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Question Title Posted By Question Date
Population Control Carol Wednesday, August 13, 2008

Question:

At my previous Protestant fellowship, which method of birth control to use for family planning was routinely included in pastoral marriage preparation counseling. I was raised to view birth control as necessary and responsible. It took me years and much prayer to understand the Catholic Church's teachings on artificial contraception on a sure, gut level.

Population control and overpopulation has been a sticky topic lately with my Protestant family, especially because China is hosting the Olympics. China is notorious for its forced population control. Family members do agree that abortion is a terrible evil, but they insist that especially poor, third world country governments have to do something to control their populations to avoid mass starvation and economic collapse. They insist that artificial contraception is the only solution and are extremely angry with the "irresponsible" teachings of the Catholic Church for encouraging huge, unmanageable families. They point out that it is immoral to have more children than can be reasonably cared for, and that it is cruel to have so many children that parents cannot give them adequate attention, affection or resources.

I believe that an evil act cannot be used to bring about desired outcome (if you can consider not having children desirable-- the Bible speaks of children as blessings from above). But my family simply doesn't see artificial contraception as evil. They believe God gave us medical reproductive ability and ingenuity as a way to take charge of our lives and give the children we do decide to have a better life.

I'm pulling my hair out trying to counter some of these challenges to Church teaching, wondering if such a deeply ingrained world view can only be changed by prayer, if there is any point in trying to challenge their thinking. I'm hoping you can provide a couple practical arguments I can counter their charges with. Thank you for your help!



Question Answered by Bro. Ignatius Mary, OLSM

Dear Carol:

It looks to me that you are doing just fine. The bottomline, regardless of any other argument is that the "ends do not justify the means." This is the maxim of any civilized society. We cannot use an moral evil to secure a moral good. The "way" we do something is just as important and the end result.

For example, I could feed the starving children in Africa if I robbed a bank and then gave the money to them. Robbing a bank is a moral evil and even though I would give all the money to the poor and starving that does not justify my actions. I still committed a sin and a crime.

I could rob YOUR family and use the money to help the poor. If I did that would your family see the good of the end result and choose to not call the police and have me arrested?

This basic principle that the "ends do not justify the means" forms the much of the foundation of a civilized society. Anyone disagreeing with this is an idiot.

So now comes the question about whether or not artificial contraception is a moral evil.

Before 1930 ALL Christian denominations thought artificial contraception was a moral evil. IN 1930 the Anglican's broke ranks and began to accept contraception. Like dominoes the rest of the Protestants lock-stepped behind the Anglicans. Only the Catholic Church maintained this ancient teaching unchanged.

The Church teaching in brief is found in the Catechism:

2366 Fecundity is a gift, an end of marriage, for conjugal love naturally tends to be fruitful. A child does not come from outside as something added on to the mutual love of the spouses, but springs from the very heart of that mutual giving, as its fruit and fulfillment. So the Church, which is "on the side of life," teaches that "it is necessary that each and every marriage act remain ordered per se to the procreation of human life." "This particular doctrine, expounded on numerous occasions by the Magisterium, is based on the inseparable connection, established by God, which man on his own initiative may not break, between the unitive significance and the procreative significance which are both inherent to the marriage act."

2367 Called to give life, spouses share in the creative power and fatherhood of God. "Married couples should regard it as their proper mission to transmit human life and to educate their children; they should realize that they are thereby cooperating with the love of God the Creator and are, in a certain sense, its interpreters. They will fulfill this duty with a sense of human and Christian responsibility."

2368 A particular aspect of this responsibility concerns the regulation of procreation. For just reasons, spouses may wish to space the births of their children. It is their duty to make certain that their desire is not motivated by selfishness but is in conformity with the generosity appropriate to responsible parenthood. Moreover, they should conform their behavior to the objective criteria of morality:

When it is a question of harmonizing married love with the responsible transmission of life, the morality of the behavior does not depend on sincere intention and evaluation of motives alone; but it must be determined by objective criteria, criteria drawn from the nature of the person and his acts criteria that respect the total meaning of mutual self-giving and human procreation in the context of true love; this is possible only if the virtue of married chastity is practiced with sincerity of heart.

2369 "By safeguarding both these essential aspects, the unitive and the procreative, the conjugal act preserves in its fullness the sense of true mutual love and its orientation toward man's exalted vocation to parenthood."

2370 Periodic continence, that is, the methods of birth regulation based on self-observation and the use of infertile periods, is in conformity with the objective criteria of morality. These methods respect the bodies of the spouses, encourage tenderness between them, and favor the education of an authentic freedom. In contrast, "every action which, whether in anticipation of the conjugal act, or in its accomplishment, or in the development of its natural consequences, proposes, whether as an end or as a means, to render procreation impossible" is intrinsically evil:

Thus the innate language that expresses the total reciprocal self-giving of husband and wife is overlaid, through contraception, by an objectively contradictory language, namely, that of not giving oneself totally to the other. This leads not only to a positive refusal to be open to life but also to a falsification of the inner truth of conjugal love, which is called upon to give itself in personal totality. . . . The difference, both anthropological and moral, between contraception and recourse to the rhythm of the cycle . . . involves in the final analysis two irreconcilable concepts of the human person and of human sexuality.

For a more detailed explanation see Humanae Vitae.

All you can do is to express the facts. The rest is beyond your control. It is not your job to convince them. That job belongs to the Holy Spirit. Your job is merely to present the message in a persuasive way, but merely to present it. After that, let the Holy Spirit do the rest.

There is no need to continued argumentation. Just explain the facts. If the subject comes up again the only needed response you need is, "You already know my position on that."

St. Paul tells us to not get involved in unproductive argumentation. It is best to heed his advice.

God Bless,
Bro. Ignatius Mary


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