Sex for the unitive purpose alone is moral within Catholicism

[svoboda]

It is moral for Catholics to have sex for the unitive purpose alone even when there is no infertility or menopause.

Here is why: NFP is moral.

Using NFP means taking very careful measurements of the woman’s fertility, and most of the time throughout the marriage having sex only during the infertile times.

Physically sex during the infertile times is not open to life. Without the release of an egg conception is physically impossible. That NFP has a 2% chance of failure is not what makes it moral, and better methods could very well be 100% successful and still be moral.

The means of NFP is not open to conception.

The intent of NFP is not open to conception either. For whatever reason (which could be very serious) NFP couples go through the effort of finding out when the woman is fertile and abstaining during that time. They do it to have sex without becoming pregnant.

Sex for the unitive purpose alone among fertile couples is perfectly moral.

 

[Della]

svoboda:

It is moral for Catholics to have sex for the unitive purpose alone even when there is no infertility or menopause.

Here is why: NFP is moral.

Using NFP means taking very careful measurements of the woman’s fertility, and most of the time throughout the marriage having sex only during the infertile times.

“Throughout the marriage having sex only during the infertile times” is a bit misleading (not that you intended to be misleading). NFP is to be practiced for grave reasons and generally short term, not as a form of permanent contraception for healthy couples.

Physically sex during the infertile times is not open to life. Without the release of an egg conception is physically impossible. That NFP has a 2% chance of failure is not what makes it moral, and better methods could very well be 100% successful and still be moral.

The means of NFP is not open to conception.

The intent of NFP is not open to conception either. For whatever reason (which could be very serious) NFP couples go through the effort of finding out when the woman is fertile and abstaining during that time. They do it to have sex without becoming pregnant.

Sex for the unitive purpose alone among fertile couples is perfectly moral.

Conception does sometimes take place when least expected, so NFP isn’t closed to conception, but is only a means of attempting to regulate when a couple will have children.

 

[the-3rd-parent]

svoboda:

It is moral for Catholics to have sex for the unitive purpose alone even when there is no infertility or menopause.

False.

Here is why: NFP is moral.

Objectively speaking NFP is moral.
Subjectively speaking, NFP can be used immorally.
Objectively speaking, ABC is immoral.

Physically sex during the infertile times is not open to life. Without the release of an egg conception is physically impossible. That NFP has a 2% chance of failure is not what makes it moral, and better methods could very well be 100% successful and still be moral.

False. NFP’s failure rate is not what makes it objectively moral. If that were the case, only the forms of birth control with the highest success rates would be immoral. That is not the case at all being that NFP is more successful than the pull-out method and even some barrier methods.

The difference is that birth control by its objective nature is immoral. NFP by its nature is not. There is absolutely nothing wrong with refraining from sexual activity. What is morally wrong is artificially lengthening infertility or frustrating the fertile nature of the sexual act through the use of barriers or pulling out.

The intent of NFP is not open to conception either. For whatever reason (which could be very serious) NFP couples go through the effort of finding out when the woman is fertile and abstaining during that time. They do it to have sex without becoming pregnant.

The problem we are getting at is that you believe ABC is claimed to be immoral for purely subjective reasons. This is not true. ABC is immoral for objective reasons. Even if a couple engages in ABC while saying “If we become pregnant, we will accept the child and not have an abortion” the use of ABC is still immoral.

NFP for subjective reasons can be immoral. If the couple for instance denies each other sexual activity during their fertile period with lack of a sufficiant reason other than “We just don’t want kids yet. We want to wait to have kids till five years down the line so that we can take trips vacations and have more alone time together” than denying sexual activity is immoral.

It should also be noted that it is immoral to deny sexual activity as a form of punishment and manipulation of your spouse.

 

[bear06]

Why is it that you needed to start yet another thread on something we’re already discussing on several other loops? :whacky:

We’ve already tried to explain a million times that it’s not the outcome that makes it “open to life”.

