Thank Mr. Saltzman for a well written article. Maybe more catholics should agree with you on you re-visting the encyclical.

Several recent writings -- most notably, "Adam and Eve After the Pill," by Mary Eberstadt -- have shown that Humanae Vitae was truly prophetic. Everything it predicted about the consequences of widespread use of contraceptives has come to pass: increased divorce, increased infidelity, increased abortion, increased pornography.

A good and fair article overall, and certainly cause for reflection.

There is, however, a false dichotomy at the top of the article, and an incomplete description of the relevant Catholic teaching that could mislead.

The false dichotomy is the either-or between family planning/spacing children (through contraception) on the one hand, and no-planning/children-too-often (implicit) on the other. Natural Family Planning gives a couple the opportunity to plan with about the same confidence as Pill users--actually, more confidence in a way, since Pill users do not always experience a return of fertility when they stop to have a child.

Re Church teachings, as Rev Saltzman would have read in the early sections of HV, the overarching teaching is Responsible Parenthood. Under RP, the couple is charged to love as God loves (freely, totally, faithfully, fruitfully) and to live by this hierarchy of priorities: God first, then spouse, then family, then all else. In that context, to have the children whose spiritual, physical, educational, and emotional needs they have realistic prospects for fulfilling. Each couple is unique, and the couple themselves, prayerfully before God, are to determine how many children, and when, they should try for--with generosity tempered by prudence, and using only natural means.

Under the common-sense precepts of RP, avoiding contraception is merely a necessary, but not sufficient condition for employing marital sexuality in a fully moral way.

As "converts" from the use of contraception early on, my wife and I have personally discovered a well-kept secret--that the whole marriage is better under the discipline of NFP. NFP users have a good track record for marital success. I do believe that contraception, and all the fallout from it predicted by Paul VI in HV 17, are direct causes of the epidemic of marital breakdown in our culture. Like any epidemic, not everyone falls victim--but the risks are greater.

We have taught NFP to many Protestant couples, whose personal prayer and meditation on Scripture moved them to "place their sexuality under the dominion of God." I view such spirtual sensitivity as practically miraculous, given the cultural sea in which we swim, and it shames our Catholic brethren (including many clergy) who have rejected this true and beautiful teaching.

Everyone, and I really do mean everyone, still knows the truth of how disconnecting sex from creation creates societal tension and mostly hurts women; afterall it's the men who get what they want with no strings attached. (That's why abortion had to, absolutely had to become available on demand, to enable women to become just as selfish as men.) But alas, polite society is terrified of appearing judgy-judgy and feeling even the least bit uncomfortable and so scoffs and derides the entire notion. People know the truth in their hearts, everyone does but no one is willing to stick their necks out, at least not anyone at the top of the cultural heap.

I am glad that you got the sex and marriage linkage but is obvious by its absence is that sex is for marriage and sex brings about...wait for it...CHILDREN. We have summarily separated marriage from sex...children from sex...and our innate God given way of being man or woman. What i mean is that men dont protect women and men arent changed by the natural loving femininity that women hve within them...the Feminine Genius ala JPII. Sexes are now interchangeable.

Thanks for your thoughtful remarks, Joe DeVet.

I would add to yours that we are called to follow Christ, not the reverse. We are not to make a plan and say, “Hey Jesus! Follow me!” He has had a plan from all eternity for the souls He wants to bring forth from the union of a Christian couple, souls He intends to spend an eternity of bliss with Him. While the world cannot understand that, Christian couples should.

What right do genuinely Christian couples have, who are supposed to be living a life of faith, following Christ even when they don't see how doing so can work out according to the wisdom of the world (if they could see that, faith wouldn't be necessary in the spiritual life) to plan their families without any regard at all for *God's* plan for the fruit of their union? For Christians it is not simply a matter of our deciding on our own whether we can handle another child. It simply is not up to the couple alone if they are following Christ and living a life of faith. The couple, as Joe DeVet put it, "**PRAYERFULLY** before God, are to determine how many children, and when," (emphasis mine) and carry that out without using any unnatural or artificial means, which would effectively say to God, "This is entirely up to us, Jesus. Come follow us." It is *NOT* entirely up to them.

For Christians openness to God's plan is required, and following God's plan always requires faith. Our understanding how we can handle another child, while it is a factor in our planning a family, cannot be the primary factor for Christians. The primary factor is adherence to God's plan, following Christ in faith, Who we are supposed to be serving with all our heart, mind, soul and strength – and trust.

This comes from one who has raised ten kids on a single income who are all happy and productive members of society. I never did see along the way how it was possible to provide for them all, but now believe with all my heart that “for God, all things are possible.” I am thrilled with every one of my children and thank God for the grace He gave my wife and I to be open to His plan. Christians need to prayerfully ask for that grace, and then accept God's plan whether it leaves them childless or blesses them with multiple children and the struggle that comes with that.

“Take up your *CROSS* and follow me.” The cross, as may of the saints have pointed out, does indeed become the sweetest thing in a Christian's life. My children are for me a joyful blessing derived from a cross that consisted in the struggle to provide for them, but, quite honestly, overall we had so much fun with them over the years, they brought us so much joy, that it seems almost dishonest to me to refer to raising them as “a cross,” but I reluctantly do so as we did indeed struggle through some hard times, and I do not want to leave the impression that I am saying following God's plan is easy. It isn't. It requires faith and carrying the cross, but does indeed bring with it abundant life, joy and “a peace that passes all understanding” – a peace most certainly beyond the understanding of the world.

One more thought. It turns out artificial contraception is often abortifacient – which should be a huge clue for Christians indicating that it never was in God's plan.

    Correlation versus causation.  Would the small divorce rates of providentialists, Amish, Jewish Hasidim, Islam be similar to the small divorce rates of NFP couples?  I suspect so.  Is that because contraception is avoided or because females become economically dependent once they are staying home with children and having large work skips in their resume?  Do large family NFP couples have lower divorce rates than 3 child NFP couples where the mom goes to a career?  We don't know.
    Most divorces are initiated by females which is far easier under something else brand new in culture that Humanae Vitae doesn't consider...no fault divorce.  Does no fault divorce cause extreme divorce stats also?  Catholic thinking on this matter is a priori.  It starts with the answer that Paul VI was prophetic and then seeks to buttress the answer.  It doesn't seem to address "correlation versus causation" at all.  It would be interesting to know the divorce rates of Catholic sterile couples ( who can morally have sex whenever they like and frequently but I'm sure don't unless they live on a trust fund and have no job stress) but I'm sure there are no such stats.  Who would gather them?  But the sterile couple would have two unique variables (unless they adopt multiple children): the economic independence of the female (in the contracepting couple) joined to the obedience to the Magisterium of the NFP couple.
     Secondary things could account for low NFP divorce rates: vulnerably positioned females vis a vis economics; and on the positive side, constant communicating about goals.  What if NFP communicating skills are stopping divorces?  We'll never know as long as we already have the answer.

Thank you Russ for initiating a long-overdue conversation about a Roman Catholic teaching that has befuddled many Protestants (and Catholics). I once heard a Roman Catholic Bishop tell an emotionally and physically exhausted mother of four that that if she died giving birth to a fifth child that she would "go to heaven." Never mind that she would leave four young children motherless, etc. I found the Bishop's reading of "Humanae Vitae" to be deeply troubling and un-pastoral. At the same time, the Protestant tendency to dismiss the issue and to separate sexual intimacy from procreation has led to all kinds of abuses, some of which you mention.

