Posted on 08/16/2005 1:48:10 PM PDT by NYer
Having married in 1985 when both were medical students, Ann and Michael Moell had their life together planned out.
Once they established medical practices and had a big house with a sprawling back yard, they would begin to have children. Until then, Ann would take the birth-control pill.
Although both had grown up in large Catholic families in Ohio, neither was well versed or much interested in the Church’s teaching on birth regulation.
“While we were in medical school and residency, we didn’t think we had time for a child,” Ann says. “We had the American dream in mind, not just for ourselves but for the children we would have.”
Their plans began to unravel four years into the marriage, when Ann stopped taking the pill because of persistent headaches.
“Here we were, both studying medicine, and neither of us knew anything about the pill and its side effects,” she recalls. “It just isn’t a topic in medical school because the pill is assumed to be a good thing.”
They used periodic abstinence, condoms and other barrier methods but, within a year Ann became pregnant. They welcomed the child into their lives, yet continued to contracept.
After their third child arrived, Ann says, “That was it. We were still young, with three children and growing medical practices. We thought we had to do something foolproof that would keep us from having more children.”
They discussed the possibility of a vasectomy for Michael.
“We thought it would be the best thing for our family,” Michael explains.
Something happened, though, in the Moells’ pursuit of the American dream. Ann began to pray. The couple had begun attending Mass again with the birth and baptism of their first child, but they were “just doing the Catholic thing,” Michael says. “We didn’t know anything about contraception being sinful or that Jesus is present in the Eucharist. We were missing so much.”
“To actually ask God to give us an answer was something new,” Ann admits. “I was praying at Mass, ‘God, show us what to do about this issue.’ A month later, I was pregnant. It was God’s answer. It was so immediate, so direct, and I was elated. It changed our whole attitude about who was in charge of our lives and our marriage.”
They began using natural family planning, and have welcomed two more children into their lives.
But God was not finished with them yet. Ann was a family-practice physician who prescribed the pill. Michael was a pediatrician who was prescribing the pill for young girls. Someone gave them the videotape “Contraception: Why Not?” by Janet Smith. “It changed the whole direction of our practices,” Ann says. “We started looking into the side effects of the pill and I knew I had to stop prescribing.”
Now Dr. Ann Moell is a stay-at-home mother who volunteers as a prenatal-care physician at a pro-life pregnancy center in Dayton, Ohio. Michael left a pediatric partnership to open Holy Family Pediatrics, in the same building as the pregnancy center. About half his patients are pregnant teens referred by his wife. They recommend abstinence before marriage and NFP in marriage to their young patients. Many Catholic parents travel long distances to bring their children for routine care to Holy Family Pediatrics.
“This has been a huge spiritual journey as well as a growth and learning experience in proper health care,” says Ann.
“It was a huge financial leap and leap of faith, to give up the partnership and open my own medical practice,” Michael adds. “Four months after I opened the door, our fourth child was born. I was questioning God the whole way. But it’s worked out better than I could have dreamed.”
Conversion is a word Penny and John Harrison use often to describe their experience with birth control. They were married in 1983 in Penny’s Protestant church; a Catholic priest witnessed the ceremony for John, who was raised in a Catholic family.
They used various forms of contraception for the first 10 years of marriage and had two children “pre-conversion,” as John describes it.
A Catholic Marriage Encounter weekend opened Penny’s heart to the Church, and, when she decided to become a Catholic, all the assumptions of their lives were uprooted. While she was going through a parish RCIA program in their hometown of Kansas City, Mo., John began looking at his own faith and asking questions. He had no problems with the sacraments or the Real Presence of Jesus in the Eucharist, but his vague knowledge of the Church’s teaching on contraception nagged at him.
When he and Penny asked a priest about the issue, “we got some confusing and unspecific answers,” John recalls. “We ultimately were told to ‘follow our conscience.’ Unfortunately, that’s the answer too many Catholic couples get today, and they’re not being told the full beauty of the truth.”
Penny entered the Church at the Easter Vigil in 1993 and shortly thereafter she and her husband went on a 10th-anniversary vacation without their two children.
“We were both very uncomfortable using contraception on that trip,” John said. “We came back and just stopped using contraception of any kind, and prayed and hoped for another child.”
