NFP?

[iamscifimike]

If your argument is that it is acceptable because it does not have the abortifacient features of some birth control pills - then why not use condoms? They are not abortifacients…

Goal of condom usage = prevent pregnancy

Goal of NFP = prevent pregnancy

No, I don’t think abortafacient = contraceptive
I am saying that contraceptive != birth control ( ! = not )

I also don’t believe that NFP = prevent pregnancy
It can be misused to those ends and that misuse I object to.
On this I think we agree.

When you practice NFP you must be open to procreation with every sexual act.

 

[billpenn]

What do you make of Pius XII’s allowance for couples to use NFP for grave reasons in 1951? I can only interpret it as a compromise of the traditional Roman Catholic teaching.

God bless,

Adam

I think it was a compromise…I think he made this allowance in a series of speeches.

 

[billpenn]

No, I don’t think abortafacient = contraceptive
I am saying that contraceptive != birth control ( ! = not )

I also don’t believe that NFP = prevent pregnancy
It can be misused to those ends and that misuse I object to.
On this I think we agree.

When you practice NFP you must be open to procreation with every sexual act.

But you practice it…WHY? to avoid pregnancy…no?

 

[ForeverAdam]

When you practice NFP you must be open to procreation with every sexual act.

You mean that you must be open to father/mother the accidents that may result from your deliberate attempt to keep a particular conjugal act’s procreative end from being preserved. That is the only openness to life that NFP has.

God bless,

Adam

 

[wanner47]

Space children through continence, not an act that has, as its intention, the avoidance of pregnancy…and therefore the subordination of the primary ends of the act to its secondary ends.

Continence? Hard…um…OF COURSE. But this is just another cross to bear for our Lord.

Matthew 16:24 - “Then said Jesus unto his disciples, If any man will come after me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross, and follow me.”

The one time you have sex because you want to enjoy one of its secondary benefits while avoiding its primary end, you SUBORDINATE it’s chief end to its ancillary ends.

Again, back to Casti Connubii:

Pope Pius XI, in Casti Connubii, #54, said that the “conjugal act is destined primarily by nature for the begetting of children…”

He goes on to say in #59 that “…in the use of the matrimonial right there are also secondary ends, such as mutual aid, the cultivating of mutual love and the quieting of concupisence which husband and wife are not forbidden to consider so long as they are subordinated to the primary end and so long as the intrinsic nature of the act is preserved.”

St. Ceasar of Arles said, “As often as he knows his wife without a desire for children, without a doubt he commits sin.” (from the Faith of the Early Fathers, by Jurgens, 1970.)

Why, then, would God create a woman’s cycle with infertile periods if His primary purpose for sex is procreation? Wouldn’t it make more sense for a woman to be fertile 24/7/365, like a man is, if that was the case? Or wouldn’t it make more sense for a woman to have no clue when her infertile period was instead of having clearly recognizable signs such as fertile quality cervical mucus, high basal body temp, etc.?

Moreover, do you believe that God would allow His Church to teach such serious error if NFP was so evil and wrong? Wouldn’t that indicate that the gates of Hell had prevailed against the Church?

One can use NFP to abstain while still being subordinate to the primary purpose of sexual intercourse. Procreation isn’t JUST putting tab A into slot B. It’s also making sure that you can provide the basics – food, shelter, adequate clothing – for the children you to bear. If you’re not in a situation to support another child, either due to one’s ill health or one’s financial status, the most responsible thing you can do is to postpone procreation using God’s own design.

 

[ForeverAdam]

I think it was a compromise…I think he made this allowance in a series of speeches.

I believe that this compromise by Pius XII sparked the birth control debate that raged within the Roman Catholic Church in the 1960s. By maintaining the traditional teaching that every conjugal act possesses both the primary and secondary ends given to it by God, while allowing couples to deliberately dispense the procreative end for grave reasons, only begged the question of why barrier methods that essentially do the same thing couldn’t be allowed. Many people blame Paul VI for the birth control debate. However, Pius XII, by his compromise, caused it to start.

