Birth control reconsidered: Protestant film questions contraception, rediscovers Reformation beliefs

For anyone under 60, birth control is just a fact of life. Those under 50 won’t recall that it was ever controversial. The pharmaceutical separation of sex from babies has been so thoroughly accepted by Western society that any holdouts are seen as fringers: “orthodox” Catholics, Mormons, and health hippies.

But questions about contraception are arising from unlikely sources lately: not enough to call it a trend, but significant enough to notice.

For example, the film, Birth Control: How Did We Get Here? Its Protestant director, Brian Peeples of Huntersville, North Carolina, said he got the idea after he and his wife changed their minds about birth control at a Baby Conference in 2010. It’s more of a movement than a movie, however, with a second film expected later this year, and a series of books and study guides to “communicate the Biblical position on birth control and its impact on the church, marriage and family.”

The birth control movie was “born from a desire to communicate the truth about birth control and family from the Word of God to other believers,” explains its website; this in a culture where there is little if any difference between Christians and non-believers when it comes to preventing children.

It’s the sort of ideology that’s expected from Catholic clergy and the more serious Catholic laity, but this film features mostly Protestant evangelicals: high profile Calvinist minister R.C. Sproul Jr., author George Grant, and Geoffrey Botkin of the Western Conservatory of the Arts and Sciences.

It retells the history of birth control from an evangelical perspective, recounting how in little more than a century, Protestant churches turned away from ages-old teachings on sexuality and marriage. In a flurry of European eugenics and overpopulation “science” they began to view children as inconvenient. Their teachings and birth control practices were before long indistinguishable from nonbelievers’.

Yet before that, one commenter in the film observed, “Every single church affirmed that children are a blessing and that we have no business saying no to God’s blessings.”

The film recounts the eugenic roots of the birth control movement and its rabidly anti-Christian, racist, hedonist founder Margaret Sanger, who seized on then-persuasive Malthusian overpopulation theories. Opposing her were protestants like Anthony Comstock, a 19^th century Puritan-tradition crusader who saw birth control as the devil’s particular attack on the young, and as being inextricably wed to pornography and abortion – all “born of the same mindset ,” according to the film, “the corruption of the sexual impulse… [and] contrary to scripture”

With the fall of contraceptive laws in the mid-20^th century, first pornography and then abortion were rapidly legalized; so, like him or not, Comstock is vindicated.

So is the Catholic Church, which the movie notes was the sole voice – given that the Protestants had collapsed – to weigh in, with Pope Paul VI’s Humanae Vitae (Of Human Life) encyclical, affirming everything Christianity had taught about birth control for the millennia previously.

In a way the movie seems a bit of a mea culpa for mainstream Protestantism missing the boat. “Opposition to birth control was seen as a Catholic thing,” one commentator says. “Protestants were for liberty.”

One of the great tragedies of the last century, says another, is how willingly Christians co-operated with the anti-baby, pro-eugenics, agenda, compelled by “science,” a sense of duty, a desire to be modern, and for “deliverance from responsibilities of children while having all the pleasures of adulthood,” as one commentator put it.

Some saw birth control as a means of preventing abortion. However, 50 years and 50 million American abortions later, that is a harder argument to sustain.

The difficulty in defending marriage today derives in large part from the legal arguments for the new “right to privacy” that brought birth control to the West. It began with “privacy in marriage, which soon gave way to privacy for the unmarried, this in turn gave way to privacy for homosexuals,” the film narrator remarks. “Now that sterility is universally accepted, marriage has lost its fundamental purpose; procreation. Marriage, disconnected from its purposes, loses its meaning and the historical definition of marriage hangs in the balance.”

It is this half-century years of hindsight since the birth control pill was first marketed in North America in 1960 that is beginning to spur the sexual counter-revolutionists.

“I think we’re seeing the fruits of the whole contraceptive revolution and quite honestly the fruit is rancid,” Julie Roys, host of the radio show Up for Debate on Moody Radio, says in the film. She notes that since the pill’s arrival, the marriage rate has declined by a third, divorce has almost doubled, the proportion of children born in single parent families has more than tripled “and now we’re seeing the hookup culture.”

In that respect, the film is not alone. Mary Eberstadt’s 2012 book Adam and Eve After the Pill: Paradoxes of the Sexual Revolution recounts in detail the harm done by sexualization of the West, from rising divorce, increasing promiscuity, juvenile delinquency, neglect of children, abuse and objectification of girls and more.

“Society is losing its mooring and all of us are beginning to ask, ‘Where is all this heading?’” Roys says in the film. She finds that many young people particularly want a deeper understanding of male and female sexuality, and and its deeper meaning.