The best papal encyclicals for our times are those that offend the greatest number of people and seem the easiest to reject out of hand. Those are the best because they get the greatest number of people pulling their hair out. At that point one of two things will happen: 1) The person who says "Oh what is this crap?" reads the thing and sees that it makes perfect sense, or 2) he never reads it but uses it as an example why the Catholic Church is anti-woman (or some such) and thus really sets himself up for a thorough takedown next time he's in the company of someone who knows what he or she is talking about.

(I certainly don't include Mr. Saltzman among those pulling their hair out--great piece!)

Hi, bill bannon,

Thank you for pointing out that NFP couples have low divorce rates and that their increased communication may be a factor in that low divorce rate.

As for your other speculations, I will offer one of my own: There is no way to know the happiness of married couples. There is also the possibility that groups with low divorce rates may have many miserable married couples, but because divorce is so unacceptable to others in their group they persist in suffering though an unhappy marriage due to peer pressure. I doubt this is the typical case for Catholic NFP couples. I know too many happy NFP couples to believe that. It would be difficult to make the case that Catholic couples feel pressured by the culture to stay married these days, and because the divorce rate among contracepting Catholics is much higher than for Catholics using NFP, there must be something positive about NFP for marriage.

For believers, if being open to life is in God's plan, it should be no surprise that things work out better for those who don't take artificial measures to prevent new life from being conceived.

One thing that cannot be disputed by either side in this debate is that contraception has led to less children being born. Places where contraception has been for the last two generations accepted and promoted widely have all fallen below the replacement birth rate. In the U.S. this has been masked a bit by the immigration of our friends to the South. But not so in many other West countries, and Japan, etc.

Without reproducing your civilization, you die out and before doing so, you become of diminishing significance in the world debate of ideologies. In the U.S., you also cause grave harm to the standard of living of many, because we have a social security system that relies greatly on the young to pay for the old. We are now entering that unchartered phase of our history in the U.S., where, due to contraception, easy divorce, abortion, and evertying else that militates against birthing children, the folks whose work we need to generate the taxes to pay for the older generation are shrinking in proportion. Immigration helps a litte but not enough, since the immigrants are not nearly as educated as the unborn children to those already in the U.S. would be, and thus not nearly as able to generate the income and resultant taxes of the non-immigrants.

So, the debate of whether contraception is moral or immoral almost becomes moot. It becomes secondary to the pernicious effect that its widespread use has on the sustainabililty of our culture as we have come to know and enjoy it. In other words, congratulations to those who have urged and continue to urge for use of contraception--you have won, but you (and we, our children, and our grandchildren) actually lose in the long run.

@bill,

I'm not sure where you're coming from. Indeed correlation does not prove causation, as is well known (and gotten wrong from time to time) in science. However, correlation remains the first place to look for causation. There is no versus at all. Causation is a subset of correlation. Put another way, there is no causation without correlation. Do we agree there?

That said, beware of the phrase, "Correlation does not imply causation." It's been turned inside out by today's politics. It means correlation is the start. Find that first and you're likely to find other correlations and eventually zero in on the cause. Too often, it's used to argue that correlation is meaningless with alternative explanations (without the necessary correlation) being offered instead. If someone proposes a cause, ask immediately "Where is the correlation?" If there is none, then that person needs to do more work before being taken seriously. If instead someone proposes a correlation, then you know you're on the scent.

"his partner whom he should surround with care and affection"
It's been 10 year perhaps since I read HV. Pastor Saltzman's excerpt made me wonder how many females do not even have a slightest expectation of care and affection from their guy(s).

My gratitude goes deep, Mr. Saltzman, for keeping this conversation alive: it gets buried so quickly in the glut of popular culture's ongoing assault against the nuptial mystery of life.

And thank you, Joe DeVet, The Moz, harry and the rest who persist in going to the heart of the matter. I think of that film 300 that cinematically explores the event where 300 Spartans take on the thousands of an invincible Persian army. It is a miracle of the heart.

Mike,
There's a "versus" in the moment when people take correlation as proof of causation...as in examples in this link:

http://stats.org/in_depth/faq/causation_correlation.htm

"It makes sense to space children; I did."

I stared at this sentence for a full minute. I was thinking, "What makes sense to space children, and where did these children from space come into the conversation?"

Probably just me.

I, my wife and my five siblings are counted among the group of evangelicals that contraception allowed to refrain from the burden of children until we decided we were ready. Contraception allowed us to determine the number of children we would have.
A retrospective analysis shows the following results for my family: My wife and I have only one child, conceived in our mid-thirties (having planned so well and waited so long, we were unable to conceive more children). My five siblings have nine children conceived while carefully regulating the timing and number with the use of contraception. So, for 12 adults (myself, my siblings and our spouses), there are 10 children. Contraception allowed us to radically reduce the number of children to far below what nature would have provided, that is, far below replacement level as per the report of demographers.
Contraception has been instrumental in creating a sex-obsessed society that has objectified women for men and, when earlier forms of contraception fail, abortion becomes necessary as the ultimate contraception. Besides devastating family structure, contraception has resulted in STD’s being epidemic throughout all demographics. Genital herpes infects 25% of all adults. Human Papilloma Virus (HPV) infects approximately 50% of society at any one moment in time with the expectation being that most people will contract some form of HPV in their lifetime. These diseases and Chlamydia, Pelvic Inflammatory Disease (PID) etc. are infecting children. And now the old STD’s are returning. And, what should be of great concern to all Christians, contraception, supported by evangelicals, has created the most sexually immoral society on the face of the earth.
It is fair to say that as evangelicals, we could celebrate the opportunity to pursue sexual ecstasy and copulate with the same utter abandon as secular society; and all within the “alleged” sanctity of marriage. For many, the freedom to exercise their sexual satisfaction begins well before marriage, includes many partners and often includes more than one marriage.
It certainly seems no exaggeration to say that Pope Paul VI’s encyclical Humanae Vitae, if not prophetic, is at least prescient. Abortion (spurned by evangelicals as a Catholic obsession) was either ignored as a significant issue or was accepted, practiced or even celebrated by many evangelicals. Unfortunately, very large swaths of evangelicalism still await awakening to the importance of this issue. Of greatest import however, we evangelicals, on the advice of, or lack of warning against, are complicit in the murder of more than fifty-four million persons in the U.S.A. alone.
Even those of us who never aborted or ever directly influenced an abortion did, however, use abortifacient contraceptives and are guilty of the exact same evil; murder, albeit of very tiny souls. Most of the younger generation accepted and followed the advice of well-meaning but utterly misled spiritual advisors, ministers, Sunday school teachers and Christian professors.
Remarriage and repeated failures at relationship, if not directly, can be indirectly correlated with the introduction and widespread use of contraception following 1930 when Anglicans accepted contraception and all Protestant denominations rapidly followed suit. The divorce rate surged to greater than fifty percent for both society in general and evangelicals in particular. An entire spectrum of evils developed that affected all those who survived our contraception practices. Contraception is directly related to the dehumanizing effects that started with our alleged “God given” right to substitute our personal, private judgment for His prerogative and judgment. It is interesting to note that prior to 1930, all Christian entities, Protestant, Orthodox and Catholic, taught that contraception was sinful. The divorce rate for all of society at that time was 3% and single parent homes (apart from widowhood) were virtually unheard of. The introduction of contraception has led to the sexualization of individuals, of dating relationships, of marriages, of society and even of young children. All these societal changes may be blamed squarely on the embrace and promotion of contraception by our Protestant evangelical world. Now, evangelicals have the same divorce rate as the general population yet those orthodox Jews and Catholics, who are open to life each time they engage in the marital sex act; who practice Natural Family Planning (NFP), have a divorce rate of only 3 percent.
As Pope Paul VI argued, there is no acceptance of contraception without a progressive accommodation of secular practices. As Kainz points out:

“A contraceptive mindset carries with it important logical connections. Once one believes in the right to sex without procreation, and contraception occasionally fails, abortion remains as the ultimate, although regrettable, means of exercising that ‘right’” (Kainz, H., The “Catholics for Obama” Syndrome).

