Traditions of Man - Birth Control Pills

[Eden]

Texan in DC:

LOL

Ok if a woman uses a pill, this does not abort a fetus because a fetus has to be in place for it to be aborted.

Your opinion that life begins at the fetus stage is not consistent with fact. Life begins at conception through the stages of blastocyst and embryo and then onto fetus.

We are not talking about a “fetus”, as a conceived life will not be able to grow to the fetal stage if it is not able to implant.

Are you purposely using the word fetus or are you not familiar with the stages of pregnancy?

 

[Eden]

Texan in DC:

LOL

A woman on the pill will alter her cervical mucus so that they sperm would have a harder time getting through to fertilize the egg.

“The same thing happens when a woman goes through her normal God Given cycle, during that time estrogen is higher and her cervial mucus is altered, therefore making is harder to concieve a child.”

I would encourage you to read the entire article by the American Association of Pro-Life Obstetricians and Gynecologists. Some of your medical knowledge is inaccurate.

www.aaplog.org/collition.htm

“First, it is important to realize that there exists a large cohort of physicians currently leading our profession in the big lie. These doctors are writing and speaking across the whole nation, selling the idea that the BCP, the IUD, the “morning after pills”, so-called “emergency contraception”, are not abortifacient.”

“Most (virtually all) literature dealing with hormonal contraception ascribes a three-fold action to these agents. 1. inhibition of ovulation, 2. inhibition of sperm transport, and 3. production of a “hostile endometrium”, which presumably prevents or disrupts implantation of the developing baby if the first two mechanisms fail. The first two mechanisms are true contraception. The third proposed mechanism, IF it in fact occurs, would be abortifacient.”

I asked him, ‘Does the Pill sometimes fail to prevent ovulation?’ He said ‘yes’. I asked, ‘What happens then?’ He said, ‘The cervical mucus slows down the sperm. And if that doesn’t work,** if you end up with a fertilized egg, it won’t implant and grow because of the less hospitable endometrium.’ **(Emphasis in the original)
"I then asked Hill if he was certain the pill made implantation less likely. ‘Oh yes,’ he replied. I said, ‘ So you don’t think this is just a theoretical effect of the Pill?’ He said the following, which I draw directly from my extensive notes of our conversation.

"Oh, no, it’s not theoretical. It’s observable. We know what an endometrium looks like when it’s rich and most receptive to the fertilized egg. When the woman is taking the Pill, you can clearly see the difference, based both on gross appearance - as seen with the naked eye - and under a microscope. At the time when the endometrium would normally accept a fertilized egg, if a woman is taking the Pill it is much less likely to do so."

 

[Eden]

Texan in DC:

My attack on this issue is simple you are stating that other christian faiths who practice contraception are aborting therefore = murderers and that is where you are 100% WRONG.

Of course it’s murder, albeit unknowingly of course.

The fact is, other Christian religions which do not teach that artificial contraception is morally wrong have exposed their members to the possiblity that they are unknowingly aborting through their use of birth control pills. Their teachings have led them into error.

This is a clear example of how the moral authority of the Church as guided by the Holy Spirit does not lead us into error.

Perhaps you do not realize that contraception, abortion and infanticide were practices of the pagans. Even in the first centuries, Christians were distinct for their rejection of contraception, abortion or infanticide.

The Church teaching against contraception is Christian through and through. The same can be said for all Christian faiths until the early 20th century, when one by one, they led themselves into error.

I assume from your answers that you support the use of contraception. How would you justify this biblically?

www.trosch.org/rwd/brthcntl.htm

 

[Eden]

Texan in DC:

Catholic doctrine holds that God created the marital act to be both unitive and procreative. Deliberately altering fertility or the marital act with the intention of preventing procreation is considered to be a grave sin. Thus, artificial birth control methods and orgasmic acts outside of full marital intercourse are forbidden. Not having sex at all (abstinence) can be considered moral. Having sex at an infertile time in a woman’s life (such as pregnancy or menopause) can also be moral since the infertile condition is considered to be created by God, rather than as an act by the couple intended to frustrate fertility.
Thus, it is considered morally acceptable to abstain during the fertile part of the woman’s menstrual cycle. Increasing the infertile period through particular breastfeeding practices — the Lactational Amenorrhea Method — is also considered a moral way to space a family’s children.
The benefits of spacing children are recognized by the Catholic Church, and use of Natural Family Planning for this reason is encouraged. Humanae Vitae cites “physical, economic, psychological and social conditions” as possibly compelling reasons to avoid pregnancy. Couples are warned, however, against using NFP for frivolous, selfish, or materialistic reasons. Many Catholic sources extol the benefits children bring to their parents, their siblings, and society in general, and couples are encouraged to have as many children as their circumstances make practical.

