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Is NFP Just Catholic Birth Control?
Spirit and Life Video Email for Friday, April 13, 2007

Hello, I’m Fr. Tom Euteneuer, President of Human Life International. Welcome to the second mini-catechesis on contraception. Today I pick up from the previous topic of how contraception leads to abortion, and I will address the topic of why natural family planning is not just “Catholic birth control”—as some have said. To do this, it is important to clarify just exactly what the actual teaching of the Church is with regard to the transmission of human life.

First, what the Church means by “openness to life” is simply that no sexual act must be directly and deliberately sterilized by chemicals, devices or surgeries done for the purpose of frustrating fertility. This position was the consensus position of all Christian Churches, not just the Catholic Church, until 1930 and has long been understood as the reason why the Scriptures see sterility as a curse, most especially when it is deliberately chosen. When the Church says that each conjugal act must be open to life, it does not mean that each act must produce a child! God Himself has created the fertility cycles of the female body so that it is not even possible for most conjugal acts to be fertile.

Second, the Church’s teaching is that married couples should not sterilize their intentions either. That is, it is not just the act that can be cut off from God’s life but also the hearts of the people who are supposed to be co-creators with God and following His command to “be fruitful and multiply.” Any means of rejecting God’s sovereignty over fertility or the conjugal act is sinful.

Third, the Church teaches that not only the act and the intent but the couple’s circumstances also matter in making a moral decision about childbearing. Married couples may have legitimate recourse to the infertile periods for the conjugal act when they have a just or serious reason to space the births of their children. This means that while the attitude of generosity toward childbearing is of primary importance, the Church also recognizes that there are times when couples have a legitimate, non-selfish, reason to space the births of their children. Pope Paul VI calls this “responsible parenthood” in his 1968 encyclical Humane Vitae presuming always that people will use both reason and prayerful discernment in deciding to postpone childbearing for the right reasons. The call to generosity is never meant to violate reason or crush people in degrading or inhumane conditions.

Nor must we forget that NFP is not only effective in spacing births but also in achieving pregnancy! That too is a legitimate need of many people in today’s day and age.

These teachings are the basis of why NFP is not to be considered “Catholic birth control.” While both an NFP couple and a contracepting couple may achieve the same end of avoiding a pregnancy, the means to that end are very different. Couples who use NFP do not sterilize any conjugal act but rather cooperate with the natural cycles without artificially overriding fertility. The NFP couple sees the need to postpone childbirth based upon serious and just reasons and not just lifestyle considerations. NFP fosters an attitude of generous stewardship towards childbearing that contraception rejects. And most importantly, the NFP couple uses self-control by the practice of periodic abstinence every month, a discipline foreign to the contracepting couple.

Skeptics don’t call NFP unrealistic because it has a track record of failure. They dismiss it because usually they have never tried it!

Finally, as I said in the last catechesis, contraception breeds selfishness, lack of self-control, and leads very easily to abortion. If the culture of death is marked by promiscuity, broken relationships, sterilized conjugal acts and ultimately the death of babies by abortion, then NFP is its antidote. NFP is the culture change that will truly transform this culture of death that we live in. It is no wonder why NFP couples generally have a much lower divorce rate and a higher rate of marital stability and satisfaction. You know a tree by its fruit, as they say!

Well, I end this catechesis on NFP by challenging all single people to live chastely before marriage which is the best preparation for the practice of periodic abstinence within marriage. I also challenge all married couples to be truly open to God’s invitation to be co-creators with Him in the act of bringing new life into the world. You don’t just build a family this way, you also build up God’s Kingdom and ultimately populate heaven with God’s children.

Finally, please remember to help evangelize our culture by forwarding this catechesis to others who may need to hear it. You can do so by clicking the forward button at the bottom of this screen, and if you wish more resources on this subject please go to the sidebar of this email or to our website at hli.org to hear the teachings of the experts. Stay tuned for our next catechesis on the subject of overpopulation and population control—it should be interesting!

Church Militant, keep up the good fight for the soul of our nation! May God bless you!

Copyright 2007. Human Life International. Permission granted for unlimited use. Credit required.