Sterilization for health reasons

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tiflemetry

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I am married to a Catholic man, and attend Mass with him and my two children on a regular basis. I have only felt at home in this Church.

My question I have one step son, and my biological daughter. Following the birth of my daughter, I suffered from postpartum depression, and postpartum psychosis. I became very suicidal, and I had full intentions of it for about a year and a half. I was finally diagnosed with bipolar disorder. It has taken 2 1/2 years to find the right medication balance, and we are still having to tweak it. These medscould have complucated another pregnancy, and I don’t believe I would have lived following another baby. I had a tubal lugation, and then complications from that forced me to have another surgery to fix it and it unfortunatly has voided any chances of further pregnancy.

Am I right that this was a mortal sin, or would this be acceptable procedure to preseve my life for my family? I don’t believe I would live through another one. My husband was not sure of this either.
 
It is a mortal sin if you do it deliberately knowing that it is a mortal sin. If you did not know at that time, then it wouldn’t be but you would still have to confess it now that you know.

Sterilization and contraception are NEVER permissible. The church offers two options: NFP and/or abstinence.
 
tiflemetry said:
I am married to a Catholic man, and attend Mass with him and my two children on a regular basis. I have only felt at home in this Church.

My question I have one step son, and my biological daughter. Following the birth of my daughter, I suffered from postpartum depression, and postpartum psychosis. I became very suicidal, and I had full intentions of it for about a year and a half. I was finally diagnosed with bipolar disorder. It has taken 2 1/2 years to find the right medication balance, and we are still having to tweak it. These medscould have complucated another pregnancy, and I don’t believe I would have lived following another baby. I had a tubal lugation, and then complications from that forced me to have another surgery to fix it and it unfortunatly has voided any chances of further pregnancy.

Am I right that this was a mortal sin, or would this be acceptable procedure to preseve my life for my family? I don’t believe I would live through another one. My husband was not sure of this either.
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I am not a priest or a moral theologian, so take what I say with a grain of salt:

Having a sterilization procedure is gravely wrong, and constitutes the grave matter which is one of the requirements for a mortal sin. (I mean if the procedure is for the primary purpose of sterilization; i.e., I am not talking about a situation where sterilization is an unwanted side effect of some other medical treatment.) However, given your circumstances, it may be that the other requirements for a sin to be mortal (full knowledge of the gravity of the wrong, and free consent) may not have been fulfilled.

I would strongly recommend that you take this issue to a priest who affirms the teachings of the Catholic Church on sexuality. He can advise you. And if you are Catholic, he can give you absolution in the sacrament of Penance for any sin that you may have committed through this sterilization, whether mortal or venial. If you are embarrassed to talk to a priest, you can go and talk to him at a scheduled time for the sacrament of Penance (a.k.a. Confession or Reconciliation) and remain behind the screen in order to preserve your anonymity.
 
tiflemetry said:
I am married to a Catholic man, and attend Mass with him and my two children on a regular basis. I have only felt at home in this Church.

My question I have one step son, and my biological daughter. Following the birth of my daughter, I suffered from postpartum depression, and postpartum psychosis. I became very suicidal, and I had full intentions of it for about a year and a half. I was finally diagnosed with bipolar disorder. It has taken 2 1/2 years to find the right medication balance, and we are still having to tweak it. These medscould have complucated another pregnancy, and I don’t believe I would have lived following another baby. I had a tubal lugation, and then complications from that forced me to have another surgery to fix it and it unfortunatly has voided any chances of further pregnancy.

Am I right that this was a mortal sin, or would this be acceptable procedure to preseve my life for my family? I don’t believe I would live through another one. My husband was not sure of this either.
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From what you’ve said, it sounds like the tubal ligation was done with the intent that you could continue a sexual relationship without getting pregnant. If that was the case, then yes it was a serious sin. In order for it to be a mortal sin for you, you had to know it was mortal and still choose to do it anyways. The moral choices to avoid a pregnancy would be to either abstain from sex completely or to learn NFP and use it conservatively for the rest of your marriage.

The surgery you had to fix the complications was not sinful. The intent of that surgery was to prevent further damage to your body. Catholics are allowed to have surgery that attempts to fix a problem, even if the side affect is sterilization. This is different than sterilization for the sole purpose of preventing pregnancy. The very sad result of your surgery is that you are no longer able to bear children.
 
