Over on his blog, Steve Kellmeyer has a post in which he argues against the claim that recent Magisterial documents using the phrase “conjugal act” are only addressing the use of contraception within marriage. He argues that the phrase “conjugal act” is to be given a broader meaning.
I appreciate the polite tone that Kellmeyer uses (for he is taking me to task here), and I hope to respond in the same way.
I am sympathetic to the desire to find in recent Magisterial statements a ban on contraception regardless of the circumstances. Indeed, I used to hold that this is what the documents said (in part because I was using faulty translations that rendered “coniugale commercium” as “sexual act” rather than “marital act” or, even more literally, “marital congress” or “marital intercourse”).
Over time, and in consultation with various Latin experts and experts in moral theology, I came to realize that this view is incorrect and that in its recent statements the Magisterium has limited itself to treating the use of contraception within marriage.
In the future it may deal with extramarital situations, but we will have to wait to see what it says. It may say that the same principles apply to extramarital sexual acts or it may not. We will have to see.
In his piece, Kellmeyer acknowledges that
[I]t is true that the 20th century Magisterial pronouncements on contraception all discuss the “conjugal act,”
but argues that
it is NOT the case that this phrasing is only meant to reference the sexual act within marriage.
He proposes several arguments for this, but his basic argument is this:
For precedence, we have the Fathers and Doctors of the Church, who clearly forbid the use of contraceptives regardless of the marital state of the participants.
A bit later on he summarizes his basic argument this way:
In order to reconcile the writings of the Fathers with the Magisterial documents which base themselves on the Fathers, we must assume that “conjugal act” does not strictly confine itself to meaning “the sexual act that takes place within marriage”, rather, it must mean “the sexual act that is supposed to take place within marriage (but often does not)”.
For this argument to be sound one would have to show that the phrase “coniugale commercium” (translated in whatever language the Fathers and Doctors were writing in) was used to refer to sexual intercourse without reference to whether it was occurring in marriage.
This would indeed set a precedent for taking the phrase “coniugale commercium” in something other than its obvious, literal sense. If a substantial series of quotations of this nature could be produced (not just one or two here or there, which would be insufficient to show an established usage) then it would show an established prior usage that was broader in semantic range.
Unfortunately, none of the writings that Kellmeyer cites (many of which were drawn from a Fathers Know Best column that I composed) do this.
It may very well be the case that there is an established tradition of condemning contraception both in and outside of marriage, but that does not tell us what the phrase “coniugale commercium” means. The existence of a broad theme does not tell us the meaning of a specific phrase used to express aspects of that theme in a Magisterial document.
Structurally, the argument seems to be something like:
- 20th century Magisterial documents use the phrase “coniugale commercium” while condemning contraception.
- The passages in these documents that use the phrase “coniugale commercium” must express the totality of any prior Catholic tradition concerning contraception.
- There is a prior Catholic tradition that condemns contraception both in an outside of marriage.
- Therefore, by using the phrase “coniugale commercium,” 20th century Magisterial documents are condemning contraception both in and outside of marriage.
This argument does not work because the middle premise (line 2) is false. It is not the case that the totality of a prior, broader theme must be what Paul VI is referring to when he uses this phrase.
To the contrary, one cannot take passages from hundreds of years ago that, although on the same general topic, do not use the same language, and insist that they inform the meaning of a single and different phrase in a modern document, contrary to its obvious literal meaning.
I believe firmly in a hermeneutic of continuity, and thus one cannot dismiss a prior, broader tradition as being irrelevant to the modern treatment of contraception. But saying something is relevant to the modern discussion of a broad moral topic is not the same as saying that it must be what was meant by one particular phrase that has an obvious, contrary meaning.
Make no mistake; Latin has a word for “sexual” (i.e., sexualis). If Paul VI had wanted to say “sexual intercourse” in Humanae Vitae then he would have said sexuale commercium.
In fact, he wouldn’t have even needed to say that because the word commercium itself–in context of a sexual discussion–means “intercourse.” (In broader discussions it can refer to non-sexual exchanges, such as social intercourse or business intercourse, but the context tells us that this is the sexual usage.)
What “coniugale” does is specify the kind of intercourse. Not sexual intercourse in general, but specifically marital intercourse: intercourse in marriage.
This is indicated both by the immediate context of the document itself and by the historical context in which the document arose.
Humanae Vitae is not a general meditation on the subject of contraception–the kind of document that might address both marital and extra-marital sex (as with a manual of moral theology). It is specifically a document intended to offer guidance to married couples. This is established as its subject matter from its opening sentences:
The transmission of human life is a most serious role in which married people collaborate freely and responsibly with God the Creator. It has always been a source of great joy to them, even though it sometimes entails many difficulties and hardships.
The fulfillment of this duty has always posed problems to the conscience of married people, but the recent course of human society and the concomitant changes have provoked new questions. The Church cannot ignore these questions, for they concern matters intimately connected with the life and happiness of human beings.
So the purpose of the document is to answer the “new questions” (created by modern socio-economic factors and the new methods of birth control that had been developed–especially the Pill, which did not seem to violate the physical structure of the marital act, the way condoms do) that Humanae Vitae sets out to answer so that married couples may know how to properly live out their vocation.
And the document did not come out of a vacuum. It was the Pope’s 1968 response to the disastrous 1967 report that had been authored (and then leaked to the press) by the Pontificial Commission on Population, Family, and Birth, which had endorsed contraception between married couples.
The Pontificial Commission had been set up during the reign of John XXIII to deal with an upcoming United Nations population conference, but he died before it met. When Paul VI was elected, he expanded and reworked its membership and mission, tasking it in 1964 with answering three questions:
What is the relationship between the primary and secondary ends of marriage? What are the major responsibilities of married couples? How do rhythm [i.e., the rhythm method] and the pill relate to responsible parenthood? [SOURCE].
The Pontifical Commission was not tasked with writing a general moral treatment of human sexuality. It was tasked specifically with analyzing the situation of married couples and their use of contraception in “responsible [and thus marital] parenthood.”
The Commission accordingly crafted a report which, while it was pro-contraception, was focused on the use of contraception by married couples. It is not a general treatise on human sexuality. (READ IT HERE.)
When the Commission’s pro-contraception report was leaked to the press it caused an enormous raising of expectations that the Pope would approve the Pill, and to combat this Paul VI wrote his final encyclical, which was released the next year. Humanae Vitae is his public response to the Commission’s report and his effort to deal–as he says–with the new questions that married couples face.
When he then uses the Latin words meaning “marital intercourse,” we must recognize that this is exactly what he is talking about.
While I as much as anybody would love for Humanae Vitae to settle all questions on the topic of human sexuality, the fact is that it is a document of deliberately limited scope and that its key passage is focused on the use of contraception in relation to marital intercourse.
It is not possible to shoehorn other elements of prior Catholic thought into this passage because this would violate its clear language and force it to answer questions that it is not attempting to address.
