On Marriage, Sex & Confession

[upnorth123]

Had a few questions, wasn’t quite sure how to distribute them among forums, thought I’d stop here first.

We are getting married in six months! SO excited. Prior to discerning engagement, we’d been engaging in premarital sex and using ABC. Post-engagement (especially post-conversation-with-our-intense-priest!), we mutually agreed on abstaining until the wedding and my stopping the pill. It’s been about 3 months and sometimes it’s difficult but ultimately rewarding (and I’ve got to say, getting off the pill does make sex seem alternately more scary/sacred because of the potential to create life!).

I haven’t made a full confession yet, and I intend to before the wedding. Weird clincher ahead: we’re out of state for grad school and getting married back home. Both our priest here and our hometown priest that’s actually marrying us know we’ve engaged in premarital sex. If I confess here, and then make a confession post-rehearsal ahead of the wedding, will my priest back home judge me if I don’t RE-confess the past sexual sins? I just don’t want him to think I’m withholding that confession or that I’ve sinned those sins as I had in the past…

Also, we’re in the midst of a 3 month course on NFP through our parish right now. I am not kidding when I say the woman’s educational materials are from 1976 and prepared for illiterate women in Africa. There’s also some sketchy “research” included: one study done by a nurse who found that nightlights/street lamps filtering in through blinds can induce ovulation, and “statistical evidence” from our teacher that double ovulation can happen wherein 2 eggs are dropped a week plus apart-- my biologist partner could barely hold his tongue. Where can I find 21st century, approachable materials for my future husband and I? We’re pretty resistent to the anti-BC propoganda that’s filling our folders at the moment-- we’d much rather see materials that effectively argue FOR the method we plan on using post-wedding, you know?

Thanks in advance for any advice or direction!

 

[Erich]

If I confess here, and then make a confession post-rehearsal ahead of the wedding, will my priest back home judge me if I don’t RE-confess the past sexual sins? I just don’t want him to think I’m withholding that confession or that I’ve sinned those sins as I had in the past…

“Bless me, Father, for I have sinned. It has been since my last confession…”

Why would he think you’re withholding anything? Particularly if “N weeks ago” you were still out of state and couldn’t have confessed to your priest back home?

 

[fastenatingguy]

Go to confession ASAP.

There is nothing wrong with “setting the scene” for your upcoming confession:

“Father, several months ago, my fiance and I … BUT…”

May God bless you both on your wedding day.

 

[TraderTif]

I’ve been real happy with the Creighton method of NFP. Very scientific and all that.

creightonmodel.com/

You’ll need an instructor to teach you, but it’s totally worth it!!

(Also useful to uncover health problems!!)

 

[1ke]

will my priest back home judge me if I don’t RE-confess the past sexual sins?

No.

Also, we’re in the midst of a 3 month course on NFP through our parish right now. I am not kidding when I say the woman’s educational materials are from 1976 and prepared for illiterate women in Africa.

Which in no way makes the informaiton inaccurate.

I am sure you do not mean to, but you have come across in a very condescending tone here. It is really sort of insulting to African women.

There’s also some sketchy “research” included: one study done by a nurse who found that nightlights/street lamps filtering in through blinds can induce ovulation

I am not sure you can classify this information as “sketchy”, there is actually quite a bit of research that has been done on the relationship between light and menstrual cycles. See for example:

onemoresoul.com/catalog/effects-of-light-on-the-menstrual-cycle-and-fertility-p316.html

ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC1851732/

shanspirations.org/?p=87

sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0306453098000754

brn.sagepub.com/content/9/1/49.short

and “statistical evidence” from our teacher that double ovulation can happen wherein 2 eggs are dropped a week plus apart-- my biologist partner could barely hold his tongue.

I cannot comment as I have no knowledge of this topic nor the study referenced.

Where can I find 21st century, approachable materials for my future husband and I?

Well, there are four main methods of NFP:

Sympto Thermal
Creighton Model Fertility Care
Billings Ovulation Model
Marquette Model

You can google these for information and possible instructors. Some offer distance teaching if no certified teachers are in your area.

What method are you currently learning?

We’re pretty resistent to the anti-BC propoganda that’s filling our folders at the moment-- we’d much rather see materials that effectively argue FOR the method we plan on using post-wedding, you know?

Contraception is a grave sin against God, so if that is what you have been told it isn’t propaganda.

i can suggest a lot of good material available at the www.omsoul.com website.

I think on the spiritual side of the house the book Life Giving Love by Kimberly Hahn might be a good investment. NFP is not just contraception by another name. They are fundamentally different.

And, NFP is for times when there are serious reasons to space children, not to be used simply as a matter of course.

 

[Aggies08]

As far as NFP resources, I rather like the SECULAR book Taking Charge of Your Fertility

amazon.com/Taking-Charge-Fertility-Anniversary-Edition/dp/0060881909/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1340156094&sr=8-1&keywords=taking+charge+of+your+fertility

You will just need to ignore the “use condoms during your fertile period” comments.

