realizing it; but medical research has this well documented. That’s where the secondary effect of the pills takes place - the hormones make the womb hostile to the fertilized egg and prevent a newly conceived human being from implanting in his/her mother’s womb. The baby is aborted.

NFP makes use of body temperature and other physical signs to make a woman aware of when ovulation is possible. Knowing that the BC pill hormones will hinder or prevent implantation, and therefore cause a newly conceived human being to be aborted, the couple would abstain from marital relations during that time to avoid being parties to abortion. On a regular pill-induced 28-day cycle, the potentially fertile phase would usually be between the 9th and 15th days of her cycle.

 

[Newbie2]

Not when you realize that ovulation still occurs under certain situations, such as missed pills, antibiotic treatment, unusual stress, or illness. A woman on BC pills could actually ovulate several times a year without ever realizing it; but medical research has this well documented. That’s where the secondary effect of the pills takes place - the hormones make the womb hostile to the fertilized egg and prevent a newly conceived human being from implanting in his/her mother’s womb. The baby is aborted.

NFP makes use of body temperature and other physical signs to make a woman aware of when ovulation is possible. Knowing that the BC pill hormones will hinder or prevent implantation, and therefore cause a newly conceived human being to be aborted, the couple would abstain from marital relations during that time to avoid being parties to abortion. On a regular pill-induced 28-day cycle, the potentially fertile phase would usually be between the 9th and 15th days of her cycle.

Yes, I understand how it all works.

However, in a moral sense, if a couple uses ABC they are by default not able to use NFP.