How terribly unfortunate it is that evangelicals do not have a spiritual leader who could provide authoritative moral guidance. Isn’t it profoundly damaging to the seminal Protestant doctrines of sola scriptura and perspicuity of scripture that we didn’t have even one evangelical leader who trumpeted the clarion call to righteous battle? Rather, we evangelicals have now prevented the birth of countless millions of persons who would have been raised in Christian homes (a sin of which I am guilty). We have doomed the very few remaining children to bear the responsibilities of caring for both elderly parents (an act of which I am guilty). How could evangelicals universally embrace the practice of abortifacient contraception and almost universally ignore and/or foster the murderous practice of abortion for so long without a single major evangelical pastor, evangelist or theologian raising hue and cry? How? Because with no valid authority in the evangelical world, we evangelicals helped the godless rip open the “gates of Hell.”
Jude writes “…certain men whose condemnation was written about long ago have secretly slipped in among you. They are godless men, who change the grace of our God into a license for immorality… these dreamers pollute their own bodies, reject authority and slander celestial beings… these men speak slanderously against whatever they do not understand… Woe to them! They have taken the way of Cain; they have rushed for profit into Balaam’s error; they have been destroyed in Korah’s rebellion” (portions of Jude 3-16). To put it simply, pastors, youth leaders, theologians and evangelists accepted, promoted and championed contraception and ignored, accepted or even promoted abortion. Thus, those evangelical leaders bear the guilt for promoting a “license for immorality” by leading their congregations “for profit” into “Balaam’s sin.” Those evangelical leaders failed to protect their flock from violating the fifth commandment by ignoring or supporting the killing of the smallest of God’s children through the use of abortifacient contraceptives and by outright murder by abortion on demand.
How is it possible that a lonely, celibate, old man, who knew nothing of sexuality in the broader sense of the term, who went against the recommendations of the majority of the bishops in western countries at that time, could write a prophetic work like Humanae Vitae fifty years ago and could get it right when all those evangelicals couldn’t even begin to foresee where the legitimatizing of contraception would lead the world?
Is it possible that this dramatic, fifty year long, evangelical moral failure on abortion and abortifacient contraception and the scandal of the schismatic nature of Protestantism (forty-three thousand denominations at last count) are caused by the same error? Evangelicals dogmatically declare Scripture to be the sole source of authority but have no authoritative interpreter. In fact, Luther’s doctrine of perspicuity of scripture, when carried to its logical conclusion, reserves all authority to each and every individual. Each evangelical is his or her own final authority. Consequently, evangelicals missed moral leadership on the greatest moral and human rights issue of the past century.
In shocking contrast to faithful Catholics, every evangelical who used abortifacient contraception (becoming their own god and killing persons created by God) did so with the blessing of their spiritual leader. Every evangelical who willfully supported, encouraged, helped another obtain, forced another to obtain or obtained an abortion, did so with their spiritual leader’s silent consent or even with his or her blessing.
The Pope taught correctly.
The denominational leaders taught a lie as “all truth”.
The fact that Catholics were taught the truth, the fact that truth never changes, places those individual Catholics at risk of their souls for defying Church teaching. Millions of evangelicals will face the same consequences for unconfessed sins they committed because their Christian leaders told them that doing so was perfectly fine. To those evangelical leaders Scripture says,

“Woe to those who call evil good and good evil, who put darkness for light and light for darkness…”

As an aside, my mother, who never used birth control pills, was diagnosed with triple negative breast cancer at about age 55. She died at age 74 after an active and productive, if not particularly long life. My youngest sister was treated with the pill beginning at age twelve due to menses irregularity and continued to use the pill, once married, for limiting and timing her pregnancies. One of my older sisters utilized birth control pills from early adulthood throughout her childbearing years to regulate timing and number of children. You may be aware that estrogen drives triple negative breast cancer and triple negative breast cancer is hereditary. My youngest sister died a few years ago at age fifty leaving a chronically ill husband and two teen children. My older sister died two years later at age sixty leaving a husband and two young adult daughters. Unbeknownst to most Americans, the pill is far more dangerous than the media or the medical community has ever been willing to publicize; in fact, the W.H.O. lists it as a carcinogen.
Let me close by sharing something you probably already suspect. As an evangelical Bible-believer, I was convinced my family should only worship where all of Scripture was accepted, I faithfully sought God’s truth by studying the doctrines of denomination after denomination. Each time I was disappointed by the discovery that each evangelical denomination violated clear Scriptural teaching in some aspect of their doctrine or practices. One example, among many, is the anti-Scriptural teaching and practice in violation of Christ’s own words; i.e., Christ’s forbiddance of divorce and declaration that remarriage is adultery. Yet divorce and remarriage are sanctioned in all evangelical denominations. After more than fifty years, my search led me to the only source of “all truth” the Church against which “the powers of death shall not prevail”; the only Church with two thousand years of consistent teaching (e.g., abortion was authoritatively forbidden in the first century Didache). On Easter Vigil 2008 I and my family, with great joy, entered the Catholic Church. The joy has continued to increase as we enjoy the clarity of teaching of the one, holy, universal, apostolic Church.

Hello, New Catholic,

Welcome aboard the barque of Peter! It looks as though you have noticed, like the rest of the orthodox Catholics aboard, that it is a leaky old boat and, like the rest of us, have begun furiously bailing the water out of it! It won't sink. It can't sink. We have that on the promise of Christ -- but bail we must. That labor is a share in carrying His cross, which He commanded us to take up as we follow Him. It sometimes feels like a bucket. ;o)

@bill,

I read stats for a long time before they too finally went political. They are still quirky enough to be in opposition (I check from time to time) to a "popular" approach, but their leader lets her own opinions get in the way of her science far too often. I admit it's mild compared to the fringes (think Russ Limbaugh or moveon.org) but it long ago turned me off.

As to making the mistake noted, reread my first paragraph. And then reread what you substitute, particularly when you say a small sample space may have something to say about the larger community. As I say, be careful with it. Propose the other possibilities, by all means, but show that they also meet the statistics needed.

Don't get stuck on the "versus". Talk instead about other possibilities that also correlate. Correlation does not preclude causation. Remember that.

Some excellent comments to this column. May I suggest a couple of texts in addition to Humanae Vitae for those interested in the Catholic view: Mary Eberstadt's Adam and Eve after the Pill mentioned above, and Elizabeth Anscombe's Contraception and Chastity, which argues that rejecting contraception is the only possible Christian response faithful to the history of the church and usefully explains why different types of intention matter.

[NOTE TO THE EDITOR: I accidentally hit "Submit". Please publish this comment instead.

