In this piece, I’ll help us do that by explaining what led evangelicals to embrace birth control. In part two, I’ll describe the theology developed to defend this embrace. And in part three, I’ll examine biblical arguments for and against contraception.
"Anglicans Break With Tradition"
Though Martin Luther had no problem with natural family planning, he strongly opposed contraception, calling it “intrinsically evil” and “a grave sin.” John Calvin felt similarly. Referring to Onan’s sin, he wrote, “It is a horrible thing to pour out seed.” This “quenches the hope” of one’s family and “kills the son … before he is born.”
In saying these things, Luther and Calvin were not expressing anything new. They were simply stating a position the Church had held for more than a thousand years. Early Church Father St. Clement of Alexandria wrote, “(T)he seed is not to be … wasted. To have coitus other than to procreate children is to do injury to nature.” Likewise, John Chrysostom lamented that some couples viewed children “as grievous and unwelcome” due to their greed.
Historically, opposing birth control has not been a Catholic thing. It’s been a Christian thing. As late as 1908, Anglican church leaders officially resolved that “the use of all artificial means” of birth control should be discouraged. They added that contraception corrupted character and was “hostile to national welfare.”
Yet in 1930, Anglicans reversed course and became the first church to condone birth control. As author and scholar Allan C. Carlson said in a 2015 interview, the impetus for this change was not spiritual, but pragmatic. Planned Parenthood founder Margaret Sanger had recruited Anglican pastors and convinced many to embrace eugenics, or “controlled breeding.” The American Eugenics Society even sponsored a “Eugenics Sermon Contest” with cash prizes for the best sermons.
Evangelicals Succumb to Fear Evangelicals, however, opposed birth control for several more decades. But in 1959, Billy Graham made a stunning statement. He told reporters that he found “nothing in the Bible which would forbid birth control.”
Like the Anglicans, Graham didn’t appear to be motivated by Scripture. Instead, having recently visited Africa, he cited concerns of overpopulation. “I do believe that some form of birth control is necessary in Asia, Japan, Africa, and other nations where population explosions are threatened,” he said.
Many in Graham’s generation shared his concern. In 1952, the Population Council had warned that overpopulation was going to deplete the world’s resources. And in 1958, the Draper Committee reported that the “population problem” was the greatest obstacle to world progress.
A month before Graham’s statement, Christianity Today ran an article on the Draper Report. It suggested that the time had come for a “re-examination” of sex apart from procreation. Apparently, Graham agreed.
Over the next decade, fears of overpopulation continued to grow and exploded when Paul Ehrlich published The Population Bomb. This best-selling book predicted that overpopulation would lead to mass starvation in the 1970s and 80s. Though Ehrlich’s predictions never came true, the fears he raised remained and impacted Christians and non-Christians alike.
Yet evangelicals couldn’t fully embrace contraception without a some kind of biblical rationale. That came seven years after Graham’s statement. And it led to major changes in Christian thought and action.
Many evangelicals began accepting and using contraception. And as I explain in my next article, some even began to condone abortion as well.
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NONSENSE!
Less contraception = more Catholics
That is all.
I was once ambivalent about contraception, at least as a Christian. Not any more.
We are acting like the world when we.... ACT LIKE THE WORLD.
I, too, thought being opposed to birth control was a Catholic thing that even most Catholics didn’t really believe. I once heard my mom’s Catholic friend say, “If the the pope wants us to have more than 2 kids he can buy their shoes!”
When discussing having a family my husband and I, in our human arrogance, decided on four. Looking back I am ashamed at how we would dare to tell God how many blessings we were going to allow Him to give us. Thankfully, God was merciful and despite our wrong thinking and choices gave us 6 children. I sometimes wonder who we might have missed out on during the 5 years between # 4 and #5 because we chose our own path.
Our 6th seems like an extra special blessing because we lost one before and one after her.
I know this is a topic that gets people quite hot and so in my real life I keep my strong opinions to myself. But really, if a position cannot be supported by supported by scripture, then believers shouldn’t accept it.
To my understanding the only religious groups that currently oppose contraception within marriage are Christian. The only Christian groups that still officially ban it within marriage that I have found: Old order Mennonites, Amish and Catholics. I think the ‘quiver full’ movement might encompass individuals from many different groups. And of course there are many individuals who don’t accept it for their personal religious beliefs.
Freegards
“To have coitus other than to procreate children is to do injury to nature.””
Nature?
Trying to follow nature? Trying to please nature?
This article didn’t provide a biblical argument against contraception.
God creates us and provides for us.
We respect life and His creations and praise God for His gifts to us.
The Blessed Mother was another gift as our spiritual mother from God who was obedient to God and provided the Ark that gave us our Savior.
Where is the over population in western countries. Dec 11, 2017 - Half the World’s Population is Reaching Below Replacement Fertility .
If you have the talent to have 10 kids should you use it? Perhaps the Holy Spirit tells you it is better to use another talent instead. Alternatively, you may not think you can handle it. I am not going to fault you for that decision nor the decision to have ten kids.
We all make choices. Not sure they are always thought out and good choices from God’s perspective.
Julie Roys is better known for her investigative reporting on financial and personal, or personnel, abuses in evangelical megachurches. She can fairly be said to have brought down James MacDonald of Harvest Bible Chapel, and nobody ever deserved it more.
I recommend her website with enthusiasm.
Now, let's shed some light on the topic.
Roman Catholics practice birth control through the NFP.
“Be fruitful and multiply”.
Or embrace blocking conception so you can be lazy...
There are consequences to everything that we do, and we are seeing some of them due to contraception.
One of the consequences is a slowing birth rate. Programs like social security were created with the idea that there would be an ever growing population to pay for the care of elders. This is backfiring. I believe the consequence of a slowing birth rate is the reason politicians want an ever increasing amount of immigrants....legal and illegal to make up for it. And then the consequences of rampant immigration are...
A worthy topic! Looking forward to her next article.
+1
To have sex for any reason outside of procreation is to do “injury to nature”?
How absurd. Even St. Paul himself said the marriage bed is undefiled, and it is better to marry than to burn.
I just don’t get this obsession against contraception.
Sex outside of marriage is wrong? Totally agree; porn is wrong, absolutely agree. I’m totally conservative all those stances, except birth control. I just don’t relate and I don’t see it as a sin.
If it’s an abortifacient, like the pill, yeah, that’s wrong, it’s destroying a fetus.
Ed