Posted on 01/05/2014 2:25:11 PM PST by Gamecock
September 18, 2012 (Mercatornet.com) - Back in February this year, when the battle between religious leaders and the Obama administration over the latter’s contraceptive mandate reached a new pitch of intensity, the White House defended its policy by alleging that 98 per cent of Catholic women had used contraception. If that was the case, we were meant to ask, what on earth were the Catholic bishops, for one, making a song and dance about? Hadn’t their own female constituency effectively deserted them on this issue?
The claim, quoted far and wide at the time, turned out to be a political factoid rather than a real statistic. People who analysed the Guttmacher Institute study it came from pointed out that the study was selective and self-contradictory. For a start it was based on a survey restricted to women aged between 15 and 44, so it could say nothing about women between 45 and 100. And one table showed that 11 per cent of sexually active Catholic women who did not want to become pregnant were using no method of contraception at all.
Still, nobody is pretending that hordes of Catholics don’t dissent from their Church’s “thou shalt not” regarding contraception. We do not need the Guttmacher Institute or the White House to tell us that. Nor do we need them to tell us why the many Catholics who never go to church would not bother with one of its more difficult moral teachings.
What we don’t know is why practising Catholics who do go to Mass—and even, if only occasionally, to confession—also feel entitled to reject the teaching.
Why, for instance, do “Catholic moms in minivans drop their children at the parish school and head to their gynaecologists to be fitted for diaphragms or to get a new prescription for ‘the pill’ —and think nothing of it,” as the authors of a new study, What Catholic Women Think About Faith, Conscience, and Contraception, put it.
Do the parish moms have an accurate idea of the Church’s teaching on family planning? After four decades of dissent it would be surprising if they all did. And when the teaching is presented accurately to practising Catholics are they more open to it? What are their reasons for rejecting it, and what would they like to know more about?
For all the times Catholic women have been surveyed on whether they have “ever used” contraceptives, no-one has asked those who practice their faith but not its teaching on family planning, “Why?”, say the study’s authors, lawyer Mary Rice Hasson, a Fellow in the Catholic Studies Program at the Ethics and Public Policy Center, Washington, D.C, and director of the Women, Faith, and Culture project, and Michele M. Hill, a Baltimore Catholic and co-director of the project.
National survey of church-going women
To answer that question a national online survey of church-going Catholic women aged 18 to 54 was carried out in June and July of last year by the polling company inc./WomanTrend. (This is a preliminary report, say the authors, as further insights are expected from focus groups and ongoing in-depth interviews with 100 of the women.) Of the 824 women in the sample, half attended church at least weekly, while the other half attended less than weekly but at least a few times a year.
Their responses confirm that, on this issue at least, church-going Catholics have been influenced far more by popular culture than by Catholic teaching on sex and reproduction. Fully 85 percent of all the women believe they can be “good Catholics” even if they do not accept some of this teaching, including the 37 percent who completely reject it.
The picture, of course, looks decidedly better among regular Mass-goers. Among young women (18-34) who attend every week, 27 percent completely accept the Church’s teaching, and among those who both attend Mass weekly and have been to confession within the past year that figure rises to 37 percent. Just 24 percent of the women who go to Mass every week completely reject the teaching on contraception, and for those who have been to confession that figure drops to 12 percent.
Even among the dissenting majority, however, not all are closed to the Church’s message on this subject. Hasson and Hill point out that about a third of these women mistakenly believe that the Church itself gives them the right to make up their own minds about which methods of family planning are morally acceptable. Many do not reject the Church’s authority out of hand.
Top reasons for contraceptive use
Mistakenly or not, 53 per cent of all women in the study who dissent in part or completely from church teaching cite a couple’s “moral right” to decide which method of family planning they will use. This makes it the top reason given for rejecting church teaching on the matter.
Two other reasons are cited frequently among this group: 46 percent say couples have “the right to enjoy sexual pleasure without worrying about pregnancy”, and 41 percent think that natural family planning is not an effective method to space or postpone pregnancy.
The authors perceive two main dynamics shaping these views: the influence of a cultural mindset that divorces sex from procreation and promises “sexual pleasure without consequences”, and a deficit on the church side in presenting Church teaching.