Mr. Saltzman, as a newly married Catholic woman in her mid-twenties, I greatly and sincerely appreciate your reflections on Pope Paul VI's defense of Catholic marriage--really, as you touched on, the only absolutely valid marriage. However, as with some commenters above, I feel that your reflection is a bit lacking in that it gives a mere nod to the Catholic doctrine of the sacrament of marriage as a Christian vocation--a vocation as both human and divine as a Christian vocation to religious life. The key words here are "Christian vocation", a vocation instituted by Christ, through His Catholic Church, as a Sacrament (as with the 6th Sacrament of Holy Orders).

Is a marriage between two non-baptized persons, or one baptized and one unbaptized person, less valid than a marriage between two baptized persons? Yes and no. It depends on how one chooses to look at it (non-religious vs. religious).

The Catechism of the Council of Trent gave this definition of marriage: It is the conjugal union between a man and a woman, both in legal status, establishing a perpetual and indissoluble communion of lives.

Here, the definition of marriage and its goals apply to both: the marriage between two non-baptized persons and the marriage between two baptized persons.

St. Thomas Aquinas and the Council of Trent explain that the goals of the marriage are two: the primary goal is the procreation and education of the offspring; the secondary goal is the mutual support of the spouses, either psychologically or as a remedy for concupiscence (Summa theologiae, Supplementum, Q. 67, a. 1, ad 4th; Catechism of Trent, Part II, VII, §§ 13-14).

Both definitions sound rather secular, don't they? In this second definition, however, we have marriage according to the Catholic Church, which is the same contract that was elevated by Christ to the level of a Sacrament (Dictionnaire de Theologie Catholique, entry “Marriage,” cols. 2044-2045).

Why did Christ institute marriage as a Sacrament, not for man to put asunder (Matt 19:6)? Because of the deviations and disparities that marriage suffered in the realm of Natural Law (deviations and disparities that popularly continue on today as evidenced by shows like The Bachelorette).

The Sacrament of holy matrimony confers a grace to the natural marriage. This is what its sacramental character signifies. The Council of Trent explained: “The grace that should enhance natural love, consolidate the indissoluble union [of the marriage], and sanctify the spouses was merited by Christ in His Passion, He who is the author and end of the venerable Sacraments” (Denz. 971).

The sacrament improves natural love by giving spouses a supernatural model for their union, which sadly, is inaccessible to those who deny the supernatural aspect of their relationships. The "holy" part of matrimony is what makes Catholic marriages 100% a Sacrament (let's not use the words "legitimate" or "valid" here) in the eyes of God. In the Catholic Church, there is not any ONE characteristic of marriage that makes it fully legitimate or valid, except for the characteristic of marriage as a Sacrament. For example, the Catholic Church doesn't deem marriages between two non-baptized persons invalid off the bat. Are both persons in it to win it until the very end (the death of one or both spouses)? Are they open to having and raising children? Are they committed to loving one another? Say yes to all these, and more, and the Catholic doctrine will tell you, "Yes, your marriage is valid." But is your marriage a Sacrament? That is the final and more important question. It's not a no, no, no sort of situation; e.g. no it's not a marriage because it's not Catholic. If you sought all these things--absolute fidelity, charity, love--will your marriage be bad? More likely, it will be a lasting and happy one.

This brings me to your point that Pope Paul VI sought to preserve the family. This is partially true. In reality, Christ is the original preserver of the family. This is what He sought to do when he instituted the Sacrament of marriage. The Sacrament of marriage seeks to protect the family, whether that family be husband and wife, husband and wife and children, or widower and children. Just thought I'd try to more concretely bridge the two conclusions. The Catholic Church, and Pope Paul VI, is often condemned for saying what marriage "is not" when they should be praised for trying to protect what the Sacrament of marriage IS.

It seems like you begin to close with a nearly solid conclusion/revelation when you ask, "How about the task and joy, the duty and delight, of serving Christ in the public vocation of marriage, that necessarily intrinsic connection once existing between sex and marriage?" The error of your question lies first, in your description of marriage as merely a public vocation, not as a Sacrament; and secondly, in your omission of the fact that Pope Pius VI made his arguments for the sake of protecting the joy and delight of serving Christ within the Sacrament of marriage.

I understand that these points are probably already evident to you since you read Humanae Vitae. I simply bring it up in more detail for the potential benefit of any readers who may be unfamiliar with the Catholic Catechism (unfortunately, this includes many Catholics).

Also, it was encouraging to read the very stirring and beautiful witness by New Catholic (above).

May I add a postscript, and point out that Evangelicals, and all Protestants, have a spiritual leader (actually several) who teach with clarity on this issue. Martin Luther himself (and most of the reformers) taught that contraception was a serious sin. I understand (not sure it's true) that Luther went so far as to say contraception is worse than abortion. That's farther than I would go, but I do believe contraception is an "intrinsic evil", from which many evil effects are to be expected.

Anyway, someone still teaches this beautiful and salvific truth. You're invited! And as you cross the Tiber, please do not look back. You may turn into a pillar of salt (ie, a Saltzman!) {Smile.}

There are undoubtedly problems associated with the widespread use of contraceptives outside marriage. But it seems that within marriage, the problems are considerably fewer. The idea of deciding prayerfully what number of children one can raise and spacing the children or delaying conception until one can afford to raise them hardly seems selfish. Rather, it is planning to provide well for the children. Also, once one accepts the idea of regulating reproduction "naturally", why is it wrong to use (non-abortifacient) contraception to do that more effectively? It is an interesting historical footnote that the inventor of the Pill, John Rock, was a practicing Catholic who did not believe that his invention was (pre HV) inconsistent with Catholic teaching.

Before I became Catholic or even considered becoming one, I understood untuitively that contraception is saying to God, "Not Thy will, but MINE be done". Having been taught that we are to give ourselves totally to God, it seemed like a no-brainer that contraception would be wrong. And from a purely physical standpoint, it also didn't make sense. As a popular margarine commercial from the '70's put it: "It's not nice to fool with Mother Nature". I had read enough about human health and nutrition to know that we can't interfere with our natural bodily functions without negative consequences. There seems to be a willful blindness in our culture towards these very basic considerations.

HV posits that men won't respect women if contraception is licit, but I see zero evidence that men respected women more before the Pill or that subcultures that reject contraception respect women's abilities and intelligence at all. Women achieve vastly more today than in the past, a fact which is directly related to the availability of family planning that women control. Take away contraception and women return to being ignorant domestic drudges.

“New Catholic’s” wandering screed proclaiming the alleged deficiencies of Protestantism is hopelessly ignorant and terribly insulting. To launch a broadside against Protestantism as if it were the sole advocate of contraception and abortion is not only bad form, but hopelessly ill informed, and utterly offensive. NC would not be so distasteful if he were more conversant – or honest - about the history of his own sect which was decidedly pro-choice until late in the last century.


And his utterly offensive statement – “It is fair to say that as evangelicals, we could celebrate the opportunity to pursue sexual ecstasy and copulate with the same utter abandon as secular society” – calls out for an apology. It is not at all fair to say that. To smear evangelicals in that manner is disgraceful.
NC’s ignorance is further portrayed here:

“Even those of us who never aborted or ever directly influenced an abortion did, however, use abortifacient contraceptives and are guilty of the exact same evil; murder, albeit of very tiny souls.”

Really?

Pray tell, Mr. NC, what exactly is the Romanist doctrine of “tiny souls”? Is it similar to Aquinas’s hylomorphic concept or more like Augustine’s vegetable-to-animal progression? Would NC be surprised that until 1895 official Catholic teaching was that “Nobody enclosed in the mother’s womb should be baptized”? Why would that prohibition have been in place if Rome had, indeed, taken the view which NC seems to think it does – that life begins at conception?