In any case, the first rumblings about birth control have not been missed by pro-abortion advocates. Robin Marty, a columnist at rhrealitycheck.org, a sexual and reproductive health news site, has launched an ongoing series of commentaries under the title “They’re Coming for Your Birth Control.” And one atheist blogger calls it a “freaking creepy” trend.

If you thought I misinterpreted your comment, please clarify what you meant. It certainly looks like if you believe Catholic teaching "manages a couple's sex life", by the same logic that would imply that teaching against pre-marital sex and sodomy also manages a couple's sex life.

Matthew 19:1-13 does NOT say virginity is better than marriage. Just another Scripture twisted to support Catholic doctrine.

Jesus clearly states in Matthew that those who can accept not having marital relations should do so.

How about Paul's take on the subject?

1 Corinthians 7:36-40

36 If anyone is worried that he might not be acting honorably toward the virgin he is engaged to, and if his passions are too strong[a] and he feels he ought to marry, he should do as he wants. He is not sinning. They should get married. 37 But the man who has settled the matter in his own mind, who is under no compulsion but has control over his own will, and who has made up his mind not to marry the virgin—this man also does the right thing. 38 So then, he who marries the virgin does right, but he who does not marry her does better.[b]

The Church does not forbid people to marry, so how is this verse even applicable? Where did you make the leap from the Church's teaching on virginity for the sake of God's kingdom to expressing that the Church forbids marriage? In Church teaching, a marriage can only be valid if intercourse occurs. How does this show that the Church is against proper marital relations?

If virginity were better for man, then why did God make sex necessary for procreation? Why make sex in the first place?.

Jesus and Paul answer this succinctly. Not all are capable of perpetual virginity, but those who can accept it should. Just because one is held in higher esteem than the other does not mean the other is not respected and honored. In the Catholic Church marriage is a sacrament. There is a celebratory mass for couples who marry.

What kind of God to Catholics serve who would create man and woman, give them a strong sex drive, and then tell them that it's better to not have the sex He created them with a desire to have?

Disordered sexual desires is one of the many crosses we bear from the fall. God didn't twist it, man did.

and destroy the most basic relationship known to man, the marriage one.

The most basic relationship man has is with God.

accepting birth control is a slippery slope to abortion

Even the Supreme Court admitted this. From Contraception & Abortion: The Deadly Connection

The Planned Parenthood of Southeastern Pennsylvania v. Casey decision, which placed some legal restrictions on access to abortion including informed consent and parental consent, reaffirmed the basic tenets of the 1973 Roe v. Wade decision.
http://caselaw.lp.findlaw.com/scripts/getcase.pl?court=US&vol=505&invol=833
In what is probably the key passage to the entire decision, the Court argued that the legal necessity of surgical abortion is based on its social use as backup contraception:
The Roe rule's limitation on state power could not be repudiated without serious inequity to people who, for two decades of economic and social developments, have organized intimate relationships and made choices that define their views of themselves and their places in society, in reliance on the availability of abortion in the event that contraception should fail. The ability of women to participate equally in the economic and social life of the Nation has been facilitated by their ability to control their reproductive lives. The Constitution serves human values, and while the effect of reliance on Roe cannot be exactly measured, neither can the certain costs of overruling Roe for people who have ordered their thinking and living around that case be dismissed.
Again, what the Casey Court is essentially saying is that legal abortion as backup contraception is a social necessity. The pro-life community, therefore, needs to examine the role of contraception in legally sustaining abortion-on-demand - on propping up, so to speak, Roe v. Wade. We would be foolish to ignore what the United States Supreme Court is telling us here. Sadly, many pro-lifers sink their collective heads in the sand when it comes to the sensitive issue of contraception and its social and legal link to surgical abortion.

