The unitive purpose of sex

[searching04]

The unitive aspect cannot be separeted fromteh procreative aspect. Each act is unitive by nature and ordered toward procreation by nature. If we disrupt either of those, the act is disordered.

You mentioned stimulating your husband to climax outside of you. This is masturbation (see CCC 2352).
2352 By masturbation is to be understood the deliberate stimulation of the genital organs in order to derive sexual pleasure. "Both the Magisterium of the Church, in the course of a constant tradition, and the moral sense of the faithful have been in no doubt and have firmly maintained that masturbation is an intrinsically and gravely disordered action."137 “The deliberate use of the sexual faculty, for whatever reason, outside of marriage is essentially contrary to its purpose.” **For here sexual pleasure is sought outside of "the sexual relationship which is demanded by the moral order and in which the total meaning of mutual self-giving AND [not “or” ] human procreation **in the context of true love is achieved."138
To form an equitable judgment about the subjects’ moral responsibility and to guide pastoral action, one must take into account the affective immaturity, force of acquired habit, conditions of anxiety, or other psychological or social factors that lessen or even extenuate moral culpability.-emphasis and brackets mine

And if you have paid attention to what she has been saying (not her original question, which was overlooked a while back), you will see that you can drop/quote all the black and white definitions from the CCC all day long, but her situation is different. Her approach and handling of it towards healing may not fit the church, but it is no less a reality, no matter what the church says. It is one of many examples - and you made the point here - where the church cannot, will, not does not address issues where teachings do not fit perfectly. Just follow the print. And so couples do indeed need to pray and get guidance and help - and make their own decisions within their marriages and hearts.

 

[Nate13]

Your definition:

The contraceptive mentality is I want to have sex and I have no plans to accept a life should it come of what we are about to do.

Disagree, because whether you use ABC or NFP at infertile times, the point is to avoid. Difference here is the focus on timing or intent with NFP.

Haha read over it again. Maybe you just haven’t experienced meeting people who really believe sex and baby-making have nothing to do with each other and if so I envy you not having to meet such people. Every abortion, except possibly in the case of rape, is a result of the contraceptive mentality. Someone had sex and wasn’t prepared to accept a baby should that occur. The contraceptive mentality also includes asking why a person is attempting to prevent another child. There are morally valid reasons for not deciding to pursue having another child.

 

[Jaaanosik]

It really does not take much time to study Encyclicals and Chruch Doctrine. I average about an hour per week (sometimes more, sometimes less) reading through the Catechism and reading whatever Encyclical apllies to whatever question or concern I have at the time. I read from the Bible each evening (this can even be a family event)…maybe a chapter or a half chapter of any given book. Tradition can be studied at the same pace…by reading a few pages from the early Church Fathers’ documents (all available online these days).

And we are not supposed to “stop”. Our Faith should be the most important thing in our lives, because it is our Faith that teaches us how to be good spouses, parents, workers, individuals, etc…living a life that is pleasing to God. It is only fitting that we should devote some time to studying our Faith daily. We may have to give up an hour of TV or “free-time” to do it, but the time is available if you make it available.

Your truth and my truth doesn’t matter unless it is in unison to God’s Truth. We can be certain about God’s Truth by reading the Bible, the Catechism and reading the Popes as I mentioned above. Our Priest will explain these teachings in his homlies/sermons and even in private during confession or Bible studies. If we have put any amount of time into learning the Faith, we will begin to properly form our conscience and we will be able to tell when a Priest says something that does not sound right…that does not coincide with the Church’s teaching. At that time, we can privately ask the Priest to clarify what he said and let him know what our understanding of the Faith is and go from there. It IS simple…just takes time and effort on our part.

Here are a couple links you may find helpful:
papalencyclicals.net/
vatican.va/ (click on your language preference)

Nice try but you are wrong.
You can not be certain about God’s Truth. You can only believe.

One simple prove is that there are many christian denominations and they study more or less the same Bible and still they come to a different God’s Truth.

