The Passion of Blessed Paul VI - 'Humanae vitae'

[_Abyssinia]

Vatican City, Oct 21, 2014 / 12:03 am (CNA/EWTN News).- Father Francesco di Felice worked at the Secretariat of State during the pontificate of Bl. Paul VI, and recently recounted the story behind the blessed Pope’s 1968 encyclical which was received with widespread dissent.

In drafting Humanae vitae, his encyclical on the regulation of birth, Bl. Paul VI studied the work began by St. John XXIII, who created a “commission for the study of population problems, the family, and births” in order to have a better understanding of the effects of contraceptives, Fr. di Felice told CNA.

Hormonal contraceptives having been introduced in 1960, in March 1963 – three months before his death – St. John XXIII established a Pontifical Commission on Birth Control to, as Bl. Paul VI wrote in his encyclical, “examine views and opinions concerning married life, and especially on the correct regulation of births” and “to provide the teaching authority of the Church with such evidence as would enable it to give an apt reply in this matter.”

catholicnewsagency.com/news/the-passion-of-blessed-paul-vi-humanae-vitae-15253/