You see, NC no more relies on a “spiritual leader” as he just ad libs his own doctrines and then attempts to pawn them off as authoritative. How very sad.


And his further libel – “Most of the younger generation accepted and followed the advice of well-meaning but utterly misled spiritual advisors, ministers, Sunday school teachers and Christian professors.”

Really?

Would these “spiritual advisors” have been as “misled” as Pope Innocent the III who promoted abortion? Or Popes Sixtus V and Gregory XIV who failed to view the fetus as human?


All of which makes his closing utterly laughable – “my search led me to the … only Church with two thousand years of consistent teaching.” Consistent teaching my eye.

NC – if you have a drop of Christian blood in your veins, you should publicly apologize for your insulting post. Then, and only then, may your ignorance of the subject matter be discounted.

Peace.

Mollie's comment begs for a response; there are two. First, the claim: "I had read enough about human health and nutrition to know that we can't interfere with out natural bodily functions without negative consequences." I suspect that those on kidney dialysis or taking blood pressure medication or having cataract surgery would disagree. We have been given by God the capacity to deal with "natural" problems, and it is perfectly appropriate not to place all our trust in faith healing. Second, and following from this, the decision to contracept is not a simply selfish decision. Planning does not equate with selfishness. It would be selfish to refuse to have children so as to increase one's pleasure but not to plan so as to have the children one can afford to support. If contraception is "not Thy will", then NFP would seem to be the same, since the aim is likewise to avoid conception.

Natural Family Planning is great when it works, but it doesn’t work for everyone. Every once in awhile, First Things runs a column praising NFP, and the comments often include heartbreaking statements about the strains its practice put on the marriage or the guilt that followed when the couple realized that the woman’s body just wouldn’t cooperate or the suspicion thrown their way within the church community when it became obvious that the couple was no longer using NFP but were not bearing children. For these couples, artificial contraception or chastity was the sole choices.

There is something wonderful that occurs whenever a couple shares some spiritual discipline, and NFP certainly brings some couples together.

But NFP also fights nature since it requires that women have sex at precisely the same moment when their body is the least interested in sex. There’s some evidence that even men are sensitive to these changes and desire sex less during this time.

Calling this “natural” family planning and the other “artificial” contraception is splitting hairs. The more accurate and the more we learn about how to time infertile periods the more artificial NFP becomes. The explicit aim of all contraception—“natural” or “artificial”—is to enjoy sex without the possible consequence of pregnancy. The couple who practices NFP and thinks they are somehow more virtuous than a couple using a condom is fooling themselves.

The prob;em with the Pope's ideas is:
The biology of sex. Go out to the farm and you will see that the female of essentially every animal species is interested in sex only when she is in "heat". We are not just animals but we our biology is not totally different from theirs. Women will generally get the most pleasure from sex at mid-cycle which is when sex must be avoided to use "legal" contraception. The Pope did not have a clue. As a result his position is not respectful of women.

What's missing here (I haven't read all the comments by any means) is setting the issuance of Humane Vitae in perspective. It was issued by Pope Paul VI peremptorily, after ignoring a report gathered painstakingly over many months by a commission of laity appointed by the Vatican to examine the question. I should say the work of the commission, rather than being ignored, was summarily rejected.

So the Pope issued his ground-breaking encyclical without laying the foundation for it and without making any effort to prepare the laity, who after all were placed in the line of fire, for what was coming. Instead, he unloaded it and it hit like a bombshell. Not entirely unlike the same Pope's abrupt and radical changes in the mass liturgies and other areas of traditional Catholicism.

No matter what the encyclical's worth as a document, it prompted a tremendous uproar and resulted in painful examinations by many Catholics, particularly in the U.S., where the hierarchy chose to toe the Vatican line and, in the case of Washington's Archbishop O'Boyle, for example, demanded a loyalty oath from the diocesan clergy. To me, the damage done by this Pope's peremptory action far outweighed any benefits that may be seen accruing to the encyclical's content.

The whole issue needs to be revisited, but in today's climate of vigilante Catholics, it will not happen.

Constantine,

You expressed your incorrect view of traditional Catholic teaching on abortion once before here:

http://www.firstthings.com/blogs/firstthoughts/2011/09/02/early-christians-on-abortion/

You were refuted, and one has only to read the posts at that that link to see that.

It is not like *your* remarks were diplomatic. They were more like one yelling at a child for yelling. That wouldn't have been quite as silly of you if New Catholic had deserved being rebuked for sharing his life experience with us and the conclusions they drew him to, but NC *didn't* deserve your harsh rebuke. You could have just calmly and charitably attempted to refute the points he made that you disagreed with.

By the way, it is plain that by “tiny souls” NC meant the souls of tiny human beings.

@Harold Helbock MD, you correlate women mid-cycle to animals in heat then assert that the author of Humanae Vitae (which you don't seem to have read) was clueless? I think that your statement is extremely disrespectful to women. But as Russell Saltzman (above) quoted Paul VI, "Another effect that gives cause for alarm is that a man who grows accustomed to the use of contraceptive methods may forget the reverence due to a woman."

Sadly, Humanae Vitae's predictions about the consequences of contraception have come true: "a general lowering of moral standards throughout society; a rise in infidelity; a lessening of respect for women by men; and the coercive use of reproductive technologies by governments." Clueless? I think not.

@Michael, may I recommend reading something by the brilliant philosopher G.E.M. Anscombe? She brilliantly distinguishes between NFP and the use of artificial contraception and -- spoiler alert -- does not find them to be morally equivalent.

@ Harold Helbock MD, do remember that Humanae Vitae doesn't teach that nfp must be used by couples; HV teaches that nfp is morally acceptable as a technique for trying to regulate births. The serious reasons that couples have for postponing conception vie with the opportunity for "the most pleasure", and I don't think the pope gave counsel against pursuing "the most pleasure", right? So your beef isn't w Humanae vitae, is it?
But you tell me. Is it true that the pill reduces a woman's libido, even at the middle of the cycle? If true, it might be an issue you would want to take up w/ artificial contraception. I mean, really, is your concern about pleasure serious?

Michael is exactly right. NFP seems to be a great blessing to some couples. For others, it is downright harmful to their relationships. We should be willing to listen to both experiences. Doing so would likely yield a teaching which emphasizes the Christian duty to be seriously open to procreation in the relationship as a whole, but which does not insist upon the need to be open in each sexual act. We need to focus more on the formation of the couple andless on the mechanics of the act. NFP can be used with a contraceptive mentality, and contraception can be used in a way that doesn't lead to selfishness, disrespect, and using the other.

For those who are willing to listen to the honest reflections of those who have had negative NFP experiences, I suggest reading some of the accounts and comments here:

http://womenintheology.org/category/women-speak-about-natural-family-planning/

This should be required reading for Catholic clergy.

To Alan, Michael, Harold: the Christian choice, following Anscombe, is NFP or chastity, it would seem to me. NFP is indeed so much more acceptable than contraception because of intention. There are two sorts of intention - the purpose inherent in the act, and then any accompanying intentions you add. So forging a cheque in order to donate to first things is wrong because of the dishonesty inherent in forgery, even though charitable giving is laudable. With NFP, the purpose of the act is begetting children, whatever the accompanying intentions to avoid doing so. With use of contraception or any other type of sexual act, there is no fundamental purpose of procreation in the act, independent of the accompanying intentions. I think this distinction from Elizabeth Anscombe helps clarify thinking about many other issues too.