God bless,

Adam

 

[wanner47]

You mean that you must be open to father/mother the accidents that may result from your deliberate attempt to keep a particular conjugal act’s procreative end from being preserved. That is the only openness to life that NFP has.

God bless,

Adam

The baby I lost was conceived while my husband and I were using NFP to avoid. S/he was NOT an “accident.” S/he was a surprise gift that, sadly, was taken from us entirely too soon.

 

[wanner47]

I believe that this compromise by Pius XII sparked the birth control debate that raged within the Roman Catholic Church in the 1960s. By maintaining the traditional teaching that every conjugal act possesses both the primary and secondary ends given to it by God, while allowing couples to deliberately dispense the procreative end for grave reasons, only begged the question of why barrier methods that essentially do the same thing couldn’t be allowed. Many people blame Paul VI for the birth control debate. However, Pius XII, by his compromise, caused it to start.

God bless,

Adam

Because barrier methods are ARTIFICIAL.

NFP is merely using God’s own design for a woman’s body to avoid for *grave *reasons. Thermometers and charts are only aids in charting a cycle; they don’t provide the means for conception or abstinence, they provide information about the woman’s cycle. It is the couple that decides what to do (try to conceive or abstain) with that information.

As I said before, procreation isn’t just sex. It’s also responsible parenthood. Is it responsible to put God to the test by bringing another life in the world that you cannot afford to feed and clothe?

 

[ForeverAdam]

Why, then, would God create a woman’s cycle with infertile periods if His primary purpose for sex is procreation? Wouldn’t it make more sense for a woman to be fertile 24/7/365, like a man is, if that was the case?

The woman still has her strongest desire for marital intercourse when she is fertile. I think this moots your point about the woman’s infertile cycle being a sign that God doesn’t want procreation to generally come from the conjugal act.

Or wouldn’t it make more sense for a woman to have no clue when her infertile period was instead of having clearly recognizable signs such as fertile quality cervical mucus, high basal body temp, etc.?

God didn’t tell you to buy instruments that reveal these things anymore than God tells couples to invest in latex.

One can use NFP to abstain while still being subordinate to the primary purpose of sexual intercourse. Procreation isn’t JUST putting tab A into slot B. It’s also making sure that you can provide the basics – food, shelter, adequate clothing – for the children you to bear. If you’re not in a situation to support another child, either due to one’s ill health or one’s financial status, the most responsible thing you can do is to postpone procreation using God’s own design.

You’ve just conceded the legitimacy of barrier methods. God’s own design cannot be used to do something that he opposes (which in this case, if you hold the traditional Roman Catholic belief, would be to deliberately attempt to cause the procreative end written into every conjugal act to not be present). If we can use nature to do this, we can use artificiality. Nature in the human schema only has moral value if it approximates to God’s law.

God bless,

Adam

 

[ForeverAdam]

Because barrier methods are ARTIFICIAL?

That’s immaterial. Transportation via vehicles is artificial too. It’s not wrong. Something artificial is only wrong if it breaks God’s law. If his law allows you to deliberately reject the procreative end written into every conjugal act then this may be done by either natural or artifical means, just as if God lets you get from point A to point B, this can be done either by natural walking or artificial transportation in a vehicle.

As I said before, procreation isn’t just sex. It’s also responsible parenthood. Is it responsible to put God to the test by bringing another life in the world that you cannot afford to feed and clothe?

You just developed the definition of the procreative end of the conjugal act. That’s interesting.

God bless,

Adam

 

[kleary]

As we were taught through NFP classes, the only reason allowed to specifically abstain purposefully of the marital act in order to avoid pregnancy is for grave reasons and not for financial gain so to say.

And no virginia, the withdrawl meathod is not part of NFP- any sexual act that has the man ejaculating outside the woman is NOT NFP- many people have this confused- especially my wife’s OBGYN who suggested using condoms or the withdrawl meathod since no pills are allowed.