'You find me a Scripture verse that says it’s immoral to use the current calendar and I’ll consider it a moral issue.' It isnt a just a moral issue... it's a worship, obedience issue. Remember the sabbath day, to keep it holy. Six days shalt thou labour, and do all thy work: but the seventh day is the sabbath of the Lord thy God: in it thou shalt not do any work, thou, nor thy son, nor thy daughter, thy manservant, nor thy maidservant, nor thy cattle, nor thy stranger that is within thy gates: for in six days the Lord made heaven and earth, the sea, and all that in them is, and rested the seventh day: wherefore the Lord blessed the sabbath day, and hallowed it. (Exodus 20:8—11) Surely My Sabbaths you shall keep, for it is a sign between Me and you throughout your generations, that you may know that I am Yahuwah who sanctifies you. You shall keep the Sabbath, therefore, for it is holy to you . . . a perpetual covenant. (See Exodus 31:13, 14, 16.) Moreover also I gave them my sabbaths, to be a sign between me and them, that they might know that I am the Lord that sanctify them. (Ezekiel 20:12) For as the new heavens and the new earth, which I will make, shall remain before me, saith the Lord, so shall your seed and your name remain. And it shall come to pass, that from one new moon to another, and from one sabbath to another, shall all flesh come to worship before me, saith the Lord. (Isaiah 66:22, 23) Thus saith the Lord GOD; The gate of the inner court that looketh toward the east shall be shut the six working days; but on the sabbath it shall be opened, and in the day of the new moon it shall be opened. (Ezekiel 46:1) Let there be lights in the firmament of the heaven to divide the day from the night; and let them be for signs, and for seasons( moed-appointed times, feasts, assembly) and for days, and years . . . .” (Genesis1:14 Mōed and Chodesh in word studies are critical to knowing His calendar. Month and new moon is the same word in Hebrew... He appointed [created] the moon for seasons [mo’ed].” (Psalm 104:19) Moed again means appointed times of assembly.. ( not our understandng of the word seasons) The moon as you see is vital in finding His appointed times according to Scripture.. The Gregorian calendar skips that... Uses just the sun. The new moon meaning 'month' in Hebrew as the same word is not an accident. A study of the new moon and its occurances and its tie to the feasts and the Sabbaths in scripture are a way to see His calendar pop out. A little time in Leviticus and seeing it unfold in the Passion week is undeniable. As Ezekiel 46:1 puts it, quoting God. 1. New moon (new month day- first day of month that had the markets closed (Amos 8:5) but the temple was to be open special offerings are listd in sripture. banquets and feasts were held on this day too. 2. Six work days (days 2,3,4,5,6,7 in His month) 3. One Sabbath day (the seventh day of the week, but the 8th day of his month) Then six work days, the the 7th day sabbath(15th of His month) .. then another six work days, then another sabbath (22 day of His month and was the first sabbath recorded in Exodus).then six more work days( then His last Sabbath day of His month. Then a new moon is to be observed in the sky and not calculated by a smartphone. The moon phase is on average 29.5 days.. God's calendar first observed by Moses in the wilderness has four equal Sabbaths and unlike the solar calendar, renews each new moon (month same word in Hebrew) Now scripture says times and laws would change (Daniel 7:25) and the whole world would follow after the beast In reality, at the beginning of each month in God's calendar, there is a day that is neither a work day or a seventh day Sabbath that is the new moon day.(pretty critical to understanding His calendar And His timekeeping. There is one time, each month, that there are seven days before sabbath, so no continuous seven day weeks since the beginning of time. Best evidence in a real scripture battle? The battle of Jericho. It was a seven day march. God, after Forty years in the wilderness , He would not allow Israel to violate a His sabbath. He changes not. And with the Gregorian calendar, there is an obvious violation of the sabbath. With His calendar, if they began the march on the new moon day, Israel did not violate the sabbath... ( and the book of jasher, noted in our scripture a couple times, says that the battle did in fact begin on the new moon day the first day of His month) That is why there are no days named in scripture, only numbers.. The Gregorian calendar is a work of science and man and only uses half of God's timekeeping tools in the sky. And when the moon isn't involved, it is imposible to find His appointed times and His appointed times (especially His Sabbath) And it isn't easter or christmas- that just helps to confirm the counterfeit Gregorian calendar floats around God's and each day of the Gregorian week has the same chance to be the Seventh day sabbath each chodesh. And His calendar isn't a mystery, just lost.. It was observed in our Savior's day..and then calculated calendars came about.. which scripture says would happen that even time and laws would be changed.. Daniel 7:25 Last point.. God's seal ( name, title and territory) is in one place in the ten commandments, the sabbath commandment. I think it is that important.. the choice is God's seal or Satan's mark on our foreheads and hands.. both have a calendar.both have holy days.. One is scriptural, eternal and seen I creation. The counterfeit is found on your smartphone and wall calendar with maybe even Bible verses and man made holy days on it to boot...and the world follows one religiously...

Jesus came to set us free. Not put us back under the bondage to the Law. While we were sinners Christ died for us. There's nothing we can do to make God love us any more or any less.

Romans 14:1-29 As for the one who is weak in faith, welcome him, but not to quarrel over opinions. One person believes he may eat anything, while the weak person eats only vegetables. Let not the one who eats despise the one who abstains, and let not the one who abstains pass judgment on the one who eats, for God has welcomed him. Who are you to pass judgment on the servant of another? It is before his own master that he stands or falls. And he will be upheld, for the Lord is able to make him stand.

