NFP and contraception

[LaSainte]

It is implicit in the study that they are using NFP to avoid pregnancy, not to achieve.

Also, if you cannot accept this study, then you of course cannot accept any statements that the pill also causes abortions as a result of failure to implant, as not even ONE has ever been proven to have occurred.

So you can accept both or neither.

And LOTS of medications cause a slightly increased risk of death and are not immoral. This has nothing to do with the morality/immorality of the pill. Ya know what else causes increased risk of death? Using an inexact science like NFP to avoid pregnancy when you are likely to have a ruptured uterus if you have another baby.

You can’t keep it up with the double standards. None of these things (possible miscarriages, increased risk of maternal death, the intent of the couple, etc.) have ANYTHING to do with he Church’s stance on the immorality of the pill or of ABC in general, because all of these factors can be applied to NFP as well in certain circumstances.

There is ONE reason and one reason only for the supposed immorality of ABC, and it has to do with the necessity of always depositing the semen into the vagina, no matter what, with no artificial barriers to stop the sperm from either reaching the egg or dying trying. That’s it, and for the Church, this imperative trumps the value of human life in any all circumstances.

Let’s at least be honest here.

 

[Mary_Gail_36]

It is implicit in the study that they are using NFP to avoid pregnancy, not to achieve.
Also, if you cannot accept this study, then you of course cannot accept any statements that the pill also causes abortions as a result of failure to implant, as not even ONE has ever been proven to have occurred.

So you can accept both or neither.

It isn’t implicit to me at all.

The women participating provided there own charts and noted when peak was and when intercourse was.

Some women used the ovulation method, AKA Billings. The way the chart works is a baby sticker with a P indicates peak fertility. A letter I is used to indicate intercourse.

If a woman is at peak and has intercourse, she is not avoiding conception. It doesn’t seem that the charts were altered after the fact.

Again, if you note the Creighton link provided, there is a chart of a cycle where miscarriage occured. There is a very short mucus phase. Short luteal phase. The woman was monitored daily with sonogram.

A side note, I suffered two very early miscarriages. They were emotionally devastating, but my use of NFP did not cause them…in fact NFP allowed me to know when I conceived.

And the Creighton method helps determine problems that can lead to miscarriage, and address thoses problems.

 

[LaSainte]

Oh I see now. We are talking about 2 conflicting studies.

 

[Warrior1979]

Yet, this is not the only reason that the Pill is immoral.

But even if it only one of the reasons it is problematic. Do the miscarriages get a pass because they are unintentionally done by natural means? Apparently so, because there is no other possible way to reconcile this with the morality of using NFP.

Also, the Pill, in particular, is immoral because it causes an increased risk of death. It was tested on poor women in Puerto Rico and many of them died. They readjusted the dosage, but the increased risk of stroke, heart disease and breast cancer is still there. The Pill is killing women and it has been classified as a Group I carcinogen by the World Health Organization.

Actually, that would be an increased risk of death from some causes, and a decreased risk for others. But this is nothing particular to the Pill. Many modern medications do exactly the same thing.

 

[sacredcello]

It is implicit in the study that they are using NFP to avoid pregnancy, not to achieve.

Also, if you cannot accept this study, then you of course cannot accept any statements that the pill also causes abortions as a result of failure to implant, as not even ONE has ever been proven to have occurred.

I do accept the study and its conclusions and it is not at all implicit that they are using NFP to avoid conception. Where does it say that? It only speaks of couples who had intercourse that was optimally timed to achieve conception and those that were non-optimally timed for conception (i.e., having sex when they chose to, not based on a decision to conceive or to avoid). It does imply that they were trying to avoid.

If a couple were trying to avoid pregnancy, they can use sound logic, however, to take the information from this study and use it to apply the strictest rules of NFP (wait until P+4 in phase III-only) to avoid any possibility of a “non-optimally timed” conception which might have a greater risk of miscarriage, especially for a woman with a history of miscarriages. Therefore, a couple can take the data in this study and use it to make an informed and moral decision, rather than to accept it as a conclusion that the outcome of NFP-use is going to result in increased miscarriages. It does not need to be so, nor would anyone in the NFP community advocate in favor of a loose application, but, rather, a stricter application of the phase III rules in light of this data.

