NFP Is A Burden

[Ham1]

Smokeboy,

While we agree on the sometimes over-emphasis on NFP, it does do some good in getting people into doing the right thing. NFP can be sometimes a gateway for people to come to the truth about God’s will. There are countless stories of people using NFP as “healthy contraception” only to realize later the truth.

As I have mentioned before, I think the awareness of NFP is a good thing considering the overwhelming contraceptive attitude by many catholics. However, you are correct that we must never forget to highlight the fact that NFP is a remedy for serious times and not just a happy little way of life.

 

[Bernadette64]

It’s really sad anyone would see NFP as a burden. The abstinence period itself just makes for wonderful anticpation!

I can now give myself* truly* FULLY to my husband! I used to be a contraceptor, a pill popper. Besides giving me dangerously high blood pressure, it made me feel like an object. I couldn’t put my finger on the melancholic feelings after my husband and I were intimate, but I notice it’s no longer there now. To be able to “do it” anytime anywhere our selfish desires demanded has given way to treating this wonderful God-given gift as exactly what it is – a gift. One to anticipate with awesome respect for each other.

And, sorry, Smokeboy, I’ve never been so star-crossed in love with my husband because of it. And my husband’s never been happier and more impressed with the fact that his wife doesn’t have to take chemicals and he doesn’t have to wear barriers…I mean, how ridiculous and denigrating have we made sex? Our contraceptive mentality in society has actually RUINED sex and perverted it from its true full emotional, spiritual as well as bodily connection with openness to life that it was intended to be so that rather than joyful, it’s become a burden when performed without the “safety” barrier of artificial birth “control.” And that’s why it’s so sad.

I’m also now in FULL communion and obedience to the Church (I reverted four years ago) and have never been happier and have a wonderful child because of it.

Checking myself is the easiest thing to do. I don’t do the charting because it’s now become second nature.

I recommend humility and obedience with prayerful thanks to God for giving us this gift that we’ve abused so that now what’s natural and beautiful has become a burden to some. (Again, sorry, Smokeboy) .

God knows what’s best and if I had only followed his laws earlier, I would have been happier a long time ago.

Bernadette:twocents: :getholy:

 

[Smoke_Boy]

**NFP can be sometimes a gateway for people to come to the truth about God’s will. There are countless stories of people using NFP as “healthy contraception” only to realize later the truth.
**
Do you also advocate people receiving communion in mortal sin in hopes that someday the grace of the eucharist will convince them of their error, hence, come to the full truth that they really should not have been receiving unworthily? The church certainly would not advocate that.

Bernadette: I don’t understand your references to me:** And, sorry, Smokeboy, I’ve never been so star-crossed in love with my husband because of it.** What are you talking about?

**I recommend humility and obedience with prayerful thanks to God for giving us this gift that we’ve abused so that now what’s natural and beautiful has become a burden to some. (Again, sorry, Smokeboy) **I would like to respond to you but, I don’t understand what you are getting at.

 

[Ham1]

Bernadette64:

It’s really sad anyone would see NFP as a burden. The abstinence period itself just makes for wonderful anticpation!

I can now give myself* truly* FULLY to my husband! I used to be a contraceptor, a pill popper. Besides giving me dangerously high blood pressure, it made me feel like an object. I couldn’t put my finger on the melancholic feelings after my husband and I were intimate, but I notice it’s no longer there now. To be able to “do it” anytime anywhere our selfish desires demanded has given way to treating this wonderful God-given gift as exactly what it is – a gift. One to anticipate with awesome respect for each other.

And, sorry, Smokeboy, I’ve never been so star-crossed in love with my husband because of it. And my husband’s never been happier and more impressed with the fact that his wife doesn’t have to take chemicals and he doesn’t have to wear barriers…I mean, how ridiculous and denigrating have we made sex? Our contraceptive mentality in society has actually RUINED sex and perverted it from its true full emotional, spiritual as well as bodily connection with openness to life that it was intended to be so that rather than joyful, it’s become a burden when performed without the “safety” barrier of artificial birth “control.” And that’s why it’s so sad.