As is often the case with the Magisterium, it moves slowly and in a step-wise manner. It doesn’t tend to take on questions without strong reason. The Church already taught that sex outside of marriage is gravely sinful. The mid 20th century had brought about new socio-economic and technological factors that impinged on the question of sexuality within marriage, and this is what both the Pontifical Commission and Humanae Vitae expressly set out to address.
Rather than being a summation of the whole of Catholic thought on sexuality, Humanae Vitae is a document with a sharply limited scope intended to provide moral and pastoral guidance to married couples facing the challenges of the modern world.
There is a lot more that could be said about this (particularly regarding some of the sources Kellmeyer cites), but I hope this provides a basic response to his central argument.
I am also happy to note that he concludes by stating:
So, is the Holy Father’s private theological opinion correct? Is it the case that the use of the condom with the intent to reduce disease transmission less damnable than using the condom without that intention? Probably. Aquinas, whose love for such fine distinctions is precisely what makes him the greatest doctor of the Church, would almost certainly agree that it was.
And that is heartening.
Indeed it is.
Please tell the baby that “Of Human Life” costs between $5.74 and $72.80 on Amazon.
I agree with your emphasis on the scope of the encyclical, and given recent developments in the field of papal interviews, I think it is time for many of us to reread it.
You forgot to link to Steve Kellmeyer’s post.
Actually, it was in there, but inserting the picture seemed to cause a glitch in the html. Link fixed!
http://skellmeyer.blogspot.com/2010/11/jimmy-akin-pope-benedict-and.html
Jimmy, your presentation is cogent. However, I believe that it lacks one element that would be useful to see in a short, subsequent post. Namely, I believe you’re missing a premise in your discussion of the translation of “conjugal act.” You discuss two types of sexual acts, but it seems that there are really three, and that the vocabulary of them is not always crystal clear.
1. You have “sexual intercourse” generally. As we all learned during the Clinton administration, this category includes acts, which we won’t name, other than vaginal sexual relations between a man and a woman.
2. You have “conjugal intercourse,” which I think at least a significant number of people would construe as being any act of vaginal sexual relations between a man and a woman.
3. You then have “marital intercourse,” which is of course vaginal sexual relations between a man and a woman who are married to each other.
So could you, for the sake of clarity, perhaps round out your discussion of the terminology: other than the context, what linguistic evidence is that that Paul VI meant #3 and not #2. Specifically, what term would translate to #2?
Thanks for the leg work.
I think both Skellmeyer’s claims and Jimmy’s claim go together. If you look at the focus of Magesterial writings on contraception, starting in the late 1800s and then into the the 20th Century, including Casti canubii and Humanae vitae, you see the focus on married couples, not unmarried couples. IMHO, this is because martial intercourse is the ideal of sexual unions, the “type” (to use Platonic terms) that everything else is based off of. Everything else must flow from that. If we can establish what married love is really all about (mutual self-giving in a total, free, and loving way), then that will (hopefully) set the tone elsewhere (by this I mean, of course chastity, fidelity, and abstinence until marriage).
When we see marital intercourse as debased, by virtue of contraception, what then is our standard? Sex is no longer about total self-giving, and procreation, so other forms of sexual intercourse are now legitimized. This is echoed not only in the Fathers’ treatment of contraception (especially Augustine, who talks about women who use herbs to eliminate the consequences of their infidelities), but also the rationale of the Comstock laws in effect in our own US: namely that the mere presence of contraception for anyone (married or unmarried) increases the chance that intrinsically evil sexual acts like fornication, sodomy, and adultery will be promoted because their consequences are reduced.
In sum, while Jimmy is correct, and the Magesterium since the late 1800s has focused on marital intercourse, this is done in consistency with the Fathers, who condemned contraception for everyone.
Between 5.74 and 72.80? I think I got it for about 2 bucks once.
So, is the Holy Father’s private theological opinion correct? Is it the case that the use of the condom with the intent to reduce disease transmission less damnable than using the condom without that intention? Probably. Aquinas, whose love for such fine distinctions is precisely what makes him the greatest doctor of the Church, would almost certainly agree that it was. And that is heartening.
But this ignores the fact the ubiquitous presence of condoms condoms everywhere creates a culture where people will more likely engage in such risky behaviour.
Pope Benedict should resign.
Here is what Church Father Augustine said on NFP: “Is it not you (Manichaenas) who used to counsel us to observe as much as possible the time when a woman, after her purification, is most likely to conceive, and to abstain from cohabitation at that time? From this it follows that you consider marriage is not to procreate children, but to satiate lust.”
Yes, Church Fathers knew about NFP and taught it was contraception. No wonder, since they claimed “marital intercourse” is only for procreation. If I am not mistaken the “disastrous” majority report accepted this as a fact. Minority report made complete boycott of this tradition, giving critics of “Humanae Vitae” a huge upper hand which continues today.
In the matter of using contraception inside or outside of the marriage- this is like discussing whether you can stab somebody with a pencil in the arm or in the leg. Pencil is not for stabbing, and contraception is not to be used in sexual activity.
Thank you Jimmy, for addressing Kellmeyer’s post while other grand poobahs of Catholic apologetics malicioulsy pretend he doesn’t exist.
Sash,
Is the condom a contraceptive only and not a dual purpose object for HIV people? If it is a dual purpose object and only for them, the principle of double effect may apply with the object being neutral not evil for them only, for the first requirement of double effect….and not as in your case….in which it is a one purpose object… a simple contraceptive object.
If for them not for you, it is simultaneously a fatal disease blocker WHEN used ideally with great caution and not with lax attention….then it is not the same object description in their case as it normally is for most people. It fails under double effect for Catholic teaching if one is talking about healthy people in whose case it is only a contraceptive.
But I don’t see how it fails double effect if it’s priority function becomes life preservation as a dual purpose object.
Why does not the couple abstain forever? According to I Corinthians 7, there is a group of strongly sexual laity for whom that abstaining invites Satan into the situation:
verse 5 “Do not deprive each other, except perhaps by mutual consent for a time, to be free for prayer, but then return to one another, so that Satan may not tempt you through your lack of self-control.”
Just some scholarly remarks:
From the exhaustive Latin dictionary by Lewis and Short (use here is a single citation and within fair use):
com-mercĭum (con-m- ; ante-class.; sometimes ‡commircĭum ; cf. Vel. Long. p. 2236 P.), ii, n. merx.