On the tiny souls theme, everyone do some reading on embryology and the phenomenon of identical twinning. The details show that all fertlized ova are til roughly day 14, after implantation, units composed of dividing cells which are totipotential to becoming one or multiple persons. No individual is present but rather human genetic matter in flux until nature decides whether there will be one person or several. While multiples are rare, all pre-embryos can be teased scientifically into becoming twins e.g. at roughly day 14. When the term
"abortifacient" is used of the pill, it is slander actually. You will not see the Pope use the term but you will see the lower echelons of Catholicism do so. In Evangelium Vitae, John Paul gets close to making the same mistake as the lower echelons but he does not make their mistake.
The pill might prevent implantation but of a cell mass that has not yet decided as to how many persons it will become. The primitive streak which indicates one person will exist... develops later after the cells are no longer toti-potential to becoming multiples. Aquinas held that a soul fills the body not accidentally but as a substantial form and it's withdrawal from any part spells death. And souls cannot split into twins according to Aquinas who held them to be indivisible.
If anyone continues to call pill users murderers after reading in these matters, then they are sinning as to slander. And they have an obligation to get all the females in their family to attend a doctor who specializes in optimizing endometrial receptivity the lack of which therapy may be inhibiting implantation. Yes the lower echelon lady who is denouncing the pill user may herself be inhibiting implantation by not optimizing endometrial receptivity in herself. Popes are more quiet than the lower echelon Catholics for a reason...they are getting letters from theologians apprising them of the nuances of embryology.

Joe DeVet said:

“ Martin Luther himself (and most of the reformers) taught that contraception was a serious sin. I understand (not sure it's true) that Luther went so far as to say contraception is worse than abortion. That's farther than I would go, but I do believe contraception is an "intrinsic evil", from which many evil effects are to be expected.”
---
I do not have any idea what Martin Luther thought of contraception but if he did indeed consider it worse than abortion perhaps he was following one of the greatest Fathers and Doctors of the Church.

"...This is by far the most difficult of the moral issues to discuss with people (much more difficult than abortion, in fact) indeed, it is something worse than murder, and I do not know what to call it; for she does not kill what is formed [in the womb] but prevents its formation. What then? Do you condemn the gift of God and fight with his laws? The matter still seems indifferent to many men—even to many men having wives. In this indifference of the married men there is greater evil filth; for then [contraceptive] poisons are prepared, not against the womb of a prostitute, but against your injured wife. Against her are these innumerable tricks.” (John Cyrsostom - Homilies on Romans 24)

Women will generally get the most pleasure from sex at mid-cycle which is when sex must be avoided to use "legal" contraception. The Pope did not have a clue. As a result his position is not respectful of women.

Wow, so much wrong in three short sentences.

1) The premise that sex is only about maximizing female pleasure.

2) The notion that the Pope (!) must make doctrinal decisions to maximize female sexual pleasure.

3) The notion that contraception is involved in any marital act aimed at avoiding conception.

4) The notion that respecting women is coterminous with maximizing their sexual pleasure.

Uh, way to reduce women to an orgasm. And it's the Pope who is not respectful of women! Rich.

Bill

Twinning is indeed remarkable...you have an identifiable mass of cells, which from induction we can be certain will develop into a human adult, from which some cells split off and form another individual with the same powers...amazing

It is important that you not get confused by starting with the fact that twinning happens and conclude that there wasn't an individual before it happened. The tissue came from a single organism which came from the joining of a sperm and egg (to get the full DNA..thus a unique individual). Just because the cells have the power to form another complete organism doesn't mean they came from an incomplete one...on the contrary *only* a complete human embryo, an individual human life, can divide to from another. If a mass of my cells sharing DNA divided off from me and became another twin (I have one already), this would not show that I wasn't an individual before that happened...

The result of twinning is that now you have two separate masses of cells, each with the same powers as the other...all that has happened is that you have gotten a new individual (marked by having the same powers as the original) from the other. It is not the case that some new powers were added to both masses...the new mass is just now capable of developing in its own right... and not as part of the original individual.

Biology is fascinating, and there is much to learn...but don't let it be confusing
Peace

bill writes "On the tiny souls theme, everyone do some reading on embryology and the phenomenon of identical twinning..."

Bill,

You are aware this argument ignores the fact that few twins occur, whether or not they can be induced? So if no twinning occurs, what magical thing happens that makes that individual an individual only on day 14 but not before? Are you really arguing that a "potential" twin somehow keeps an individual from becoming such until that twin doesn't happen? One might call it the "nit-picking" fallacy or maybe the "context-less" fallacy. Or worse, are you arguing that identical twins are not persons because they do not have "unique" DNA?

When does God "ensoul" us? We don't really know, but the best bet still seems to be conception when the physical possibility of (at least) one human being is realized.

Even the old "one third of all embryos spontaneously abort" has better statistics behind it, even if the "therefore it is OK to take any of the remaining two-thirds" is a non-sequitur.

Re: Karen: "HV posits that men won't respect women if contraception is licit, but I see zero evidence that men respected women more before the Pill or that subcultures that reject contraception respect women's abilities and intelligence at all. Women achieve vastly more today than in the past, a fact which is directly related to the availability of family planning that women control. Take away contraception and women return to being ignorant domestic drudges."

Your comments evidence that you have no respect for women today, what with you considering that keeping a household and raising a family makes women "ignorant domestic drudges." Your idea of achievement is narrow and limited, subject to areas and parameters traditionally reserved to men. It's fine if those are achievements women want to pursue (though not at the expense of her husband and children, IMO); however, women, and society at large, would be better served in (re)learning to respect women by expanding the meaning of "achievement" (as in, "what a successful woman she is, having raised five children and maintained a mostly happy household") instead of constricting it to the ridiculous notion that achievement for a woman means doing something men do.
And as for zero evidence of men respecting women before the pill, would not the higher rates of marriage in past decades be evidence, for one? The social demand that sex happen within marriage (or, if it did not and resulted in pregnancy, the demand that a marriage then quickly take place) squarely pushed a man to accept his share of the responsibility in caring for his newly formed family. He was forced to respect the woman's fertility. He was not allowed to demand (or suggest or plea) she destroy it or its consequences. He was not allowed to simply walk away, saying "deal with it," without being held accountable (to varying degrees) by society. Of course, there is other evidence to be found, for those who have eyes to see (see Mary Eberstadt's new book, mentioned previously).
At any rate, today's stereotypical man looks far more disrespectful to women.

Jy..
   There is no individual before identical twinning because the cells are totipotential or open to becoming disparate elements even of one human being or of several human beings up til about day 14.  Where there are totipotential cells, there cannot be a person because a person is composed of cells that are no longer indeterminate or totipotential.  You are actually picturing a person in existence with determined, dedicated cells prior to that being possible.  Once cells have chosen one person existence at c.14 days, they dedicate to being parts of one whole and that individual can no longer branch off into twinning because as an individual, he has no totipotential cells...individuation closes off totipotentiality in cells.  You are arguing for a square circle. 
   Your ideology is forcing you to overcome reason...exactly what Benedict was 
warning Islam about at Regensburg: faith overcoming reason.  When you do so, you enable pro choice people to ignore your entire ethos as being extremist.
   Real actual abortion is evil but from Augustine (5th century) till St. Alphonsus Ligouri (18th century) delayed ensoulment ruled...1300 years  Your school of immediate personhood ( 400 years) began at Ligouri's time but he rejected it.  Embryology is making the old view more plausible at least in essence not in the particulars of their theories...some based on a possible mistranslation of Exodus in the Septuagint...the later Jerome and Augustine both of whom moved from early murder to late murder as to abortion....Aquinas following Aristotle's theory of a similar outlook.
    For those who want a history of the inter Catholic debate on this at a higher level at "Theological Studies" where the best theologians of liberal and conservative leanings have debated through the decades... go to this link and start at page 127 near top:

http://www.ts.mu.edu/content/54/54.1/54.1.6.pdf

Except, Harold Helbock MD, you don't mention that other aspect of the biology of sex: namely that female animals don't mate when pregnant. Which explains why the pill, which simulates pregnancy, can kill sexual desire. Permanently. even, for some women.

