Posted on 12/16/2009 7:03:22 AM PST by Patrick Madrid
The incoming Archbishop of Milwaukee, Jerome Listecki, for example, has just come out publicly with a ringing affirmation of the truth of Catholic teaching about contraception — i.e., that it's a serious sin and no Catholic in good conscience can willfully contracept— this in response to yet another goofball pro-abortion front group which styles itself "Young Catholics for Choice" . . .
(Excerpt) Read more at patrickmadrid.blogspot.com ...
Perhaps so. But then, truth isn’t based on numbers.
Good for the Bishop. He’s absolutely right.
I’m 26, unmarried, Catholic, and will only date someone who is for NFP. Yeah, the effect of contraception and NFP are the same (which is fine), but the means are different.
Contraception implies that there is no legitimate physical, spiritual, and emotional connection between husband and wife, or in most cases, Person A and Person B.
NFP maintains the dignity of conjugal relations. The purpose of sex between man and wife is fulfilled only if 1. It is for mutual love & please and 2. it is open to creating new life. Contraception strikes out the latter.
I went past a shelf of condoms the other day at the store and saw some of the descriptions of the products. One box talked about extra spermicide or what have you. And I thought to myself- this is completely unnatural. Why would we want to kill something that naturally comes from us and is used to make a new human being? The rationale behind condoms and artificial birth control is kinda sick.
And the issue of artificial birth control is peanuts compared to the behemoth that is abortion, but the gravity of contraception should not be overlooked by the Church or its congregants.
Ever tried it?
Let me tell you a story about human nature. I lived in Chicago for many years. I always wanted to go to the Field Museum. Never made it. There was always something better to do, and, after all, I could always get to the Field Museum next weekend when I would be less busy. Right?
Then, one day, the moving van pulled up, and I didn't live in Chicago anymore. I finally got to the Field Museum on a long weekend trip up there a few months later.
The moral of the story is that people don't put a high value on an activity when they think it's always available. But make it not always available, and suddenly those slightly-rarer opportunities for that activity become extremely special. And important. And not to be missed.
If you get my drift.
All Christian traditions rejected it prior to 1930.
Luther and Calvin were both violently against it.
Well, we did have to wait a couple weeks after the baby came... otherwise no, and it wouldn't be particularly healthy for our marriage either. Not without special circumstances like one of us being out of town. And I'm saying this as someone who believed in abstinence, didn't live with my husband before marriage, etcetera.
What about now?
Practically everyone else has caved, except some pockets in Eastern Orthodoxy.
NFP-using couples have a very low divorce rate. Whether that's a cause-effect relationship is open to discussion, but the correlation is certainly there.
It strikes me that the issue really can be boiled down to a question of whether one believes that Christ established his Church on earth (Mt 16:18) and that it possesses infallible authority in matters of faith and morals.
If one does accept that premise, he or she must accept and observe those teachings.
If one does not accept that premise, they cannot say they are Catholic as they, ipso facto, dispute the Church’s authority on such matters. By definition, they are Protestant.
Personally, I recognize that some of the Church’s teachings can require sacrifice, but I accept that the Church is His Church and must accept its teaching on these matters.
Thanks
You are confusing two different teachings. Catholic doctrine is not anti contraception because it views it as a form of abortion.
The church is not “wrong”, you may not agree with the church’s stand on contraception, though given you believe its simply tied to their stand against abortion I suspect you don’t know the Church’s teachings on contraception.
Here’s a little history lesson, until about the 1930s all Protestant denominations agreed with the Catholic Church that contraception was a sin. The Anglican Church bowing to social pressure, not theological argument, announced it would allow contraception in “some” cases, and shortly thereafter caved completely and allowed contraception in all cases and thus the flood gates were opened.
The Catholic Church’s teachings on contraception have nothing to do with its stand on abortion. Abortion under catholic church is MURDER. Contraception under catholic teaching is intrinsically wrong because it prevents new human beings from coming into existance. (Abortion the human being already exists and is murdered) To engage in the natural marital act and to not allow its full and complete consequence is a sin.
While this may be inconvient to modern sexual mores and the selfish desires of man, the stand of the church is logical, well thought out and well documented supported by scripture and theology.
You don’t have to agree with it, but at least find out the basis of their teachings before you claim the church is wrong.
Contraception is “any action which, either in anticipation of the conjugal act [sexual intercourse], or in its accomplishment, or in the development of its natural consequences, proposes, whether as an end or as a means, to render procreation impossible” (Humanae Vitae 14). This includes sterilization, condoms and other barrier methods, spermicides, coitus interruptus (withdrawal method), the Pill, and all other such methods.
Great posts. Thanks.
All protestant churches held contraception to be a sin until 1930. Did God suddenly write a new book of the bible then? No, the Anglican church bowed to social pressures and decided to ignore the bible and 2000 years of theological teaching and thought.
The Roman Catholic Church’s stand on this is very well thought out and documented and justified. While it may be inconvient for the modern social mores, there argument is in every way I can examine it, airtight.
The Church isn’t wrong on this one, men and women just act in selfish ways, which is the nature of man. When they do, and those selfish acts are challenged by the church, the natural reaction is to say the church is in the wrong. This however is rarely the actual case.
And if I recall correctly, when this decision was made at the 1930 Lambeth Conference, it was only under strict circumstances - certainly not for the entirety of Anglicans.
Yet this was the camel's nose under the tent - Pope Pius XI responded with the encyclical Casti Connubii a year later, marking an explicit disagreement with the approach taken by the Anglicans, and later by nearly the entire remainder of Christianity.
Yes the initial decision was part of the Lambeth Conference and oked it for “very limited” cases, but shortly thereafter it was opened wide up.
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