I’m also now in FULL communion and obedience to the Church (I reverted four years ago) and have never been happier and have a wonderful child because of it.

Checking myself is the easiest thing to do. I don’t do the charting because it’s now become second nature.

I recommend humility and obedience with prayerful thanks to God for giving us this gift that we’ve abused so that now what’s natural and beautiful has become a burden to some. (Again, sorry, Smokeboy) .

God knows what’s best and if I had only followed his laws earlier, I would have been happier a long time ago.

Bernadette:twocents: :getholy:

Bernadette,

You seem to be of the opinion that there are two ways for a couple to act:

1. Contraception
2. NFP.

That is not the case. The choice is between:

1. Contraception
   2a. Non-NFP
   2b. NFP for a serious reason.

2a is the norm. It is the way that God designed creation. For serious reason, couples can resort to 2b but that is a remedy (an exception). In that sense 2b is a burden. Granted, as with any burden we can offer it up and make the best of it and be happy while living with it. But just because we are able to bring joy and goodness out of difficulty does not mean that we should lose sight of the fact that NFP is not the norm.

Smokeboy,

I understand your point about communion. However, getting someone to stop the sin of contraception in favor of a lesser sin (NFP for no serious reason) is a good thing. Getting them to abandon an intrinsically evil act for an act with a good object is certainly a strong step in the right direction.

 

[perpetua]

SmokeBoy: That is the trap. It is not NFP that has opened your hearts it is the moral teaching of the Church. Do you understand? The wrong use of NFP is still the “selfish contracepting culture of death mentality” Regardless of NFP, what is liberating is the truth that the church espouses not NFP. Again, people can be open to life without using NFP.
SmokeBoy- You are 100% correct. It is not NFP that has changed our hearts, it is LEARNING what the Church actually teaches. That said, however, without investigating NFP, we never would have learned what it is the Church has to say. We have never heard anything important from the pulpit on this matter, and as I mentioned earlier, while we knew bc was wrong, we had no idea why. I agree 100% that the wrong use of NFP can keep people in the same wrong mentality as birth control, because that is essentially how they are using it.

It was from our NFP teacher that we were first handed a copy of Humane Vitae, and learned how beautiful the Church’s teachings on our sexuality truly is. I agree completely (of course!) that people can be open to life without using NFP; as I mentioned earlier, we have only ever used it to get pregnant, and honestly, if we had been as mature in our faith (and knowledgeable about Church teachings) as we are now, we might never have bothered to learn it.

That said, I must say that God used our initial fears of too many children too quickly (which is why we learned NFP) to direct us to learn the beauty of the Church’s teachings, which we might never have heard or learned otherwise.

 

[Smoke_Boy]

Ham: I hear ya. I just want to be clear. It is easy to allow certain things - harder to rescind them. As the saying goes “What is tolerated today is accepted tomorrow” Do you know what I mean? Once we allow taxation for something it is harder to get rid of that tax even though the original purpose has been met. Same holds true with other church teaching. I believe the Church leadership let some things go in favor of being compassionate etc. and now they can’t get the genie back in the bottle, so to speak.It was from our NFP teacher that we were first handed a copy of Humane Vitae, and learned how beautiful the Church’s teachings on our sexuality truly is. I agree completely (of course!) that people can be open to life without using NFP; as I mentioned earlier, we have only ever used it to get pregnant, and honestly, if we had been as mature in our faith (and knowledgeable about Church teachings) as we are now, we might never have bothered to learn it

Perpetua: I hear you too. For the sake of clarity I posted back to you. The church’s teaching on morality is the liberator. I believe you have it right - your wording in the original post, was a little unclear. I have been guilty of not expressing myself as clearly as I can many times. It’s hard to post exactly what you mean sometimes. I look forward to more posts from you!

 

[Bernadette64]

Smoke Boy:

I disgree with people who romanticise it and proclaim it to be some marriage enhancing way of life and the couple is sooo much more in love and they are soo in tune with their bodies blah, blah, blah.

Bernadette: I don’t understand your references to me:** And, sorry, Smokeboy, I’ve never been so star-crossed in love with my husband because of it.**

What are you talking about?

