Yet another NFP question...

[Equites_Christi]

To me, it seems like a cold, utilitarian teaching on the most intimate experience we can share with another person

Oh, poor child of God! Do not fear this, it isn’t at all true.

You say you’ve often heard people say “Feelings don’t matter” which is really a misleading statement. But, if you’ve been around to hear that, I’m sure you’ve heard “Marital, Unitive and Procreative” as the requirements for licit sex, NOT just proper male finish.

The overwhelmingly popular requirement is Procreative, and this is because today’s society has occupied itself with coming up with 1,001 ways to contracept, and all of them have been a big hit. But the secular world’s failure to also meet the Unitive requirement is also there, just not as obvious. Casual sex is a horrid idea and shouldn’t be anything more than a nonsensical oxymoron, but instead we are told we can go around sampling people like flavors - keep what you like, dump what you don’t. I can’t imagine the scarring and numbness that can result and the tragic way it prevents someone from having what you have so excellently phrased “the most intimate experience we can share with another person.”

I think the reason we hear so doggone much how a man must finish properly is because the majority of people are talking about doing or not doing that, not the closeness or bonding of the partners. If you put a penny in a jar every time someone asked about contraception or NFP and took a penny out of it every time someone asked about the total fusion of the spouses, the jar would never be empty. They figure that’s the easy part - or maybe, the unimportant part

Now about the “feelings don’t matter” thing, I think this is really a poorly worded attempt to prevent the trivialization of sex. If we think of “Yes, I’d like sex” or “No, I wouldn’t like sex” in the same sense we think of “Yes, I’d like a cheeseburger” or “No, I wouldn’t like a cheeseburger”, we are entirely missing the point, as you know. It’s not just a whim to say “Sure, why not” to. With sex, we are dealing with two people. If one desires sex, even if the other isn’t hot and bothered and ripping their clothes off, the other in a way owes it to their spouse. Now, as you know, one cannot force the other to do it, and it’s perfectly ok for one to abstain if they are really and truly not up to it. But sex is what married couples do, it is the consummation and the perpetuation of their union. If the general state is that one is never really interested in sex with their spouse, I think that’s a rather sad situation and likely has underlying issues.

The Church is the last defense in this world of the beauty of sex. You have the gift of perceiving this beauty, many do not. I think some of the faithful, in their desperate/zealous attempt to preserve the sanctity of sex against an ever growing tide, sometimes fall off the other end of the horse, so to speak. When in doubt, look to the Church.

And about your comment on Casti Conubii, if a papal encyclical doesn’t reflect Church teaching, nothing does!!!

 

[LaSainte]

Oh, poor child of God! Do not fear this, it isn’t at all true.

You say you’ve often heard people say “Feelings don’t matter” which is really a misleading statement. But, if you’ve been around to hear that, I’m sure you’ve heard “Marital, Unitive and Procreative” as the requirements for licit sex, NOT just proper male finish.

The overwhelmingly popular requirement is Procreative, and this is because today’s society has occupied itself with coming up with 1,001 ways to contracept, and all of them have been a big hit. But the secular world’s failure to also meet the Unitive requirement is also there, just not as obvious. Casual sex is a horrid idea and shouldn’t be anything more than a nonsensical oxymoron, but instead we are told we can go around sampling people like flavors - keep what you like, dump what you don’t. I can’t imagine the scarring and numbness that can result and the tragic way it prevents someone from having what you have so excellently phrased “the most intimate experience we can share with another person.”

I think the reason we hear so doggone much how a man must finish properly is because the majority of people are talking about doing or not doing that, not the closeness or bonding of the partners. If you put a penny in a jar every time someone asked about contraception or NFP and took a penny out of it every time someone asked about the total fusion of the spouses, the jar would never be empty. They figure that’s the easy part - or maybe, the unimportant part

Now about the “feelings don’t matter” thing, I think this is really a poorly worded attempt to prevent the trivialization of sex. If we think of “Yes, I’d like sex” or “No, I wouldn’t like sex” in the same sense we think of “Yes, I’d like a cheeseburger” or “No, I wouldn’t like a cheeseburger”, we are entirely missing the point, as you know. It’s not just a whim to say “Sure, why not” to. With sex, we are dealing with two people. If one desires sex, even if the other isn’t hot and bothered and ripping their clothes off, the other in a way owes it to their spouse. Now, as you know, one cannot force the other to do it, and it’s perfectly ok for one to abstain if they are really and truly not up to it. But sex is what married couples do, it is the consummation and the perpetuation of their union. If the general state is that one is never really interested in sex with their spouse, I think that’s a rather sad situation and likely has underlying issues.

