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TheLittleLady
Guest
Women monitoring their cycles for fertility has been around since the beginning. It got a fancy new name in recent times.
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Xantippe
Guest
I just found the most interesting thing:
"Galen (130-200 AD), the founder of experimental physiology, stands second only to Hippocrates in importance during the ancient period of Greek medicine. His writings dominated medicine until the time of Versalius.
"In his De Sanitate Tuenda, or Hygiene, Galen gave the following advice about breast-feeding.
“I order all women who are nursing babies to abstain completely from sex relations. For menstruation is provoked by intercourse, and the milk no longer remains sweet. Moreover some women become pregnant, than which nothing could be worse for the suckling infant.”
“Meantime the blood of the pregnant naturally becomes less and of inferior quality, so that not only less, but inferior, milk collects in the breasts; so that if a nursing mother should become pregnant, I should strongly advise that another nurse should be procured, thinking and considering that her milk would be better in taste, appearance, and odor.”
Galen was extremely influential throughout the medieval period.
I believe there were also traditional Catholic rules about sexual abstinence for the married during Lent, which continue among the Eastern Orthodox.
I know some people have a picture of traditional life being some sort of marital sexual free-for-all, with babies periodically dropping from the sky, but traditional societies tend to have restrictions on even marital sexuality.
"Galen (130-200 AD), the founder of experimental physiology, stands second only to Hippocrates in importance during the ancient period of Greek medicine. His writings dominated medicine until the time of Versalius.
"In his De Sanitate Tuenda, or Hygiene, Galen gave the following advice about breast-feeding.
“I order all women who are nursing babies to abstain completely from sex relations. For menstruation is provoked by intercourse, and the milk no longer remains sweet. Moreover some women become pregnant, than which nothing could be worse for the suckling infant.”
“Meantime the blood of the pregnant naturally becomes less and of inferior quality, so that not only less, but inferior, milk collects in the breasts; so that if a nursing mother should become pregnant, I should strongly advise that another nurse should be procured, thinking and considering that her milk would be better in taste, appearance, and odor.”
Galen was extremely influential throughout the medieval period.
I believe there were also traditional Catholic rules about sexual abstinence for the married during Lent, which continue among the Eastern Orthodox.
I know some people have a picture of traditional life being some sort of marital sexual free-for-all, with babies periodically dropping from the sky, but traditional societies tend to have restrictions on even marital sexuality.
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LundyLund
Guest
You keep saying the “pre nfp church” taught that children were a blessing, and did not teach that we should prudent. I (and others) have now asked you on numerous occasions to provide some evidence for this assertion. You have yet to do it.
Children being a blessing and couples using prudence in spacing their children is not an either/or proposition, as you seem to make it. In essence, your argument is that couples should forget about prudence (a cardinal virtue, CCC 1806) when it comes to their family size. Because children are blessings, there’s no place for our human discernment.
Food is a blessing from God. So, by your logic, I can’t use the observable conditions (weather, soil, etc.) to discern when to plant or harvest a crop. Because then I’m using my prudence instead of treating food as a blessing from God.
Come forward with a citation to something, anything, in the 2,000 year history of the Church where the Church taught that humans should not exercise prudence in their family size. We’re still waiting.
Children being a blessing and couples using prudence in spacing their children is not an either/or proposition, as you seem to make it. In essence, your argument is that couples should forget about prudence (a cardinal virtue, CCC 1806) when it comes to their family size. Because children are blessings, there’s no place for our human discernment.
Food is a blessing from God. So, by your logic, I can’t use the observable conditions (weather, soil, etc.) to discern when to plant or harvest a crop. Because then I’m using my prudence instead of treating food as a blessing from God.
Come forward with a citation to something, anything, in the 2,000 year history of the Church where the Church taught that humans should not exercise prudence in their family size. We’re still waiting.
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Xantippe
Guest
Prudence is one of the seven traditional virtues.
The theological virtues are faith, hope and charity and the cardinal virtues are: prudence, temperance, fortitude and justice. The cardinal virtues are highly relevant to decisions about marital abstinence.
We don’t need an engraved invitation to apply the virtues to family size. You are quite free to argue that faith, hope charity and fortitude require going for broke–but anybody arguing with you can also claim fortitude, charity, temperance, prudence and justice in support of caution with regard to family size.
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Yeah but it’s also become much more accurate and sophisticated in recent years.
Exactly. Why would the Church teach that you should NOT excercise one of the virtues in a very important area of life?
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goout
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Here is the root of your problem.starlady:
Can anyone here name for me something that has a sinful nature , something other than nfp that the church classifies this way?