We have three and one on the way. We finally were able to track the cycle- in my wife’s case we have to abstain for 22 days or so once her cycle begins…that requires a LOT of discipline- we knew the lack of it would bring our fourth child to come- but I felt it best for us to have 4 to fill up our table with no empty seats at dinner time and take a chance in it being a girl (2 boys and 2 girls) . Now the table is full so I am going to put a TV in the bedroom and be more attentive and disciplined. With the current house up for sale and looking for another with bigger bedrooms and house prices so high - me the only one with the full time job- wife with part time job…well I guess you can consider that grave reason, to use NFP. We are just getting by as it is now.

Ken

 

[ForeverAdam]

The baby I lost was conceived while my husband and I were using NFP to avoid. S/he was NOT an “accident.” S/he was a surprise gift that, sadly, was taken from us entirely too soon.

I’m sorry to hear about that. May God bless you and be assured that your baby is safe and loved in the arms of God right now.

God bless,

Adam

 

[iamscifimike]

But you practice it…WHY? to avoid pregnancy…no?

Yes, I have a 5 yr old a 2 1/2 yr old and a 10 month old. I am an Intern and my wife is a part time nurse. Catholic school tuition just hit our wallet hard. It wouldn’t be prudent to have another kid now for both those reasons.

I see NFP as more of a healthy and obedient sexual lifestyle. If your not planning your family, your being irresponsible to it. Some people can afford to have kids often, physically as well as financially. God Bless them. ( I wish we could ) what of the rest of us the rest of us?

 

[universalindult]

By maintaining the traditional teaching that every conjugal act possesses both the primary and secondary ends given to it by God, while allowing couples to deliberately dispense the procreative end for grave reasons, only begged the question of why barrier methods that essentially do the same thing couldn’t be allowed.

This is just wrong. Do you deny the distinction here?:

NFP vs Contraception

Spacing children may be a desirable goal that does not violate God’s laws in certain serious situations such as those outlined above. But the means of achieving the goal differ. One is intrinsically evil (abortion, abortifacient contraception, barrier methods, sterilization) while one is morally neutral (Natural Family Planning.)

**In one, an act is performed (sex) but its natural outcome is artificially foiled. In the other, no act is performed (simple abstinence during fertile times) so there IS no act, therefore the practice is morally neutral. It is then the intention of using NFP that constitutes its relative moral licitness or illicitness.

If NFP is used in a selfish manner, it too can be sinful. If it is used only in grave circumstances, it is not sinful.

The difference is real.**

Dieting (decreasing caloric intake, the act of NOT eating) is a moral and responsible means of losing weight to maintain the body’s health.

Bulimia (the ACT of eating, them vomiting) is rightly called an eating DISORDER. An ACT is performed (eating in this case) and its natural outcome (nutrition) is foiled by expelling the food from the body.

Likewise contraception is a disorder. An ACT is performed (sex) and its natural outcome (procreation) is foiled by expelling the sperm or egg or both (abortifacient contraceptives) from the body.

Contraception is to NFP what Bulimia is to dieting. But just as dieting can be misused (anorexia) so too can NFP be misused in a sinful manner.

Yours is a perfect example of the Pharisaicalism present within some camps of the traditionalist movement.

You will not bend your will, even to the wisdom of pre-VII popes. You tie up heavy packages (“all NFP is contraceptive and thus immoral”) and place them on the shoulders of others.

You are just as wrong as those who would claim that the use of NFP can never be sinful.

Sad.

 

[iamscifimike]

You mean that you must be open to father/mother the accidents that may result from your deliberate attempt to keep a particular conjugal act’s procreative end from being preserved. That is the only openness to life that NFP has.

God bless,

Adam

No NFP within the teaching of the church requires openness beyond happy accidents. I think it’s an oxymoron to say I’ll lovingly accept any gift God gives me in the form of a child, but then think it won’t happen because I plan my family through abstnence. Abstinence being the method of birth control employed by NFP. If you take to an exteme the position against NFP then you get the position that everytime your wife is fertile you must try to conceive. Marital abstinance becomes improper. Is it ok to have intercourse with your wife when she is pregnant even though she cannot conceive? If so, then it is ok to have intercourse with your wife when she “cannot” conceive.