If the Church were to examine this study of couples who had non-optimally timed pregnancies (which is not implied that they were using NFP to avoid), I would say, that perhaps it might be warranted to undertake an actual study of NFP-users who were trying to avoid. But, that study has not been undertaken. Perhaps it should, and the conclusion, perhaps, might be, that couples should wait until P+4, when trying to avoid. Of course, I am only expressing my own opinion, using reason and logic.

 

[sacredcello]

Oh I see now. We are talking about 2 conflicting studies.

Where is another conflicting study? The article that you posted from the Science Daily is based on a gross misinterpretation of the data of this one study which we are currently discussing. This was done by Professor Bovens of the London School of Economics (he is not in the field of medicine).

 

[sacredcello]

But even if it only one of the reasons it is problematic.

Where does it say in any Church document that the Pill is immoral due to its abortifacient potential? It does not spell this out in any encyclical such as Humanae Vitae or Veritatis Slendor nor in the work of Blessed John Paul II known as the Theology of the Body. It has been the work of pro-life endocrinologists and gynecologists to write about this from their knowledge of how the Pill effects the reproductive organs. And, lay people such as these, have made important contributions to our understanding. However, they do not speak for the Church. I don’t believe you will find any document from the Vatican which lists “abortifacient” as one of the reasons for the immorality of the Pill.

Actually, that would be an increased risk of death from some causes, and a decreased risk for others. But this is nothing particular to the Pill. Many modern medications do exactly the same thing.

It would be largely an increased risk of death, otherwise the Pill would not have been classified as a Group I carcinogen.

I am very happy that I am not married to a man who would suggest to me that “oh, well, honey, it’s an increased risk of death for some causes…why don’t you go ahead and take it because I don’t care to undertake the discipline of self mastery”

 

[LaSainte]

Where is another conflicting study? The article that you posted from the Science Daily is based on a gross misinterpretation of the data of this one study which we are currently discussing. This was done by Professor Bovens of the London School of Economics (he is not in the field of medicine).

I’m sorry, I should have said that we are reading 2 separate interpretations of the same study, although the full study itself would cost $32 to read. At any rate , there are several interpretations of this study, but the data is irrefutable. Women using NFP, who had had miscarriages and conceived on the fringes of fertility were 15% more likely to miscarry/abort.

None of his matters though, because as I stated above, protection of human life has NOTHING to do with the Church’s stance on ABC. Its all about the semen and where it ends up-human life and health is not a factor at all.

 

[Abu]

Image of God, #867
Quote from Chrono13:
*However, the rules of generation are that couple needs to wish for procreation, even if they are barren. *
Furthermore, by your reasoning a woman who is pregnant needs to hope she procreates again while she is having relations? This doesn’t make any sense.
A rule is not a wish. Neither is the “order appointed for the procreation of children” (another translation) a wish

Chrono13’s reasoning is riddled with nonsense, from the beginning.

#869:
I think you are misreading the underlined statement. It says that “the marriage debt should always be rendered faithfully, frankly, and just as if it were with the hope of begetting children…” NOT “the marriage debt should always be rendered faithfully, frankly, and with the hope of begetting children…”.

Chrono 13 has shown repeatedly that his prejudices interfere with logical reasoning, and he is now incapable of acknowledging truth, fact and the meaning of either.

The contorted efforts to assume NBR was known at the time of the Early Fathers is just one example of the obsession.

The second obsession is the attempt to portray NBR, as developed, as a Catholic fetish, and to discredit the use of this part of God’s creation of human nature as a killing field.

The third obsession is to discredit Christ as God the Son in transferring His authority to His Church to infallibly teach the truths of faith and morals.

 

[sacredcello]

I’m sorry, I should have said that we are reading 2 separate interpretations of the same study, although the full study itself would cost $32 to read. At any rate , there are several interpretations of this study, but the data is irrefutable. Women using NFP, who had had miscarriages and conceived on the fringes of fertility were 15% more likely to miscarry/abort.

In the abstract of this study, it states that

Conceptions on days - 1 or 0 with respect to the natural family planning estimated day of ovulation were considered to be “optimally timed,” and all other conceptions were considered as “non-optimally timed.”