 

[sw85]

FLOG!

“Thank you, Master! May I have another?!”

FLOG!

“Thank you, Master! May I have another?!”

Judge and jury, are you? Proven guilty before inoocent? You know what you do when you A-S-S-U-M-E, right? You are the type of person who drives people away who have come looking for answers or a place to discuss disagreements. Some Catholics do not agree with nor understand all the nice flowery words.

Thanks for the Catholic hospitality.

I bet you think you’re quite clever, don’t you?

Admonishing sinners is a WORK OF CHARITY – i.e., of the love to which we’re ACTUALLY called as Christians.

I know it doesn’t jive with you deficient view of the word but there you have it – the problem is on YOUR end, not MINE.

That you even THINK this is a mere “disagreement” that ought to be aired out shows how far gone the contraception apologists here are.

The Church’s teachings are INERRANT and NONNEGOTIABLE.

If you reject EVEN ONE of its teachings then you are *ipso facto *rejecting the magisterial authority of the Church and of the Holy Spirit who protects it from error.

In fact, since the Holy Spirit DOES protect it, you are in a sense calling God Himself a LIAR.

And THIS compounds the sin of contraception with the sin of scandal, and of desecration (if its practitioners continue to take communion despite their rebellion).

Pointing out these facts it not only NOT a sin – it is a DUTY.

Comfort the afflicted, afflict the comfortable, no?

So people here seem to be suggesting that “unitive” sex refers strictly to the physical aspect of “penis in vagina, ejaculate”. It was always my impression that this was the procreative aspect and that the unitive aspect was the bonding experience and closeness between spouses.

According to most people here, spousal rape is unitive.

NO.

The unitive aspect of sex ITSELF DERIVES FROM THE PROCREATIVE.

If sex were not inherently procreative, it would not be unitive – there would be no reason for it to unite people!

It would be no more unitive than any other nonprocreative gesture, such as handshaking.

So sex which is not inherently ordered to procreation IS ALSO NOT UNITIVE. The two aspects cannot be separated; they are two sides of the same coin.

You can have them both – or you can have neither.

Contraceptive sex is NOT an act of complete self-giving, and THIS ALONE is what makes sex unitive.

Hence the unitive aspect of sex is NOT a matter of emotive, solipsistic navel-gazing but of OBJECTIVE FACT: of the language of the sexual act itself.

“Contraceptive mentality”. What a joke.

This from the person who has previously remarked that God is a utilitarian!

 

[ahs]

And if you have paid attention to what she has been saying (not her original question, which was overlooked a while back), you will see that you can drop/quote all the black and white definitions from the CCC all day long, but her situation is different. Her approach and handling of it towards healing may not fit the church, but it is no less a reality, no matter what the church says. It is one of many examples - and you made the point here - where the church cannot, will, not does not address issues where teachings do not fit perfectly. Just follow the print. And so couples do indeed need to pray and get guidance and help - and make their own decisions within their marriages and hearts.

Right…I have been paying attention. My point is, the Church Teaching is what it is and can never change because it is God’s Teaching, and the Church has no authority to change it.

Right again, that this is an example of something that needs to be brought to a Priest or Bishop by the OP. MaryGail36 adn Nate also provided resources that deal with these types of issues. Only there will the OP find the real answer. On this forum, she will get only get quotes from the Church and/or a variety of opinions that don’t really matter when they are all boiled down to the nitty gritty.

 

[searching04]

I bet you think you’re quite clever, don’t you?

Admonishing sinners is a WORK OF CHARITY – i.e., of the love to which we’re ACTUALLY called as Christians.

I know it doesn’t jive with you deficient view of the word but there you have it – the problem is on YOUR end, not MINE.

That you even THINK this is a mere “disagreement” that ought to be aired out shows how far gone the contraception apologists here are.

The Church’s teachings are INERRANT and NONNEGOTIABLE.

