When people think of birth control as "protection" - reframing the paradigm

[HoneyBea]

As far as benefits…I’m not ingesting harmful drugs into my body, I have learned to know my body and my husband has as well and it’s has made our sex life more intimate because you share the responsibility. It brings a sense of awareness each time you make love that you may or may not be creating life and even though we admittedly had hoped we didn’t we knew it was possible and we made love anyways knowing, accepting, trusting and free. It’s a beautiful thing I hope you experience it one day and more than once,

 

[HoneyBea]

I think I answered all your questions and I hope I didn’t confuse you too much I confuse myself most of the time! If I can do NFP anyone can lol

 

[OurLadyPray4US]

I think this is a pretty good post, OLP4us! You have a good understanding of how things fit together and you explain things well.

I understand how the physical aspects of the sacrament are meaningful. Water for baptism, oil for unction of the sick.etc. But you go on to say that if we were to use orange juice for baptism it or battery acid for annointing the sick that would be blasphemy. I am clearly not nearly as well versed in this stuff as you, but are we certain that changing the physical components of these sacraments is necessarily evil? I mean inherently so?

Also, I understand that sex is a renewal/reflection of the marriage covenant and a sacred act, but it is not a sacrament like the others you mention. So do we go too far to hold a non sacrament, though sacred, act to the same level as a sacrament? Are there other sacred acts that have similar standards?

Anyway, just some thoughts as I was reading your post. Thanks.

I may have gone too far with the “blasphemy” word. If someone deliberately “baptized” another person with some inappropriate liquid, in an attempt to deliberately mock the sacrament, that would be safe to say it was a blasphemy. Also, if someone tried to blow up the sacred image of Our Lady of Guadalupe, something that did happen around 1905 in Mexico, but the image was miraculously spared from harm, I think that was also an attempt at blasphemy. I say “I think”, because I’m not educated well enough to state it confidently. Sacred images and statues are not “sacraments”, they are “sacramentals”, but again I think it would be blasphemous to deliberately damage and destroy them.

With the marital act, Pope Benedict said it is a reflection of a deeper mystery that belongs to the spiritual world. Also, it is a renewing of the marital covenant.

So, I speculated that a deliberate perversion and mocking of the marital act would be blasphemous. But maybe I was wrong.

I’m sure baptizing with orange juice, or divorcing the unitive and procreative aspects of the marital act is always and necessarily evil, but there is a big difference between someone who knows exactly what he is doing and he is doing it to deliberately disobey and mock God’s commandments, versus someone else who simply made a mistake out of ignorance.

Still, the definition of blasphemy which includes “injuring the reputation, gross irreverence towards any person or thing worthy of exalted esteem”, shows the dangers of committing potentially blasphemous acts, whether they are actually blasphemous (done with deliberate intent) or only potentially blasphemous (done out of mere ignorance, with no real intent to harm the reputation of an object worthy of lofty esteem).

Since I know that the marital act is worthy of lofty esteem, being a renewing of the marital covenant, and being a sacred activity that’s a reflection of a deeper spiritual mystery, I would not dare to mess with it. We know that Onan messed with it, he deliberately spilled his semen on the ground in an attempt to avoid conceiving a child with his wife Tamar, and God killed Onan in punishment for this sin.

I guess most people simply don’t realize how terribly sinful contraception is, and they don’t engage in contraception (as well as other sexual sins, masturbation, pre-marital sex, gay sex, etc) with a deliberate intent to “harm the reputation of an object or act worthy of lofty esteem”. But even when there’s no deliberate intent to harm, there is still objective harm taking place. We are harming our own marriages, and the reputation of marriage in society, when we commit sexual sins including contraception.

 

[OurLadyPray4US]

I think that is a very personal assessment, but others using ABC could comment. May I ask if it is the assessment of a married person?

I’m not married, and it may be easier for me to abstain. I mean, I do not go to sleep sharing my bed with a spouse.

But I observed married people who were forced to abstain - I knew as many as 3 married couples where either the husband, or the wife, was paralyzed and unable to engage in the marital act. Two of these spouses failed miserably, they were cheating on their paralyzed spouses.

So, I came to understand that we all need to learn self-control, we all need to learn how to abstain if the need arises. For unmarried folks, abstinence is needed by default. But married folks also must be able to practice abstinence when necessary.

I guess abstinence is just a dirty word in today’s society. Single folks fornicate and masturbate because they don’t want to abstain. Married folks engage in contraception and adultery because they don’t want to abstain.

 

[jmcrae]

Read Humanae Vitae you will not find the word abortifacient anywhere.

About the Birth Control Pill:

How Does It Work?

Most birth control pills are “combination pills” containing a combination of the hormones estrogen and progesterone to prevent ovulation (the release of an egg during the monthly cycle). A woman cannot get pregnant if she doesn’t ovulate because there is no egg to be fertilized. The Pill also works by thickening the mucus around the cervix, which makes it difficult for sperm to enter the uterus and reach any eggs that may have been released. The hormones in the Pill can also sometimes affect the lining of the uterus, making it difficult for an egg to attach to the wall of the uterus.

Source: How Does It Work?

Bear in mind that the “egg” that is trying to attach to the wall of the uterus is, in fact, a human child. If she fails to attach to the uterine wall, she starves to death.

 

[OurLadyPray4US]

Source: How Does It Work?

Bear in mind that the “egg” that is trying to attach to the wall of the uterus is, in fact, a human child. If she fails to attach to the uterine wall, she starves to death.

