The following is simply a 70 year
old lifetime Catholic’s opinion except for the historical information at the
end.
God has
generously given to human beings great insight into human sexuality,
specifically fertility. All God gives us
is good but could be used for bad purposes as promiscuity.
This insight is called contraception. In the Catholic Church, contraception has
become the Galileo of our time.
Catholics believe that they are the children of God, but it is time they
see themselves as adult children who have responsibilities. In this context, those married couples who
use contraception and invitro fertilization (a special gift from God to those
who cannot conceive naturally) to manage their fertility should be commended
for not accepting the condemnation of the institutional church. Could it be
that instead of being “intrinsically evil” as the institutional church claims
this is, be instead God’s sharing of wisdom to help married couples be
responsible for their children?
99% of Catholic married couples of
childbearing age use some kind of contraception to help them space their
children and determine how many they will have.
This is particularly significant for those couples who have been advised
by doctors that their genetic match will produce only severely debilitated
children or that bearing more children will cause severe physical, mental or
emotional damage to the mother.
Financial difficulties as loss of job can be another significant reason
to use contraception as this could cause extreme distress trying to provide for
the current family needs.
Therefore,
these faithful Catholic couples who have well formed consciences and are knowledgeable
about the gift from God of contraception, pray about it and make the best
decision for their families, children and their marriages. They recognize that God gave them free will
and responsibility to do the best they can given their individual
circumstances. Using currently available
means of contraception to be responsible for the family should not be
considered “intrinsically evil” as stated by law of the Catholic institutional
Church.
It is
interesting where this law began. Below
is a brief explanation of its origins.
Suffice to say, celibate males who made this law without the input of
Catholic married couples or women who have a lived experience with fertility,
should not have the right to dictate to those who live the experience.
History of Contraception and the Catholic Church
A Pontifical
Commission on birth control was set up by Pope John XXIII to get an independent
source of information to be used at Vatican II council. When Pope Paul VI
became pope, the commission became a papal secret and all of its findings were
handed over to Paul VI who could use or suppress it as his discretion. Sessions were held from 1963 to 1965. The vote of the theologians on the commission
was 15 to 4 against the claim that contraception is intrinsically
evil. The vote of the larger group was
30 to 5 against accepting that contraception is evil. After having presented 16 Bishops with their
findings, the climactic vote was 9 to 3 for changing the church’s position on
contraception. Pope Paul VI ignored all
this and wrote Humanae Vitae and
condemned contraception. Polls of Catholics registered an instant noncompliance
with the encyclical. Paraphrased from Papal
Sin by Gary Wills
Vatican II
encouraged Catholics to see the church (faithful people) as a body with a
“supernatural sense of faith.” The
Dogmatic Constitution on the Church teaches that the body of the faithful
cannot err in matters of belief. The
people of God exercise the sense of faith or sensum fidei, when they manifest a universal consent in matters of
faith and morals. If this sense of faith
as an instinctive sensitivity and discrimination is valid for reception
of doctrines and practices in to the body of the church then that same sense of
faith is also valid for nonreception.
Paraphrased from Lay Ministry by
William J Rademacher.
Could the 99% of those
who are Catholic today and refuse to accept the hierarchal stand against
contraception be validly expressing this nonreception as the sense of
the faithful?
Submitted by
Judith A Cox
Bridget Mary 's Reflection:
Thank you Judith for expressing the wisdom from people in the pews on the birth control issue. Pope Paul VI should have listened to faithful Catholic couples and the majority of the Commission before he mandated the rule against artificial birth control. It is obvious that the Spirit speaks through you and the millions of Catholics who have experienced God's generosity in human fertility! The Spirit speaks through the people of God, not just the hierarchy. It is obvious that 99% of Catholics who follow their consciences on birth control reflect the sense of the faithful, not the Pope! Come, Holy Spirit, fall afresh on our church, the people of God! Renew us and transform us as we celebrate Pentecost this Sunday!