If you reject EVEN ONE of its teachings then you are *ipso facto *rejecting the magisterial authority of the Church and of the Holy Spirit who protects it from error.

In fact, since the Holy Spirit DOES protect it, you are in a sense calling God Himself a LIAR.

And THIS compounds the sin of contraception with the sin of scandal, and of desecration (if its practitioners continue to take communion despite their rebellion).

Pointing out these facts it not only NOT a sin – it is a DUTY.

Comfort the afflicted, afflict the comfortable, no?

NO.

The unitive aspect of sex ITSELF DERIVES FROM THE PROCREATIVE.

If sex were not inherently procreative, it would not be unitive – there would be no reason for it to unite people!

It would be no more unitive than any other nonprocreative gesture, such as handshaking.

So sex which is not inherently ordered to procreation IS ALSO NOT UNITIVE. The two aspects cannot be separated; they are two sides of the same coin.

You can have them both – or you can have neither.

Contraceptive sex is NOT an act of complete self-giving, and THIS ALONE is what makes sex unitive.

Hence the unitive aspect of sex is NOT a matter of emotive, solipsistic navel-gazing but of OBJECTIVE FACT: of the language of the sexual act itself.

This from the person who has previously remarked that God is a utilitarian!

Good Lord, you do think a lot of yourself. Have a banner for this personal crusade of yours?

 

[searching04]

Right…I have been paying attention. My point is, the Church Teaching is what it is and can never change because it is God’s Teaching, and the Church has no authority to change it.

Right again, that this is an example of something that needs to be brought to a Priest or Bishop by the OP. MaryGail36 adn Nate also provided resources that deal with these types of issues. Only there will the OP find the real answer. On this forum, she will get only get quotes from the Church and/or a variety of opinions that don’t really matter when they are all boiled down to the nitty gritty.

Well, awesome - on the last sentence, we can agree…

 

[Nate13]

Right…I have been paying attention. My point is, the Church Teaching is what it is and can never change because it is God’s Teaching, and the Church has no authority to change it.

Right again, that this is an example of something that needs to be brought to a Priest or Bishop by the OP. MaryGail36 adn Nate also provided resources that deal with these types of issues. Only there will the OP find the real answer. On this forum, she will get only get quotes from the Church and/or a variety of opinions that don’t really matter when they are all boiled down to the nitty gritty.

Yeah and if you think about it there is no required “depth” of penetration that the Church deems necessary haha. Obviously if someone used this point to attempt to lessen fertility that would be wrong, but in the case of vaginismus the “depth” would be a factor out of their control. I was trying to get at this in a round-a-bout away without getting to graphic, but do you get the drift of what I’m saying? Vaginismus does not prevent pregnancy by normal means and getting “all but there” can still make it happen.

 

[ahs]

Nice try but you are wrong.
You can not be certain about God’s Truth. You can only believe.

One simple prove is that there are many christian denominations and they study more or less the same Bible and still they come to a different God’s Truth.

Actually, there was 1 Christianity until a heretic decided that he could interpret the Bible his own way and that certain books of the Bible no longer were pertinent. Only after he protested and formed his own religious sect did there become so many (40,000+ ) “christian” religions…this was after 1500 years of Christianity. Sure, the early Church had its share of spats and fights over what was or was not correct, many revolts, and many hersies that were stamped out; but several times in history it is shown that all Christians prescribed to the same basic Doctrines that the Catholic Church prescribes to today. For more deatails on this, read “A Popular History of the Catholic Church” by Philip Hughs. For even more details and the proofs you may want to see, find the 3 volume set by the same author (the title I gave you is the condensed version).

Also read the writings of the early Church Fathers like Gregory I, Augustine, Thomas Aquinas, Alphonsus de Ligori, Francis de Sales, etc… (forgive me if I mis-spell…and these are all Saints).

Anyway…getting further into this may require a new thread to avoid getting off-topic.

 

[searching04]

I bet you think you’re quite clever, don’t you?