I. Commercial intercourse, trade, traffic, commerce: “mare magnum et ignara lingua commercia prohibebant,” Sall. J. 18, 5; Plin. 33, 1, 3, § 7; Plin. Pan. 29; Tac. Agr. 24; Liv. 4, 52, 6: “salis,” id. 45, 29, 13: “commercium hominum in locum aliquem mutui usus contrahunt,” id. 38, 18, 12: “neque Thraces commercio faciles erunt,” id. 40, 58, 1: “jus commercii,” Dig. 49, 5, 6.—
B. Meton.
1. The right to trade as merchants, a mercantile right: “commercium in eo agro nemini est,” Cic. Verr. 2, 3, 40, § 93; cf. id. ib. 2, 2, 50, § “124: L. Crasso commercium istarum rerum cum Graecis hominibus non fuisse,” id. ib. 2, 4, 59, § “133: ceteris Latinis populis conubia commerciaque et concilia inter se ademerunt,” Liv. 8, 14, 10; 43, 5, 9; cf. Dig. 41, 1, 62; 30, 1, 39; 45, 1, 34.—*
2. An article of traffic, merchandise, wares: “commercia militaria,” Plin. 35, 13, 47, § 168; for provisions, id. 26, 4, 9, § 18; cf. Front. 2, 5, 14.—
3. A place of trade, market – place: “commercia et litora peragrare,” Plin. 37, 3, 11, § 45; Claud. in Eutr. 1, 58.—
II. In gen., intercourse, communication, correspondence, fellowship; lit. and trop.: “quid tibi mecum est commerci, senex?” Plaut. Aul. 4, 4, 4; id. Bacch. 1, 2, 9; id. Stich. 4, 1, 15: “mihi cum vostris legibus Nihil est commerci,” I have nothing to do with your laws, id. Rud. 3, 4, 20: “commercium habere cum Musis,” Cic. Tusc. 5, 23, 66: “commercium habere cum virtute,” id. Sen. 12, 42: “dandi et excipiendi beneficii,” Val. Max. 5, 3, ext. 3: “agrorum aedificiorumque inter se,” Liv. 45, 29, 10: “plebis,” with them, id. 5, 3, 8; 41, 24, 16: “linguae,” Ov. Tr. 5, 10, 35; Liv. 1, 18, 3; 9, 36, 6; 25, 33, 3: “sermonis,” id. 5, 15, 5; cf.: “loquendi audiendique,” Tac. Agr. 2 fin.: “commercia epistularum,” Vell. 2, 65, 1: “hoc inter nos epistularum commercium frequentare,” Sen. Ep. 38, 1: “communium studiorum,” Suet. Claud. 42: “sortis humanae,” Tac. A. 6, 19: “belli,” stipulation, treaty, id. ib. 14, 33: “belli tollere,” Verg. A. 10, 532; so, “belli dirimere,” Tac. H. 3, 81.—Plur.: “est deus in nobis, et sunt commercia caeli,” Ov. A. A. 3, 549.—
B. Esp., forbidden intercourse, illicit commerce: “libidinis,” Val. Max. 8, 2, 2: “stupri,” Suet. Calig. 36.—Absol.: “cum eā mihi fuit commercium,” Plaut. Truc. 1, 1, 77.—
2. In law, = collusio, Cod. Th. 3, 11, 4; cf. ib. 11, 4, 1 al.
Excerpt taken from:
A Latin Dictionary. Founded on Andrews’ edition of Freund’s Latin dictionary. revised, enlarged, and in great part rewritten by. Charlton T. Lewis, Ph.D. and. Charles Short, LL.D. Oxford. Clarendon Press. 1879.
I hate to stir things up, but lexicologically speaking, while regular intercourse within marriage is the presumed definition within the Magisterial texts, there is a weak sense, indicated in IIIB, above, in which commercium can refer to illicit sex, with the modifier coniugale acting as a modifier referring to two object types that go together (a man and a woman rather than a man and a man or a man and a beast). Thus, coniugale commercium in its weaker sense can refer to sexual intercourse outside of marriage. The context in which the Maisterial documents were written indicate the strong sense is being discussed, but outside of that context, the phrase, coniugale commercium, does not have to refer to the sexual act within a marriage.
Therein lies the problem is scholarship. While it is clear that there is a restrictive sense being used in modern Magisterial texts, this does not mean that earlier texts might not have had the broader sense in mind. It is a matter of context which will determine if there is a consistent use of the term historically, or not. I doubt that anyone has done the linguistic/etymological study of the contextual use of the term to prove, one way or another, whether or not the modern use is a refined use of a more general context, or whether the weak sense of the term is a vulgarity not often adopted. If there are any masters students in linguistics reading, here’s an easy M. A. project.
All of this MUST be placed in the proper context of the history of science, since the ideas of how sexual reproduction work have gradually evolved (no pun intended) such that contraception was not exactly understood in the same way as in modern times. As I understand it, it was believed that there was a latency period before ensoulment occurred and what existed before was not, properly speaking, human, but a type of earth (used in the classical Greek sense of the word as a type of elemental basis). Contraception under this type of scientific reasoning was not, properly speaking, contraception as regards a moral act, since the thing being destroyed was not considered a human being. Thus, it may be argued that such “contraception” was not the frustration of an act of human creation, but the prevention of the proper basis for humanity to generate.
At least this type of reasoning might have been advanced according to the knowledge of the day by SECULAR authorities. This reasoning has bled over into modern Protestant rationalizations for the licitness of early term abortions. Preventing (or terminating) the formation of mere tissue is not, in itself illicit, according to these arguments. The science was sufficiently dicey as to the nature of human growth back then, that the Popes may have had no basis for issuing an encyclical for or against contraception based on purely scientific grounds as known at the time.
I am, of course simplifying the history a bit, but I really do not like to discuss these matters in polite company, for reasons of modesty in speech. Thus, Pope John XXI may have had no scientific basis for issuing any statements on contraception and I suspect the Holy Spirit prevented the popes from doing so until science had brought the picture into clearer focus. Today, of course, we know that the embryo is human, ab initio, and capable of receiving a soul (when it does has not, however, been defined). Thus, abortion or contraception is known, today, to precisely prevent the proper basis for a human to generate.
Interestngly, around the same time that Petrus Hispanus (Peter of Spain) was the papal doctor prior to becoming pope (having written the Thesaurus pauperum), St. Thomas, in his Summa Contra Gentile (1258 – 12 64 A. D.), III. no. 122 writes:
[5] It is evident from this that every emission of semen, in such a way that generation cannot follow, is contrary to the good for man. And if this be done deliberately, it must be a sin. Now, I am speaking of a way from which, in itself, generation could not result: such would be any emission of semen apart from the natural union of male and female. For which reason, sins of this type are called contrary to nature. But, if by accident generation cannot result from the emission of semen, then this is not a reason for it being against nature, or a sin; as for instance, if the woman happens to be sterile…
[9] Nor, in fact, should it be deemed a slight sin for a man to arrange for the emission of semen apart from the proper purpose of generating and bringing up children, on the argument that it is either a slight sin, or none at all, for a person to use a part of the body for a different use than that to which it is directed by nature (say, for instance, one chose to walk on his hands, or to use his feet for something usually done with the hands) because man’s good is not much opposed by such inordinate use. However, the inordinate emission of semen is incompatible with the natural good; namely, the preservation of the species. Hence, after the sin of homicide whereby a human nature already in existence is destroyed, this type of sin appears to take next place, for by it the generation of human nature is precluded.
From this, it seems that St. Thomas, although not listing all types of inordinate emission of semen, would probably concur that the act of preventing sperm from uniting with egg or preventing such product to be implanted in the womb is not compatible with the generation of the species, of which contraception as understood in modern times and hence said emission would be inordinate as to its teleology.