This would indicated couples who were using NFP to actively try to achieve, or, at least, did not avoid having intercourse on or near their most fertile day. Okay, so this is their control group.

The study also says

The number of days from the most probable conception intercourse to probable day of ovulation provided an estimate of the time the gametes remained in the reproductive tract before fertilization; less than 48 hours was considered optimal.

Less than 48 hours from ovulation is established as optimal. This is likewise true in the practice of NFP. Outside of 48 hrs is less optimal…so, let’s say a couple is using NFP to avoid conception, but they have intercourse on the morning of P+3 (still well within the “fertile” time as defined by STM and other methods of NFP, but outside the optimal time for conception). So, this means that they took a risk, and broke the rules (this sometimes happens), and they get pregnant and it ends in miscarriage. This is very rare according to the study: it happens in 1.8% of the time in women with no history of miscarriage. In any case, this event is a good indicator that this particular couple should wait until they are outside the fertile window next time, so that, if they are trying to avoid, they do not end up having a repeat miscarriage. However, if the couple had waited until the evening of P+3, they most likely would not have conceived at all, because the egg does not live 3 full days after ovulation. This is just one example, we could give others…

In any case, there is absolutely no evidence, based on this study, that the practice of NFP to AVOID conception, leads to an increase in miscarriage. It only speaks of non-optimally timed intercourse, but does not mention the intention of the couples. The study did not include daily ultrasound to show how many early miscarriages result from optimally timed (peak day) relations which occur before implantation. There could be many more miscarriages which take place in the early days before implantation as a result of relations at the most fertile time, and this study has not been undertaken. In the same way, (I agree with you on this, LaSainte) …the number of Pill abortions are not known, because of the difficulty involved in undertaking such a study.

 

[Abu]

Chrono13, #862
Quote:
“Augustine is conscious not only of the procreative ordering of marriage, but also of its unitive value."
Of marriage? Yes. Of marital sex? Not.

False. Readers can see St Augustine’s emphases below.

For example, what were the reasons behind Augustine’s ban of NFP?

NBR was unknown at that time and therefore irrelevant.

Augustine’s middle of the road is not what Burke suggests in his text. Modern world is not Puritan, Manichean, Jansenist, or even Pelaginasian, for that matter. It is the world which searches for his identity. And has read Augustine and his claims that “there is something wrong with sex”.

Your confusion is endless. St Augustine wrote at a certain time in history clarifying what was wrong with those heresies concerning the use of sex and marriage. Msgr Cormac Burke articulates, drawing attention clearly to what St Augustine is saying, he doesn’t “suggest” nor worse, twist in Julianistic fashion as you do, to suit your contorted imagination.

You have confirmed your refusal to see your fantasies for what they really are, although offered the reality of St Augustine’s work.

The reality: churchinhistory.org/pages/booklets/augustine.htm

St Augustine’s “vision of sexuality and marriage became more and more sharpened and refined by his efforts, in controversy, to keep a Catholic balance between the extremes of Manicheism, on the one hand, and Pelagianism, on the other.

“To the Manichean argument that marriage is bad because procreation is bad, Augustine offers the counter-thesis that it is precisely the goodness of procreation which makes marriage good. [4] This explains in large part his insistence on the generative purpose of sex. [5]

“…he strongly defends the goodness of sexual difference and of the union of husband and wife. [6] Of particular importance is his work De bono coniugali, written to refute the accusation of Manicheism made by Jovinianus against the Catholics.

“…it is also important to bear in mind the nature and terms of the debate in which he sought to defend a Christian understanding of sexual morality against a naturalistic exaltation of sex.

“Julian had twisted Augustine’s strictures on concupiscence, as though they implied a negative judgment on the attraction between the sexes, or on sexual pleasure in marital relations

**“…he reiterates that he has nothing to object to Julian’s praise (by which he seeks to lead the thoughtless astray) “of the works of God; that is, his praising of human nature, of human seed, of marriage, of sexual intercourse, of the fruits of matrimony: which are all of them good things.” [29] When Augustine condemns concupiscence, therefore, he condemns none of these divinely-given values of sexual nature. **Now a further point is to be noticed. Augustine makes it clear that what he regards as the disorder of concupiscence is not synonymous with sexual pleasure either.
**“This point needs to be specially stressed since, given the vigor with which Augustine criticizes the yielding to concupiscence, a superficial reader might easily be led to conclude that he is criticizing the actual seeking of pleasure itself in marital intercourse. A proper reading shows that this is not so.