One person esteems one day as better than another, while another esteems all days alike. Each one should be fully convinced in his own mind. The one who observes the day, observes it in honor of the Lord. The one who eats, eats in honor of the Lord, since he gives thanks to God, while the one who abstains, abstains in honor of the Lord and gives thanks to God. For none of us lives to himself, and none of us dies to himself. For if we live, we live to the Lord, and if we die, we die to the Lord. So then, whether we live or whether we die, we are the Lord's. For to this end Christ died and lived again, that he might be Lord both of the dead and of the living.

Why do you pass judgment on your brother? Or you, why do you despise your brother? For we will all stand before the judgment seat of God; for it is written, “As I live, says the Lord, every knee shall bow to me, and every tongue shall confess to God.” So then each of us will give an account of himself to God.

Therefore let us not pass judgment on one another any longer, but rather decide never to put a stumbling block or hindrance in the way of a brother. I know and am persuaded in the Lord Jesus that nothing is unclean in itself, but it is unclean for anyone who thinks it unclean. For if your brother is grieved by what you eat, you are no longer walking in love. By what you eat, do not destroy the one for whom Christ died. So do not let what you regard as good be spoken of as evil. For the kingdom of God is not a matter of eating and drinking but of righteousness and peace and joy in the Holy Spirit. Whoever thus serves Christ is acceptable to God and approved by men. So then let us pursue what makes for peace and for mutual upbuilding.

Do not, for the sake of food, destroy the work of God. Everything is indeed clean, but it is wrong for anyone to make another stumble by what he eats. It is good not to eat meat or drink wine or do anything that causes your brother to stumble. The faith that you have, keep between yourself and God. Blessed is the one who has no reason to pass judgment on himself for what he approves. But whoever has doubts is condemned if he eats, because the eating is not from faith. For whatever does not proceed from faith is sin.

Acts 15:1-29 But some men came down from Judea and were teaching the brothers, “Unless you are circumcised according to the custom of Moses, you cannot be saved.” And after Paul and Barnabas had no small dissension and debate with them, Paul and Barnabas and some of the others were appointed to go up to Jerusalem to the apostles and the elders about this question. So, being sent on their way by the church, they passed through both Phoenicia and Samaria, describing in detail the conversion of the Gentiles, and brought great joy to all the brothers. When they came to Jerusalem, they were welcomed by the church and the apostles and the elders, and they declared all that God had done with them. 5 But some believers who belonged to the party of the Pharisees rose up and said, “It is necessary to circumcise them and to order them to keep the law of Moses.”

The apostles and the elders were gathered together to consider this matter. And after there had been much debate, Peter stood up and said to them, “Brothers, you know that in the early days God made a choice among you, that by my mouth the Gentiles should hear the word of the gospel and believe. And God, who knows the heart, bore witness to them, by giving them the Holy Spirit just as he did to us, and he made no distinction between us and them, having cleansed their hearts by faith. Now, therefore, why are you putting God to the test by placing a yoke on the neck of the disciples that neither our fathers nor we have been able to bear? But we believe that we will be saved through the grace of the Lord Jesus, just as they will.”

And all the assembly fell silent, and they listened to Barnabas and Paul as they related what signs and wonders God had done through them among the Gentiles. After they finished speaking, James replied, “Brothers, listen to me. Simeon has related how God first visited the Gentiles, to take from them a people for his name. And with this the words of the prophets agree, just as it is written,

“‘After this I will return, and I will rebuild the tent of David that has fallen; I will rebuild its ruins, and I will restore it, that the remnant of mankind may seek the Lord, and all the Gentiles who are called by my name, says the Lord, who makes these things 18 known from of old.’

Therefore my judgment is that we should not trouble those of the Gentiles who turn to God, but should write to them to abstain from the things polluted by idols, and from sexual immorality, and from what has been strangled, and from blood. For from ancient generations Moses has had in every city those who proclaim him, for he is read every Sabbath in the synagogues.”

Then it seemed good to the apostles and the elders, with the whole church, to choose men from among them and send them to Antioch with Paul and Barnabas. They sent Judas called Barsabbas, and Silas, leading men among the brothers, with the following letter: “The brothers, both the apostles and the elders, to the brothers who are of the Gentiles in Antioch and Syria and Cilicia, greetings. Since we have heard that some persons have gone out from us and troubled you with words, unsettling your minds, although we gave them no instructions, it has seemed good to us, having come to one accord, to choose men and send them to you with our beloved Barnabas and Paul, men who have risked their lives for the name of our Lord Jesus Christ. We have therefore sent Judas and Silas, who themselves will tell you the same things by word of mouth. For it has seemed good to the Holy Spirit and to us to lay on you no greater burden than these requirements: that you abstain from what has been sacrificed to idols, and from blood, and from what has been strangled, and from sexual immorality. If you keep yourselves from these, you will do well. Farewell.”

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Birth control reconsidered

A Protestant film questions contraception, and rediscovers Reformation beliefs