Key to their decision was hearing a talk by Catholic evangelist Scott Hahn, a former Protestant minister, and reading Rome Sweet Home, in which Hahn and his wife, Kimberly, defend the Church’s teaching on contraception.
“We date our deeper conversion to the heart of the Church primarily from the fervor we took from listening to Scott Hahn’s talks,” John says.
Since their conversion, the Harrisons have had three more children, including twins in 1999.
“I come from a Protestant background where it is considered irresponsible not to practice contraception, so I’ve come a long way,” Penny says. “The problem was that when I was preparing to enter the Church, we knew what Catholics were supposed to believe but we couldn’t find any Catholics who actually lived the teaching on contraception.”
As teachers with the Couple to Couple League, which promotes NFP, John and Penny are seeing “more and more couples open to the gift of life,” she says. “I tell them that, in the Nicene Creed, we call the Holy Spirit ‘Lord and Giver of Life.’ If we take that title seriously, we cannot shut the Holy Spirit out of our marriages.”
John says he tells couples who are not particularly religious that contraception is “disrespectful to your wife’s body. You expect a woman to take these hormones that make her body think she’s pregnant just so she can be available to you sexually all the time. And it goes the other way too. Your wife expects you to put on a special device. That’s not very respectful of the man, either.”
“Love means giving your whole self to your spouse,” adds Penny. “And that’s the great gift of NFP.”
Dear Prolifeconservative,
"BUT you go and get extremely ugly.....WHY DID YOU DO THAT?"
My own reading of Tax-chick's post was that it was a relatively restrained reply to this piece of hyperbole:
"It's worthy for what, abstaining 48 hours.........sexual appetite under control for what.....48 hours!"
Having direct knowledge of NFP, as well as the knowledge of others who practice it, this doesn't quite ring true. Our minimum periods of abstinence have been longer.
"And then it's carry on your wild passion for the next 28 days."
LOL. For folks with that much energy, drive, passion, etc., it's tough for me not to say, "Go get 'em!" ;-)
However, I don't actually know anyone (least of all myself) for whom this is true.
"And then, the process is repeated. 'Hold the line, honey, we are fertile, we only have to wait another 18 hours and then we're good to go.'"
That's a weird distortion of how folks who practice NFP relate to each other, from my own experiences, and the reports of others whom I know. It's also insulting.
"That is the practical application for the majority of Catholic couples."
You mean, of the sadly too-small number who reject artificial contraception.
"I suppose I'm just a hard-headed obstinate individual who has problems with NFP."
Do you have problems with NFP or with the Church's ban on artificial contraception?
"I've heard all the flowery and beautiful Church definitions and explanations for NFP but when it's true applications are used in the bedroom, a couple has engaged in the sex act WITHOUT the probality of conception."
LOL. I know more than one person who would dispute that "WITHOUT the probability of conception."
Of course, a lot of the folks who use NFP from time to time that I know are folks either with bunches of kids (five, seven, nine, 10, even more), or wish they'd had more (you don't always get what you want). These are families who were not trying to use NFP to limit to one or two children. In fact, although NFP is pretty effective, it's not so darn effective that over the course of 20 years or so of fertile married life, one might not wind up being "open to the possibility of conception" in a very practical sense a few times.
"And I'd say they make up for the 'abstained period' to which the Church addresses."
Well, in Church life, feasts often follow fasts. We aren't puritans.
"As a matter of fact, I'd say that 'appetite' you speak of is mitigated by a couple who engages passionately up to that small window where they can't engage in sex."
Perhaps. But then again, we have Mardi Gras, as well. In my own parish, our Knights of Columbus Council, under the approving watch of our pastor, has a pretty good blow out Pancake Dinner the night before Ash Wednesday.
"They know the froth off their sex drives leading up to that window!"
See, the problem is that in expressing your frustration, you're imputing a lot of stuff that has a negative tone to those who practice NFP. Perhaps Tax-chick is offended because she uses NFP to space births (and if she is, she's got a whole bunch of kids to show she's not using it to avoid a large family) and doesn't really see herself in your broad-brush generalizations.
"I'm just trying to get people to think about the practical application of NFP. And you can't tell me the way I've described the NFP application above isn't the way most Catholics go about it."
Well, perhaps if you did it without painting folks with such impugned motives, folks might take a bit less objection.