Please read the Church teaching more carefully. All methods of NFP are “open to life”. That is not the case with artificial means of contracepting. NFP and the Church teaching have been the subject of many threads here and have been discussed in great detail many times.

My thread is not about NFP. It is about how “bible only” faiths can justify the use of birth control pills when it clearly contradicts scriptures.

 

[Texan_in_DC]

Eden,

I am a Catholic and I support the churches teaching of contraception 100 % but you are very wrong when you say that if a woman whom chooses birth control and practices it is aborting life, or to even claim she is a murderer.

Nowhere in our beliefs within the Church is this stated. You have taken this out of context and put your own personal opinion on this.

Through our faith we do not use artificial birth control, you are right that the bible does talk about this in the bible. I will reference it later but anytimes witchcraft and sorcery is mentioned in the bible that the bible was against was because people in these pagon communties and some christians would come to these people and get their birth control so that they could then practice sexual desire outside of their marriage so that they would not get caught by their spouse.

 

[Texan_in_DC]

Eden:

Your opinion that life begins at the fetus stage is not consistent with fact. Life begins at conception through the stages of blastocyst and embryo and then onto fetus.

We are not talking about a “fetus”, as a conceived life will not be able to grow to the fetal stage if it is not able to implant.

Are you purposely using the word fetus or are you not familiar with the stages of pregnancy?

Eden, below is the stance from the Pro-Life office of the Bishops Conference says that a woman who has been raped should be able to defend herself from potential conception meaning the morning after pill would then be offered in this case by a Catholic hospital. Your opinion is that conception begins either at the moment of intercourse or at the moment the sperm connects with the egg, which one? The Bishops said that the pill can be offered in a situation that conception has not occured yet, why? Because prior to conception no life has actually begun. I do not know the medical window that this takes place.

But this woman who chooses to take the morning after pill after being raped is not aborting life nor is a murderer just because she took the morning after pill. Nor is a woman who is not Catholic committing abortion or a murderer if she takes the pill daily.

One more question, if this woman had been raped and the Catholic hospital says that no conception has occurred what point is it then to take the pill no conception has taken place?

“The Pro-Life Office of the Bishops Conference, by the way, holds that ‘A woman who has been raped should be able to defend herself from a potential conception and receive treatment to suppress ovulation and incapacitate sperm. If conception has occurred, however, a Catholic hospital will not dispense drugs to interfere with implantation of a newly conceived human embryo.’

 

[Eden]

Texan in DC:

I am a Catholic and I support the churches teaching of contraception 100 % but you are very wrong when you say that if a woman whom chooses birth control and practices it is aborting life, or to even claim she is a murderer.

Nowhere in our beliefs within the Church is this stated. You have taken this out of context and put your own personal opinion on this.

You are not understanding the thread.

If a woman takes a birth control pill, she is taking an abortifacient. It is a medical fact that if someone uses birth control pills, there is a possiblity that her body will abort a conception because of the hostile environment in the womb.

Now you are trying to say that my thread is claiming that a woman is causing this to happen knowingly or on purpose. I most certainly am not.

I am stating that women who take this pills and are Christians and who now have the knowledge that the pill is an abortifacient through this thread should test what their church teaches about the use of the pill against the scriptures and determine whether their church which is “Bible only” has teachings which contradict the Bible.