“Already in De bono coniugali, in a passage where he compares nourishment and generation, he had insisted that sexual pleasure, sought temperately and rationally, is not and cannot be termed concupiscence. [30] Elsewhere he contrasts the lawful pleasure of the conjugal embrace with the unlawful pleasure of fornication.” **[31]

 

[sacredcello]

In honor of the passing of Father Richard M. Hogan earlier this month (may his soul rest in peace), I would like to turn to him in this thread to summarize some of our discussions about the history of Church teaching. In his short book entitled, “Is NFP Good?” he says:

"In the patristic age, most were agreed that the marital act was for the procreation of children and that spouses should intend children when they engaged in sexual intercourse. On the one hand, the Fathers of the Church were responding to the sexual permissiveness of the pagan Roman culture which surrounded them. On the other hand, they were facing the Gnostic heresy. The Gnostics believed all matter to be evil. Thus, the human body and human sexuality were also evil. One should never bring more evil, that is, another body, into the world. For Gnostics, procreation was one of the greatest evils because more flesh came into existence. In response to the Gnostics, the Fathers of the Church emphasized the inherent goodness of new life, that is, of procreation. This emphasis also countered the sexual mores of the time. Human sexuality is not a plaything. Rather it is for the serious and awesome purpose of giving new life. The marital act exists to give new life, and spouses should intend to give life when they have sexual intercourse. The Fathers acknowledged that intercourse also could be a remedy for concupiscence, but they also held that this purpose is selfish. They taught that spouses who intend only this purpose sin, at least venially.

 

[sacredcello]

Father Richard M. Hogan, in his book called “Is NFP Good?” continues:

St. Augustine (354-430), Bishop of Hippo, taught that marriage and sexual intercourse were for procreation. Spouses should intend procreation when they engage in the marital act. He realized that sexual intercourse could be used as a remedy for concupiscence, but he taught that spouses who did this were guilty of a venial sin. Augustine does indicate at one point that marital relations can express friendship, and so it seems that he does leave the door open to intercourse as an expression of fidelity. This development pointed to what was to come.

 

[sacredcello]

From the short book “Is NFP Good?” by Father Richard M. Hogan:

The flowering of theology in the medieval period brought with it a development in the theology of marriage. In the thirteenth century, Thomas Aquinas and Bonaventure both taught that the marital act was for conjugal fidelity as well as for procreation. Spouses could choose to express their friendship to one another through the marital act. In other words, although procreation was clearly understood as one of the purposes of the marital act, spouses need not specifically intend this purpose when they engaged in sexual intercourse. They could intend to express friendship. Of course, these theologians maintained that the spouses could never exclude procreation, but they need not explicitly intend it. Recognizing that some thought the marital act was for the release of desire, Thomas Aquinas and Bonaventure taught that taking a spouse out of selfish desire was flawed.

 

[sacredcello]

Father Hogan continues:

Finally, in the eighteenth century, Alphonsus Liguori, accepting procreation and fidelity as the purposes of sexual intercourse, taught that it was not necessary for spouses to intend explicitly the good of procreation or fidelity. It was sufficient that they implicitly intended these purposes. As long as these two purposes were intended, at least implicitly, Alphonsus taught that there was nothing aberrant in enjoying the pleasure which accompanied the sexual act. Thus, Alphonsus Liguori united the two purposes of the marital act. Not only were both recognized as existing in reality (that had occurred in the medieval period), but now Alphonsus taught that both should exist in the intentional order at least implicitly.

Throughout history, magisterial documents and the theological research stimulated by them have tried to teach what the purposes of marriage are and what the spouses should include in their intention. The procreative purpose was recognized at the beginning. The conjugal friendship purpose came to be appreciated as the Church reflected on the mystery of the marital act. Intercourse as a remedy for concupiscence was recognized and criticized. From the beginning, the spouses were to intend the procreative purpose of the marital act. When the conjugal friendship purpose was recognized, it was clear that spouses could implicitly intend the procreative purpose and explicitly wish to express their friendship. The final development occurred when Alphonsus Liguori taught that both intentions need not be explicit, but it sufficed if they were implicit. Finally, the whole tradition holds that spouses who intend only the satisfaction of their own desires sins, at least venially.