Hi, Smoke Boy, I was referring to your statement of those who romanticize NFP, like me.

HAM1:

You seem to be of the opinion that there are two ways for a couple to act:

1. Contraception
2. NFP.

That is not the case. The choice is between:

1. Contraception
   2a. Non-NFP
   2b. NFP for a serious reason.

You’re absolutely right; you can’t just use NFP as a means to avoide pregnancy and not be open to life. We do, however, practice it for serious health reasons as I get pregnancy-induced hypertension and because of it my first child was born prematurely:thumbsup:.

Having lived a life with my husband contrary to God’s will for so long, now being in Communion fully with His Church, we’ve used it to once again try to conceive.

Bernadette

 

[Bernadette64]

Bernadette64:

Smoke Boy:

I disgree with people who romanticise it and proclaim it to be some marriage enhancing way of life and the couple is sooo much more in love and they are soo in tune with their bodies blah, blah, blah.

Bernadette: I don’t understand your references to me:** And, sorry, Smokeboy, I’ve never been so star-crossed in love with my husband because of it.**

What are you talking about?

Hi, Smoke Boy, I was referring to your statement of those who romanticize NFP, like me.

HAM1:

You seem to be of the opinion that there are two ways for a couple to act:

1. Contraception
2. NFP.

That is not the case. The choice is between:

1. Contraception
   2a. Non-NFP
   2b. NFP for a serious reason.

You’re absolutely right; you can’t just use NFP as a means to avoide pregnancy and not be open to life. We do, however, practice it for serious health reasons as I get pregnancy-induced hypertension and because of it my first child was born prematurely.

Having lived a life with my husband contrary to God’s will for so long, now being in Communion fully with His Church, we’ve used it to once again try to conceive.

Bernadette
Okay, I need to learn how to the quoting feature. Sorry!

 

[Mum4four]

**Ok. I begin reading the posts and think… “oh, I wanna say this.” But by the time I am through with them all I am overwhelmed. LOL **

Here are my thoughts. We have a better marriage now that we use NFP. We do have serious reasons for it. It has not always been easy. Dh and I are both learning how to weed out the selfishness. (of course the kids do that for us as well. LOL)

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**One thing for me that worked was changing methods. I am not making a judgment on any paticular method. But we did the temp thing with all the cross checking with other symptoms and it just was way too hard. Burden was definitely the word I would use! And it all fell to me. Plus our time was more limited because I wasn’t always sure I was reading it all right. **

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Keith… I don’t know what you are using but for me switching to the Creighton model was a God send!! It is much easier for me… no waking up at a certain time and taking temps. (and dealing with daylight savings time… don’t get me started.)
Check into this. It really helped me and was easier as well as opening up more days for us that before were closed off.

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OK. There is my (name removed by moderator)ut. Good discussion here!
God bless,
Mum

 

[Smoke_Boy]

** We have a better marriage now that we use NFP.**

---

**Mum: Does the fact that you use NFP make your marriage better or is it the fact that you are in line with the Church’s moral teaching that has made your marriage better? **

 

[kristalyn]

I’m just popping back in to say this: I think that some of the misunderstanding in the middle of this thread came from a, well, a misunderstanding.

Keith’s original post made it sound like his wife wants to use artificial birth control, because NFP is a burden. Keith wants to use NFP. That’s how I read it, and how many others read it. So we argued that NFP is not a burden, which compared to ABC, it is not.

Ham, (and possibly others) I think read it as she didn’t want to use any form of birth control, but Keith wants to use NFP. So we argued that NFP is not a burden, which compared to complete Providentialism, it is.

The options, correctly, are:

1. Artificial birth control
2. NFP
3. Providentialism (we leave it all up to God!)

And they are listed from worst to best.

 

[Smoke_Boy]

Kristalyn: Nice summation. I may have inadvertantly highjacked the thread and discussed more of a NFP culture. I hope the discussion has still been edyfing.