To summarize: If you are “biblically-based” in fact, even if you have Sacred Tradition (the Church), your teachings must not contradict scripture. If they do, this is the “tradition of men” we read about in the Bible. If your church teaches that taking birth control pills is not morally wrong (ignorance of the medical facts about the pills by their ministers is not a valid excuse because the True Church is guided by the Holy Spirit and will not err despite lack of medical knowledge), then your church is in error and has corrupted the Bible with a “tradition of men” (meaning teaching something that is not from God).

 

[Texan_in_DC]

Eden:

For those who belong to “bible only” Christianity, why do your faiths allow for the use of birth control pills which are known abortifacients when the bible says, “Thou shalt not kill”?

I do not have a problem with the first part where you state for bible only believers where does the bible allow such use. At this point I have no issue.
But then you say “thou shalt not kill”

So I am now going to educate you and everybody else who cares about the history of Birth Control and how and where the bible is very against it. I hope that someone outside of our faith can for the first time actually see and understand how not only the bible is right but also the Catholic Churches stance on birth control.

I know for a fact that our current Pope Benedict will be readdressing this issue in the near future.

And I will rest on the issue that you claim that taking the pill equals to murder.

 

[Texan_in_DC]

Birth Control and the Bible
A few centuries before the time of Christ, someone discovered that a plant called silphium, growing wild in the North African desert, had excellent birth control properties. (The silphium of today is not the same plant.) This put it at the head of a list of other successful birth control herbs, asafoetida and Queen Anne’s Lace, and some others. These were collectively referred to as pharmakeia in New Testament Greco-Roman society. Cyrene, Libya (the home port of Simon of Cyrene) became the main export city for silphium. Cyrene grew rich on silphium, as people around the Mediterranean "beat down the doors” to get as much silphium as they could, to disconnect sex from the risk of conception.

In the recipient ports, the main purchasers of silphium were fortune tellers! Why? Because throughout the Roman Empire, promiscuous girls would gather around the local fortune teller, hear their fortunes respecting their latest love matches, and then the fortune teller, after receiving a fee for the usually-optimistic love fortune, who sell the girls some silphium as “protection” for their next few dates. Husbands and wives would also gather around the fortuneteller to purchase pharmakeia. For this reason, birth control substances came to be referred to with the euphemism “sorcery,” meaning “sorcerer’s stuff.”

How little things have changed! Today people still go to the pharmacy to buy their pharmakeia, or birth control pills or condoms, while they buy those little rolled-up fortunes or astrology magazines at the counter!

In any event, at four places the Bible nastily condemns use of pharmakeia. Three of the four places, we are told that pharmakeia users will be damned. It is hard to see that is what is going on in our modern translations, for translations of the Bible into English have mistranslated pharmakeia – literally, “drugs” – to read “sorcery,” paying homage to the Greco-Roman euphemism for contraceptives, “sorcery.” Didache 2:2 – clearly uses pharmakeia to refer to “contraceptives.” The didache was written in the same era as the Book of Revelation. The Didache condemns, in this order, (1) use of magiae – curses against conception; (2) pharmakeia – contraceptives; (3) abortion; and (4) infanticide. The context defines the use. Do you understand what the Didache is doing? – It is condemning progressively invasive interruptions of the reproductive process.

Here are the four verses condemning connection with pharmakeia, three of them very straightforwardly declaring that those who make use of pharmakeia will be damned to Hell fire…

Galatians 5:19-21: 19 Now the works of the flesh are obvious: immorality, impurity, licentiousness, 20 idolatry, sorcery [pharmakeia], hatreds, rivalry, jealousy, outbursts of fury, acts of selfishness, dissensions, factions, 21 occasions of envy, drinking bouts, orgies, and the like. I warn you, as I warned you before, that those who do such things would not inherit the kingdom of God.

Revelation 9:21: 21 Nor did they repent of their murders, their magic potions [pharmakeia], their unchastity, or their robberies.

Revelation 21:8: 8 But as for cowards, the unfaithful, the depraved, murderers, the unchaste, sorcerers [pharmakeus], idol-worshipers, and deceivers of every sort, their lot is in the burning pool of fire and sulfur, which is the second death."

Revelation 22:14-15: 14 Blessed are they who wash their robes so as to have the right to the tree of life and enter the city through its gates. 15 Outside are the dogs, the sorcerers [pharmakeus], the unchaste, the murderers, the idol-worshipers, and all who love and practice deceit.