Talk about turning women to sex toys: kill their desires in order to make them more convenient for men.

And if you want biology to rule, the tendency to conceive is as natural as the other. To want to thwart one rather than the other can not be defend on grounds of "biology."

Mike Melendez,
Read about the chimeric individual which is the result of two fraternal, not identical, twin fertilized ova which lie too close to each other after conception and them merge into one person who later shows disparate genetic material. Were there a soul at conception in each fraternal twin, then two souls merged into one which is impossible also.
If you perdure in your position though, you probably logically should be getting the young women in your family to optimize endometrial receptivity through a doctor so as to maximize implantation. If...if...you are calling the pill abortifacient, then you should be calling the lack of endometrial medical investigation by each woman...abortifacient also. Calling names is easy until it comes home to roost.

Constantine, I’m sorry you experienced my comments as a screed, they were not intended as such.

Joe DeVet and Constantine, it is clearly evident that based on sola scriptura governed by Luther’s doctrine of perspicuity of scripture, all Protestants are their own biblical authority. Consequently, there is not any authoritative biblical interpreter in any Protestant denomination; there is in the Catholic Church. That Catholic authority is not diminished because many Catholics ignore or distort the doctrinal teachings; those Catholics do so to their own spiritual and (potentially) eternal detriment.

Harry, Thanks for the welcome. Nothing could ever induce me to leave the Church established by our Lord and Savior; the one true, holy, catholic and apostolic Church. Thanks for your support.

I always think that Part II of Humanae Vitae was called Veritatis Splendor, because VS deals with the underlying premise behind so many of these arguments in favor of contraception. VS is basically an extended meditation on St Paul's prohibition of doing evil that good may come (Rom 3:8).

These arguments (except for the dude who was all about maxing out pleasure for the woman) all seem to basically come down to: life's circumstances aligned in such a way that continence during the fertile phase of the woman's cycle was really really hard and would have required heroic measures, so, yeah, we didn't.

No arguments here. NFP is really really hard. My wife has gyno issues. And frankly, when NFP-promoters do the hard sell about how wonderful and life-changing it is, I wish they wouldn't, because it creates certain expectations, which are not always reality.

But, however much we may wish it to be so, good intentions cannot change the character of an act that is (per se) contrary to the good. We cannot do evil that good may come.

Jeanette,

Thanks for the suggestion, but I think the Church has spent far too much time running after philosophy to the neglect of real pastoral care. The comment by Greg that follows soon after yours captures more clearly what pastoral care looks like.

Chris Brown,

The evidence is everywhere you look that our society has been damaged (hopefully not irrevocably) by the divorce of sex from procreation. But there’s no need to make the opposite mistake of reducing sex to procreation. Marriage and child rearing is complicated enough as it is.

Erin, I think women are humans before we are doormats for the convenience of husbands and children. I want families to work for all their members while you and the catholic church want men to enjoy themselves and women to cater to every male desire except sex. Women have minds as well as bodies and the world only now notices that fact.

@Michaelp71 - Re. mentioning children, I am reminded of a nun who taught the following about sex.

"The complete sexual act has three parts.
1- The father inserts his member into the mother's passage to touch her womb.
2- The child is then created by God.
3- The then child leaves the womb, travels down the passage, and into the arms of the father.
This is the complete sexual act."

As to the evil consequences of the use of birth control, I wonder if a comparison could be made to the consumption of alcohol? There is no doubt that alcohol causes many evils in society and families, yet my wife and I enjoy a glass of wine at night before going to bed with no apparent evil consequences--and probably some actual health benefits. Could there be a parallel to the limited use of birth control technology for constructive purposes, such as spacing children for the physical and psychological benefit of the mother?

And if we blame the increase in divorce on contraception, how do we explain the consistent decrease in the divorce rate in America since about 1980? Has the use of birth control been decreasing over the last 30 years? Somehow, I doubt it.

Giuseppe,
That is the Stoic position not the Catholic position even though Clement, Lactantius and Jerome erroneously subscribed to it. There are sterile couples who adopt but whose sexual act is for affirming each other and their marriage is accepted by the Church. Affirming each other in sex....not an area visible to most celibates who were virtually the only commentators on sex til Dietrich von Hildebrand.

Pastor Saltzman:
As a Catholic, I thank you for opening youself to the great PASTORAL Encyclical of the late 20th century. As the son of a Lutheran, I pray daily for my father's people - that they serve Christ in their marriages.

Humanae Vitae was indeed insightful and forward anticipating. The question is that did all the deleterious results of mass contraception Have to happen?. Were there other factors which combined with "The Pill" that turned the world so bitter? Prior to "The Pill", were we going to hell in hand basket already?

Let's remember that those years prior to "The Pill" weren't a bed of roses either.

Now that you have opened your heart and mind to Humane Vitae, I suggest a followup read from Blessed Pope John Paul II "Theology of the Body". This will bring greated clarity into God's plan for the beautiful gift of our sexuality and further explains the negative effects of the pill and how contraception contradicts God's plan for marriage and human love, which He intended to be:fruitful, faithful, free and forever.

Rev. Saltzman: Another interesting and thoughtful essay, although (as usual) one followed by some truly bizarre comments. As a Catholic, I would like to ask you why all Protestants now accept divorce. This is something I have never understood. Even when I was not a practicing Catholic and professed no religion, I couldnt' see how any sort of Christian could accept divorce. The article you cite with two couples, one co-habiting and one married, is strange enough. How can people who supposedly believe in Biblical teaching seriously accept that living together without being married isn't morally wrong? The only way I can understand it, is if they say to themselves something like, "well, adultery is wrong, but people a long time ago got married really young so in the Bible people just didn't have the opportunity to live together before marriage the way we do" (which is false, of course, but I can imagine people thinking it). But Jesus was quite clear about divorce, so how do all these supposedly "Bible-believing Christians" account for themselves? I really don't understand this. And practically speaking, divorce has been a disaster for the West.

Alan, your comments essentially assert that artificial contraception and NFP are morally equal. You must believe the end justifies the means. Yet the two methods are as different as waiting for grandma to die naturally and putting a pillow over her face in the night. The end is the same, no? Grandma dies. But one is obviously morally illicit. It is the same with artificial contraception and NFP. Surely you can see the difference in avoiding pregnancy by NOT having sex, and avoiding pregnancy by having sex but blocking its life-giving aspect (either by injecting the woman's body with chemicals or inserting barriers of some kind). It is like a person who wants to lose weight - if he eats carefully and exercises restraint to avoid overeating, is that the same as if he indulged in whatever food he desired, then purged it?

