Cardinal Walter Kasper on “Artificial” Birth Control

Homiletic and Pastoral Review ^ | 9/25/2014 | John F. Kippley

[markomalley]

In the online edition of the Telegraph (UK) on September 19th, Religious Affairs editor John Bingham reported that Cardinal Walter Kasper “hinted at the possibility of a reinterpretation of the Roman Catholic Church’s ban on artificial contraception.”

He said it was “the responsibility of the parents” to decide how many children they should have. Almost no informed orthodox Catholic will disagree with that if it is rightly understood as decisions made in the light of the divine call to generosity in the service of life and family. A church of only one-child and two-child families is doomed to self-extinction.

According to Bingham, the Cardinal said that “so-called natural family planning, which is promoted by the Church as an alternative to contraception, also has an ‘artificial’ element.” Bingham notes that some representatives of natural family planning will be at the Extraordinary Synod on the Family and then adds, “But the Cardinal argued that natural methods have an ‘artificial aspect’.”

The Cardinal simply has to know that “artificial” has nothing to do with the birth control issue. Almost everything we do today has an artificial aspect. The alarm clock that wakes us in the morning. The central heat that goes on automatically at a preset time. A thermometer used to check body temperatures. None of this has anything to do with being contrary to nature.

Cardinal Walter Kasper is 81 years of age. That means that he was 35 when he witnessed the promulgation of Humanae Vitae and the explosive dissent from it including the German bishops’ lack of support for it. As a theologically interested priest, he would have also read the two conflicting reports from the Papal Birth Control Commission. He would have seen that the “conservative” report pointed out that the “liberal” paper could not say “no” to sodomy, and he would have seen that the “liberals” replied that such activity was against human dignity, an assertion of their personal opinions but not based in logic. Over the years, he would have seen that homosexual activists say, or assume, that sodomy is in accord with human dignity and, sometimes, even call their organizations “Dignity.” In the ensuring debate, he would have seen that researchers found that Martin Luther called the “Sin of Onan” a form of sodomy.

I grant that there are some today who erroneously refer to unnatural forms of birth control as “artificial contraception,” but no one today is arguing that the evil of marital contraception is its use of an artifact. After all, when married heterosexuals practice fertility awareness, and then engage in the contraceptive practices of sodomy, or mutual masturbation, to avoid abstinence during the fertile time, they are using their own organs, not anything artificial. The Cardinal has to know that the traditional argument has been that marital contraception is contrary to nature, and he has to know that the argument from natural law is criticized in certain quarters. But as a theologian, he also has to be aware that some, or many, now argue that the essence of the sin of marital contraception is its contradiction of the marriage covenant. The act of marital contraception pretends to be a marriage act, but it says, “I take you for better, but definitely NOT for the imagined ‘worse’ of possible pregnancy,” thus contradicting the “for better and for worse” of the marriage covenant. That’s why St. John Paul II affirmed that in the marriage act, couples are called to confirm their marriage covenant, and why he taught repeatedly that marital contraception is dishonest.

It may be that Cardinal Kasper, and many others, have not kept up on the theology that supports Catholic teaching affirmed by Casti Connubii and Humanae Vitae. But he simply has to know that “artificiality” is not in the discourse.

[markomalley]

Most everybody knows about Humanae Vitae. Far fewer people know about the prohibition against artificial contraception in Casti Cannubii (written in 1930):

54. But no reason, however grave, may be put forward by which anything intrinsically against nature may become conformable to nature and morally good. Since, therefore, the conjugal act is destined primarily by nature for the begetting of children, those who in exercising it deliberately frustrate its natural power and purpose sin against nature and commit a deed which is shameful and intrinsically vicious.

Or as St Augustine said back in 420 AD (De Coniguiis Adulterinis Lib. II, Cap 12):

Illicite namque et turpiter etiam cum legitima uxore concumbitur, ubi prolis conceptio devitatur. Quod faciebat Onan filius Iudae et occidit illum propter hoc Deus

[ConorMacNessa]

Perhaps the author should rethink the title of his article. Just sayin'.

Human life begins at conception and continues to the time we shift off this corporeal shell, at which point we face Eternity. In my opinion, artificial conception is intrinsically evil.

What would Jesus do? "Suffer the little children . . . "


"Dia shábháil ar fad anseo!"

Genuflectimus non ad principem sed ad Principem Pacis!

Listen, O isles, unto me; and hearken, ye people, from far; The LORD hath called me from the womb; from the bowels of my mother hath he made mention of my name. (Isaiah 49:1 KJV)

[Mrs. Don-o]

Card. Kasper seems intellectual deficient.

Everybody with any familiarity with this issue at all --- most especially a Cardinal ---- realizes that when the Church speaks of "natural" in this context, she means "in accord with human nature" --- meaning in accord with reason and with the integrity of design of the human embodied person.

That is so basic --- I teach it to all my RCIA'ers.

Understanding that context, NFP would be "natural" even if it required a computer, and "the Pill" would be anti-natural even if it grew on trees.

I've got to go to bed.

The most charitable thing to think, is that poor Card. Kasper has become intellectually incompetent.

[The Great RJ]

Isn’t the purpose of “natural family planning” to limit the number of children and allow sex to be enjoyed by married couples without the worry of pregnancy? If the same end were achieved in marriage by use of the pill it would seem that it is a matter of interpretation.

[markomalley]

Isn’t the purpose of “natural family planning” to limit the number of children and allow sex to be enjoyed by married couples without the worry of pregnancy?

"Without the worry" is probably not the best way to put it.

If the same end were achieved in marriage by use of the pill it would seem that it is a matter of interpretation.

Use of the pill, condoms, etc., are a deliberate matter of interruption and frustrating the body's natural functioning. NFP works with the body's natural functioning to allow a couple to properly time when she gets pregnant. The natural processes are not interfered with in any way. (I've known a few that have used NFP techniques to intentionally time things to maximize the possibility of achieving a pregnancy, fwiw). Church doctrine does not, btw, endorse NFP to allow a couple to be childless.

Consider the quotes that I provided above:

St Augustine: Illicite namque et turpiter etiam cum legitima uxore concumbitur, ubi prolis conceptio devitatur. Quod faciebat Onan filius Iudae et occidit illum propter hoc Deus (Translation: "Intercourse even with one's legitimate wife is unlawful and wicked where the conception of the offspring is prevented. Onan, the son of Juda, did this and the Lord killed him for it.")

Pope Pius XI: 54. But no reason, however grave, may be put forward by which anything intrinsically against nature may become conformable to nature and morally good. Since, therefore, the conjugal act is destined primarily by nature for the begetting of children, those who in exercising it deliberately frustrate its natural power and purpose sin against nature and commit a deed which is shameful and intrinsically vicious.

Natural family planning does not violate the proscriptions in either of the above citations. As I stated, though, the teachings of the Church do not permit natural family planning to remain childless. Please see this from Paul VI, Humanae Vitae:

If, then, there are serious motives to space out births, which derive from the physical or psychological conditions of husband and wife, or from external conditions, the Church teaches that it is then licit to take into account the natural rhythms immanent in the generative functions, for the use of marriage in the infecund periods only, and in this way to regulate birth without offending the moral principles which have been recalled earlier.