 

[wanner47]

The woman still has her strongest desire for marital intercourse when she is fertile. I think this moots your point about the woman’s infertile cycle being a sign that God doesn’t want procreation to generally come from the conjugal act.

And the strong desire I have for my husband during my fertile period gives me an opportunity to “fast” from intercourse and unite my suffering with Christ. Even St. Paul recognized that such an act was permissible.

Do not deprive each other except by mutual consent and for a time, so that you may devote yourselves to prayer. Then come together again so that Satan will not tempt you because of your lack of self-control. 1 Corinthians 7:5

If God had intended for couples NEVER to abstain so as to not frustrate the procreative purpose of the conjugal act, why the above?

God didn’t tell you to buy instruments that reveal these things anymore than God tells couples to invest in latex.

How do you know that God doesn’t intend for us to make use of th instruments we develop using our God-given intellect, as long as we aren’t using those instruments to attempt to deny or directly contravent His will?

My husband and I used NFP to time intercourse when trying to conceive the the child I currently carry. Was it sinful, then, to use the thermometer and charts to *achieve *procreation?

Like I said, the thermometer and charts provide INFORMATION. They don’t say, “Have sex now” or “don’t have sex now”. It is the COUPLE that makes those decisions, not the thermometer and not the charts.

I use my eyes to determine if my cervical fluid is fertile or not. Would that make my eyes sinful instruments, as well?

You’ve just conceded the legitimacy of barrier methods. God’s own design cannot be used to do something that he opposes

Bolding is mine. Last time I checked, condoms weren’t God’s design. However, a woman’s menstrual cycle IS his design.

Condoms are a man-made invention that can be used to attempt to circumvent God’s plan for our fertility by working DIRECTLY AGAINST his design, not WITH his design.

The primary use of condoms is to prevent pregnancy. The primary use of NFP is NOT to prevent pregnancy; it is to track a woman’s menstrual cycle. It is then up to the couple in question to discern God’s will and decide if it would be more responsible to use the information gained from NFP abstain or more responsible to use that information to conceive.

(which in this case, if you hold the traditional Roman Catholic belief, would be to deliberately attempt to cause the procreative end written into every conjugal act to not be present). If we can use nature to do this, we can use artificiality. Nature in the human schema only has moral value if it approximates to God’s law.

What you don’t seem to understand is that in the case of a woman’s infertile period, it is not humans who are causing the procreative end not to be present – it is GOD who has made that decision by His design of the menstrual cycle.

The procreative element still exists if a couple decides to abstain from intercourse. It’s simply not utilized. Neither God nor the Church mandates that every single procreative instance of a woman’s menstrual cycle must be utilized, otherwise we would be commanded to have intercourse every day of a woman’s fertile period.

 

[JButky]

Since procreation is written into the nature of every conjugal act, any deliberate action/behavior taken by the couple to prevent conception from occurring could only be defined as an attempt to play God and remove what he, himself, established as part of the nature of conjugal union (an action otherwise known as contraception). This would make NFP equal to barrier methods of contraception. Under this belief, barrier methods of contraception would differ from NFP only in that they delay the removal of the act’s procreative nature a little longer.

Non-sequitur. This line of reasoning ignores too many facets and establishes rather funny conclusions. You only give one and ignore the rest.

One can also conclude from your initial line of reasoning that:
The behavior to prevent conception from occurring could also mean refraining from sex all the time. It also implies that married couples should only engage in sex when they know they will get pregnant. By your reasoning, you too run the risk of reversing the primary and secondary functions. You now have the same problem approached from the diametrically opposed direction (ironic isn’t it?) How you then go from there to equating barrier methods and NFP is way beyond any logical deduction. That reasoning is akin to throwing a spear in the air and after it lands declaring, “Yep, just where I thought it would go”.

I believe that the Roman Catholic Church traditionally taught this belief of the primary and secondary ends of the conjugal act existing in their divinely established order in every conjugal act.

Nothing in NFP contradicts that. Do people abuse it? Sure…but the practice of abuse does not negate the reasoning for the original practice of NFP itself. Reason does not allow you to “throw the baby out with the bath water”

By deliberately altering your sexual activity in order to arrive at a marital act that lacks procreativity is to violate the objective procreative end that God, himself, placed into the act.