 

[fix]

svoboda:

Physically sex during the infertile times is not open to life.

This is where you have an erroneous understanding of Church teaching. If you think this is what is taught then your conclusions will all be incorrect.

It is not about not being able to conceive that means one is not open to life. Not being open to life intends one is frustrating the fertility aspect of the conjugal act.

 

[ElizabethAnne]

svoboda:

It is moral for Catholics to have sex for the unitive purpose alone even when there is no infertility or menopause.

According to whose authority? You?

The Catholic Church says otherwise. Each and every sex act within marriage must be both unitive and procreative. You are confusing “procreative” with “reproductive.” Sex within marriage need not always be reproductive.

God bless you.

 

[bear06]

It is moral for Catholics to have sex for the unitive purpose alone even when there is no infertility or menopause.

And you Church documentation for this statement is? The Church says that it must be procreative and unitive. Because you don’t understand these aspects, doesn’t mean that Church says your statement is moral.

 

[uncleauberon]

NFP is more about Fertility than about conception.

Couples must accept each other and themselves fully.

If they are infertile (post-menopause or medical reasons) then they accept this reality when they decide to have relations.

A fertile couple should accept eachother’s (and their own) fertility completely as it is.

Most men are always fertile.
Does he and his wife accept this ?
Or do they try to use ABC to thwart his fertility ?

Most women are only fertile for about 10 days per/cycle.
Does she and her husband accept this ?
Or do they use ABC to thwart her fertility ?

NFP helps the couple accept their own natural fertility and make decisions in regards to their fertiliy and when they will have conjugal relations (sex).

It is not a sin to have sex.
It is a sin to intentionally thwart fertility while having sex.

It is not a sin to avoid sex.
It is a sin to avoid sex merely for the purpose of avoiding fertility when you should otherwise be trying to build your family.

ABC is always a sin of Commission. I have intentionally tharwted my own natural fertility during the sex act.

NFP could be a sin of Omission against the faimly. Something that I didn’t do … (have a child) when I should have tried.

I hope this is helpful

 

[CuriousInIL]

The difference is that birth control by its objective nature is immoral. NFP by its nature is not. There is absolutely nothing wrong with refraining from sexual activity. What is morally wrong is artificially lengthening infertility or frustrating the fertile nature of the sexual act through the use of barriers or pulling out.

False. Birth control is not immoral and NFP, whether used to achieve or avoid pregnancy, is birth control. It is contraception and ABC that is taught as immoral, not birth control.

Can we please be clear on this. Such a foundational error weakens otherwise strong arguments.

 

[svoboda]

“Throughout the marriage having sex only during the infertile times” is a bit misleading (not that you intended to be misleading). NFP is to be practiced for grave reasons and generally short term, not as a form of permanent contraception for healthy couples.

I didn’t say only, I said most of the time. Even couples who have 5 kids during the 20 fertile years of marriage will have far more sex than that.

Conception does sometimes take place when least expected, so NFP isn’t closed to conception, but is only a means of attempting to regulate when a couple will have children.

But if it does it is only so because the couples fail the method or the method fails the couple. With better science NFP could be 100% effective.

It is physically impossible to become pregnant without the egg.

 

[vluvski]

svoboda:

It is moral for Catholics to have sex for the unitive purpose alone even when there is no infertility or menopause.

I agree, if and only if the procreative purpose is not being deliberately supressed. Remember, procreative is not the same as reproductive.

 

[Giannawannabe]

I heard something on Catholic radio that cleared this issue up for me.

Each “sexual act” within marriage needs to be procreative AND unitive in nature. When a couple abstains from sex during fertile times due to a grave reason, there is NO sexual act. No sexual act=no need to determine whether it is procreative/unitive in nature.

When using ABC during a “sexual act”, a couple is eliminating the procreative nature of the act, and that is what is against Church teaching.
Well, it cleared it up for me anyway .