 

[sacredcello]

Father Hogan on Casti Connubii:

"The next stage in the development of Catholic teaching occurred with Pope Pius XI’s encyclical, Casti Connubii. It is important to remember the context in which this encyclical was written. First, by the 1930’s scientists had made some progress in their investigations into human fertility. For the first time, it was possible for spouses to artificially and effectively thwart procreation. The procreative purpose could be excluded both in the physical and intentional orders. Spouses could now temporarily suspend their fertility and attempt to express their friendship while blocking the procreative purpose of the marital act.

Through a natural method, it was also possible for them to know with some accuracy when they were fertile. Thus, without artificially altering themselves, that is, without physically blocking the procreative purpose, they could engage in the marital act knowing that they probably would not conceive a child. With greater probability than ever before, they could intend not to have a child while engaging in the marital act.

Second, in the year of the publication of this document, the Anglican Church had altered the constant teaching of the Christian Churches regarding the procreative aspect of sexual intercourse. The Anglican Church accepted contraception and taught that couples could physically exclude procreation and not even implicitly intend conception. This was a radical departure from the previous tradition. The medieval and modern theologians had spoken of spouses not explicitly intending procreation every time they engaged in sexual intercourse. They never allowed procreation to be exluded in the physical or intentional orders. With these developments, new questions were raised. Could the spouses exclude procreation physically and intentionally? Was the knowledge that conception was improbable an exclusion in the intentional order? Pisu XI wished to reaffirm the Catholic tradition, giving some guidelines to the faithful about the new methods and responding to the Anglican position.

Pope Pisu XI affirmed most strongly the Catholic teaching that the direct frustration of procreative purpose was gravely sinful. Spouses could not physically or intentionally exclude procreation. Spouses should intend procreation at least implicitly. However, in conformity with Catholic tradition, he did allow spouses to engage in non-procreative sexual intercourse (which they now could do with the new scientific knowledge of the natural cycles of human fertility) for sufficient reasons. In the judgment of the magisterium, recourse to the infertile periods was the equivalent of not explicitly intending procreation, but still accepting it and intending it, at least implicitly, as a purpose of the marital act.

 

[LaSainte]

Sacredcello,the miscarriage rate for optimally-timed conceptions was not 1.8%. It was 1.8% GREATER in those where conception was not optimally timed. Here is the whole abstract to avoid further confusion.