 

[Mum4four]

** We have a better marriage now that we use NFP.**

**Mum: Does the fact that you use NFP make your marriage better or is it the fact that you are in line with the Church’s moral teaching that has made your marriage better? **

Smoke Boy,
This question is making me think. Our marriage improved when we started NFP. But, I will also say that it took a few years of using it before we really got what it was all about. We started it to find out how to get pregnant. (Not the best reasons) We stayed on it because by then I had learned that ABC could cause abortions. It was in the use of it and learning more about it in the process that we started to see how God was using it to bring us closer to him.
**Our marriage has improved in many ways for many reasons: getting more in line with the Church about everything, understanding and loving our Faith more, terrible illness in our 2nd son when he was just 16 months old, being in a Teams of Our Lady group with other strong Catholic couples, reading more from our Holy Father and Christopher West on marriage, and as Dr. Paul had mentioned, we had a long time of abstinence and it really changed my husband in many ways. He grew and I grew with him. Our “love life” is wonderful now and this may sound strange to some but I can feel just as loved by him with a hug as anything else. He has told me the same and has shared with other men what NFP has taught him about being a man. **
Now, he has grown as a Catholic in this time as well, but I do think that NFP has changed how he treats me and our love life.
It has helped me to not feel used. NFP has played a big part of that.
*So, I hope this answers your question. To me it is a bit like that old apologist argument you always hear. It is both/and not either/or. ***
Mum

 

[kristalyn]

Smoke Boy:

Kristalyn: Nice summation. I may have inadvertantly highjacked the thread and discussed more of a NFP culture. I hope the discussion has still been edyfing.

It has been a good discussion…and I don’t disagree that NFP is not actually the ideal way to go! Leaving our ENTIRE lives in God’s hands is the way to go (to Heaven!) but we’re only human, and it’s so hard to leave such a thing entirely up to God.

I hope Keith got some answers, though. He didn’t know what to say to his wife, and I’m not so sure he has any more ideas now than he did before!

Still, yes, I believe. Good discussion.

 

[system]

I think we need to remember that NFP is morally valid and it is up to the couple to decide if they need to space or limit their families. Providentialism is a bit pie in the sky, why use anti-biotics then, follow God’s will! Maybe he wants you to get infected and die?

My friend said that she had trouble persuading her husband because of back in the 60s his parents had 7 kids in 10 years(without NFP) so why should he take NFP instruction from a couple that has 7 kids supposedly using NFP?

It seems like you have a mentality that even NFP thwarts God or they say they use it and have 7 kids anyway. Again NFP can be abused but it is allowed and it is not for us on the forum to second guess everyone’s intentions. My friend and her husband have 2 children. He works long hours and she was in her mid 30s when they married. Two is what they can handle. If they choose moral methods to accomplish that, that’s good enough for me. She just turned 42 so this is becoming a moot point more than likely. Even my granmdma who had ten kids from 1920-1939 did not have any past age 43.

What would people say to Andrea Yates if she had used NFP because of her mental inability to cope with all those kids? She may have only had two and the other three would not have been conceived but the two older boys might still be alive.

My point in summation is that there are gray areas in NFP and it is up to the married couple to decide. Just because you can handle 7 kids does not mean everyone else can. Better for a couple to underestimate their abilities and use NFP then to go for broke and wind up divorced or with a dead kid and a wife in jail.

 

[keith2002]

Wow…71 replies to this original posting and I’ve been reading with interest. Thaks for some of the suggestions many of you posted.

A couple of things…

First, my wife does not want to go back to ABC. We have serious reasons for postponing a child now (loss of job, back to school for me to get an advanced degree, etc.). My wife right now for many reasons doesn’t have much interest in the marital act. And when she does have interest it’s during the time we need to abstain to postpone a pregnancy. So it’s very frustrating for her.

Second, the suggestion that I look at myself as having an issue of selfishness made sense and I thing that is an issue with me.

Third, I had printed off an article by the Bishop of St. Agustine abou why the church teaches no contraception and how NFP is acceptable. I had left it out on the table unintentionally and my wife read it on her own. She didn’t have much to say but i wasn’t going to push it much. Glad that she responded to the grace of God to read it.

