Openness to Life?

[silicasandra]

I think another point to bring up regarding the use of NFP is that using NFP is not always intended to avoid pregnancy for whatever reason - it is used by couples who are trying to conceive, as well.

A condom is ONLY used to contracept (and avoid disease if that’s an issue). It cannot be used for something else (well, it probably could, but not on the advice of the manufacturer. ) The use of NFP is entirely dependent on the couple using it - it can be used to maximize or minimize the chance of conception, which makes it unlike any other “family planning method.”

 

[wynnejj]

So NFP isn’t sinful during the ACT of having sex (or abstaining)…but could a couple’s SYSTEMIC use of NFP be sinful if the couple used NFP to prevent conception for selfish reasons?

Is this a selfish reason? If I’m an environmental nut, and I fully believe to save the planet many couples should choose not to have children. Hypothetically, my wife & I have decided to forgo children but not the unitive aspects available via a strict regimen of NFP to prevent children. That is, a kind of new age Josephite marriage with marital relations.

 

[wynnejj]

Well, here’s an analogy for you. Suppose I am a cab driver who gets paid by the hour, not by the number of rides I give. I am lazy and want to get paid without actually giving anyone a ride. So here is what I do. On the nights when the opera is playing, I wait around the ballpark. And on nights when there is a baseball game, I sit outside the opera house. Neat, eh? Needless to say, my cab is rarely hailed and I get to sit a lot. Now my boss complains that I am not doing my job. My response to him is that I am physically open to giving people cab rides. I am doing the very thing that, at other times, would result in getting customers. But I am using my knowledge of timing (like NFP) to avoid that consequence.

Now there is another cab driver (call him “Bill”) who also is lazy like me, but he avoids work a different way. He waits in his cab at the proper venue, but he hangs a dead fish in the window to discourage customers with the smell (like contraception). Needless to say, our boss is not very happy with him either.

So is there a substantial difference between my technique of avoiding work and the one Bill uses?

Very good analogy of active versus passive means to obtain a goal without earning the goal. Neither case would be the case of a cabby acting responsibly to his master and employer.

Then there might be the very good reason to avoid a venue when there is some threat to cabby or fares, such as avoiding an area experiencing a riot, a bad neighborhood, etc. Such real world precautions might be termed “responsible cabby-hood”.

Responsible parenthood asks married couples to be generous but prudent when regulating births for family size and the good of all. Such a cabby in our example would be generous going to a riot area or bad neighborhood to pick up a fare, but not necessarily prudent. Nevertheless the cabby and parents are actually heroes if a cabby is willing to pick up fares under such unfavorable conditions and pulls it off successfully, as well as married couples who have successful large families under unfavorable financial conditions.

 

[jjervis]

I don’t think the fact that both NFP and condoms are more or less equally effective makes a difference, because the effectiveness of each is outside of our control. What I think makes a difference is the INTENTION of the couple using it. Couples who use artificial contraception fully intend to render every single act sterile. Couples who use NFP can use it to avoid conception or achieve it, depending on whether they have a just reason to avoid having a child.

 

[LeafByNiggle]

…What I think makes a difference is the INTENTION of the couple using it. Couples who use artificial contraception fully intend to render every single act sterile. Couples who use NFP can use it to avoid conception or achieve it, depending on whether they have a just reason to avoid having a child.

The intention can be exactly the same between NFP users and condom users. Condom users can intend to use condoms temporarily to postpone children for a while. Such users would not intend for every single sex act for the rest of their lives to be sterile. And NFP users can intend to avoid children forever. That is not to say they do, but they can. That is also not to say the two methods are morally equivalent, only that intent is not the thing that makes them different.

 

[Fogwalker]

I feel like the Church often makes it sound like a couple can do no wrong if they are using NFP. The message I get is that condoms are always sinful and NFP is never sinful. My original post on this thread wasn’t an attempt to justify condom use. My original post on this thread was intended to challenge the idea that NFP cannot be sinful. After a long discussion on this thread, it still looks to me like a couple can sin by using NFP. While I’m sure that many, many couples use NFP for responsnible reasons, I suspect that there are many others who practice NFP so they can live in a big house and go on long vacations, but don’t recognize their use of NFP as sinful because of the Church’s golden treatment of NFP.

The ends do not justify the means in Catholic morality, but it’s important to remember that the means don’t always justify the ends, either.