Display Settings:AbstractSend to:
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Am J Obstet Gynecol. 1995 May;172(5):1567-72.
Timing of conception and the risk of spontaneous abortion among pregnancies occurring during the use of natural family planning.
Gray RH, Simpson JL, Kambic RT, Queenan JT, Mena P, Perez A, Barbato M.
Source
Department of Population Dynamics, School of Hygiene and Public Health, Johns Hopkins University, Baltimore, MD 21205, USA.
Abstract
OBJECTIVE:
Our purpose was to ascertain the effects of timing of conception on the risk of spontaneous abortion.
STUDY DESIGN:
To assess these effects, women who conceived while using natural family planning were identified in five centers worldwide between 1987 and 1993. Timing of conception was determined from 868 natural family planning charts that recorded day of intercourse and indices of ovulation (cervical mucus peak obtained according to the ovulation method and/or basal body temperature). Conceptions on days - 1 or 0 with respect to the natural family planning estimated day of ovulation were considered to be “optimally timed,” and all other conceptions were considered as “non-optimally timed.” The rate of spontaneous abortions per 100 pregnancies was examined in relation to timing of conception, ages, reproductive history, and other covariates with bivariate and multivariate statistical methods.
RESULTS:
There were 88 spontaneous abortions among 868 pregnancies (10.1%). The spontaneous abortion rate was similar for 361 optimally timed conceptions (9.1%) and 507 non-optimally timed conceptions (10.9%). However, among 171 women who had experienced a spontaneous abortion in a prior pregnancy, the rate of spontaneous abortion in the index pregnancy was significantly higher with non-optimally timed conceptions (22.6%) as compared with optimally timed conceptions (7.3%). This association was not observed among 697 women with no history of pregnancy loss. The adjusted relative risk of spontaneous abortion among women with non-optimally timed conceptions and a history of pregnancy loss was 2.35 (95% confidence intervals 1.42 to 3.89). The excess risk of spontaneous abortion was observed with both preovulatory and postovulatory conceptions.
CONCLUSIONS:
Overall, there is no excess risk of spontaneous abortion among the pregnancies conceived during natural family planning use. However, among women with a history of pregnancy loss, there is an increased risk of spontaneous abortion associated with preovulatory or postovulatory delayed conceptions.
The results of a large, multicenter study suggest that users of natural family planning are not at increased risk of spontaneous abortion, even when conceptions are not optimally timed. Between 1987-93, data on timing of conception and spontaneous abortion were collected from the charts of 868 natural family planning clients at five centers in the US, Chile, Colombia (two sites), and Italy. This issue was investigated due to concerns that unplanned pregnancies arising from failures of the natural family planning method could be associated with aged gametes and adverse pregnancy outcomes. The day of peak mucus was used as the marker for estimating ovulation. The number of days from the most probable conception intercourse to probable day of ovulation provided an estimate of the time the gametes remained in the reproductive tract before fertilization; less than 48 hours was considered optimal. There were 88 spontaneous abortions (10.1%) and eight stillbirths (0.92%) in this series. Of the 361 conceptions judged to have occurred during the optimal time frame, 33 (9.1%) were spontaneously aborted. The miscarriage rate among the 507 conceptions that occurred at nonoptimal times was 10.9% (55). The difference was not statistically different. Among the 171 women with a previous pregnancy loss, an optimally timed conception in the index pregnancy was associated with a low rate of miscarriage (7.3%). ]There was, however, an excess rate of spontaneous abortion (22.6%) in women with a prior miscarriage and a pre- or post-ovulatory conception in the recent pregnancy. Although the biologic reasons for this finding are unclear, it is recommended that women with a prior spontaneous abortion use the ovulation method mucus peak or the basal body temperature rise to conceive during the optimal time.

PMID: 7755073 [PubMed - indexed for MEDLINE]
Publication Types, MeSH Terms, Grant Support

LinkOut - more resources

As you can see, obviously for those with miscarriages who are TRYING to conceive, they would of course ALREADY be trying to conceive during he optimal time, but the problem with the huge increase (15%) in miscarriages would really come into play for those using NFP to AVOID conception, as any failure of the method on the fringes of fertility has a much greater chance of miscarriage. Obviously, people who use NFP to avoid conception are much more likely to be intimate on these fringe days because they are counting those days until they can become intimate. You’re much more likely to have sex on hese days if you have been abstaining and counting he days to infertility than if you were just having sex at random using no BC method at all.

I’m not really seeing your point here.

 

[Holly3278]

Contraception is wrong. I used to practice contraception but I do not do so any longer. I finally decided that it is not worth the risk of losing my soul. That said, contraception can cause you to become permanently sterile, and yes, I am talking about so called “temporary” methods too.

There are a ton of side effects of contraceptive pills and other contraceptives such as blood clots which can turn into a pulmonary embolism which can in turn cause a heart attack. There is also the effects on the mood and such. And yes, it can affect your natural sex drive as well.

And finally, most methods of contraceptives are abortifacient as well. They can cause an early abortion. Mainstream medicine defines pregnancy as beginning at implantation but it actually begins at conception. At conception all of the chromosomes are there that are needed for a person.

 

[Image_of_God]

That’s an interesting point. Did Augustine say anything about having sex while pregnant?

I don’t think he says anything about it.

 

[LaSainte]

Here is an article about miscarriage and NFP from the New York times that cites a few studies on the issue. It seems the consensus is that increased chances of miscarriages are unproven but possible in the average woman, and that in women who tend to miscarry, there is probably a greater chance of miscarriage if the conception takes place past a certain point.

The article seems to take many different sources and opinions into account, so is possibly a more neutral source for information on the subject for those interested.