The Church is the last defense in this world of the beauty of sex. You have the gift of perceiving this beauty, many do not. I think some of the faithful, in their desperate/zealous attempt to preserve the sanctity of sex against an ever growing tide, sometimes fall off the other end of the horse, so to speak. When in doubt, look to the Church.

And about your comment on Casti Conubii, if a papal encyclical doesn’t reflect Church teaching, nothing does!!!

Wow. Thank you so much for this post! I think you have a point that it may be those talking about Church teaching who overemphasize the procreative aspect of sex to the detriment of the unitive aspect, as if the unitive aspect is just a given. The fact is, the unitive aspect can be the hardest aspect to really maintain in a marriage, especially of a couple has more kids than they can handle and has other stressors in their lives. The EASY part is really the procreative part…we all know how to do that! The harder part is what goes on in the heart and mind when one is worried about pregnancy and bills and whether or not they turned off the stove after dinner! I think the sense is that if we didn’t have to worry about the procreative aspect so much (were allowed to use ABC) that we would all just have one less thing to worry about and we could relax and celebrate the unitive aspect of sex more fully.

The problem is that we are not allowed to/cannot try to separate the two, and nobody tells you you’re going to hell for being distracted during sex, so that bonding, unitive, soul-melting feeling is the part that tends to suffer while the mechanics of the act remain intact.

Add that on top of the fact that sometimes people don’t want to contracept per we, but just want a little more variety, and you get a very frustrated couple!

I really appreciate you taking the time to post your thoughts and you really gave me some things to think about…we are one of those couples who are faithful to church teaching but not really embracing or loving it and not so convinced about it it general, so it makes it tough to follow

We want to do the right thing, but only of we KNOW it’s the right thing, if that makes sense. It’s a lot of effort to go through on a “maybe”.

 

[ahs]

The Church is mainly concerned with the physical mechanics of sex, not with feelings or will or anything else really. If the semen goes into the vagina, you did it right, if not, you did it wrong. All this talk of feelings and oneness and unity is nice and everything, but the actual teachings where this is concerned seem to belie any importance these may have.

The teaching on proper marital sex can be summed up in 3 words: Semen In Vagina.

I can see where it would appear this way, but the Catechism does in deed teach of the unitive bond, not just the physicality of the act. Casti Conubii that Corki recommended will be a wonderful reading for you, I think. I’m a guy and even I was moved with emotion when I read it. It’s kinda long, but so very worth it and I think you will see a whole new vision on teh unitive value of sex after reading it. Here is a link to the online version at the vatican website:

vatican.va/holy_father/pius_xi/encyclicals/documents/hf_p-xi_enc_31121930_casti-connubii_en.html

 

[Good_Daughter]

The teaching on proper marital sex can be summed up in 3 words: Semen In Vagina.

‘Semen in Vagina’ could also describe an act of rape, hardly proper marital sex. You may need to go back to the drawing board on that 3 word summary.

I can’t recall if anyone here has reccomended *Love And Responsibility *to you. I only skimmed a copy years ago and I still can’t forget the uniquely beautiful way John Paul II wrote about marital relations. (He even gives practical guidelines.) What I took from that book can be summed up in 6 words: Husbands treat your wives like gold. I’m looking forward to reading it ‘for real’ soon, it just struck me as a book you might like as I read through your posts in this thread.

 

[Nate13]

I learned something new today and I think it fits well into this discussion currently. Does anyone ever wonder how the Church has come to declare that each sex act must be unitive and procreative? It comes directly from the Bible actually. All we have to look at is one passage from Genesis 2:24.