So, I think this issue is a long way from being settled. My feeling is that contraception outside of marriage is never allowable, but the evidence is somewhat ambiguous, both linguistically and historically. I, for one, am content to know that deliberate sex outside of marriage with knowledge of its sinfulness will send you to Hell. Whether or not it will send you to a different circle of Hell if done using contraception is a matter I will let theologians sort out.
The Chicken
My apologies for the last post. I have been trying not to make comments on this issue all week. Rats. Now you see why.
But I don’t see how it fails double effect if it’s priority function becomes life preservation as a dual purpose object.
See Summa entry above. By using a condom, one is frustrating the normal ordination of sperm to egg which makes the act unnatural, since marriage confers the responsibility to safe guard this integrity of the act. One can imagine a case where the sperm is inimical to the wife because of protein incompatibilities. Using a condom in that case may or may not be licit, since the marital act is dangerous, but under normal circumstances, since there is a less dangerous way to prevent the spread of HIV (abstaining), that is the morally preferred way.
No more comments from me. This topic makes me sick. Sorry. I must leave the discussion for more spiritually mature minds.
The Chicken
Masked Chicken,
The life saving part is vanishing for you as a simultaneous function of the condom in the HIV case as it vanishes for Skullmeyer in a post he did on double effect. You and he are seeing it as following the contraceptive part as an effect follows a cause whereas some of us are not seeing that (I’m thinking of one report…John Allen’s first relevant one regarding the Barragan affirmative poll of doctors and theologians on whether HIV “justified”
condom use…(not Benedict’s term at all in the first half of his quote but seeming compatible the second half and with his not only not drawing away from his first quote but extending it to heterosexual couples through Lombardi).
You need not reply but if the condom makes the act unnatural so as to not
safeguard the ordination of sperm to egg…without the act of condom use simultaneously and distinctly
protecting the other’s life independent of the sperm ordination….then how could it be a
first step toward bettering one’s overall moral direction in Benedict’s schema. It would rather be like a
robber
switching from a shotgun to the lesser evil of a pistol…but the victim will still be killed.
If Catholic HIV workers actually get an ok from Rome only in the case of HIV people to
give only such people condoms, then double effect not lesser evil will be the reason
since they will not help a person to a lesser evil proximately. ( Excuse the ipad indentation problems throughtout.)
One does not have to have sex to have a marriage and extraordinary circumstances are given extraordinary graces. Saving the spouse from HIV does not require a condom, but rather the grace of self-control which is a higher virtue because it makes the possibilty of HIV zero, wheras a condom is presumptious, morally, since the possibilty is not negligable. Last comment, really.
The Chicken
Masked Chicken,
The HIV problem in Africa may involve many of the types of people whom Paul told to marry rather than burn with desire in I Corinthians 7….and whom he told to not stay away from each other too long lest Satan enter in. Both those quotes because of the extensive reality of millions of incontinent HIV persons cannot be made to vanish under “extraordinary grace” for “extraordinary circumstances”…..the numbers are too great and extraordinary grace does not change Paul’s very sexual group into Paul’s later described less sexual group for the duration of decades.
Paul addresses a different group shortly after who he tells to remain unmarried but if they marry, they do not sin. This is the moderately sexual person who can take on the Josephite marriage later on under extraordinary circumstances without that Josephite abstinence inviting Satan to appear as it would in the first group. The example of Joseph and Mary is not the best even for them though since Aquinas held that Mary had no concupiscence after the Nativity and it seems Joseph may have been old since we do not hear of him when Jesus is a grown man.
Jimmy,
I have responded to you here:
http://skellmeyer.blogspot.com/2010/11/jimmy-akins-response.html
While I appreciate your concern about contexts, I think you may have missed the larger point I made. The context issue is actually not really a problem.
If your assessment is correct, then none of the papal encyclicals are about contraception, for all of them talk about the conjugal act, and the contracepted act is – by definition – not a “coniugal commercium”, as you phrased it.
THAT’S a problem.
Or, to put it another way, my context problem is not nearly so bad as the context problem you propose.
“Thank you Jimmy, for addressing Kellmeyer’s post while other grand poobahs of Catholic apologetics malicioulsy pretend he doesn’t exist.”
I suspect this comment comes from Kellmeyer himself.
On his blog since this controversy, Kellmeyer has clearly edged towards the SSPX position. When he is not yapping about on other blogs (like Damien Thompson’s) trying to drive traffic to his own.
Let’s all countdown ’til the moment when Kellmeyer erupts in blind rage that he’s not being consulted by the National Catholic Register and CNA as The Expert. Because that’s what all this mindless minutiae on his part is really all about.
For your information, I ALWAYS sign my own name to my own comments.
I ALWAYS oppose the SSPX.
Just FYI.
There does seem to be an opposing or related pair phrase in Catholic texts, in which “conjugale commercium” is contrasted with “carnale commercium”, but I don’t know how they contrast. It may include “sinful things that people married to each other do”, or it may not. Usage may also have changed, or theology developments may have refocused it.
I really really don’t have either the theological or the Latin training to engage in a really useful search engine usage study, alas. (And of course, books.google.com is not a super-perfect usage study tool, because it has a lot of trouble with identifying words in foreign languages and screwy fonts.)
Okay… “carnale” doesn’t seem to be a pejorative in this case, but just means sexual intercourse (in the flesh, so to speak). But it’s really hard to tell from these sources. I don’t know where to look or who to trust….
Dennis
You seem to be new here, but I’m a long-time reader and used to be a regular commenter here for 2 years.
As you see, I’m not Steve Kellmeyer; I’m…well, myself. 🙂
Bill,
I understand your points, but the issue is whether declining procreative aspect of sex is bigger evil then risking health of married couple. If condoms lead you to hell, they are most certainly not the most prudent solution.
Masked Chicken
I am sorry that we are not spiritually mature enough for your company in discussion. In case that one day you find a worthy speaker, maybe he would ask you questions like this:
1) To which extent is Thomas Aquinas under influence of stoicism? Does he believe that sex is only for procreation (remember his remarks on mouth kisses)?
2) Would Thomas Aquinas allow NFP, since he disapproved any emission which can not result in conception? He claimed that contraceptive intercourse is fine in case of accident, not if woman is healthy and capable of conceiving. If “inordinate” means “incompatible with the natural good” and that good is “the preservation of the species”, then answer is very easy to find. After all, the system of NFP works with the destruction of semen in mind.
3) If Popes were waiting for secular sciences for facts regarding ensoulment, I must ask how are we to defend the idea that Church was “always against contraception”. Also, what scientific discovery has been given for Pope to forbid contraception? Encyclicals are based on natural law, not on science- especially not on secular.
4) How can “Thesaurus Pauperum” recieve so much praise and popularity in Catholic world? Or even better, why was there no opposition from Catholic moral theologians. Thomas Aquinas first among them?
Sash
If in the near future the curia office for family permits Catholic HIV workers to hand out condoms to the poor HIV infected only, you’ll know that it is double effect even if they advertise it as lesser evil. Procreation happens in a minority of sexual acts also which is an odd unusual factor.
