The blurb on the page says, "This book will seek to prove beyond a doubt that the consequences of the Rhythm Mentality (i.e. Natural Family Planning or NFP) are contrary to the Christian moral code.""...the consequences of the Rhythm Mentality (i.e. Natural Family Planning or NFP) are contrary to the Christian moral code." is a strange way to express yourself
Nadir, I posted what the ad on Ebay says. Anyone can buy it who wants to, and anyone can write a review of it that can be read..
The short of the subject is that NFP was never considered a Catholic thing from day 1, up to and past Casti Cannubii. Pius XII wrongly broke rank when he gave any other impression. He had not that authority. He has had to answer for it.
The short of the subject is that NFP was never considered a Catholic thing from day 1, up to and past Casti Cannubii. Pius XII wrongly broke rank when he gave any other impression. He had not that authority. He has had to answer for it.
.No - (feels like the old "What's My Line?" !)
Are you Jeanne Dvorak?
Big scandalous posters like this are plastered on the walls of the vestibules and social halls of the novus ordo churches. It's as though couples are being subconsciously programmed to feel stigmatized for having more than 2, 3, or at the most 4 children and it's putting a "mysterious" subject right before the faces of children week after week who don't need to have that staring at them raising their consciousness so to speak.Yes - agreed. And NFP is anything but "natural."
(http://www.usccb.org/issues-and-action/marriage-and-family/natural-family-planning/awareness-week/2015/images/nfp-week-ad-facebook-851x315.jpg)
No - (feels like the old "What's My Line?" !).
Quote For Sale: |
This is the whole point. NFP or the Rhythym method etc... are not sinful when using it to procreate. What makes NFP and ALL birth regulation or control sinful, is when it is used to deliberately frustrate the purpose of the conjugal act, which is the begetting of children. It's pretty clear and not hard to understand. Frustrating the natural power of the act, purposely, is intrinsically vicious to nature as Pope Pius XI says above..
Well you say grave reasons legitimatize the act of relegating the conjugal act to periods in which there is virtually no possible way to conceive and refraining from the conjugal act when conception is possible. This is deliberately frustrating its natural power. You have full knowledge of the times in which the woman is likely to get pregnant and intend to only use the times when it's not likely or possible? Is this really not clear to you? Pope Pius XII clearly contradicts CC in his SPEECH to midwives even though he clearly says CC's contents are to remain valid always..
I rather think CC supports what I'm saying, rather than what you're saying. Pius XII read it, even cites it in his letter to the midwives (in which he teaches that it is lawful for couples to reserve the marital act to sterile periods for a grave reason). Surely you don't think you understand it better?
"Which of my children would you wish I did not have?" There was a sudden silence with no forthcoming reply. I think my fellow employee immediately realized his terrible gaffe and wished he could have slithered out of the restaurant at that very moment. He was quite subdued for the rest of the evening as best I can recall!
Anyways, is the following a fair representation of your argument, in logical form:
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(Major Premise 1) Contraceptive acts are intrinsically against nature
(Minor Premise 1) NFP (i.e., the reservation of the marital act to sterile periods for a grave reason) is contraceptive
(Minor Premise 2) But a thing which is intrinsically against nature can never be licit, no matter the situation
Ergo, reserving the marital act to sterile periods is sinful as such
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Has nothing to do with it. It's the teaching of CC that the primary end of marital relations can never be subordinated to the secondary ... which Pius XII completely ignored, citing only the section on the inherent potential (natural power) of the act..
klasG4e,OK, right! Sorry, if I may have been a distraction.
No one is defending the indiscriminate use of NFP found and taught in the Novus Ordo. The only question is about Pius XII's teaching, and even those who say he was wrong understand that he stipulated the use of NFP on a grave reason.
or that a fertile couple who have very bad timing and inadvertently"inadvertently" is the key word, which means the couple did not put "pleasure/marital love" above "openness to life". If you switch the two, this is where sin is born. Intention is key here.
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Tell that to AES, I was trying to summarize his position, and asked him to clarify if I had it wrong. In either event,
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What reasons would you give that a sterile couple are not guilty of such subordination, or that a fertile couple who have very bad timing and inadvertently but always observe only sterile periods, are similarly not guilty of such subordination?
"inadvertently" is the key word, which means the couple did not put "pleasure/marital love" above "openness to life". If you switch the two, this is where sin is born. Intention is key here.
Frustrating the primary end and subordinating it to the secondary is completely different than simply having the primary end be absent or unattainable. CC actually treats quite extensively of this. One may indeed have marital relations when only the secondary end is attainable. That's why couples may have relations during infertile periods, in their older age, etc..
It's all about the formal intent. If I am intending to frustrate the primary end so that I can enjoy the secondary end only, that's clearly subordination. Indeed, it's intrinsically permissible to have relations during infertile periods ... and that isn't intrinsically immoral. What's immoral is when I intend to have relations ONLY during the infertile periods because I want the secondary end but don't want the primary end..
If trying to achieve the secondary end while avoiding the primary is not subordination, then I don't know what is, honestly..
But the NFPers argue that it's permissible precisely because it's not intrinsically immoral to have relations during the infertile periods. But that's where the formal intent comes in and is forgotten about by the proponents of NFP..
So the burden of proof is on the NFPers to explain what formal intent can be present that would absolve people of trying to subordinate the ends of marital relations..
That being the case, I think that to "frustrate the primary end" is more or less controvertible with "subordinating the primary end to secondary ends." They're not two different things and Pope Pius XII didn't "ignore" anything by treating the one and not the other.