Admonishing sinners is a WORK OF CHARITY – i.e., of the love to which we’re ACTUALLY called as Christians.

I know it doesn’t jive with you deficient view of the word but there you have it – the problem is on YOUR end, not MINE.

That you even THINK this is a mere “disagreement” that ought to be aired out shows how far gone the contraception apologists here are.

The Church’s teachings are INERRANT and NONNEGOTIABLE.

If you reject EVEN ONE of its teachings then you are *ipso facto *rejecting the magisterial authority of the Church and of the Holy Spirit who protects it from error.

In fact, since the Holy Spirit DOES protect it, you are in a sense calling God Himself a LIAR.

And THIS compounds the sin of contraception with the sin of scandal, and of desecration (if its practitioners continue to take communion despite their rebellion).

Pointing out these facts it not only NOT a sin – it is a DUTY.

Comfort the afflicted, afflict the comfortable, no?

NO.

The unitive aspect of sex ITSELF DERIVES FROM THE PROCREATIVE.

If sex were not inherently procreative, it would not be unitive – there would be no reason for it to unite people!

It would be no more unitive than any other nonprocreative gesture, such as handshaking.

So sex which is not inherently ordered to procreation IS ALSO NOT UNITIVE. The two aspects cannot be separated; they are two sides of the same coin.

You can have them both – or you can have neither.

Contraceptive sex is NOT an act of complete self-giving, and THIS ALONE is what makes sex unitive.

This is one of the areas of disagreement, especially for couples who cannot, for one reason or another, have intercourse or another child. I am happy to have found in here that I am not the only Catholic - yep, I’m Catholic - that believes and has experienced completely self-giving, selfless, loving, intensely unitive non-intercourse sex. And before you go off an a verbal rampage again, don’t be so assumptive when you do.

Hence the unitive aspect of sex is NOT a matter of emotive, solipsistic navel-gazing but of OBJECTIVE FACT: of the language of the sexual act itself.

Solipsistic - you like that word, don’t you? Think you’ll find no one here who thinks the unitive part of sex is only emotive and solipsistic - all emotion and mindless, is it? Yeah, I looked it up. But you will probably find people who like navel-gazing!

This from the person who has previously remarked that God is a utilitarian!

 

[ahs]

Actually, there was 1 Christianity until a heretic decided that he could interpret the Bible his own way and that certain books of the Bible no longer were pertinent. Only after he protested and formed his own religious sect did there become so many (40,000+ ) “christian” religions…this was after 1500 years of Christianity. Sure, the early Church had its share of spats and fights over what was or was not correct, many revolts, and many hersies that were stamped out; but several times in history it is shown that all Christians prescribed to the same basic Doctrines that the Catholic Church prescribes to today. For more deatails on this, read “A Popular History of the Catholic Church” by Philip Hughs. For even more details and the proofs you may want to see, find the 3 volume set by the same author (the title I gave you is the condensed version).

Also read the writings of the early Church Fathers like Gregory I, Augustine, Thomas Aquinas, Alphonsus de Ligori, Francis de Sales, etc… (forgive me if I mis-spell…and these are all Saints).

Anyway…getting further into this may require a new thread to avoid getting off-topic.

In other words, I can be certain that what I believe is God’s Truth because it is a Truth that has remain unchanged in the 2000 years since Christ established His Church.

The other “truths” of the protestant religions and other denominations not only has changed since the 1500’s, but it continues to change everytime someone comes along and thinks they have a better interpretation. That’s why there are over 40,000 different ones, all of them different than the True Faith that has never changed.

 

[LaSainte]

I do so love it when you respond!

Hello there, Searching 04. I’ve been watching this thread with rapt attention and as usual the typical NFP rhetoric keeps coming up. I’m just waiting for someone to throw out the old argument that I’m one step closer to an abortion if I use contraception (I don’t) vs. NFP. I think part of the problem I have with these threads is that I find them to be intellectually so dishonest.