@Rick: To answer your question: "how do we explain the consistent decrease in the divorce rate in America since about 1980?" It is because people are getting married less and less, and choosing to cohabitate, therefore when they cohabitate there is no such thing as a divorce. So, what seems to be a reduction in divorce is actually a reduction in marriage. And FYI: Cohabitation, by the way, is a direct result of the use of contraception.

"once one accepts the idea of regulating reproduction "naturally", why is it wrong to use (non-abortifacient) contraception to do that more effectively?"

Once one accepts the idea of winning honestly, why is it wrong to cheat to do that (winning) more effectively?

Most likely because cheating undermines sportsmanship, which is considered to be part of the essence of gaming. There is more at stake than just winning efficiently. The honest player wants to win, but not at any cost.

Likewise, there is more at stake in birth control than just avoiding pregnancy efficiently.

For the Church, if a couple care about the love-making, sacramental aspect of their sexual relationship, they may try to avoid pregnancy, but not at any cost. They will not sacrifice the essence of sexuality, it's life-directedness for the sake of satisfying the flesh.

The honest player and the cheater are different not because their intentional states regarding winning or losing, but their intentional states regarding the value of sportsmanship, which is not identical with either winning or losing any particular game.

In the same way, NFP and contraception are different not because they have similar goals of avoiding pregnancy, but because of the difference in their intentional states regarding the essence of sexuality.

It's *that* difference that the Church thinks makes all the difference morally and qualitatively for the couple.

IMHO.

Gail Finke,

“As a Catholic, I would like to ask you why all Protestants now accept divorce. This is something I have never understood. Even when I was not a practicing Catholic and professed no religion, I couldnt' see how any sort of Christian could accept divorce.”

The answer has to do with pastoral care. The Roman Church annuls 50,000 marriages in the United States each year. That’s a lot of marriages that aren’t really marriages.

Alan said: The idea of deciding prayerfully what number of children one can raise and spacing the children or delaying conception until one can afford to raise them hardly seems selfish. Rather, it is planning to provide well for the children

The problem is this: "until one can afford" tends to mean more luxuries, fewer kids the longer one delays having children. Quite frankly, we limited our family so that we could "raise them properly"--that is with a large home, late model cars, private schools, good colleges and frequent, expensive vacations. I regret that now on so many levels. What seems like a legitimate argument for spacing children in practice too often is just another way to be selfish.

What it really takes to raise children adequately is not nearly as much as people think when they start raising the "afford" argument. God does not ask us to be irresponsible (hence, the prohibition against sex outside marriage, premarital sex being something that allows children to be brought into being without a family to support them) but He does ask us to be trusting and rely on Him rather than on ourselves. Ask the parents who raised 9, 10, 12 kids in the 40s and 50s and they'll tell you they have no idea how they managed--but they did. Hand me downs and leftovers and community all played a part.

And God asks us to care for each other. Now in my near-dotage, I try to do my part to alleviate the load on young families with many children, because I can and because some of them need help. There are plenty of resources to raise families adequately if we would rely on God and each other rather than on just ourselves. Fewer vacations and older cars and smaller houses--but SO WHAT?

Has anyone tracked the co-habitating couple from '97?

Gail Finke asks: "As a Catholic, I would like to ask you why all Protestants now accept divorce. This is something I have never understood. Even when I was not a practicing Catholic and professed no religion, I couldnt' see how any sort of Christian could accept divorce."

That's another can of worms.

"We accept divorce; why can't we accept same-sex unions?" is one of the pro-gray marriage arguments I have heard in church circles, suggesting that what was once a sin no longer fits as a sin.

Trouble is, it is wrong. Protestants can no more "accept" divorce than anyone else. What Jesus said of divorce, so far as I know, hasn't been repealed. It remains sin. Crud, I'm divorced and I don't accept it.

But Lutherans and other Protestants have come to tolerate it very well. Yet if anyone says it is no longer a biblical sin, they are wrong. Unlike "un-sinning" biblically-challenged sexual practices, no one has managed to repeal what Jesus said of divorce. Biblically, theologically, it is sin.

But we have a lot of trouble saying that. We clergy have forgotten how to preach Law; we get squirmy telling our divorced parishioners they have sinned. I don't imagine it does much for the offering plate, either. Of course, by neglecting Law we really don't have any Gospel of forgiveness to offer them. Divorce isn't so much accepted as ignored. That is likely the greater failure.

And from first-hand observation I cannot say the Catholic annulment process, fenced around with Latin and legaleese, is any better as a pastoral practice than the neglect of souls I've observed among Protestants.

Thank you Rev Saltzman for your article. I found it quite refreshing, and I hope you continue to read the encyclicals.

As for some of these women in the comments I am shocked by how unladylike you are and how you seem to turn off your ability to think when it comes to birth control. I am not some servant to my husband and children. How dare you relegate my VOCATION in life, something I cherish and do lovingly for God, and debase it, as if it is something to be despised. The greatest gift God has given us as women is our ability to nurture and care for our children - you only have to look at Christ and see the pedestal on which he places his mother to understand how monumental and Godlike motherhood is. It is only among my friends who practice birth control that I have seen infidelity, visits to porn shops, violent fights, marital rape (yes rape!), and divorce. If there is one thing that I never ever worry about, it is in the love of my spouse and his dedication to our family. And, lest you try to tell me I am uneducated or old, I will quickly assert both my husband and I have post graduate degrees and I am in my early 30s.

Something I've barely seen touched upon in this discussion is that while it is so en vogue to be environmentally conscious and organic, somehow the majority of our population seems to not realize birth control is one of the most unorganic things you could possibly do to your body - polluting it with foreign hormones contributing to weigh gain, loss of desire, and increased blood clots and breast cancer rates. I also have read (and I apologize for not knowing where exactly) that with the increased use of the pill, the amount of estrogen in the water table continues to rise. As the mom of two small sons, I actually worry what this does to them, because estrogen is not something treated in our water plants. What are we doing to our children by tampering with our bodies?


Also, I just wanted to say a huge Thank You! to Mr deVet as I am one half of a couple you taught NFP to 13 years ago.

To New Catholic and to Molly, I am glad to see you agree with me totally :-). Good thinking. Good believing. It was a great example of how the Holy Spirit of God guides His Church when Pope Paul VI did not cave into the arguments of those who tried to claim the pill was natural. The Pope had the support of the well-thought-out defense of the Church's prohibition of contractione by the Polish Archbishop Karol Wotyla, who had developed his Theology of the Body.

@ML:
At first, I thought you might have a valid point about cohabitations making the divorce rate seem to decline when it really didn't. But then I realized that your argument didn't make mathematical sense. The divorce rate is calculated by comparing the number of actual marriages to the number of divorces. When a cohabiting couple breaks up, there is no divorce, but there never was a marriage added to the statistics either. If 90% of the couples living together are cohabiting without benefit of marriage, the divorce rate would still accurately reflect the percentage of married couples whose marriages ended in divorce, and the statistics indicate that marriages are considerably more stable and enduring today than they were 30 years ago.

When we got married, we did pre marriage counseling in both my LCMS church and my wife's Catholic one. They were very similar, right down to the relationship test. But that was in an area (Lincoln, Nebraska) that is known to be very othrodox in both.

all this business about twinning and chimaerae is based on a false idea, namely that the Church teaches that ensoulment happens at conception. The question is worth a close reading of the Catechism, and recourse to this article at the National Catholic Bioethics Center http://www.ncbcenter.org/Page.aspx?pid=305