Revisited: NFP and grave reasons: Serious reason "quietly dropped"?

EWTN Ask the Experts Forum ^ | various | Fr. Richard Hogan

[Hermann the Cherusker]

We know that the magisterium has approved the use of periodic continence with certain restrictions, that's not in question. But the use of periodic continence always requires grave reasons. The requirement does not cease when you've had a certain number. None of your numerous sources claims otherwise.

I'm beginning to question whether or not "grave reasons" is anywhere to be found in the Magisterium.

"legitimate reasons" - Sacred Penitentiary, Decree of 2 March 1853

"just reasons" - Pope Paul VI, Encyclical "Humane Vitae", 16, 25 July 1968

"just reasons" - Catechism of the Catholic Church, 2368

It is only in Pius XII's Allocution that says "grave reasons", and I am wondering if this is a mistranslation. I think I am going to the library today to find the AAS and see the original.

Okay, I went to the Seminary and dug up the AAS yesterday. Here is the relevant lines of the Allocution:

Quindi abbracciare lo stato matrimoniale, usare continuamente la facolta ad esso propria e in esso solo lecita, e d'altra parte, sottrasi sempre e deliberatamente, senz un grave motivo, al suo primario dovere sarebbe un peccare contro il senso stesso della vita coniugale.

Da quella prestazione positive obbligatoria possono esimere, anche per lungo temp, anzi per l'intera durata del matrimonio, seri motiva, come quelli che si hanno non di rado nella cosiddetta "indicazione" medica, eugenica, economica e sociale.

I take "grave" and "serious" as meaning essentially the same thing. The question is then, how does this relate to other prouncements using the words "just" and "legitimate"? I don't think a dichotomy should be set up here.

A grave reason is one meriting serious consideration. A just reason is one conforming to the moral good. It seems Pius XII uses "grave reasons" in a sense of as opposed to "frivolous reasons" or "no reason", with the unstated implication that the reasons are also "just reasons". Perhaps the Magisterium has more recently avoided the word because of confusion between "grave reasons" and "grave sin", as well as the sense of some that its use should be unusual or rare for all Christians?

I'm going to need to see a Moral Theology Handbook on this topic to see what the Theologians try to draw out by using these words.

[Hermann the Cherusker]

Your entire understanding of the concept of teleological purpose is defective. Try this from the same section of "Allocution to the Italian Midwives":

Now, the truth is that matrimony, as an institution of nature, in virtue of the Creator's will, has not as a primary and intimate end the personal perfection of the married couple but the procreation and upbringing of a new life. The other ends, inasmuch as they are intended by nature, are not equally primary, much less superior to the primary end, but are essentially subordinated to it. This is true of every marriage, even if no offspring result, just as of every eye it can be said that it is destined and formed to see, even if, in abnormal cases arising from special internal or external conditions, it will never be possible to achieve visual perception.

Once you make the effort to understand this, you may be able to grasp the concept. First of all, procreation is always the primary end of every sexual act. Secondly, this applies even to sexual acts which are presumably infertile, "just as every eye is designed to see, even if it is blind due to circumstances." In the above quote, Pius XII talks about the primary end of marriage, but this applies to each individual act, as was reiterated by Humanae Vitae, and cannot be said to apply only to a "totality."

No, I can't accept the reasoning you are using above. The Church teaches that it is legitimate to have sex during pregnancy. This is not a period of "presumable infertility" but actual and unavoidable infertility. There is simply no way that a woman who is already pregnant will become pregnant again by a new act of intercourse. Procreation cannot be the primary end of a sexual act when the woman is pregnant (nor after menopause either, the miraculous conceptions of Isaac and St. John the Baptist notwithstanding). One is not required to will the impossible.

In fact, Humane Vitae says the exact opposite of what you just claimed:

It does not, moreover, cease to be legitimate even when, for reasons independent of their will, it is foreseen to be infertile. For its natural adaptation to the expression and strengthening of the union of husband and wife is not thereby suppressed. (HV, 11)

The Church's teaching is that procreation is the primary end of matrimony. In other words, it is the main justification for its existence. One does not need to intend or pretend one is willing procreation as the end of an obviously infertile act.

Neither the Church nor her doctrine is inconsistent when she considers it lawful for married people to take advantage of the infertile period but condemns as always unlawful the use of means which directly prevent conception, even when the reasons given for the later practice may appear to be upright and serious. In reality, these two cases are completely different. In the former the married couple rightly use a faculty provided them by nature. In the latter they obstruct the natural development of the generative process. It cannot be denied that in each case the married couple, for acceptable reasons, are both perfectly clear in their intention to avoid children and wish to make sure that none will result. (HV, 16)

Artificial contraception is wrong because it frustrates nature and places pleasure as the highest good in marriage instead of sacrifice. If one reads the responses of the faithful interviewed by Patrick and Patricia Crowley of the Christian Family Movement, one sees how commonly this error was widely accepted - that "Rhythm does not allow a husband his God given rights to show his wife love for her 365 days of the year." Undoubtedly, this already existing belief that pleasure is the highest good is why the faithful so massively defected from Church teaching in the 1960's.

But the sanctification of the couples love in the unitive aspect of matrimony is not simply another form of pleasure seeking.