 

[svoboda]

the-3rd-parent:

False. NFP’s failure rate is not what makes it objectively moral. If that were the case, only the forms of birth control with the highest success rates would be immoral. That is not the case at all being that NFP is more successful than the pull-out method and even some barrier methods.

That’s what I said, the failure rate has nothing to do with whether or not NFP is moral. Better technology could make it 100% effective all the time and it would still be moral.

But in being 100% effective it would make pregnancy absolutely impossible, and therefore would be physically completely closed to the possibility of a new life.

But it would still be moral, therefore being 100% closed to life physically by means of it being 100% impossible to get pregnant renders the means of NFP not open to life in any way whatsoever while still being moral.

The difference is that birth control by its objective nature is immoral. NFP by its nature is not. There is absolutely nothing wrong with refraining from sexual activity. What is morally wrong is artificially lengthening infertility or frustrating the fertile nature of the sexual act through the use of barriers or pulling out.

This is what the Church says, but my question is why. If the reason is that the sex act must be unitive and open to life AT THE SAME TIME, then this reasoning is faulty because NFP is not open to life either in its means or in its intent.

NFP for subjective reasons can be immoral. If the couple for instance denies each other sexual activity during their fertile period with lack of a sufficiant reason other than “We just don’t want kids yet. We want to wait to have kids till five years down the line so that we can take trips vacations and have more alone time together” than denying sexual activity is immoral.

I know this, but my question to you is what is wrong with wanting to take trips together and develop their relationship? The purpose of marriage is not just to procreate, it is also the happiness of the spouses.

It should also be noted that it is immoral to deny sexual activity as a form of punishment and manipulation of your spouse.

Agreed

 

[cynic]

According to your Church though you aren’t supposed to marry out of a deisre to spend time with someone, or personla sort of love/affection. You’re supposed to marry “when you want to glorify God” through procreation. Personal attachments are an added bonus, not the purposes, not even one of the purposes. Catholics view love as synonomyous with reproduction - if you don’t want to have children with them, or want to stop - then you don’t really love them.

 

[svoboda]

fix:

This is where you have an erroneous understanding of Church teaching. If you think this is what is taught then your conclusions will all be incorrect.

It is not about not being able to conceive that means one is not open to life. Not being open to life intends one is frustrating the fertility aspect of the conjugal act.

You bring up an important question:

What does it mean to be “open to life” in each sex act?

You say that the only way you can fail to be open to life is if you deliberately frustrate fertility (i.e. suppress it with birth control) in that specific sex act.

You’re absolutely right, this definition renders any act that doesn’t use birth control (including the acts of infertile couples and post menopausal couples open to life).

Look at this passage from CCC:

2370 Periodic continence, that is, the methods of birth regulation based on self-observation and the use of infertile periods, is in conformity with the objective criteria of morality.158 These methods respect the bodies of the spouses, encourage tenderness between them, and favor the education of an authentic freedom. **In contrast, “every action which, whether in anticipation of the conjugal act, or in its accomplishment, or in the development of its natural consequences, proposes, whether as an end or as a means, to render procreation impossible” is intrinsically evil:159 **

Doesn’t the second part contradict the first? Every action which whether in ANTICIPATION of the conjugal act … wehther as an ends or as a means … renders procreation impossible is intrinsically evil.

The very practice of NFP which is done in anticipation of sex does renders procreation impossible by restricting sex only to those times when procreation is physically impossible.

How do you explain this?

Personally I think that defining “openness to life” as not using artificial birth control methods to frustrate fertility is a circular and meaningless definition.

It means not frustrating fertility, it doesn’t mean open to life. It has nothing to do with life. Effective NFP methods render the creation of new life nearly impossible, I bet that in the future they will perfect the methods to make the creation of new life 100% impossible.

How can there be a procreative dimension in a sex act that many physically be completely closed to new life, and if the method (NFP) is done precisely to make it completely closed to life in anticipation of the act.