The latter can be deduced from the fact that 72 per cent of women surveyed said they rely mainly on the homily at Sunday Mass for learning about the faith, and yet just 15 per cent of that group fully accept the Church’s teaching on sex and reproduction. The weekly Mass homily, the authors say, “seems to represent a lost opportunity when it comes to conscience formation on the contraception issue.”
As for cultural influences, they seem likely (although the authors don’t say so) to account for at least some of the scepticism about natural family planning given the systematic bad press NFP is give by mainstream family planners and the media.
For the pastors of the Church, all this represents a steep challenge. Yet Catholic women may be more receptive to the Church’s view of things than first appears.
Openness of the “soft middle”
Importantly, the survey shows they are more open to children than the average American, their “ideal” number of children averaging 3.5 (or 4 if money were not a factor) compared with the American ideal of two or fewer.
Also, say the study authors, “When presented with an accurate description of the Church’s teachings on family planning many Catholic women show reluctance to completely reject the Church’s teaching.”
Instead, three groups emerge: “the faithful” (who fully accept the teaching—13 percent of the sample), “the dissenters” (who completely reject it—37 percent), and the “soft middle” (who accept “parts” of the teaching). In addition, a significant number of women in the “soft middle” (about half of weekly Mass-goers) show openness to learning more about church teaching on contraception and natural family planning.
Good will shown by many women in the “middle” represents an opportunity for the Church, the authors point out—and natural family planning may be a good starting point for communicating the Church’s teaching about procreation. About one in four of those who attend Mass regularly shows an interest in learning more about the method: hearing from other couples about the health and relationship benefits of NFP, what doctors say about it, and scientific evidence about its effectiveness. Such messages may be more persuasive than spiritual or authoritative ones, the authors suggest.
But alongside their message that many Catholic women are “reachable” the authors warn that the task is becoming more complicated. While the survey shows 10 percent of church-going women have had abortions (lower than the national average), 17 percent of younger women have used emergency contraception. This means that the Church has to inform women about the potentially abortifacient nature of EC “as well as arguing more persuasively that contraception itself is wrong.”
The Catholic bishops are fighting the Obama administration’s contraceptive mandate—that is, the policy of forcing all employers, including Catholic institutions such as hospitals and schools, to provide full cover for contraceptives, sterilisation and emergency contraception in their health insurance plans—as an attack on the free exercise of religion, which it is.
But in light of the information in “What Catholic Women Think…” the mandate may be a blessing in disguise. By forcing the issue of contraception to the top of the Church’s public agenda it has created an opportunity for the Church to have an internal conversation on the subject—the kind of opportunity that perhaps has not been seen since Pope Paul VI issued Humanae Vitae in 1968.
The study from the Women Faith and Culture project shows that such a discussion is long overdue.
Yes, one of the purposes of the pill is to suppress ovulation. But ovulation can still occur, conception can still take place, and that conceived human can be destroyed because of the pill’s other purpose — which you and your ob/gyn are ignoring.
Please see #67. As Marie says, this is common knowledge.
Marie, thank you for persistently pressing your case. These are things we have to think (and pray) our way through!
God's plan IS about "the enjoyment of children...reproduction is vital and wonderful..[the blessing of] large families and babies." That's a part of Catholic doctrine which isn't preached much; and if you're saying it should be preached more, you're absolutely right.
However, God's plan is not continuous exposure to pregnancy from wedding-night to menopause, if there are serious reasons to not have (another) child (just yet). God's holy design has built in natural periods of fertility and infertility, activity and rest, for just this reason.
You can't get pregnant after menopause. You can't get pregnant when you're already pregnant (!) You can't get pregnant when you're in the lactational inovulatory phase. And you can't get pregnant three weeks out of four, every month.
There's nothing in Natural Law, the law of God or the laws of the Church that forbids intercourse in all of those times. Is there?
And there's nothing in God's plan that forbids choosing one's times and seasons in order to fulfill the responsibilities of one's marital vocation. That includes protection of a spouse's health, being able to take care of the kids and other dependents you've already got, etc.