Note how each use of the pharmak-related term is paired-up with sinful sexual activity. (Commentators aware of the contraceptive meaning of pharmakeia concede that “idolatry” in the Galatians verse probably refers to fertility worship in the Gnostic temples competing with Judaism and Christianity – celebrating the Gnostic pantheon with sex.)

Note also that three times the Bible points out that (presumably unrepentant) pharmakeia users will be damned.

 

[Eden]

Texan in DC:

I do not have a problem with the first part where you state for bible only believers where does the bible allow such use. At this point I have no issue.
But then you say “thou shalt not kill”

Are you denying that an abortifacient has the capability of killing a conceived life? If you agree that an abortifacient can cause an abortion, then what is your objection to “thou shalt not kill”? If someone takes a pill knowing it can abort any “accidental” conception are they not complicit?

So I am now going to educate you and everybody else who cares about the history of Birth Control and how and where the bible is very against it.

You are being very presumptious. I have participated in many threads about this topic.

I hope that someone outside of our faith can for the first time actually see and understand how not only the bible is right but also the Catholic Churches stance on birth control.

You can create your own thread on the topic if you take objection to mine.

I know for a fact that our current Pope Benedict will be readdressing this issue in the near future.

Pope John Paul II’s “Theology of the Body” has addressed contraception beautifully. I hope you will be including some of that in your thread. It is a celebration of life in stark contrast to the “culture of death”.

And I will rest on the issue that you claim that taking the pill equals to murder.

You are negating the medical evidence, presented by obstetricians/gynecologists and even by the pill manufacturers themselves, that the pill has an abortifacient nature.

www.quiverfull.com/birth_control/pill_abortifacient.html
(Patrick McCrystal MPSNI/MPSIPharmacists For Life International )

*Abortifacient: *a drug that kills a newly formed human being, whether by directly killing the baby or by preventing implantation, and so cause an abortion, either intentionally or unintentionally.

 

[Texan_in_DC]

Eden:

Are you denying that an abortifacient has the capability of killing a conceived life?
No, but there is a specific drug that is allowed by law to be given to a woman who has a living being inside her for the sole purpose of aborting it, this is the abortion pill.

I believe that when you use the term abortifacient, this is too broad.

The use of artificial drugs is wrong because this takes God out of the marriage structure and family, it allows a man and wife to have sex whenever they please, with no regard of what God wants, its like you are working in your odds are and not His will.

Eden again the only problem I have is that you are telling other christians that taking these drugs are equal to murder.

Instead they should know where in the bible prohibits the use of, and then why?

If you agree that an abortifacient can cause an abortion, then what is your objection to “thou shalt not kill”?

When my future wife has to take the pill for her medical reasons and we do the marriage act I do not believe that we are aborting, because I am a concervative catholic we will practice NFP, and at the time we are ready for childern we will have to step away from the pill and take the chance of her having more issues with ovarian cyst, the pill medically helps control this from happening.

The Church will and does recognize this and we are not commiting a grave sin because of our intent.

I think the intent is the key message here.

The intent of a bible christian is not to abort life to be a murderer, they outside of the Catholic Church and even inside do not understand why it is wrong.

If someone takes a pill knowing it can abort any “accidental” conception are they not complicit?

Sure they are, we all have to answer to our own sins. But I got the impression from you that all women that use the pill are murderers and I disagree with your broad outlook to the pill.

You are being very presumptious. I have participated in many threads about this topic.

You can create your own thread on the topic if you take objection to mine.

Pope John Paul II’s “Theology of the Body” has addressed contraception beautifully. I hope you will be including some of that in your thread. It is a celebration of life in stark contrast to the “culture of death”.

I agree I loved the book

 

[Eden]

I understand from your special circumstances that intent would be a factor. The Church teaches this as well. We are talking about contraception, the manipulation of the reproductive organs to prevent conception. You are talking about a medical use of the pill which is not contraception.

But you are again misunderstanding what this thread is about. If a Christian does not accept that the Church is the True Church and that she is guided by the Holy Spirit and cannot teach error, then they are in a church or a belief system that can teach error.