As a fellow scientist to your BF… in reproduction (animal, though), I commiserate with the crazy things that y’all may be hearing… where people come up with these things…

 

[Iheartcoffee]

Look into some of the things written by Dr. Thomas Hilgers. He is doing research NOW and he backs his work up with hard facts and numbers. My husband and I both have biology backgrounds. (Mine in neurobiology and his in genetics). We were pretty frustrated with the presentation of a lot of the “data” in our classes. Frankly, some of it was absolute junk. We were fed a lot of hype that sounded like hard core “attachment parenting” and the papers they cited for it were from back in the days when autism was seen as a failure of the mother to love her child enough. With my neurobio background I had heard of the theories taught in the NFP class…when my other classes were discussing the HISTORY of psychology.

There is better and newer data out there for NFP but the class we had was several decades behind. We just kind of had to bite our tongues and get through the parts that made us cringe so we could get to the actual NFP instructions.

I have been thinking for a while about a way to bring some of the NFP classes into the 21st century. It’s no wonder people discredit it when so many of the classes are so behind on the science. The method itself works. It’s the random data they try to throw in around the edges that I can shoot 100 holes through. My husband and I haven’t been married very long, but I think when we have a couple of years of NFP use behind us I want to get involved and teach. The NFP world does need some serious overhauls to make it competitive.

One of the big gripes I have is the ever-repeated “98% of couples that use NFP do not get divorced! It protects your marriage!” Frankly, when you look at the couples that use NFP in the first place, those are already the ones that don’t tend to believe in divorce in the first place… Correlation and causation are not the same thing.

Oh goodness…I’ve been ranting. Oh well. It needs to be heard. I rant with love. I want NFP to get some respect, but it needs to bring its materials up to speed and work on its image a bit. I see far too many NFP materials created to “preach to the choir”. They are written for those that are already 100% on board. We need to write for the skeptics.

 

[TheRealJuliane]

Look into some of the things written by Dr. Thomas Hilgers. He is doing research NOW and he backs his work up with hard facts and numbers. My husband and I both have biology backgrounds. (Mine in neurobiology and his in genetics). We were pretty frustrated with the presentation of a lot of the “data” in our classes. Frankly, some of it was absolute junk. We were fed a lot of hype that sounded like hard core “attachment parenting” and the papers they cited for it were from back in the days when autism was seen as a failure of the mother to love her child enough. With my neurobio background I had heard of the theories taught in the NFP class…when my other classes were discussing the HISTORY of psychology.

There is better and newer data out there for NFP but the class we had was several decades behind. We just kind of had to bite our tongues and get through the parts that made us cringe so we could get to the actual NFP instructions.

I have been thinking for a while about a way to bring some of the NFP classes into the 21st century. It’s no wonder people discredit it when so many of the classes are so behind on the science. The method itself works. It’s the random data they try to throw in around the edges that I can shoot 100 holes through. My husband and I haven’t been married very long, but I think when we have a couple of years of NFP use behind us I want to get involved and teach. The NFP world does need some serious overhauls to make it competitive.

One of the big gripes I have is the ever-repeated “98% of couples that use NFP do not get divorced! It protects your marriage!” Frankly, when you look at the couples that use NFP in the first place, those are already the ones that don’t tend to believe in divorce in the first place… Correlation and causation are not the same thing.

Oh goodness…I’ve been ranting. Oh well. It needs to be heard. I rant with love. I want NFP to get some respect, but it needs to bring its materials up to speed and work on its image a bit. I see far too many NFP materials created to “preach to the choir”. They are written for those that are already 100% on board. We need to write for the skeptics.

:clapping::clapping::dancing:

I LOVE it that you are motivated to improve NFP teaching!!! Can’t wait to hear about your success once you get going!!!

 

[upnorth123]

Thanks for the feedback thus far! I’m new here so it’s nice to get a warm reception.
Will definitely head to the confessional ASAP. Forget sometimes that it’s not a place of judgement.
As far as the NFP materials-- meant no condescension. My apologies for poor wording. We indicated ahead of meeting with the instructor that we’d been charting for a few months, had science backgrounds etc. and were presented with drawings depicting seasonal shifts/seed germination as analogies-- “It’s wintertime here, see the snow? So it’s dry like in your cycle” while we’re thinking snow=precipitation, just frozen, and what part of the cycle does this match with? It would be fair, I suppose, if there’d been the supplemental info to go along with the analogies. Instead, it was just some posterboard drawings and a teacher who couldn’t answer our questions about short luteal phases, low progesterone etc. If this is something that we are going to utilize we need to be able to reconcile it with my individual cycle that is not necessarily textbook. She had no examples or information regarding cycles with anything deviating from a 14 day luteal phase, for example, or how to interpret charts/make decisions about intercourse if you have more than one patch of fertile-quality fluid. I think to 100% understand and feel comfortable with the method we may need to seek additional education from a source outside our parish.
Regarding using NFP when we are married, we have discerned together valid and serious reasons to wait to build our family. We do (well, will!) remain open to life by not contracepting. The language of propaganda fits, for me, with the Church’s desire to lead people away from BC with somewhat biased materials. It’s the teacher’s decision of course-- just simply stating my preference for more PRO-NFP materials that resonate with my social location rather than ANTI-the other side.
Thanks for the recs re: books, studies etc. We’ve got some time here before this needs to be implemented so we will check them out.

 

[1ke]

I would suggest Creighton if you have luteal phase issues. Charting Creighton allows you to see a NaPro doctor should you need one.

Do look up both creighton model and the Pope Paul VI center.