For the record, homosexuals do nothing to frustrate their fertility either. But because of biology the creation of a new life is impossible. Because of biology the creation of a new life during a time when there is no egg to fertilize is also impossible. It doesn’t matter if you frustrate fertility at that time or not, there is no fertility (in the woman) to frustrate. There is no fertile/procreative component to that sex act simply because of biology.

But in addition because of intention. Because NFP couples (sometimes) limit their sex to those biologically-impossible-to-conceive times precisely because they want to have sex and not get pregnant.

How is this open to life? Does it feel open to life to you? Only if you define opennness to life as not using contraception is it open to life.

The fact that they’re not using birth control is irrelevant, there is no fertility there in the first place. Using birth control during an infertile time would not make the sex act less open to life. Procreation is already impossible!

 

[svoboda]

ElizabethAnne:

According to whose authority? You?

The Catholic Church says otherwise. Each and every sex act within marriage must be both unitive and procreative. You are confusing “procreative” with “reproductive.” Sex within marriage need not always be reproductive.

God bless you.

But what does it mean for there to be a procreative component to sex?

Restricting sex to times when there is no egg to fertilize eliminates the procreative component because procreation is biologically impossible at that time.

NFP users sometimes deliberately have sex only when there new life is physically impossible. How can that be open to life or procreative?

There is no fertility to frustrate at those times.

 

[svoboda]

bear06:

And you Church documentation for this statement is? The Church says that it must be procreative and unitive. Because you don’t understand these aspects, doesn’t mean that Church says your statement is moral.

In the rest of my post I argue why. If you don’t agree with my argument, feel free to refute it.

 

[svoboda]

uncleauberon:

NFP is more about Fertility than about conception.

Couples must accept each other and themselves fully.

If they are infertile (post-menopause or medical reasons) then they accept this reality when they decide to have relations.

A fertile couple should accept eachother’s (and their own) fertility completely as it is.

Most men are always fertile.
Does he and his wife accept this ?
Or do they try to use ABC to thwart his fertility ?

Most women are only fertile for about 10 days per/cycle.
Does she and her husband accept this ?
Or do they use ABC to thwart her fertility ?

NFP helps the couple accept their own natural fertility and make decisions in regards to their fertiliy and when they will have conjugal relations (sex).

It is not a sin to have sex.
It is a sin to intentionally thwart fertility while having sex.

It is not a sin to avoid sex.
It is a sin to avoid sex merely for the purpose of avoiding fertility when you should otherwise be trying to build your family.

ABC is always a sin of Commission. I have intentionally tharwted my own natural fertility during the sex act.

NFP could be a sin of Omission against the faimly. Something that I didn’t do … (have a child) when I should have tried.

I hope this is helpful

This is a good response And this component of Church reasoning is not contradictory.

But my initial point is that it is contradictory to say that each individual sex act must at once be unitive and procreative (open to life) and allow NFP.

In my opinion there is no procreative or open-to-lilfe dimension to sex during the infertile times. Procreation during those times is physically impossible, and the couple knows this and deliberately selects those times for precisely that reason.

If thwarting fertility is the sin, then you are right, the NFP couple commits no sin. They wouldn’t even commit a sin if the woman took the pill during the infertile time. There would be no fertility there to thwart.

But those particular sex acts also have no procreative/open to life component. And that is my point!

Being open to life during an infertile time is being open to the impossible. It would be like if a woman with no ovaries who was not using birth control said she was open to life.

It would be like if a castrated man said that sex with him had a procreative component.

 

[svoboda]

CuriousInIL:

False. Birth control is not immoral and NFP, whether used to achieve or avoid pregnancy, is birth control. It is contraception and ABC that is taught as immoral, not birth control.

Can we please be clear on this. Such a foundational error weakens otherwise strong arguments.

When I say birth control for me it means things like condoms. I think it’s a language, not concept difference!

 

[CuriousInIL]

svoboda:

When I say birth control for me it means things like condoms. I think it’s a language, not concept difference!

But the language is clear–birth control is simply the control of birth. NFP is birth control. Contraception is also birth control. Loose use of clear language makes the arguments impossible to follow.