I will note that you have totally ignored the simple analogy between dieting/bulimia and NFP/artificial contraception demonstrating why the means of NFP might be moral and artificial contraception might be immoral.
sitetest
This is a very good point, and it highlights my biggest objection to NFP -- that NFP is nothing more than a Potemkin Village, a false facade vainly attempting to cover up the ugly reality that more than 95% of Catholics are using artificial birth control.
When a pastor looks out over his congregation of families with 1 - 3 children, he can tell himself, "Maybe they're all using NFP." But the reality is that nearly all of them are using birth control.
Far from being any sort of solution to this problem, NFP only aggravates the situation. NFP is like "low fat food" which only makes the obesity problem worse because it gives a false hope that there is some answer other than eating less and exercising more. NFP similarly promises a false hope that there is an answer to the "Death of the West" other than a return to a joyful fruitfulness.
Dear Maximilian,
That link worked.
I've read that piece before. I enjoyed it as much this time as the first. Thanks.
sitetest
“Love means giving your whole self to your spouse,” adds Penny. “And that’s the great gift of NFP.”Bump.
There is no need for anyone who is secure in their practice of NFP to attack me or flame me. I cannot comprehend a vicious and personal attack from someone who is steadfastly following Church teaching - they should revel in that fact, not go on the offensive in the way she did. Their is something really disturbing about getting that defensive about one's own following of Church teaching!
Dear Prolifeconservative,
I view Tax-chick's response to you as being mild in comparison to what you wrote. Thus, perhaps the fault does not lie with Tax-chick. Perhaps a simple apology for your broad-brushed generalizations that imputed and impugned motives might go a long way.
I note that you still ignore the analogy between dieting/bulimia and NFP/artificial contraception that demonstrates why NFP, as a means, might be morally acceptable, while artificial contraception, as a means, might not.
sitetest
Perhaps Prolifeconservative is still struggling with the question of ends, in which case the issue of means is irrelevant. First you have to have a morally acceptable end, then you can start to think about a morally acceptable means. Frustrating the primary purpose of marriage is not a morally acceptable ends.
"Periodic continence" was introduced as a rare exception in unusual cases. Now it has become the theoretical norm. In reality, the true norm is artificial birth control.
Just as we are charged by Christ to choose either God or Mammon, and we are warned not to make the mistake of trying to serve two masters, in the area of marriage, we must choose either generous fruitfulness or planned sterility. These are the real choices. We must choose one or the other. NFP simply obscures that reality in the minds of many Catholics.
Dear Maximilian,
Well, at times in the conversation, it seems as if Prolifeconservative has not objected (at least not entirely in theory) to the ends of NFP. It appears that he has, rather, said that he doesn't see the difference in MEANS between NFP and artificial contraception.
If I've misconstrued that, Prolifeconservative, please correct me.
However, Maximilian, even you seem to leave open a door for a just use of NFP, in that even you appear to admit that in some exceptional circumstances, avoiding conception may be permitted. Under those circumstances, do you think NFP is a moral means? I'm sure that you agree that artificial contraception would not be a moral means.
sitetest
Thank you for this post Maximillian. I appreciate it.
Prolifeconservative expresses a concern that I too have with NFP. There just seems to be something disingenuous about it. I am NOT calling into question individuals who use NFP, I am talking about the theory itself.
It seems to me that whether one uses artificial birth control or one uses NFP, people are trying to avoid pregnancy.
If you're NOT trying to avoid pregnancy, WHY would you use NFP??
Thus if the intent, the "end" is to avoid pregnancy, it is really splitting hairs to say it is okay in one case, and a terrible sin in another case.
And the "fact" that NFP is purportedly more effective at pregnancy avoidance...well what does that say about it?
Condoms have at best a 97% effective rating, and in reality it is more like 85%.
NFP advocates say that their method has a 99% effective rating.
Could one make the argument that a couple that uses condoms is actually MORE open to having children than a couple using NFP?
Logically, if one wants to be truly open to children, then one would not use ANY method to avoid pregnancy.
If one does choose to use a method to avoid pregnancy, is one method really more moral than another (excluding abortifacents and "mutilative" procedures)?
Perhaps I misunderstood him, but the basic message I got was "In both cases you're having sex without having babies, so what's the big difference?"