As we have discussed, this is not a problem with NFP itself, but with NFP used in an abusive manner.

Since the objective procreative end of the act is always present any attempt to keep it from realizing itself is to do violence against the nature of the marital act that the Lord designed.

How can an objective pro-creative end of an act take place when there is no action?
Once again, this appears to imply that there must be or you must cause there to be an act. I realize you are discussing the impetus of action, however in doing so you are creating a syllogism in the process utilizing too many implied variables to reach your conclusion.

Are either you or Bill married?

Joe B
NFP practicing father of 9

 

[historybrat]

While I don’t practice NFP, mainly cause I’m single, I am open to the possiblity of using when I am married for many reasons:

1. NFP should only be used for grave reasons. It’s not designed to be the Catholic answer to ABC. With prayer I believe we are able to discern whether or not God wants us to use it or not.
2. The Pope allows it. (Pretty much this is enough for me)
3. I am not a breeding machine. God gave me dignity as a woman. By not allowing for the possiblity of abstaining during certain times, a lot of posters here are just as bad as those who support ABC. Women are not here just for men’s pleasure nor are they here simply to procreate. NFP allows for a balance between the two extremes. While I would never deny God’s gift of life, should I ever be granted the opportunity of being a mother, I don’t necessarily think the whole meaning of my life should be tied to procreation. Its very easy for guys to not want to do NFP, because they don’t do with the physical affects.
4. No less an authority than St. Paul claimed that it was okay to abstain and focus on things like prayer. If he said its good enough for me.

I don’t have tons of church documents lying around to quote from. If you have honestly prayed and tried to discern God’s will for you and don’t believe that he wants you to practice NFP that fine. However, many popes have said as long as its done correctly (grave reason, prayerful discernment, etc) it is moral and okay to do. I will always follow the popes before anyone on this site (not that I don’t love all of you )

Historybrat

 

[ForeverAdam]

If you take to an exteme the position against NFP then you get the position that everytime your wife is fertile you must try to conceive. Marital abstinance becomes improper.

This is incorrect. If every conjugal act has its primary and secondary end intact (which is the traditional Roman Catholic teaching) my only obligation is not to do anything deliberate to prevent one of these ends from being preserved. This doesn’t prevent me from living a normal married life of abstinence for the sake of prayer and fasting and intercourse when my wife and I desire it. However, it does prevent me from doing something deliberate to ensure that the primary end of procreation is removed. It is obvious that “deliberate” here refers to activities deliberately designed to keep procreation out of the conjugal act, not the functioning of a normal Christian marriage, which has nothing to do with a deliberate intent to keep procreation from occurring in the conjugal act.

Btw, have you found an answer as to why NFP is approved even though it frustrates the primary purpose of marriage and the conjugal act (which is procreation) yet?

God bless,

Adam

 

[ForeverAdam]

Nothing in NFP contradicts that. Do people abuse it? Sure…but the practice of abuse does not negate the reasoning for the original practice of NFP itself. Reason does not allow you to “throw the baby out with the bath water”

If the primary and secondary ends of the conjugal union exist in every conjugal act and NFP involves a deliberate attempt to keep procreation from occurring, then you are contradicting the command to keep both ends of the conjugal act intact.

As we have discussed, this is not a problem with NFP itself, but with NFP used in an abusive manner.

All of NFP is an abuse of the procreative end intrinsic to every conjugal act.

How can an objective pro-creative end of an act take place when there is no action? Once again, this appears to imply that there must be or you must cause there to be an act. I realize you are discussing the impetus of action, however in doing so you are creating a syllogism in the process utilizing too many implied variables to reach your conclusion.

But the conjugal act will eventually occur and it will either bear the marks of you trying to keep its intrinsic nature of procreation from being present or it will not. With NFP it will bear the marks of the latter and this is contraception.

Are either you or Bill married?

I think Bill is. I’m not. But neither were the Popes who said that it was wrong to deliberately frustrate the intrinsic procreativity of the conjugal act.

God bless,

Adam