Other times, they call it euphemistically an “it”. As in “it fails to attach”.

Of course, that “it” is a human person.

I have seen this euphemistic “it” on the descriptions of contraceptive drugs, provided by pharmaceutical companies.

 

[3DOCTORS]

I’m not married, and it may be easier for me to abstain. I mean, I do not go to sleep sharing my bed with a spouse.

But I observed married people who were forced to abstain - I knew as many as 3 married couples where either the husband, or the wife, was paralyzed and unable to engage in the marital act. Two of these spouses failed miserably, they were cheating on their paralyzed spouses.

So, I came to understand that we all need to learn self-control, we all need to learn how to abstain if the need arises. For unmarried folks, abstinence is needed by default. But married folks also must be able to practice abstinence when necessary.

I guess abstinence is just a dirty word in today’s society. Single folks fornicate and masturbate because they don’t want to abstain. Married folks engage in contraception and adultery because they don’t want to abstain.

This is so true. Our world has gotten so wrapped up in the notion that sex is as necessary as food and drink. Granted, sexual drives are stronger for some individuals, and for those who have been used to it on a regular basis - for example, in the case of someone whose spouse did become seriously ill or injured especially suddenly - the non-ill or injured spouse would have an adjustment. Some people speak of cheating in such cases as acceptable. It is not. Some spouses have even encouraged their able-bodied spouse to take a lover. Again, not right, even if out of pity and concern.

 

[GenerationHV]

Source: How Does It Work?

Bear in mind that the “egg” that is trying to attach to the wall of the uterus is, in fact, a human child. If she fails to attach to the uterine wall, she starves to death.

I wasn’t defending the pill as a contraceptive. But I do defend it when used for appropriate conditions. My point is that if you need to reframe the paradigm as the OP says, then calling the pill an abortifacient isn’t necessary.
My othe point was that failed implantation, while it cannot be proven, may happen IF a breakthrough ovulation occurred when the endometrial lining was not built up in anticipation of ovulation ( breast feeding, hormonal balances of peri menopause or the pill). Preoccupation with this theory leads people to call “pull out” Catholic birth control. I actually believe it does more harm than good.

 

[jmcrae]

I wasn’t defending the pill as a contraceptive. But I do defend it when used for appropriate conditions. My point is that if you need to reframe the paradigm as the OP says, then calling the pill an abortifacient isn’t necessary.
My othe point was that failed implantation, while it cannot be proven, may happen IF a breakthrough ovulation occurred when the endometrial lining was not built up in anticipation of ovulation ( breast feeding, hormonal balances of peri menopause or the pill). Preoccupation with this theory leads people to call “pull out” Catholic birth control. I actually believe it does more harm than good.

“Pull out” isn’t a Catholic concept at all - it is pretty much the definition of onanism - although obviously onanism encompasses more than just that.

 

[Rau]

We live in a world devoted to using language as a weapon. It has long been said that whoever controls the terms of debate, wins. Words mean things. To talk about ‘protection’ means something. It has shaped an entire way of thinking for the last two generations. When an entire society thinks a certain way, that certainly affects the substance of the issue.
**–> Better words than guns! I think it is useful to challenge others from time to time on the meaning of the words they use, to check intent an to ensure that we also are not subconsciously having our values adjusted through poor language. But I think there is sometimes a tendency to look for the conspiratorial. [Of course, I could be naïve!] **

Ah, my understanding is perhaps not nuanced enough. Are you suggesting my poor little brain isn’t capable of such fine thought?
→ I’m suggesting my poor little brain struggles. Don’t know about yours

You’ve also set up a strawman. I did not say there’s no reason, ever, to practice NFP. I was referring to a society-wide attitude. Speaking of nuanced understanding…

Perhaps what is needed, as has been suggested in this thread and elsewhere, is a greater understanding that children are a blessing, period. But rather, our entire society has come to see children as burdens, expenses, accessories, something to ‘complete’ the adult or couple. We are now living in a world where we abort (kill)children for being the wrong sex or having Down Syndrome or being a threat to our bikini body.
→ Agree with much of this. The wholly negative attitudes are perverse as is the idea of children as an accessory. On the other hand, some (in the minority for sure) hold to the idea that good Catholics must want a great many children.

We’re living in a world where we regard children more the way we regard furniture or cars: I’d like two, please. I’d like one that fits my lifestyle. I’d like twin girls. I’d like one boy and one girl.
**–> So maybe we differ here. I see no problem with saying (at some point in time) “I think I’d like a boy and a girl”, while both accepting that I don’t have absolute control over that, and that at a later date I may think differently. That does not reduce the value of the child to a possession however. **

 

[3DOCTORS]

Perhaps what is needed, as has been suggested in this thread and elsewhere, is a greater understanding that children are a blessing, period. But rather, our entire society has come to see children as burdens, expenses, accessories, something to ‘complete’ the adult or couple. We are now living in a world where we abort (kill)children for being the wrong sex or having Down Syndrome or being a threat to our bikini body.

We’re living in a world where we regard children more the way we regard furniture or cars: I’d like two, please. I’d like one that fits my lifestyle. I’d like twin girls. I’d like one boy and one girl.

Sad but true.

Or the situation that sparked my posting this thread in the first place - someone advising others in the family not to have “too many” children and to use birth control (“protection”) to achieve that. This person is respected by the younger relatives being advised and while the intention is good - to make sure there’s money for the kids to get educated etc. - it’s the means that are not good, and the way of strongly insisting upon those means.