“For this reason a man will leave his father and mother and be united to his wife, and they will become one flesh”

This passage as well as a passage from Ephesian’ 5 totally encompass the Church’s teaching on this issue. The passage above has three distinct meanings. The word for “flesh” in Hebrew is “basar”. Basar is used to describe a human person who is in need of others. Thus the first meaning of the passage is that it is referring to the personal union between the husband and wife. The second meaning of the passage is if the other definition of the word “basar” is used which is the male sexual organ. The second meaning then is referring to the two becoming one flesh in the sexual act. The third meaning is the more obvious which is the two become one flesh when a new baby is formed through the sexual act that is in the likeness of the husband and wife. The three meanings can be summarized as the union, the marital act, the child. To understand this passage we have to put ourselves into the mind of the ancient Semite who would have been reading this who just happened to love ambiguity. The way they would have looked at this passage is to look at it from every angle until eventually they see it as a whole. So therefore if you asked them which is the true meaning they would simply reply “yes”. This passage does not have three meanings it has one meaning which encompasses all three individual meanings into one. Thus you get the Catholic Church’s teaching that every sexual act must be unitive and procreative.

The Church’s teaching can be summed up as “The Church teaches that the sexual act has been inherently designed by God to be unitive and procreative.” This only speaks towards the act itself not towards what we do outside the act. Thus contraception is wrong because it goes against the procreative meaning as well as the unitive meaning which is for each spouse to give themselves completely to the other. NFP does not go against either since both spouses, when committing the act, are able to give themselves completely to each other which is all that is commanded here.

The next step from here is to understand the gravity of denying this idea of the “two become one flesh” and why that is so important. If anyone is interested in learning more go to this link: realcatholictv.com/contraception/

The top two clips are the ones that you want to listen to first.

 

[Nate13]

I learned something new today and I think it fits well into this discussion currently. Does anyone ever wonder how the Church has come to declare that each sex act must be unitive and procreative? It comes directly from the Bible actually. All we have to look at is one passage from Genesis 2:24.

“For this reason a man will leave his father and mother and be united to his wife, and they will become one flesh”

This passage as well as a passage from Ephesian’ 5 totally encompass the Church’s teaching on this issue. The passage above has three distinct meanings. The word for “flesh” in Hebrew is “basar”. Basar is used to describe a human person who is in need of others. Thus the first meaning of the passage is that it is referring to the personal union between the husband and wife. The second meaning of the passage is if the other definition of the word “basar” is used which is the male sexual organ. The second meaning then is referring to the two becoming one flesh in the sexual act when the sexual organs of man and wife meet and become otherwise known as vaginal intercourse The third meaning is the more obvious which is the two become one flesh when a new baby is formed through the sexual act that is in the likeness of the husband and wife. The three meanings can be summarized as the union, the marital act, the child. To understand this passage we have to put ourselves into the mind of the ancient Semite who would have been reading this who just happened to love ambiguity. The way they would have looked at this passage is to look at it from every angle until eventually they see it as a whole. So therefore if you asked them which is the true meaning they would simply reply “yes”. This passage does not have three meanings it has one meaning which encompasses all three individual meanings into one. Thus you get the Catholic Church’s teaching that every sexual act must be unitive and procreative.

The Church’s teaching can be summed up as “The Church teaches that the sexual act has been inherently designed by God to be unitive and procreative.” This only speaks towards the act itself not towards what we do outside the act. Thus contraception is wrong because it goes against the procreative meaning as well as the unitive meaning which is for each spouse to give themselves completely to the other. NFP does not go against either since both spouses, when committing the act, are able to give themselves completely to each other which is all that is commanded here.

The next step from here is to understand the gravity of denying this idea of the “two become one flesh” and why that is so important. If anyone is interested in learning more go to this link: realcatholictv.com/contraception/

The top two clips are the ones that you want to listen to first.

 

[Nate13]

A clarification to my post above. For the second meaning that was talked about where basar is in reference to the male sexual organ it should follow that the two become “one” when the sexual organs of the man meet with the sexual organs of a woman. To embrace this idea of “one flesh”, vaginal intercourse is necessary so therefore we can see that this idea streams from the Bible through the Church and there is reasoning behind telling people where to stick it.