We all know that intent or “mentality” has nothing to do with the morality of NFP vs. Contraception, so why do people continuously bring it up?

 

[searching04]

Hello there, Searching 04. I’ve been watching this thread with rapt attention and as usual the typical NFP rhetoric keeps coming up. I’m just waiting for someone to throw out the old argument that I’m one step closer to an abortion if I use contraception (I don’t) vs. NFP. I think part of the problem I have with these threads is that I find them to be intellectually so dishonest.

We all know that intent or “mentality” has nothing to do with the morality of NFP vs. Contraception, so why do people continuously bring it up?

Hey, there! That’s why I like reading your posts - they are intellectually honest.

NFP catches the bad rap most of the time, especially when a woman’s cycles and signs are “off”. But it is following church teachings on sex that I believe is the biggest area of disagreement, frustration, and cause of problems in Catholic marriages related to sex. Yes, trying to split hairs on when and why you use NFP comes up (contraceptive mentality) arises, as does whether it is Catholic contraception.

The initial post was about the unitive nature of sex. It devolved into NFP somehow, and this raging debate about what is correct, allowed, unitive, etc.

I was called nasty and gross in the “Lust and Attraction” thread because of my feeling, beliefs, experience on what the church allows in sex and why it dictates what it does in the CCC.

 

[twoangels]

The unitive aspect cannot be separeted fromteh procreative aspect. Each act is unitive by nature and ordered toward procreation by nature. If we disrupt either of those, the act is disordered.

You mentioned stimulating your husband to climax outside of you. This is masturbation (see CCC 2352).
2352 By masturbation is to be understood the deliberate stimulation of the genital organs in order to derive sexual pleasure. "Both the Magisterium of the Church, in the course of a constant tradition, and the moral sense of the faithful have been in no doubt and have firmly maintained that masturbation is an intrinsically and gravely disordered action."137 “The deliberate use of the sexual faculty, for whatever reason, outside of marriage is essentially contrary to its purpose.” **For here sexual pleasure is sought outside of "the sexual relationship which is demanded by the moral order and in which the total meaning of mutual self-giving AND [not “or” ] human procreation **in the context of true love is achieved."138
To form an equitable judgment about the subjects’ moral responsibility and to guide pastoral action, one must take into account the affective immaturity, force of acquired habit, conditions of anxiety, or other psychological or social factors that lessen or even extenuate moral culpability.-emphasis and brackets mine

If you’re going to call what my husband and I occassion do when we struggle to complete the act naturally masturbation, than guess what? It says sexual pleasure. So make sure you never kiss your spouse before they go to work because you aren’t intending on having full out sexual intercourse. Also guess what. Foreplay isn’t procreative unless you have sex. So no making out on the bed in any manner. No back rubs. You must behave around each other as if you are dating when its your fertile period. Or how about this? You know what? Foreplay isn’t actually oriented to procreation. So no foreplay. Any sexual pleasure must be exclusively experienced during sexual intercourse. And if your husband has difficulty climaxing start shouting on him “Honey you have to or we’ll go to hell! You have to. Its immoral if you don’t.” Oh and when you’re reeling in pain because the psychological pressure is making him last over a half hour, just remember if you stop its a sin because even if its not your own fault that he couldn’t climax, but if he’s so ready to go that he masturbates later in the evening without you around, its your fault.

 

[twoangels]

Yeah and if you think about it there is no required “depth” of penetration that the Church deems necessary haha. Obviously if someone used this point to attempt to lessen fertility that would be wrong, but in the case of vaginismus the “depth” would be a factor out of their control. I was trying to get at this in a round-a-bout away without getting to graphic, but do you get the drift of what I’m saying? Vaginismus does not prevent pregnancy by normal means and getting “all but there” can still make it happen.

That basically is how we approached the issue initially. However eventually this started effecting my husband. Everyone here is forgetting that my vaginismus problems are mostly over. I am getting angry at everyone because some of the things that they are insisting upon is claiming that the treatment I went through to overcome vaginismus was immoral.