Bill,
I understand, but as I see the logic of curia, the problem is that contraception is always closing the procreation- not in minority of cases. Also, one could ask why would infection be less important then, for example, responsible parenthood achieved through artificial means.
I hope you will allow me to state my personal opinion, it seems that Catholic theology has no clear picture or interpretation of nature. This is problematic because, if something is not clear, anything can be concluded.
Sash Milthon,
“I am sorry that we are not spiritually mature enough for your company in discussion.”
Unless I’m wrong, TMC was talking about himself.
Sash,
The obligation to not kill the other person with a fatal disease is more important than the obligation to procreate. Three Fathers actually saw procreation as urgent with the Jews but not with Christians. Here are the two who also were key against birth control but they saw number of children as not important for Christians. They saw the obligation to multiply as very Jewish since the nation which would produce Christ must needs be large enough to survive those centuries:
St. Jerome
Against Jovinianus section 37 at end:
And again writing to the Galatians he says: Galatians 2:16 Because by the works of the law shall no flesh be justified. Among the works of the law is marriage, and accordingly under it they are cursed who have no children. And if under the Gospel it is permitted to have children, it is one thing to make a concession to weakness, another to hold out rewards to virtue.
section 48 beginning
48. Shall a joint-heir of Christ really long for human heirs? And shall he desire children and delight himself in a long line of descendants, who will perhaps fall into the clutches of Antichrist, when we read that Moses and Samuel preferred other men to their own sons, and did not count as their children those whom they saw to be displeasing to God?
St. Augustine
The Good of Marriage section 19
Forsooth now no one who is made perfect in piety seeks to have sons, save after a spiritual sense; but then it was the work of piety itself to beget sons even after a carnal sense: in that the begetting of that people was fraught with tidings of things to come, and pertained unto the prophetic dispensation.
………………………………………………………………………
……………………………………………………………………….
Again, the condom for HIV people is then firstly a death blocker and secondarily a contraceptive. You and I have keeping ourselves alive as an obligation that has priority
over reproducing. Secondly, numbers of children are found where you have despair (the poor of East Timor) or where you find community security ( Amish, Mennonites, Hasidim, Hutterites)…and paucity of children when people worry because they have no communal security (Catholics and Protestants and secular Jews of the affluent but always threatened cultures).
I apologize to Masked Chicken. I thought he said he was leaving the discussion since he has to search for more mature minds.
Bannon,
I understand these remarks, but I still think that Vatican’s response will be different. They will probably stress that condoms are destroying the natural purpose of sex and sexual relation, and that this destruction has enough weight for couple not to use condoms even in case of AIDS. If condoms lead us to hell on this account, then not using them is prior to saving our worldly lives.
Augustine probably had a secret agenda when he preached against heirs. He hated sex so much that no reason could justify it. If I remember correctly, he said on one place that after second child, couple should stop having relations. Something very hard for conventional Catholics to chew.
Sash
I have read most of Augustine and think that your 2 children concept is not him at all. I believe you are projecting your belief onto the Vatican. They will permit advice to HIV people regarding condoms is my guess…..which only work against the disease if used perfectly with great attention.
It to me is ludicrous to put procreation before preserving the life of the other person. That is extreme. In the HIV case, the child would be born in a poor country like Africa to dying parents. If that is the gospel…the good news….I’d hate to hear the bad news.
PRAY
FOR
THE
POPE
The condom
Conundrum
In the Light
Of The World
Could leave one’s
Faith
Completely
Unfurled
But the Light
Of the world
His Blood
He did shed
For even the Pope
Who said
What he
Said
And even
The men
And ladies
Of night
That the Pope
Did address
Being ever
Polite
Forgetting
To say
“Go and sin
No more”
Damning
Misguided
Damning
The whore
But the Light
Of the world
His Blood
He did shed
Pray for the Pope
Who said
What he
Said!
Long-Skirts
It seems as though my lexicological comments have been picked up by Steve Kellmeyer. I cannot read his comments because the site is blocked by our academic institution (maybe because Blogspot has been blacklisted?).
I was writing a cautionary post. Let me be more clear. When I was in graduate school in musicology, my professor in our Ph. D Medieval Music seminar was writing an encyclopedia article on the development of the use of the words, Tonus, Modus, and Tropus, in chant theory. He had the graduate students (us) go through literally every single use of the words historically and study their meanings and historical developments in the original languages. By the time we were finished, we could say something useful about how the words developed in usage. What I was trying to say, primarily, is that no one has done a similar thing with the words coniugale commercium. Until such a study is done, there will be doubt about exactly how the word usage developed over time.
If anyone wants to do the work, they will need to reference Migne’s Patrologia Graeca and Partologia Latina to look at the usage of the Church Father’s in the original language as well as the use (with proper lexicological history) of the words in further original language Church documents. As I said, this woould be a nice masters project in linguistics. That was the take home point, not to add fuel to the fire.
The Chicken
Bill,
I recall the quote from secondary sources regarding two children. Might be a mistake, tough.
I am not projecting my opinion on Vatican. As you might have sensed from my posts, I have a dose of criticism for these teachings. My personal state is somewhat of “searching the truth”. Vatican’s explanation of nature and conclusions from these explanations are lacking. We know from history that one should be careful about these things.
However, I know how they think. For them, using condom is too sinful to be “lesser evil” in comparison to anything. Between condom and permanent abstinence, they will claim second option is lesser evil. Damage to marital couples and temptations will come, but they will be attributed to lack of self-control. Again, the layman are to be blamed.
Sash
Your observations are true of many conservatives but Popes are less conservative than their admirers. Their less educated admirers would have excommunicated the great theologians who dissented from Humanae Vitae…Karl Rahner and Bernard Haring…..these last three Popes did not excommunicate them. Ask a Catholic Theology professor why not.
When I was young, I just phoned such professors and asked them for a meeting in a nearby Catholic college. Try it. They usually like the chance to instruct the zealous.
I am not going to do the needed work of researching the development of the terms coniugale commercium as it evolved linguistically in the Church Fathers. If someone wants to do so, I will provide some references. People who study older texts are no doubt familiar with these resources and many more.
The Lewis and Short entries are pretty clear as to the classical definitions of the terms. Commercium was discussed, above. Coniugale is derived from the from Latin (or Middle French) conjugalis, which in its more developed forms does mean related to marriage. From Lewis and Short:
conjŭgālis, e, adj. conjunx,
I. relating to marriage, conjugal (prob. not ante-Aug.).
I. Prop.: “amor,” Tac. A. 11, 4: “licentia,” id. ib. 11, 27: “di,” who preside over marriage, id. G. 18; Sen. Thyest. 1103; Aug. Civ. Dei, 6, 9, 3.—
b. Esp., faithful: “CONIVX,” Inscr. Grut. 602, 5; Inscr. Murat. 1296, 8.—
II. Transf., of animals: “gregem protegere debent galli,” Col. 8, 2, 11.—* Adv.: con-jŭgālĭter , as married persons: “vivere,” Aug. Ep. 89, 39.