In other words, no other church teaches that contraception is morally wrong. So, no other church is teaching the Word of God on this issue. Catholics who follow Church teaching on contraception are protected from the error of using birth control pills for contraception despite being ignorant of their abortifacient nature. We can be assured that the Church leads us into all truth. Conversely, we can see a glaring example of how Protestantism can and does have teachings contradictory to God’s Word.

This is a very clear case of Christians being taught error outside the Church. It is very tragic to see good Christians moving through life without a rudder and being taught error when Christ gave us the Church and the protection of the Holy Spirit to to lead us into all truth.

I pray that all Protestants will one day be able to see the grave errors in teachings their founders and ministers have made (this is obviously just one example) and that they will seek the fullness of truth which lies in only one place - the Catholic Church.

 

[1ke]

Texan in DC:

This is one example how I am partially right

The minipills, which contain no estrogen, inhibit the egg’s ability to travel through the fallopian tubes, alter the cervical mucus to block sperm, partially suppress the sperm’s ability to unite with an egg, and partially inhibit implantation in the uterine wall. For maximum effectiveness, you need to take the pills as prescribed.

Inhibit, not prevent-- as in NOT 100% of the time.

When the egg makes it to the fallopian tube and the sperm makes it to the fallopian tube, a baby is created and then aborted via a hostile uterus.

That is a chemical abortion.

 

[1ke]

The Iambic Pen:

That makes sense. Still, I struggle with the idea that something is immoral just because it violates the natural order of things. After all, there are many things we do that circumvent the natural order of things. We perform surgery on those who would ordinarily die, we protect the weaker members of our society, we convert oil into gasoline so we can drive cars, we wear clothing, etc…Perhaps these aren’t good examples, but I still fail to see how something is immoral just because it isn’t “natural.” Have moral prohibitions based on Natural Law been passed down as apostolic teachings, or are they the result of theological theories by men like St. Thomas Aquinas?

Once again, I’m not attacking the Catholic Church’s position on contraception. I’m just confused by the use of this “Natural Law” argument to justify it.

God bless!

The Natural Law and “natural” as in “not man made” are not the same thing.

The Natural Law is the law written into each person by God-- actually into every thing by God. We all have a nature. Fish have fish nature, humans have human nature.

By that nature we are restricted from living in water, just as fish are restricted from living on land. No matter how badly a fish wants to live on the land, he simply cannot-- not because of some man-made zoning law, but because of the laws of nature built into his being. To attempt to live outside his nature would be death to his fish body.

The Natural Moral Law is the same way-- built into our beings by God. To transgress our moral nature is to bring death to our souls.

I highly recommend the book 50 Questions on the Natural Law: What It Is and Why We Need It by Charles E. Rice if you would like to study this concept. The concept of Natural Law shaped the foundation of our judicial system, although has been nearly abandoned in the 20th and 21st century.

 

[1ke]

Texan in DC:

you are very wrong when you say that if a woman whom chooses birth control and practices it is aborting life, or to even claim she is a murderer.

This is a misstatement of Eden’s premise. She did not present the issue of a woman who “practices birth control” but rather the case of a woman who contracepts using the birth control pill, a very specific method of contraception.

The argument is really quite a simple one:

The “birth control pill” not in all cases prevent ovulation or conception, it can allow conception to occur and then purposely abort the newly conceived child.
Texan in DC:

Nowhere in our beliefs within the Church is this stated. You have taken this out of context and put your own personal opinion on this.

The Church teaches abortion is wrong, there is no distinction in how the abortion occurs, chemical or surgical.

You are arguing from the premise that the birth control pill is not abortifacient, and that is untrue. Even the manufacturers of the pills admit that it is.

 

[1ke]

Texan in DC:

When my future wife has to take the pill for her medical reasons and we do the marriage act I do not believe that we are aborting, because I am a concervative catholic we will practice NFP

#1 You cannot practice NFP while taking hormonal birth control pills.