The issue now is that my husband struggles with difficulty climaxing from intercourse. The issue now is that our direct approach of denying him a climax when he can’t was making the problem worse. He was climaxing less and less and eventually would immediately lose his erection as soon as we’d attempt intercourse. I didn’t even know it was possible to climax without an erection, but apparently it is.

My logic is this. Foreplay is permitted because its aim toward procreation is that it makes intercourse possible. As such it is unitive and procreative because it eventually leads to that unity. The same is true with this situation. It helps us acheive the unitive and the procreative to take the performance pressure off. My understanding of the sexual process has drastically changed. When I read the Church’s teachings in this light it makes sense. When I read what other people say, they just sound like a bunch of people who look at themselves and are like “This is how sex works for me. Why doesn’t it work for others that way?” Obviously if we were trying to thwart the procreative and unitive purposes, that would be sinful.

 

[Jaaanosik]

In other words, I can be certain that what I believe is God’s Truth because it is a Truth that has remain unchanged in the 2000 years since Christ established His Church.

The other “truths” of the protestant religions and other denominations not only has changed since the 1500’s, but it continues to change everytime someone comes along and thinks they have a better interpretation. That’s why there are over 40,000 different ones, all of them different than the True Faith that has never changed.

In other words, you only believe you are certain.

 

[twoangels]

In other words, I can be certain that what I believe is God’s Truth because it is a Truth that has remain unchanged in the 2000 years since Christ established His Church.

The other “truths” of the protestant religions and other denominations not only has changed since the 1500’s, but it continues to change everytime someone comes along and thinks they have a better interpretation. That’s why there are over 40,000 different ones, all of them different than the True Faith that has never changed.

Yes, because 2000 years ago our theology was developed enough to include words like Trinity. It didn’t take years of arguments and the formation of multiple heresies for our understanding of the Truth to develop. And really the only heresy that has ever existed is Protestantism. Gnostics never existed. Arians never existed. Nope everyone was perfectly unified. Oh and there was never any confusion about what made contraceptives immoral. We don’t find any historical explanations that claim its murder before conception. We don’t have any saints condemning people for using periodic abstainence nor insisting that couples should never ever seek to limit the size of their family.

No no and no. What we have is a tradition that recognizes sexual sin exists and that there is something disordered about contraceptives. We have a Thomasitic philosphy about why it is immoral and we have JP II’s Theology of the Body which is a pretty new theological development. But ultimately the Church is still digesting the theology of the body.

I certainly don’t think it is possible for the Church to ever embrace contraceptives. However, I think that when what you’ve been taught about sex renders you incapable of actually having sex with your spouse, those ideas do not of Divine origin.

And no one can tell me that my husband and I were not respecting the procreative aspect of sex. If anything we were placing the procreative aspect so high above the unitive that in the beginning we were willing to hurt the unitive aspect. We’re now learning our lesson. But ultimately regardless of our mistakes, we have a beautiful daughter. I look at her and I think of everything going on in my heart at the time she was concieved and I know deeply that our conception was a part of what God did to show us that we could trust Him. We decided to throw out NFP till we overcame vaginismus. My husband was only working for the census and was going to be unemployed soon. I was petrified of going through a pregnancy while still having difficulty with vaginal penetration of any kind. How would I give birth? How would the pregnancy be safe? But we prayed the rosary daily during that time focusing our intentions on our problem and I felt like the Blessed Mother was calling me to take that chance. And for some reason I just felt in my heart that God intended a little girl. She even looks similiar to how I expected her to look. It was not easy but my husband and I practiced extreem faithfulness. It was such a test of faith. It is so insulting to hear people say that what we did to overcome vaginismus was a rejection of God and a result of a lack of faith.