A Latin Dictionary. Founded on Andrews’ edition of Freund’s Latin dictionary. revised, enlarged, and in great part rewritten by. Charlton T. Lewis, Ph.D. and. Charles Short, LL.D. Oxford. Clarendon Press. 1879.
The term is derived from conjunx:
conjunx or conjux (in inscrr. also COIVX, e. g. Orell. 4655; 4644; 4646;
I. “5013: COIVNX, C. I. L. 1, 1011: CONIVNCX,” ib. 5, 370; v. Neue, Formenl. I. p. 139 sq.), jŭgis, comm. (fem. conjŭga Jovis Juno, App. M. 6, p. 174, 33, and in inscrr.) [conjungo].
I. One who is united in marriage, a consort, spouse, wife; more rarely, a husband (very freq., esp. in fem. and in the poets; in Ov. M. alone about fifty times); masc., Cic. Cael. 32, 78; id. Tusc. 4, 32, 69; Tac. A. 3, 34; 13, 44; Just. 2, 4, 8; Val. Max. 2, 6, 14; Cat. 61, 32; 68, 81; Verg. A. 6, 473; Ov. M. 1, 605; 6, 538; Sen. Cons. Helv. 19, 5; Hyg. Fab. 23; Inscr. Orell. 4629.—Fem., Lucr. 4, 1274; Poët. ap. Cic. N. D. 3, 27, 68; Cic. Cat. 4, 11, 24; id. Q. Fr. 1, 3, 3; Quint. 6, 1, 33; Cat. 64, 298; Prop. 1, 19, 7; Hor. C. 1, 1, 26; 3, 5, 5; Tac. A. 15, 15; 17, 11; id. H. 4, 18; 5, 8; id. G. 7.— In plur. for the married pair: “boni,” Cat. 61, 234: “unanimi,” id. 66, 80 et saep.—
2. Transf., of animals, the female, Ov. F. 1, 451; Plin. 10, 59, 79, § 161.—And also of the elmtree, round which a vine entwines itself (cf. conjungo, P. a., B. 2. b.), Col. 5, 6, 18.—
B. Poet.
1. A betrothed, a bride, Verg. A. 3, 331; 9, 138; Tib. 3, 2, 4; Ov. H. 8, 18.—
2. A more honorable designation for concubine, Prop. 2, 8, 29; Ov. H. 8, 86; Val. Fl. 2, 208.—
II. In late Lat., = contubernalis, a comrade, a (male or female) companion or attendant, Inscr. Orell. 2841 sq.—So, a fellow-slave: “me cum meo famulo meoque vectore … factum conservum atque conjugem,” App. M. 7, p. 189, 6.
A Latin Dictionary. Founded on Andrews’ edition of Freund’s Latin dictionary. revised, enlarged, and in great part rewritten by. Charlton T. Lewis, Ph.D. and. Charles Short, LL.D. Oxford. Clarendon Press. 1879.
Note that late Latin does indicate a linguistic broadening of the term to include a concubine or a companion.
The sense I was referring to the other day relates to the related term, conjugo, where in modern science this term is used to indicate objects that are joined together, such as conjugate acids and bases in chemistry or conjugate variables in mathematics, and in biology, a man and a woman.
con-jŭgo, āvi, ātum, 1,
I. [select] v. a., to join together, unite (rare).
I. [select] In gen.: “amicitiam,” to form, unite in, Cic. Off. 1, 17, 58: “aliquam sibi nuptiis,” App. M. 5, p. 170, 35; and without a dat., Treb. Gall. 11; Aug. Conf. 6, 13.—
II. [select] Esp., t. t.: “conjugata verba,” etymologically related, Cic. Top. 3, 12, and 9, 38.—Hence, subst.: conjŭgātum , i, n., = conjugatio, II. A., q. v.; Quint. 5, 10, 85.
I stress, however, that these are deep waters. The most common use of the term was to refer to marriage. The other terms might be used under linguistic license. I would bet that the term was used 90% of the time in the Church Fathers to refer to marriage and not simply the complimentarity of male and female (instead of male and male or male and beast) such as in sex outside of marriage, but as I say, someone will have to do the work to compile the statistics.
It is clear, however, that modern usage of the term is marriage. The Latin edition of the Catechism of the Catholic Church (especially, 1640 ff.) makes this use abundantly clear.
My caution still stands. If one wants to really say what the Church Fathers meant when they used the term coniugale or conjugalis and commercium, one will have to do the tedious work of examining contexts. This may clarify the use.
I am being overly pedantic, since the use of coniugale commercium in modern Latin writing is clear enough and has converged on the meaning of marital intercourse. That older writers might have used the term in a broader sense to mean sex outside of marriage is a point still to be proven in a strong sense by reference to the original texts.
Should anyone want to do the work (and perhaps someone should), there are many sources to reference. Unfortunately, some require a university subscription. Here are some sites of interest:
The best sources of the original Church Fathers (although there are updated texts) is, without doubt, Migne’s Patrologia latina. A text version of the 217 volumes may be found, here. For the Greek Fathers, one need, Migne’s Patrologia graeca, which may be found, here.
There are other collections, but these are a start. Good hunting.
The Chicken
p.s. I am sorry that I stumbled into this mess. This is really a project for experts and could take a great deal of time. Whether or not it will support a broadening of the use of the term of immorality of contraception to refer to sex outside of marriage will probably not be decided by this linguistic study. It will probably be decided by a pronouncement of the Magisterium some time in the next thousand years and I suppose we can await their official pronouncement. Until then, avoid all known evil. What more can one say?
For those who want a big word to describe the process of linguistic broadening or contracting, the word is onomasiology.
Dear Steve Kellmeyer,
I cannot make any comments on your blog because, after finally being able to read it, I find that it does not allow for anonymous comments (and I am the Masked Chicken). It would have been nice if you had printed my final paragraph in the November 27, 1:46 pm comment, above, when you quoted the Lewis and Short definition on your blog.
In any case, any research into the ancient use of coniugale commercium and contraception has to take into account the changes in the scientific understanding of the generative process, historically. Augustine’s remarks as well as St. Thomas Aquinas’s remarks have to be read in the light of the knowledge of the day, both linguistically and scientifically.
I tend to try to be conciliatory in my blog posts, so, whether or not the contentious notion that contraception is licit at all outside of marriage, I am content to hope that we all agree that sex outside of marriage is sinful. The finer points are the finer points. Young people (as well as old) need relatively clear guidelines and this seems like a good place to start.
Before I cause more tension between you and Jimmy (and you are brothers in Christ), I will bow out of the discussion as I promised, earlier.
The Chicken
Should read:
I tend to try to be conciliatory in my blog posts, so, whether or not the contentious notion that contraception is licit at all outside of marriage is true or false, I am content to hope that we all agree that sex outside of marriage is sinful.
The Chicken
Bill,
Thanks for your advice. I generally know Rahner and Harig for their influence. I am self-educated Catholic, not afraid to ask questions. A call of solitude, but specific fruit as well.