Mental prioritization isn't the same thing as proper subordination, which in the context of CC and the natural law follows from some act. I may prioritize the taste of a meal over its nutritive qualities, and I may be motivated to eat the meal because of its smell or appearance rather than out of a Aristotelian appreciation for its participation in an intricate network of causality and ends. And in so doing I would never be subordinating the primary end of consuming the meal to a secondary end. That's just boilerplate human behavior. Now, if I eat the meal and then go to the bathroom and purge, I'm frustrating the primary end of nutritive consumption and subordinating it to secondary ends.
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So if you want to argue that there is devious, even sinful intent in having marital relations only in sterile periods, let's argue that, but let's just be really clear that such an argument has nothing to do with the natural law, frustration, or the subordination of ends.
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Condoms. Birth Control Pills. And so on. Those all directly frustrate (not avoid) the power of the act in a way that makes the realization of its primary end virtually impossible. That is true subordination. What you're describing is, at worst, an interior disposition of "not wanting to conceive right now." Not a perversion of the act itself, which is the problem with birth control.
Well, it's permissible because it isn't intrinsically immoral, and only when the conditions set down by Pius XII are met. Those include a grave reason and as I recall, consultation with one's confessor. Point just being that I'm in this for Pius XII's honor, not because I have any interest in defending the gross abuses in the Novus Ordo, where NFP is taught indiscriminately as something that married couples "just do" because it's "all natural" or whatever other tripe. I hope you understand that.
My 2 cents...
God gave us NFP. He doesn't make mistakes. However, He gave it to us to use only for a serious reason and you will answer to God for your decision and choice. What would be a serious reason? Talk to your spiritual advisor because many things come in to play.
The problem today is twofold:
1. Lack of proper Catholic education prior to marriage
2. Selfishness.
These problems cause an abuse of NFP.
We should be grateful to God for the children He blesses us with, remembering He designs all things and as long as we cooperate with His design everything will work out.
"Openness to life" is a garbage Novus Ordo term.Stern but fair.
Stern but fair.
Right. Was just trying to use a term other than 'primary end'. I agree wholeheartedly with you on this topic.
This is a great anti-NFP article by MHFM (http://www.mostholyfamilymonastery.com/42_NFP.pdf)
It also answers a lot of the objections raised by its proponents.
I am posting today, because a great source of sadness for me right now, at 50, is that, while a NO Catholic, my husband and I practiced NFP. Before converting to Catholicism, we used other birth control methods.
We have 7 children and I love them all dearly, but I wonder so many times how many are not here because of our practice of NFP.
Once I decided that I wasn't going to do it anymore, my children started coming around 2 years apart. I guess I can reasonably assume that my body worked that way. But we didn't throw NFP away until after our 4th child was born...and she was born primarily because I felt unhappy doing all the checking and charting.
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Would we have had 9 or 10 children? More?
Please don't be too upset. God uses even our bad and sinful decisions towards His will. Those souls whom He willed to come into existence in your family have. Now that you've repented, you are forgiven and all is as it should be.Thank you for these comments. I nursed all my children, so I am aware of how that naturally spaces births. I never really thought about everything becoming as it should be. This has been helpful.
Let's take the analogy of murder. I go out and murder someone. Now, it was in fact God's will that the person whom I murdered should have died that day. But that still makes me guilty as if it had not been. Now, once I repent and am forgiven by God, everything becomes as it should be.
Conversely, if I were to have fornicated and conceived a child out of wedlock, it is still God's will that the child came into existence ... despite His not having willed the sin (St. Augustine uses this example). Same is true of the reverse.
So the guilt is distinguishable from the actual outcome. I am held guilty ... until I repent ... AS IF I had prevented souls from coming into being, but everything in the end falls into line with God's will.
PS -- 2 years in between children is VERY common for those who nurse ... as nursing causes the woman's hormones to change so that there are fewer children. We can't be scrupulous and, say, stop nursing, just so we can have MORE children.
I never really thought about everything becoming as it should be. This has been helpful.
I have been away from this forum for awhile, just out here lurking.Thank you for writing this - I agree totally with your sentiments.
I am posting today, because a great source of sadness for me right now, at 50, is that, while a NO Catholic, my husband and I practiced NFP. Before converting to Catholicism, we used other birth control methods.
We have 7 children and I love them all dearly, but I wonder so many times how many are not here because of our practice of NFP.
Once I decided that I wasn't going to do it anymore, my children started coming around 2 years apart. I guess I can reasonably assume that my body worked that way. But we didn't throw NFP away until after our 4th child was born...and she was born primarily because I felt unhappy doing all the checking and charting.
I did lose one child in a miscarriage, but before I converted to NO Catholicism.
Would we have had 9 or 10 children? More?
In those days of NO, I knew many women who gave up the NFP and just went to using pills or patches. They reasoned it was all the same and not as gross.
I knew what we were doing when we were doing it. And I felt unloved, because my husband only wanted me when I couldn't conceive.
So I'm not going to argue about what constitutes grave reason or if it even exists. I never had any health problems associated with pregnancy. We did suffer the loss of a job or two during those years, but we always managed financially. And eventually we did buy a 12 passenger van, but I never got to fill it up because I was too old. It fit the 9 of us and our dog comfortably, but there was always room for one or two more.
Forgive me for being overly emotional. I guess I mention it because sometimes one of the spouses in the NFP couple often feels guilty or uncertain, but they are often told they are just being scrupulous, like I was told.
I'm glad we rejected it, but when a woman is 36 she doesn't really have that many child bearing years left. I was fortunate to have 3 more children, but a great many are not that blessed.