Address to Midwives on the Nature of Their Profession
Sterilization
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It would be more than a mere lack of readiness in the service of life if an attack made by man were to concern not only a single act but should affect the organism itself to deprive it, by means of sterilization, of the faculty of procreating a new life. Here, too, you have a clear rule in the Church’s teaching to guide your behavior both interiorly and exteriorly. Direct sterilization— that is, whose aim tends as a means or as an end at making procreation impossible—is a grave violation of the moral law and therefore unlawful. Not even public authority has any right, under the pretext of any “indication” whatsoever, to permit it, and less still to prescribe it or to have it used to the detriment of innocent human beings.
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This principle is already proclaimed in the above mentioned Encyclical of Pius XI on marriage. Thus when ten years or so ago sterilization came to be more widely applied, the Holy See saw the necessity of expressly and publicly declaring that direct sterilization, either perpetual or temporary, in either the male or the female, is unlawful according to natural law, from which, as you well know, not even the Church has the power to dispense.
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You are correct. Such is a grave sin. If done without knowledge that it was a sin, or if consent was given in a time where it could not be considered entirely willful on your part then culpability for the sin would be reduced. It is a grave sin regardless though because it goes against the natural law instilled in us by God upon creation.

Also note, we are talking about direct sterilization here.
 
tiflemetry said:
Am I right that this was a mortal sin,
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Yes. Sterilization is an intrinsic evil.
tiflemetry said:
or would this be acceptable procedure to preseve my life for my family?
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No. The moral option would be to avoid indefinitely using natural family planning.
tiflemetry said:
I don’t believe I would live through another one. My husband was not sure of this either.
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The Church does not require someone to have children when they have a serious reason to avoid.

Contraception and sterilization are not moral means of spacing/avoiding children. Abstinence-- either complete or periodic through natural family planning-- is the moral means by which one may avoid children.
 
Hello,

Well, anytime i read something like this i become very sad…it seems like some people don´t understand the heavy problems going with diseases like this for a relationship.This should not sound angry, i just want to write down some things flowing in my mind…

1.contraceptive methods or sterilization used by a healthy person ist the one case, another is the situation in wich exists a real an high danger for the mother and the marriage.

2.I don´t know if many people have experience with psychosis in general or postpartum psychosis, but it is something really dangerous and destroying.The sister of a friend got psychotic after her daughter was born, the next 2 years she passes in a clinic an she never gets full healthy again,she had to give away her daughter, her husband can´t bear childcare and working all day.marriage suffers because of this situation.
Another point is the possible genetic disposition for the children in future- I know this from my own family, and yes, this is a grave trouble.In some cases there is a high rist for mother AND child, and I don´t know how I could let my children out in the world with this.

3.abstinence…do you really think a marriage will be well after trouble, disease AND abstinence? the gravest problem with disease is that it seperates the people, being ill makes lonely.Its a very difficult tast to defend the sorrows going along with this as a couple, also in a good and loving relationship.I cant understand how you can call a couple like this for abstinece in marriage, this means physical AND mental seperation.
we don´t talk about sterilization as a “question of lust”, it is to protect the health of the mother and the marriage…
  1. NFP. well…NFP is always described with a pearl index of apr. 9. this means no security, but many fear on both sides if the consequences of a pregnancy are as grave as described.
Is there no possibility within the teaching of the church for couples with the problem of disease including a high risk for mother and child?we talk from a mortal risk for them, tiflemetry said in her post she got suicidal…sex without the possibility of getting pregnant is not permitted in general, for example after menopause and in case of infertility.I would like to get facts for other cases of " sex in situation without pregnance possibility".

Last, I wish you, tiflemetry, the best for you and your family and a healthy future. my heart is with you!
 
alice24 said:
Is there no possibility within the teaching of the church for couples with the problem of disease including a high risk for mother and child?
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No. intrinsically evil acts can never be justified. Sterilization and contraception are intrinsically evil. They are always wrong.
alice24 said:
sex without the possibility of getting pregnant is not permitted in general, for example after menopause and in case of infertility.I would like to get facts for other cases of " sex in situation without pregnance possibility".
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I don’t believe I understand what you are asking here.
 
alice24 said:
Is there no possibility within the teaching of the church for couples with the problem of disease including a high risk for mother and child?we talk from a mortal risk for them, tiflemetry said in her post she got suicidal…s**ex without the possibility of getting pregnant is not permitted in general, for example after menopause and in case of infertility.**I would like to get facts for other cases of " sex in situation without pregnance possibility".
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Yeah, I’m not understanding this at all??? :confused:
What you said above (bolded) is not the teaching of the church at all! Of course you can have sex after menopause and in the case of infertility!
Natural Family Planning (NFP) allows you to have sex during the infertile phases of the woman’s fertility cycle…
This is all within the teachings of the church.
 
1ke said:
No. intrinsically evil acts can never be justified. Sterilization and contraception are intrinsically evil. They are always wrong.

wich solution do you have for this? no sex in marriage? can you give me a link to official answers of the church to this theme?
by the way- because of what is sterilization in this case, and only in this case, evil?