Sex is not sinful by nature.
Your view of the Church’s teaching is distorted.
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ByWhatAuthority
Guest
You are the one throwing out the idea that the church in the past suggested we use “prudence” to determine family size. It is on YOU to prove YOUR point that this happened.
I’ve already shown that there is a difference in terminology. So now it on you! Show me where the pre HV church said anything about limiting family size for anything other then a serious reason.
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TheAmazingGrace
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Why bother? You don’t think serious reasons exist anyway.
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Xantippe
Guest
It’s not “micromanaging” if we parents are the lowest possible management level making the decision (and we are).
Micromanaging would be the Church telling all married people to have 8+ kids.
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Xantippe
Guest
Prudence is how one identifies serious reasons.
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ktmeyer
Guest
Um, Prudence is a virtue that the church has always taught. In all things. It’s one of the cardinal virtues for heaven’s sake!
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ktmeyer
Guest
At 25 you know plenty of people that have no college degree and are raising large families, say 5 kids or more?
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ktmeyer
Guest
And we have shown you there was NO change in the terminology, just in the english translation of it. The church is not based on English, the Latin has remained the same.
And believe it or not, not being able to afford food/healthcare, not having time to spend with another child, having an illness that is aggravated by lack of sleep, or just plain knowing your own limits ARE serious reasons.
The hubris of a 25 yr old (are you even married? Have kids?) telling middle aged people who have raised children your age or nearly so, when they should and should not have sex and how many children they need to have is remarkable. Honestly, I’m not sure if you are naive, or trolling.
Children are a blessing, yes. That doesn’t mean I can’t decide that I need a break from childbearing. Food is a blessing too! But that doesn’t mean I can’t go on a diet! Me limiting my food doesn’t mean I am selfish or think it isn’t a blessing. It means I’m being prudent. Same with me deciding “man, Hubby is looking hot tonight, but I’m ovulating and I haven’t slept a full night in 8 years, so I think I’ll just cuddle on the couch with him tonight instead.” That is NOT sinful. And you going AGAINST the teachings of the Magisterium, whom you as a Catholic should be obeying, and telling people it is is something you should discuss with your confessor.
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Xantippe
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…that are your age or no more than 5 years older than you?
I doubt that very much.
I also can’t help but notice that omgriley refuses to say how many children he has, or whether he has any at all.
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Xantippe
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I don’t think ByWhatAuthority has mentioned his or her age.
omgriley is the 25-year-old in the thread.
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ktmeyer
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Oops! My bad!
That’s what happens when you post while sleep deprived, thanks to the latest blessing, who just turned 9 months, lol!
And yes, me being sleep deprived IS just reason to refrain from trying to conceive.
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Xantippe
Guest
Yes, now that you mention it, claiming that there’s some huge contradiction between Catholic teachings of the last 160+ years and Catholic tradition and that the Church has been teaching error for the last 160 years is really odd behavior from a supposedly faithful Catholic.
A faithful Catholic ought to be a) docile and obedient and b) have an presumption that there is continuity and development in Catholic doctrine.
This is a very good book, by the way:
(That’s Cardinal Newman’s “Essay on the Development of Christian Doctrine” (1845).)
For the Catholic faithful (!), it’s not a good look to be speaking as if the last dozen popes were heretics.
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babochka
Guest
The Church hurch teaches that we are called to Prudence in everything. Prudence is a cardinal virtue that we should always exercise in life. The Church has never specifically applied it to family size as far as I know, but the Church has also not specifically spoken on how much a rich person should donate to charity, nor has it spoken on how much a poor person should donate to charity. These are matters of prudence. We simply know that we are called to be generous with what God has given us. The Church does not tell us how much an individual person can drink in individual circumstances, we are simply to avoid drunkenness. This can change with various circumstances, even with the same person.
Abstinence is not sinful. Periodic abstinence, by mutual consent, is even approved by Saint Paul. Artificial contraception is sinful.
The Church cannot possibly make a list of selfish reasons to use NFP because the Church doesn’t know. That would be a matter to be decided by an individual conscience, guided by a good confessor, if necessary. One can be selfish with food, with money, with time, with married sex…with just about everything. I’m not sure why you put sexual abstinence in its own special category.
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vsedriver
Guest
There is nothing wrong with regulating the amount of children you will have. Mary and Joseph regulated the amount of children they had. Using God’s natural method of regulating children is not wrong. It doesn’t suggest that the couple are ‘rejecting’ or are closed to life at all.
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