Thanks for all the interesting feedback.

Keith

 

[Ham1]

Kevin Cassidy:

I think we need to remember that NFP is morally valid and it is up to the couple to decide if they need to space or limit their families. Providentialism is a bit pie in the sky, why use anti-biotics then, follow God’s will! Maybe he wants you to get infected and die?

My friend said that she had trouble persuading her husband because of back in the 60s his parents had 7 kids in 10 years(without NFP) so why should he take NFP instruction from a couple that has 7 kids supposedly using NFP?

It seems like you have a mentality that even NFP thwarts God or they say they use it and have 7 kids anyway. Again NFP can be abused but it is allowed and it is not for us on the forum to second guess everyone’s intentions. My friend and her husband have 2 children. He works long hours and she was in her mid 30s when they married. Two is what they can handle. If they choose moral methods to accomplish that, that’s good enough for me. She just turned 42 so this is becoming a moot point more than likely. Even my granmdma who had ten kids from 1920-1939 did not have any past age 43.

What would people say to Andrea Yates if she had used NFP because of her mental inability to cope with all those kids? She may have only had two and the other three would not have been conceived but the two older boys might still be alive.

My point in summation is that there are gray areas in NFP and it is up to the married couple to decide. Just because you can handle 7 kids does not mean everyone else can. Better for a couple to underestimate their abilities and use NFP then to go for broke and wind up divorced or with a dead kid and a wife in jail.

It seems you are missing the point that some of us have made. CERTAINLY there are reasons to use NFP and NFP is a good thing. However, it is a remedy. NOT the norm.

You call providentialism “pie in the sky” and then quote numerous cases where people SHOULD use NFP. But it is not pie in the sky, it is the design of God the Father.

The use of anti-biotics is a PERFECT example…thank you! Using anti-biotics is a good thing when there is a legitimate reason to use them. If everyone used anti-biotics all the time whether they had an infection or not, that would clearly be a misuse of anti-biotics. Anti-biotics are good when necessary. NFP is the same thing. It is good when necessary, but it is not the rule. Just as with the use of anti-biotics, it is the exception which can be used when certain circumstances are present.

Let’s just be honest and tell people what the Church really teaches about NFP - that it is a good thing that can be used for serious reasons, but not that it is a good thing that should always be used. There is a big difference!

 

[Thomas2]

Hey there Keith!

God bless the efforts of both you and your wife to conform to God’s will for you as a married couple. It takes courage to live counter to the culture of our generation. May Jesus Christ be praised!

May I make one more suggestion? Perhaps praying the Roasry each night with your wife with this very thing in mind and heart might help you get around the corner with this issue. It sure can’t hurt! Trust our Lady to help both of you. You might also begin praying to St. Joseph to help you with your part! In my mind, these two things are the most effective that you can try. With prayer all things are possible and if we aren’t going in the direction we feel God wants us to, we can always pray more!

Peace and all good,

Thomas2

 

[SteveG]

• thats how some of this comes off.
  OK, first apologies for my lame attempt at levity in an otherwise great thread. When I saw SmokeBoy’s comment, I just couldn’t pass up the chance.
  …
  NFP - A day in the life

---

beep-beep-beep, beep-beep-beep.
97.6, Uh oh the thermal shift must have begun.
I don’t think we are ready for another yet.
Oh well, there goes tonight’s fun

Off to work I go,
To make our family some money.
I make my daily call to home,
I ask, ‘How’s your mucus honey?’

‘It’s stretched about 6 inches.’
I guess the verdict’s in it’s true.
Ovulation is imminent
The hazards of…Phase II

I walk in the door and she gives me a look,
She has THAT gleam in her eye
My resistance is quickly breaking down.
After all, I am just a guy.

The kids finally in bed, all’s quiet now.
Queit? Maybe it’s a sign.
She aks me for a ‘back rub’.
Oh well, time to accept another gift from the divine.

…OK, I know it stinks, but if you can do better over your lunch break, feel free.

 

[Ham1]

Sorry Steve, but any songs or poems that use the word “mucus” are inherently bad.

Actually, it’s funny…good job