Ecclesiastes 3:5
"There is a time to embrace, and a time to refrain from embracing."
"[NFP couples] don't want to give up *their* enjoyment and lust and face the consequences."
This is a harsh judgment because it generalizes the worse possible motivations to a whole group of people, most of whom have (in my experience) the motive of fulfilling their family responsibilities, not the motive of unbridled lust.
Just one example: my friend Danielle and her husband Leonard had two children somewhat prematurely but they're OK. Then she suffered two miscarriages, and then on the next pregnancy, had to be on virtually 9-month bed-rest with a cervical cerclage. She did this willingly, with her husband Leonard assuming the full responsibility for their two other little children, plus all household duties, plus his full-time job, PLUS refraining from intercourse with his wife, per doctor's orders.
When their beautiful daughter Skye was born, she had some neurological issues due to prematurity, and required electronic monitoring and a lot of back-and-forth doctoring. Husband and wife both wanted to resume intercourse, but didn't want another pregnancy right away.
Is it wrong that they wanted to resume marital relations after nine stressful months?
Is it wrong that they honor God's design by enjoying intercourse when she was in her infertile phase (which is where women are, 75% of the time) and refraining from it for one week per month?
What kind of husband wouldn't abstain a bit, to protect his wife's health?
In your view, are they morally obliged to have intercourse in precisely the most-fertile week?
1 Corinthians 7:5
Do not refuse one another except perhaps by agreement for a season, that you may devote yourselves to prayer; but then come together again, lest Satan tempt you through lack of self-control.
They're praying --- they've got us all (their friends) praying) for Danielle's and Skye's health. Are they permitted to refrain from intercourse while they're praying?
Most definitely!
Couples committed to NFP don't have bigger families because of NFP "failures." They have bigger families because the practice of NFP makes them more open to relying on God's Providence and embracing the gift of new life. We taught NFP for ten years and witnessed this repeatedly.
St. Paul said For it is better to marry than to be aflame with passion. (1 Corinthians 7:9), which suggests that sexual relations for the purpose of quieting the couple's sexual appetite and strengthening their marital bond, is a good motive for relations. One can do this even while avoiding pregnancy for serious reason, if they do it in a moral way, i.e. according to the natural, God-inscribed design.
I think this pertains strongly toward to the protection of marital unity and safeguarding the woman's well-being.
Also it does not require
--- which we call the "fruits of the Holy Spirit", based on Galatians 5:22-23 and other Pauline texts.
Thus contraception is indebted to bodily sabotage. NFP is indebted to virtue, the wonder of the woman's Intelligent Design, and the intent of the Creator.
Marie, I can see your strong concern. Zuriel, you, too. What I am hoping you will see, is that NFP is not an "out," it is not a type of contraception. It is --- for the following reasons --- the opposite of contraception.
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Contraception and its underlying ideology can end civilizations. (Look around you.) NFP can't, because it is respectful of human and divine goods: in practice, highly procreation-friendly.
This is why I say contraception and NFP are not equivalents. They are opposites.
Marie, I can see your strong concern. Zuriel, you, too. What I am hoping you will see, is that NFP is not an "out," it is not a type of contraception. It is --- for the following reasons --- the opposite of contraception.
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Contraception and its underlying ideology can end civilizations. (Look around you.) NFP can't, because it is respectful of human and divine goods: in practice, highly faith-based, marriage and family-formation friendly.
This is why I say contraception and NFP are not equivalents. They are opposites.
Hopefully...
When my husband and I married in the Catholic Church pert-near exactly 25 years ago (cheers all around!) I was dismally disappointed in the marriage preparation. I had been hoping we'd be inspired and enriched by the Church's profoundly wise, divine and fully-dimensioned human point of view; this particular parish gave us almost nothing.
We have had to persistently, almost obstinately dig and work for the in-depth Catholic perspective. This we have done, to our great mutual reward.
But shame on the negligent shepherds, who, like the Pharisees of old, do not enter the gate, and block those who are trying to enter in.
**This is why I say contraception and NFP are not equivalents. They are opposites.
Excellent comparison chart too.
