Unitive and Procreative - But Why?

[Thinking10]

Aging and illness are not part of God’s design? So we are doing something contrary to God’s design by aging and getting sick?

With this argument, you could also argue that in the garden of Eden, we were designed to be immortal, so who needs procreation?

God designed us to be naked in the garden, so who needs clothes?

Etc…

 

[Thinking10]

Does natural law demand that we do not wear clothing?

 

[Thinking10]

Well then, why do we age and why do we get sick? Would anyone really choose this? If it is not we who chose bodies that age and get sick, then who designed them this way?

 

[fide]

I would think that in order for natural law to be objective it cannot presuppose the existence of God.

I need to stop reading these threads. Every couple 3 or 4 months it causes me an existential crisis. I need to stay away from this site and go back to my simple day to day life.

Can it be that you suppose a contradiction between God and the nature that He created? How could that be?

 

[Thinking10]

Is the need for sometimes non procreative sex also a consequence of sin?

 

[Thinking10]

Are we rebelling against God by fighting against the consequences of our sin? If God’s plan was for us to be incorrupt as in the garden, wouldn’t we be incorrupt? We are trying to achieve something on our own power that God has taken from us as punishment for sin.

 

[Thinking10]

If that was the state God wanted us to be in, it would be the state that we would be in. God said “you are dust and to dust you shall return.” He didn’t say “attempt to achieve immortality on your own power.”

 

[fide]

If sex is supposed to be according to natural law, and natural law is based on how our bodies are designed, why doesn’t the church prohibit Viagra?

The male body is designed to lose it’s ability to achieve an erection as it ages. Taking drugs to thwart that so as to have more sex should also be a sin, no?

According to the nature that God created and that was infused with a moral sense - the “natural moral law” - there was then no sickness, no degradation of corruption, no death. All of those consequences of sin came into creation because of the very unnatural act of sin - opposition to God, and to the natural moral law.

In the beginning, God saw what He had does and it was “very good.” In the beginning there was no death; there was an original harmony including man and the rest of creation. Sin changed all that, and now we think that was is indeed unnatural, is “natural” because it is all around us. That is because we do not look back to the origin and source of nature.

In other words, sickness is unnatural; degradation of the body due to old age is unnatural - they are the result of sin, not of human nature. Human nature itself has been deeply wounded because of sin - and thus sickness, infirmity, birth defects, old age and death. Indeed the sense of the natural moral law has been impaired by sin - sin has caused a darkening of the intellect and a weakening of the will, such that man’s conscience can become confused about right and wrong in many moral issues.

There are two ways man can use the things of creation: in good ways or in evil ways. It is good to use medicine to help and to heal; it is not good to use it to harm. It takes moral discernment to know the difference.

 

[fide]

Every single medical procedure and every medication people take modifies the behavior of our bodies from the way God designed it. The same arguments that are used to absolutely prohibit contraception logically can be used to prohibit altering the body in any way.

Why aren’t surgery or medication banned? God designed our bodies to heal naturally. Why shouldn’t we let our bodies heal naturally instead of in man made ways?

Please see my response to quasicatholic HERE. If that doesn’t answer your question, please ask again.

 

[Jaaanosik]

I disagree because NFP couples are not engaging in that expression of giving of the self when avoiding conjugal relations. During that act, they are not withholding anything they are able to withhold. As well, not having relations is not necessarily “unnatural” as contracepting is every time. Their disposition remains in openness to life in accord with the language and design of the body. On the other hand, if the couple was using NFP imprudently, it could indeed lead to sin as with a contracepting couple.

Taking temperature reading every day is not natural.
It’s treating fertility like a disease.

 

[Thinking10]

What is natural law?

 

[davidv]

What is natural law?

See here.

 

[Thinking10]

In your own words, what is natural law?

 

[fide]

Is the need for sometimes non procreative sex also a consequence of sin?

That depends on the need itself. The “need” to vent one’s lust is clearly a consequence of the sin of lust - which is a disordered, wrongful or inappropriate sexual desire.

The “need” to space one’s children, for reasonable, charitable and prudent cause, is not a consequence of sin. The gift of reason is of God and is very good; charity and prudence are virtues.

The method of expressing good and holy marital love, in a non-procreative but still fruitful way, is crucially important. To attempt this with contraception is gravely wrong because contraception does violence to what God designed into the marital embrace; to attempt this using the God-designed cycles of fertility in the woman is perfectly acceptable.

 

[MarcoPolo]

Taking temperature reading every day is not natural.
It’s treating fertility like a disease.

NFP monitoring can reveal more than something that is “disease.” So this conclusion is not merited. The point remains that prudent NFP users still give all of themselves that they are able when entering the expression of giving of self.

 

[seakelp]

If you want to understand why God wrote into the natural law that sex must be unitive and procreative, you need a theological answer. If something is the natural law, you can’t explain why it is so through the natural law as well, or you run into tautologies.