I don’t believe I understand what you are asking here.
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-I said that sex without the possibility of getting pregnant istn´t a sin in general.

sorry, sounds very inhuman.
 
By the way— what solution do you have for this problem? no more sex in marriage? living with the risk of pregnancy and a new psychosis?
can you give me a lin k to an official paper of te church to this theme?
thanks
 
Em_in_FL said:
Yeah, I’m not understanding this at all??? :confused:
What you said above (bolded) is not the teaching of the church at all! Of course you can have sex after menopause and in the case of infertility!
Natural Family Planning (NFP) allows you to have sex during the infertile phases of the woman’s fertility cycle…
This is all within the teachings of the church.
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oh sorry a lot, typing fail, I want to say that it is not forbidden.problem of thinkind faster than writing^^
 
alice24 said:
By the way— what solution do you have for this problem? no more sex in marriage? living with the risk of pregnancy and a new psychosis?
can you give me a lin k to an official paper of te church to this theme?
thanks
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They don’t have to have a sexless marriage. NFP can be used for serious reasons, and this certainly qualifies. Conservative use of NFP, taught by a qualified instructor, using phase III (after ovulation only) has a 99% effectiveness.
 
etmom said:
They don’t have to have a sexless marriage. NFP can be used for serious reasons, and this certainly qualifies. Conservative use of NFP, taught by a qualified instructor, using phase III (after ovulation only) has a 99% effectiveness.
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99% ? wow, this is higher than the official studies here in germany tell.The dates i have are different, but i never heard from 99%- a friend of mine is gyneacologist and told me that there is a not to ignore risk to get pregnant while using NFP, especially if the woman takes medicine or has just a simple influenca…I would be feared alot if I - let me take this case- have to take medicine wich changes my body signals and includes the risk- in case of pregnancy- to harm my unborn baby…

another question:

If NFP is for a long time allowed (not only for the time between two pregancies) , so is the difference between NFP and sterilization just the choosen way to prevent pregnancy.In both situation are children not wished and the couple have sexual action. Why is the one sin and the other not?

Greetings
 
alice24 said:
99% ? wow, this is higher than the official studies here in germany tell.The dates i have are different, but i never heard from 99%- a friend of mine is gyneacologist and told me that there is a not to ignore risk to get pregnant while using NFP, especially if the woman takes medicine or has just a simple influenca…I would be feared alot if I - let me take this case- have to take medicine wich changes my body signals and includes the risk- in case of pregnancy- to harm my unborn baby…

The 99% is not using standard NFP, but restricting marital relations ONLY to phase III of a woman’s cycle, after ovulation has been confirmed by a sympto thermal shift, cross checked by complete drying up and the cervical sign, often with an additional day of abstaining. Very conservative use of NFP is sometimes used by couples with extremely serious reasons to avoid a pregnancy.
another question:

If NFP is for a long time allowed (not only for the time between two pregancies) , so is the difference between NFP and sterilization just the choosen way to prevent pregnancy.In both situation are children not wished and the couple have sexual action. Why is the one sin and the other not?

NFP can be used indefinitely (such as in the case of a serious, permenent health condition of the mother, long term harmful medications, or significant financial issues that will take so long to resolve the couple may be naturally infertile by that point) But the goal would always be that if the situation resolved, even if highly unlikely, the couple would again be open to life and cease using NFP. With NFP, you are not taking an action to render marital relations sterile. You are using days for marital relations that are likely infertile. These are naturally infertile days. No action was taken by the couple to MAKE them infertile. There is no requirement that a couple MUST have sex during fertile days of the cycle.

Greetings
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etmom:
Ok,I understand , the possibility to become pregnant is of course very important.
But if there will be no way to become pregnant and parents of a healthy child, maybe if one partner has a genetic disease. I have a similar situation, I have got a genetic, hard to handle form of epilepsy and I am weak of my heart ( pregnancy would be a too high risk).If I had children, they would be ill, and I don´t know if i would endure the birth.I see now way for “let the door open” for chldren in the future.
 
alice24 said:
Ok,I understand , the possibility to become pregnant is of course very important.
But if there will be no way to become pregnant and parents of a healthy child, maybe if one partner has a genetic disease. I have a similar situation, I have got a genetic, hard to handle form of epilepsy and I am weak of my heart ( pregnancy would be a too high risk).If I had children, they would be ill, and I don´t know if i would endure the birth.I see now way for “let the door open” for chldren in the future.
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I am in a similar situation, with life threatening reasons to need to avoid indefinitely. Unless there is a miracle, we will not be able to have future children. We intend to use NFP until menopause. It is a moral way to not to have to abstain 100% until we are out of our childbearning years.
 
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