 

[ahs]

If you’re going to call what my husband and I occassion do when we struggle to complete the act naturally masturbation, than guess what? It says sexual pleasure. So make sure you never kiss your spouse before they go to work because you aren’t intending on having full out sexual intercourse. Also guess what. Foreplay isn’t procreative unless you have sex. So no making out on the bed in any manner. No back rubs. You must behave around each other as if you are dating when its your fertile period. Or how about this? You know what? Foreplay isn’t actually oriented to procreation. So no foreplay. Any sexual pleasure must be exclusively experienced during sexual intercourse. And if your husband has difficulty climaxing start shouting on him “Honey you have to or we’ll go to hell! You have to. Its immoral if you don’t.” Oh and when you’re reeling in pain because the psychological pressure is making him last over a half hour, just remember if you stop its a sin because even if its not your own fault that he couldn’t climax, but if he’s so ready to go that he masturbates later in the evening without you around, its your fault.

I don’t think anyhting I said or quoted from the Catechism suggests anything you mention above that I bolded.

Like I told another poster, if you really want the “true” answer without reading posts where people share their opinions or qoutes from the teachings of the Church, this is a concern you should take to your Priest or Bishop.

 

[ahs]

Yes, because 2000 years ago our theology was developed enough to include words like Trinity. It didn’t take years of arguments and the formation of multiple heresies for our understanding of the Truth to develop. And really the only heresy that has ever existed is Protestantism. Gnostics never existed. Arians never existed. Nope everyone was perfectly unified. Oh and there was never any confusion about what made contraceptives immoral. We don’t find any historical explanations that claim its murder before conception. We don’t have any saints condemning people for using periodic abstainence nor insisting that couples should never ever seek to limit the size of their family.

No no and no. What we have is a tradition that recognizes sexual sin exists and that there is something disordered about contraceptives. We have a Thomasitic philosphy about why it is immoral and we have JP II’s Theology of the Body which is a pretty new theological development. But ultimately the Church is still digesting the theology of the body.

I certainly don’t think it is possible for the Church to ever embrace contraceptives. However, I think that when what you’ve been taught about sex renders you incapable of actually having sex with your spouse, those ideas do not of Divine origin.

And no one can tell me that my husband and I were not respecting the procreative aspect of sex. If anything we were placing the procreative aspect so high above the unitive that in the beginning we were willing to hurt the unitive aspect. We’re now learning our lesson. But ultimately regardless of our mistakes, we have a beautiful daughter. I look at her and I think of everything going on in my heart at the time she was concieved and I know deeply that our conception was a part of what God did to show us that we could trust Him. We decided to throw out NFP till we overcame vaginismus. My husband was only working for the census and was going to be unemployed soon. I was petrified of going through a pregnancy while still having difficulty with vaginal penetration of any kind. How would I give birth? How would the pregnancy be safe? But we prayed the rosary daily during that time focusing our intentions on our problem and I felt like the Blessed Mother was calling me to take that chance. And for some reason I just felt in my heart that God intended a little girl. She even looks similiar to how I expected her to look. It was not easy but my husband and I practiced extreem faithfulness. It was such a test of faith. It is so insulting to hear people say that what we did to overcome vaginismus was a rejection of God and a result of a lack of faith.

see post #168

As to early Saints condeming people for using periodic abstinence, I don’t think they did. I have done a fair bit of reading and found that at least 3 of the early Fathers, who were thought to condem any marital sex during the infertile period, actually did not hold that view that many associate with them. My guess is that when people study these writings, they fail to take into account the evils that were being fought with those writings during their respecitve periods. I’m not a historian so I can’t say much more on that with any accuraccy. The fact is that we, the laity, don’t really know what they meant when they were writing. The Church, however, does. The Church interprets those writings and then clarifies them for us, the laity, and presents them to us in understandable terms that can be found in the Catechism and in many Encyclicals.

 

[Wardog]

Good Lord, you do think a lot of yourself. Have a banner for this personal crusade of yours?

Just ignore him. Everyone else does.