#2 Humanae Vitae talks of medical treatments that render one sterile as acceptable if it is the unintended side effect. The pill does not render you sterile, it can allow ovulation and then kill a conceived child. This is not what Humanae Vitae was referring to, and most moral theologians concur that engaging in sexual intercourse while on the Pill is morally problematic, and the gravity of the aborting factor outweighs the other components of the Principle of Double Effect.
Texan in DC:

and at the time we are ready for childern we will have to step away from the pill and take the chance of her having more issues with ovarian cyst, the pill medically helps control this from happening.

You need to visit www.popepaulvi.com and get some counseling from Dr. Hilgers, a Catholic fertility specialist who has helped many women who have PCOS.
Texan in DC:

The Church will and does recognize this and we are not commiting a grave sin because of our intent.

Actually that is not true. Again, HV allows treatments that cause sterility as a secondary effect because their intent is to treat the diseased state. The pill does not fit in this category because it’s effects are not sterilizing but rather abortifacient. HV does not condone this in any way, nor does the Church.

 

[adrift]

ewtn.com/vexperts/showresult.asp?RecNum=451446&Forums=0&Experts=16&Days=2005&Author=&Keyword=medically+indicated&pgnu=1&groupnum=0&record_bookmark=1&ORDER_BY_TXT=ORDER+BY+ReplyDate+DESC&start_at=
from ask the experts at EWTN

other means for Birth Control
Question from on 10-20-2005:
I was wondering about using birth control to regulate my menstrual cycle. My mother says that the pill is only for people to “mess around” while they have their period. I disagree. I will remain a virgin until I am married so I am not using the pill to “mess around” while I have my period. But is there anything wrong with using birth control for my purpose?
Answer by Fr.Stephen F. Torraco on 10-20-2005:
It is morally permissible to use the birth control pill for medically indicated reasons. Having said that, I exhort you to look into natural family planning and the related science of NaProTechnology of the Pope Paul VI Institute. The pill, when prescribed, only treats the symptoms. NaProTechnology can get to the root cause. I suggest that you contact the Pope Paul VI Institute.

 

[Pug]

1ke:

most moral theologians concur that engaging in sexual intercourse while on the Pill is morally problematic, and the gravity of the aborting factor outweighs the other components of the Principle of Double Effect.

The stock answer here at CA seems to be that a wife on the pill for medical reasons may have relations with her husband…they do not have to abstain. Both Blackburn and Serpa seem to agree.

Look here:
forums.catholic-questions.org/showthread.php?t=4618

or here:

forums.catholic-questions.org/showthread.php?t=15756&

 

[joshua_b]

Pug:

The stock answer here at CA seems to be that a wife on the pill for medical reasons may have relations with her husband…they do not have to abstain. Both Blackburn and Serpa seem to agree.

Look here:
forums.catholic-questions.org/showthread.php?t=4618

or here:

forums.catholic-questions.org/showthread.php?t=15756&

Im not a theologian, or any kind of brilliant apologist, but it seems to me that people who want to use this are using it more as a rationalization than anything. What are some “medical reasons” for using the BCP that cannot be treated by NFP methods ? I am not saying that this is false, but I would think that the BCP could only be allowed AFTER all other options for treatment of said problem had been thouroughly explored and completely exhausted. With that being said, its my understanding that there are almost no (and Im not accusing anyone of not having whatever “problem” this may be) medical reasons for taking the BCP that cannot be addressed with other methods of treatment that comply to Church teaching.

 

[Pug]

joshua_b:

addressed with other methods of treatment that comply to Church teaching.

I think what I was saying is that the official employed apologists here at CA do think that taking the pill as a medical treatment does comply with Catholic teaching and that one may have relations in that situation, otherwise they would not be telling folks that it is fine to have relations while on the pill for medical reasons.

I assume they know more than me and have access to the right people to clarify the issue. Also, I personally know people not having sex who are on the pill for medical reasons, so I cannot see it as a rationalization. What could they be rationalizing?

I agree, though, that if one is considering marriage and one has been taking the pill for medical reasons, then one ought to think about the situation carefully. The correct course of action for that person could be to stop the pill a few months before marriage and then try to get pregnant immediately (using NFP to increase chances of success). It probably depends on their entire situation and medical condition. After all, they could be sterile for some unrelated reason, or who know what all.