However, Maximilian, even you seem to leave open a door for a just use of NFP, in that even you appear to admit that in some exceptional circumstances, avoiding conception may be permitted. Under those circumstances, do you think NFP is a moral means?
Periodic continence is like missing Mass on Sunday -- it's not a sin if you have a good enough reason. But it's not a good thing either. NFP is inherently superior to artificial birth control, but it's still enormously problematic.
Using NFP is comparable to getting an annulment. Both can sometimes be legitimate, but both have exploded from a very rare handful of exceptions to, in the case of annulment, more than 50,000 per year. Now that some dioceses are requiring pre-marital NFP counseling, will they also be offering pre-marital annulment counseling?
In the meantime, NFP acts like the conjurer's trick of misdirection by distracting our attention away from real issue: "I set before you today death and life -- choose life." We need to stop trying to serve 2 masters. Let's choose life, and life in more abundance.
Hermann: "It is always good for a Christian couple to abstain from sexual intercourse every so often to devote themselves more to prayer. If we do not curb our sexual appetite, our mind will become overwhelmed with thoughts of lust to the exclusion of God."
Well, abstinance may be beneficial at times, but I still think there is concern about someone purposefully thwarting the intentions of God. It is God who opens and closes the womb, is it not??
NFP is contraception, whether you want to admit it or not - it is the intentional action of limiting sex to guarantee that conception cannot occur. You are still enjoying sex (during certain cycles) without the potential to conceive. The primary question is whether God commends this practice of contraception.
What does God say about this practice? One of God's primary commands to Adam was to be fruitful and multiply. Is NFP in line with this commandment? God has commanded His people to take dominion over the earth. Is NFP in line with this commandment?
I think you should seriously examine your actions if you are practicing NFP (or any contraception). Why are you trying to limit your number of children? Do you lack faith that God will provide for you/them? Are they an inconvenience? Do you not think that God will not bless those that obey His commands?
This is just another issue where our culture (I can't afford another child but I can afford that SUV) has corrupted God's precious and holy will.
Overlooking the insulting caricature of other people's sex lives that you present, any practice of abstinence, not just NFP, in this manner might not avoid the sin of lust, but it still avoids the sins of contraception that were amply explained to you.
Your objection is not to NFP per se, but use of NFP for the improper end of avoiding pregnancy without economic or health excuse.
What do you consider a valid "economic" excuse???
And is that Biblical??
Indeed the goal of avoiding pregancy is good in one case and not good in another. It is not "splitting hairs" to understand the difference, even if it requires and intellectual effort you are unwilling to undertake.
couple that uses condoms is actually MORE open to having children than a couple using NFP?
Please see #24 and #65. I believe it would answer your question. If not, see if you can qualify your question by distinguishing between proper and improper use of NFP.
NFP is not contraception. It is informed abstinence. It can be practices rightly or wrongly. It can and often is practiced to achieve pregnancy.
Why are you trying to limit your number of children? Do you lack faith that God will provide for you/them?
Valid questions. It is wrong to practice NFP if it is used for injust, God-defying ends, such as to "afford an SUV".
I would say, if another pregnancy puts you in bankruptcy, it is a valid reason. If another pregnancy crowds your children in bunk beds or dashes the hopes for a boat and an SUV, it is not.
The question of valid excuses to avoid pregancy was asked and answered on this thread with quite a bit of detail. If you have trouble finding it answered, let me know and I will find it for you. Look for Hermann's posts.
sitetest: "Here's a helpful analogy. A dieter is someone who is trying to lose weight. So is a bulimic. One does so by abstaining from overeating, the other by eating all he cares to eat, and then purging.
Both are aiming toward the same goal, but one METHOD is legitimate, and one METHOD is not."
Hmmm, this is quite an interesting analogy. Personally, I think you could apply both these instances to NFP. Seems the NFP advocate is actually similar to the "binge and purge" approach since they enjoy sex prolificly, without care until they reach a certain cycle. It is then that they "purge" (quit cold turkey).
"purge" means to artificially induce vomit, not to abstain from food. If an NFP couple takes a chemical to avoid arousal when abstinence is advised, your analogy somewhat works, but then that couple is not practicing NFP, they are practicing self-mutilation.
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