“Humanae Vitae” is problematic on many grounds. It makes clumsy retreats from questions regarding connection between God and nature. For example, it boasts “Responsible parenthood” as a virtue, but doesn’t even want to explain what happens theologically in case of “irresponsible parenthood” (couple has relations when they shouldn’t and God sends them a child He won’t back up as a punishment?). These things are unanswered for decades.
I am also somewhat careful. I don’t want to damage other people’s faith, nor do I wish to put my soul in danger. But there is no fear in love. And love always provides opportunity to talk on open terms.
Bill,
Thanks for your advice. I generally know Rahner and Harig for their influence. I am self-educated Catholic, not afraid to ask questions. A call of solitude, but specific fruit as well.
“Humanae Vitae” is problematic on many grounds. It makes clumsy retreats from questions regarding connection between God and nature. For example, it boasts “Responsible parenthood” as a virtue, but doesn’t even want to explain what happens theologically in case of “irresponsible parenthood” (couple has relations when they shouldn’t and God sends them a child He won’t back up as a punishment?). These things are unanswered for decades.
I am also somewhat careful. I don’t want to damage other people’s faith, nor do I wish to put my soul in danger. But there is no fear in love. And love always provides opportunity to talk on open terms.
The question of the morality of contraception outside marriage is an interesting one and deserves further study.
I might point out, though, that even if it were declared to be not sinful, the harmful effects of contraception would still occur. More than 40 years after Humanae Vitae, the pope’s prophetic words about the results of contraception have only proved more true. The deeper and deeper breakdown of sexual morality in society has led to a sea change in people’s attitudes toward sex, which has harmed women, family life, children, and is certainly tied to the increase in abortion and other ills.
Irish Girl,
The claims regarding contraception as being the major reason for moral breakdown in 20th Century seem unfair. There are couples which are using contraceptives, and have stable marriage, sharing values of womanhood and parenthood. The modern contraception attributed to demise similar as modern weapons attributed to greater suffering in military conflicts. Remember that some radical Catholics claim that Humanae Vitae gave boost to impurity, since it allowed NFP.
There are stable marriages in a worldly sense and stable marriages in a spiritual sense. The claim that contraception does not harm the spiritual stability of a marriage is certainly not to be proven by examing the mere worldly stability. This is the wrong way to discern spirits.
The war analogy is backwards. Contraception isn’t like giving more violent weapons. It is like taking away the spirit of peace and order.
To prove the effects of contraception, one must run the test a number of times in similar settings with and without societal contraception. Although no such tests have been run, history has provided enough evidence to conclude, as Pope Paul VI did, that where there is marital contraception, there is the spirit of license.
The Chicken
The Chicken
Irish girl claimed that contraception harms people in worldly sense- that it changed people’s attitude to women and family life. Such interpretations lack coherence. While we can say that spiritual damage will make it’s appearance in more material world, one can not blame it (all) on contraception. If contraception is sinful, it’s damage is primary in mystical, spiritual dimension.
One could expect that writings of Pope John XXI would bring Europe in sexual amorality and lack of respect for marriage. This has not happened. We don’t see destruction of family values in these times. At the contrary.
Sash, the sociological evidence for the harmful effects of contraception is quite evident indeed.
First of all, Margaret Sanger, the biggest promoter of the birth control movement, was a eugenicist. For details on this, see “Margaret Sanger’s Eugenic Legacy: The Control of Female Fertility” by Angela Franks.
The history of the birth control movement is associated with eugenics and plans to control “undesirable” populations, as Franks documents. Indeed, the comment a couple of years ago from Supreme Court Justice Ginsberg simply bears that out.
Surely you can’t be serious in claiming that there has been no destruction of family values in our time. There is abundant literature on the increase of divorce, abortion, child abuse, and all the other ill effects that go along with it, including harm to young women. To mention a few:
Laura Sessions Stepp, Unhooked: How Young Women Pursue Sex, Delay Love, and Lose at Both (New York: Riverhead Books, 2007).
Scott F. Christopher and Susan Sprecher, “Sexuality in Marriage, Dating, and Other Relationships: A Decade Review,” Journal of Marriage and Family 62, no. 4 (2000): 999–1017, http://www.familyfacts.org/findingdetail.cfm?finding=5637.
Susan Brown and Alan Booth, “Cohabitation Versus versus Marriage: A Comparison of Relationship Quality,” Journal of Marriage and Family 58, no. 3 (August 1996): 668–678, http://www.familyfacts.org/findingdetail.cfm?finding=5050; Steven L. Nock, “A Comparison of Marriages and Cohabiting Relationships,” Journal of Family Issues 16, no. 1 (1995): 53–76, http://www.familyfacts.org/findingdetail.cfm?finding=5006.
Mary Eberstadt, “The Vindication of Humanae Vitae,” First Things, August/September 2008.
Janet Smith’s “Humane Vitae: A Generation Later” also details much of the evidence.
My point here is not to debate the question with you, but to indicate some of the sources on which the statement regarding the harm of contraception is based.
That is not to blame it all on contraception, as other factors are certainly involved. But by disconnecting sex from babies, a fundamental attitudinal change was introduced into society, one that has had deep effects.
Irish Girl,
If you check my first reply, you will notice that I affirmed the decline of moral norms. I just don’t see it as tied to contraception as more mainstream Catholics would do. The historical evidence for this was given from the point that Catholic Church in the past encouraged contraception (during papacy of John XXI and his writings on the subject) and there was no effect in the society one would expect. There was no destruction of morality, and no lack of respect to women or Church authorities.
I am more or less aware of the arguments you linked. They can be easily counterbalanced by applying different angles on the subject.
Disconnection between sex and babies was made by Humanae Vitae’s affirmation of NFP.
In any case, thank you for your links and attribution to debate so far.
The Irish girl is correct. One cannot disconnect sex from babies without social consequences, and we are seeing those rather tragic consequences today. Other factors are present to be sure, but “the Pill” really did change everything. It is naive to think otherwise.
People (especially those people who like to call themselves “recovering Catholics) often accuse the Church of being obsessed with so-called “pelvic issues.” But the Church’s focus on human sexuality in recent decades is the direct result of a major shift in modern society’s understanding of such. For centuries it was a “given” that sex, marriage, and children were interdependent and could not and should not be disentangled. Today, modern society by and large rejects this notion and the social costs are enormous. The Pill is no small part of that.
As for “coherence,” as one of my law partners once said — “For centuries men tried to have sex before marriage and women said no; sometime around 1970 women stopped saying no and society has had hell to pay ever since.” Even when he is drinking my partner is still the most coherent man I’ve ever met.
Sash,
HV’s affirmation of NFP did not disconnect sex and babies. “Openness” to children remains under HV and NFP.
Mike,
The pill was simply a side-effect of changes which happened in society, and these changes happened due to economical and technological circumstances. You could have a better contraceptive in the Middle Ages, it wouldn’t start sexual revolution, since secular situation was different. And by that, I don’t mean better.