Sexual intercourse mirrors the Trinity: Father loves the Son, Son loves the Father, and the mutual love between them gives rise to another person, the Holy Spirit. The parallel is: Man loves Woman, Woman loves Man, mutual love results in another person…child.

Sex also mirrors the final unity of each soul to God (in the Beatific Vision). God, who is the initiator (as St. Paul says, God loved us first) is parallel to Man, who is physically the active agent in the sexual act. Woman is parallel to humanity, which receives the love and loves back. So it is a symbol of this ultimate destiny. However, it is also the means by which most people will reach this final destiny; Marriage is the most common vocation, by which people learn to selflessly love. By loving our spouses and children which arise from the union, we love God and are united to him. Being open to children also involves sacrificial love.

Best recommendation to learn more about this is Theology of the Body by St. John Paul II
Hope this helps, God bless.

Thank you! I will definitely check out the book.

 

[seakelp]

You could argue that, but to me, it is clearly not persuasive, as is the argument that contracepting tends toward objectification, where the latter would tend away from objectification. By tend, I mean more reasonable, healthy persons would tend away from objectification, and only a disordered mind would treat someone as a mere biological instrument.

Maybe. But again, it seems that we can argue the other way. I’m not entirely convinced by this argument because I don’t see a particular reason why elevating some particular functions above others somehow results in greater appreciation for the whole and not the particular part.

In the case of non-procreative love, we elevate pleasure and the body over the other person as a person. In the case of procreative love, we elevate the reproductive abilities of the person over the other person as a person.

Again, I suppose that the unitive aspect of sex paired with the procreative suggests that a sexual partner must value the other sexual partner beyond that partner’s reproductive utility.

Furthermore, something I was thinking about last night: this isn’t a single instance of sexual intercourse we’re talking about, here. Your idea seems to at least open up the possibility of understanding a sexual relationship as an iterative kind of event. Sex happens again and again.

My point being, under your argument, wouldn’t it make sense that each instance of sexual intercourse could be powerfully directed at some aspect of one’s partner, with the sum whole of each practice resulting in a greater appreciation for that other person? For instance, on Day 1 you have sex solely to express one’s love for one’s partner, using contraception. On Day 2, you have sex in order to reproduce.

Over a lifetime of such interactions, though each sex act might not lead to an understanding of that person’s wholeness, the sum of the relationship well could. If that’s the case, why then would a single instance of sex that is not unitive or procreative be all that bad? Again, under the justification you proposed in the quote above and earlier.

I just think that this justification doesn’t hold much water, here.

I would welcome you to come up with a natural law reason why murder or thievery is sinful. I think the answer to that question is the same as with contraception. Both are rooted in what it means to be a human being and the due dignity merited as such.

I can’t, really. I think that murder is unlawful because God says it is, as is theft. Both are prohibited by the Ten Commandments, and both would seem to violate Christ’s teaching to love one another.

But those are matters of divinely revealed law, not natural law.

 

[seakelp]

I would also invite you to another thought exercise you may hear now and then. Compare contraception to a person who engages in bulimia nervosa (eating and then inducing vomiting).

Would you consider the later a sinful act? Against the natural law of personhood?

In both cases, you have someone who enjoys engaging in a normatively licit act, but introduces a “third party” (contraception/purging) to prevent the unwanted consequences of that act (potential pregnancy/weight gain).

Sure. But in the case of bulimia, we have serious physical consequences that come along with the behavior, which is I suppose why we call it a disease or a disorder. We don’t say that a person who has bulimia is “sinful,” they are “sick” and need treatment.

But a person who has sex with contraception doesn’t quite seem to be dealing with a comparable situation. The more analogous situation would be someone who is addicted to pornography or some other sexual disorder, which in turn causes significant negative consequences in that person’s life aside from the addiction itself.

My point being that ends-oriented declarations about what is sinful or not don’t seem all that helpful in discussions of natural law.

 

[Jaaanosik]

NFP monitoring can reveal more than something that is “disease.” So this conclusion is not merited. The point remains that prudent NFP users still give all of themselves that they are able when entering the expression of giving of self.

The temperature monitoring is done only when there are some health threat related issues.
That’s natural.
So is the fertility a health threat?

 

[HappyCatholic01]

The temperature monitoring is done only when there are some health threat related issues.
That’s natural.
So is the fertility a health threat?

1. You are implying the standard of a health threat as the reason for taking one’s temperature. That is your own definition, but you can’t assume the Church or others share that view. Again, recording one’s temperature is natural for certain goals in life. One could just as easily argue that abstaining from sex for any reason isn’t “natural.” However, for many, it is the norm, and is part of the fundamental nature of their lives. Like NFP, couples do not HAVE to abstain if they do not wish to. They must however, be open to the possibility of life which could result from their actions.
2. The Church does not mandate the use of NFP. No one is obligated to use NFP. We are free to be intimate in marriage as we see fit, and let things play out. This whole discussion has the tone of implying a mandate for using NFP. Rather, the Church’s teaching is more focused on the prohibition of contraception and the unwillingness to be open to life and have no barrier with your spouse.