Now, this is both interesting and puzzling to me.
I have never seen any discussion of the Kennedies without Catholics jumping in to express their abhorrence for their pro-abortion, pro-socialism, and (on the personal side) pro horndog trouser-unzip syndrome, and their cafeteria-Catholicism. (Who howls loudest about cafeteria-Catholicism? Evangelicals or Catholics themselves?)
When Ted was buried, I remember the universal FReeper Catholic outrage that it was treated with all the incense-monseignori-and-brocades of a state funeral. It smelled and sparkled like a canonization. You don't remember us howling over the polluted conscience of Sean O'Malley?
FReeper Catholics freely express their aggravation at both CINO's and RINO's. We routinely ask why-the-hell they aren't given a good dose of Canon 915. Haven't you seen that to be the case?
As for illegal immigration: you give me a links to a pro-illegal-immigration Catholic on this forum, and I will fly at them with hammer and tongs. With all seething sincerity, ansel12. Give me names.
And if you can show me a post or comment showing Catholic dislike of "most conservative voters in America," I will give you five gold stars and a bottle of Heineken.
Another way of saying: one of them deeply respects the divine intelligence which fashioned fertility and connected it to sexuality --- and the other rejects that connection and tries to physically damage, split off, sabotage, and impair it.
Peace, sister!
Thank you for this response. I think it shows some degree of miscommunication on my part, which I would like to correct if I may.
I have no objection to using our brains to figure out how to space pregnancies, or even avoid pregnancy altogether if the couple has a sound reason (and they're the only ones who can judge).
There's nothing anti-technology about it. Some of the most advanced research in the field has been about understanding the intricacies of normal fertility, and find ways to promote normal function, both when avoiding or achieving pregnancy.
Compare hormonal contraception to NFP.
Say the first uses a pill which always (by design) produces abnormal hormone levels in the woman, known to depress the libido, increase depression and weight gain --- woo woo, how sexy is that? --- and to elevate the risk of breast cancer; the other has no dangerous side-effects and may even approach 100% effectiveness via the use of a small computerized application to pinpoint normal BBT and pre-ovulatory hormonal changes.
Which sounds like a better use of technology to you?
" Judging by the Catholic families I’ve known over the years I’d say whatever method they were using was not real effective at preventing pregnancy."
Are you assuming that a numerous family is an unwanted family? Are you assuming every childbirth beyond #2 is a method failure? Have you considered that they may have been using NFP to achieve pregnancy?
That would have been true in our case.
:o)
Haha “seething sincerity”. I like that alliteration there.
You're saying in this paragraph that the "stupid policy" is, actually, never done. So --- I hope I'm not misconstruing you --- you seem to be reacting to a condemnation that has not been made, ever, in your experience. Is that right?
"Most Catholics I know are prolife and opposed to abortion."
Same here. However the CDC and AGI studies reveal that contraceptive acceptance and abortion acceptance go up in tandem.
And it bears scrutiny. None of the participants in pro-abortion organizations (like NARAL) are anti-contraceptive. None of the participants in pro-NFP groups (like Couple to Couple League) are pro-abortion. It's something you'd notice.
And after 50 years of successful contraceptive promotion and propaganda --- so successful that polling shows contraceptive acceptance to be stratospheric, and condoms and OC's would hardly be more accessible if you put them in every bag of M&M's in America -- after all this success, the abortion rate is stuck at about 1,000,000 per year, and the rate of marriage and family-formation is at its lowest point in U.S. recorded history.
As your own pastor what the ratio of funerals vs marriages is in your parish.
Excellent point, boatbums!
Yes, post 118 is absolutely true, it is just plain political fact.
Like earlier methods of contraception (a previous FReeper upstream on this thread mentioned putting a lemon up the works?) -- very unpleasant, and often didn't work.
Modern NFP is, as you said, esp. with some leading-edge technology assistance like OvaCue, effective, morally unobjectionable, and really elegant in every respect.
You seem to be making my point. The Catholic policy against contraception is spoken of in theory but almost never in actual parishes by actual priests or actual Catholic families.
However, abortion is considered wrong and strongly opposed by almost all Catholics.
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