 

[LaSainte]

Even if that were true (which I’m not contesting, I just don’t have that information readily available), it still eliminates the unitive property.

Why does it do this? Does sex with a bra on eliminate the unitive property? Does wiping the sweat off of your body eliminate the unitive property? Does not kissing because you haven’t brushed your teeth eliminate the unitive property? What is the big freaking deal about semen???

 

[Bookcat]

The intention can be exactly the same between NFP users and condom users. Condom users can intend to use condoms temporarily to postpone children for a while. .

Actually not. The later couple is intending a gravely evil means as part of their intention.

Intent is not just one simple thing…

Joe intends to get a cup of coffee. He goes down and gets it out of his coffee pot.

I intend to get a cup of coffee. I go and at gun point make the coffee vendor give me a cup of coffee.

We both intended to get a cup of coffee. Joe’s intention embraced good means. Mine embraced evil means. (though here I could perhaps accept that the ends justify the means hee hee …:compcoff

NFP involves the intent to avoid an new conception “not out of selfishness but for serious reasons; and with methods that conform to the objective criteria of morality, that is, periodic continence and use of the infertile periods.” ( Comp. CCC 497)

Contraception involves the intent to prevent …to hinder procreation (for what ever reason) using methods that are objectively disordered …are intrinsically immoral (either in anticipation of the conjugal act, in its accomplishment or in the development of its natural consequences). (Comp. CCC 498).

even if for a short time …

 

[Bookcat]

Why does it do this? Does sex with a bra on eliminate the unitive property? Does wiping the sweat off of your body eliminate the unitive property? Does not kissing because you haven’t brushed your teeth eliminate the unitive property? What is the big freaking deal about semen???

It is the very *nature *of marriage and the marital act that is involved.

The Church teaches according to the nature of marriage…and the marital act.

 

[Bookcat]

I feel like the Church often makes it sound like a couple can do no wrong if they are using NFP. The message I get is that condoms are always sinful and NFP is never sinful. My original post on this thread wasn’t an attempt to justify condom use. My original post on this thread was intended to challenge the idea that NFP cannot be sinful. After a long discussion on this thread, it still looks to me like a couple can sin by using NFP. While I’m sure that many, many couples use NFP for responsnible reasons, I suspect that there are many others who practice NFP so they can live in a big house and go on long vacations, but don’t recognize their use of NFP as sinful because of the Church’s golden treatment of NFP.

The ends do not justify the means in Catholic morality, but it’s important to remember that the means don’t always justify the ends, either.

The Church would certainly agree there can be sinful practice of NFP.

1. When is it moral to regulate births?

2368-2369
2399

The regulation of births, which is an aspect of responsible fatherhood and motherhood, is objectively morally acceptable when it is pursued by the spouses without external pressure; when it is practiced not out of selfishness but for serious reasons; and with methods that conform to the objective criteria of morality, that is, periodic continence and use of the infertile periods.

Compendium of the Catechism…issued by Pope Benedict XVI

 

[Bruised_Reed]

Is this a selfish reason? If I’m an environmental nut, and I fully believe to save the planet many couples should choose not to have children. Hypothetically, my wife & I have decided to forgo children but not the unitive aspects available via a strict regimen of NFP to prevent children. That is, a kind of new age Josephite marriage with marital relations.

Selfish? Maybe. There is the appearance of virtue but not having children to save the planet is not the teaching of the church. You and your wife took vows to accept children, more immortal souls for God.

And unless you are as radical in your life style (using only collected rainwater to wash and bathe wiith, never buying anything new, foregoing all creature comforts) it won’t be consistant with not having children to save the planet.

OTOH large families are typically better stewards of all resources, sometimes out of neccesity but usually it is part of the families value system.

Also, i couldn’t be farther from a Josephite marriage.

 

[Bruised_Reed]

The intention can be exactly the same between NFP users and condom users. Condom users can intend to use condoms temporarily to postpone children for a while. Such users would not intend for every single sex act for the rest of their lives to be sterile. And NFP users can intend to avoid children forever. That is not to say they do, but they can. That is also not to say the two methods are morally equivalent, only that intent is not the thing that makes them different.

I don’t know if you can separate the primary intention of obedience to God. For a Catholic with a well formed conscience, the intention has to be in line with church teaching. So the use of all con traception removes any possibilty that the intent is the same for a couple using NFP.