Sex, marriage and children were for centuries tied to idea of selective breeding among certain social groups and/for inheritance. Puritanism (including Catholic one) made sexual joy suspicious, which created frustration in generations, and added to later revolution.
Is your friend blaming man or women for this situation? I blame economical policies, which created decline collaterally, making the problem (and solution) out of Church influence.
“Openness” of NFP proved difficult to explain for mainstream Catholicism. A woman can’t be fertilized during infertile period, thus any relation in that period is closed to babies. That doesn’t mean relations are forbidden during these days. But if they are preformed because woman is infertile, they are of contraceptive nature. This is the reason why Church Fathers forbade NFP.
Sash,
I agree that modern society’s rather striking retreat from religion in the latter part of the 20th century contributed greatly to the current wide acceptance of what was once called pre-marital sex. But the current social embrace of pre-marital sex includes most mainline protestant religions and that was in large part a reaction to the possible. The ease of contraception rendered sex outside marriage no longer presumptively economically imprudent. By the mid-1970s women matriculating in colleges rather routinely requested prescriptions for birth control pills. The pill was invevitably one of the key “technological circumstances” that contributed to an altered attitude toward sex.
I take issue with your understanding of sex, marriage and children historically. The truth in your assertion is largely confined to the most elite social classes, and that is precisely because prudence need not be a constraint. The Pill popularized what had been always been true to some extent among the rich and powerful.
While excessively puritanical understandings of sex may have contributed to a sexual revolution, I doubt it was a significant factor. My reading of history confirms that men and women have long known that sex was enjoyable (and did not let any religious excesses interfere with the satisfaction of their intra-marital appetites), but believed that it was important to contain such satisfactions to marriage, if not for religions reasons then for reasons of prudence related to the risk of children. Once that risk could be managed, all bets were off.
My friend was blaming no one at all. He was making an observation, and a correct one.
And whether the “openness” of NFP is difficult to explain does not alter the fact that NFP does not “disconnect sex and babies.”
Mike,
Maybe we didn’t get each other well, much to my fault. I wanted to say that new technologies brought new economics, which reflected society. This requested prolonged education and society integration, thus rising the age for entering holy matrimony. The Pill didn’t create these things. These things created pill. You had efficient contraception long before 20th Century, but it was modern economics that created need for rubber and chemicals.
While contraception certainly made premarital sexuality easier, one can not say that marriage and parenthood have vanished. People still marry, and people still beget children. Reasons why they need more efficient birth control are in economical systematics. Ironic, but feudal economy is more friendly to large families then capitalism.
Poor people had their own sociological version of rich people’s rituals. Daughters were married to grooms by father’s choice. Yes, sometimes this choice was based on children’s emotions, but now always. A cow or a field would be a good reason to send a daughter in other man’s house.
I agree that most people recognized the joyfulness of sexuality. Even when popes and bishops were teaching stoicism (not asceticism, as we usually hear) and calling every happy pair a dissident. An issue which greatly challenges our common interpretation of sexual morality in past.
NFP disconnects sex and babies. If it weren’t like that, pope would have no reason to proclaim it as fertility control technique which involves sexual activity.
Jimmy,
I think you’re off base on this. I’ll try to be brief in my reasoning.
First I think the use of “coniugale commercium”, often translated into “the marriage act” is a usual way to refer to an act that is proper to or belongs to marriage. Even though it can be removed and abused outside of marriage, by referring to is as “the marriage act” we are reminding the reader of it’s proper home. Just as we can say the “King’s crown” even when it has been stolen and trampled upon; it’s still the King’s crown. I know of several pro-chastity speakers, and also myself, who refer to the act in this way both to remind listeners of it’s proper place, but also to afford it some respect and “privacy” that technical terms such as “sexual intercourse” seem to lack.
As for this statement: “Make no mistake; Latin has a word for “sexual” (i.e., sexualis). If Paul VI had wanted to say “sexual intercourse” in Humanae Vitae then he would have said sexuale commercium,” I am unconvinced. In the Latin dictionaries I consulted, (both print and online) most did not have this Latin word at all, and one of the two online sources that I found listed it as “uncommon, Neolatin.” Have you actually found ecclesiastical documents which use this phrase, in this context, prior to 1968? If so, please give sources.
As for your comments that we should look at the situation in America when Humanae Vitae was written, I agree. Going into The Pontifical Commission there was an understood acceptance of the Church’s universal ban on contraception. A ban that was universal to all Christian denominations prior to the 1930 Lambeth Conference, where it was accepted by the Anglican church for married couples is some circumstances. Likewise, The Pontifical Commission was asking the Holy See to consider permission for married couples in certain circumstances. Humane Vitae is a response to this, and specifically addresses this question. But it does NOTHING to reduce or throw doubt on the universal ban. In fact it strengthens it.
In closing, I admonish you to consider what effect your arguments have. I strongly suspect that you are in danger of encouraging voluntary doubt in others on a matter which has been, and will continue to be consistently taught, i.e. contraception is evil. And for what purpose?
Maria Key
Maria Key,
The idea that no Christian denomination accepted contraception prior to 1930 is problematic. It could be true to some extent, but it (purposely?) hides the fact that contraception ban was side-effect of teaching that sex is only for procreation.
One should also underline, without wish to bore the legetorium, that Catholic Church has affirmative tradition of using contraception. This was when pope John XXI, known also as Petrus Hispanicus, wrote medical book “Thesaurus Pauperum” which included chapter on contraception.
Sash,
Wiki’s entry on Pope John XXI notes that it is not clear that the “Thesaurus Pauperum” was written by him at all. Since he was in Aquinas’ century and Aquinas was repeating Augustine’s erroneous view that asking for the marriage debt without intending children was venial sin, it seems unlikely that a Pope with a specialty as to the human eyes would wander away both from Aquinas and Augustine on birth control.
There is a far greater problem for honest theologians, trying to ascertain universality, in the 29 Pope involvement (1580’s to 1878) with the castrati who were brought into the papal choirs by Pope Sixtus V in the 1580’s and which involved the coerced castration of 9 to 12 year old boys by poor fathers with hopes of their sons being accepted therein
and a bit later accepted in opera which stopped the practice 78 years prior to the
Church doing so by Bull of Pope Leo XIII. When Pius XI calls sterilization “mutilation”
in Casti C. in 1930…when the Nazis began to use it coercively, he probably was
unaware of this papal history of 29 Popes cooperating with something very similar to
what the Nazis were doing from a 9 year old boy’s point of view. New Advent seems to
have left out the entire 300 year involvement but any major encyclopedia has the
history of it. It could have weighed on the major theologians like Karl Rahner and
Bernard Haring who dissented from HV publically…. but to this point of consistent teaching in praxis…. did not see universal ordinary magisterium on this topic…..and
Rahner edited the Enchiridion Symbolorum whose task is to determine authority levels.
Pope Leo XIII stopped the castrati tradition with one bull in 1878 which means that 28 Popes after Sixtus V also could have stopped it… which means their cooperation was proximate and formal. For those who think the 29 proximately cooperating Popes
cruel in this, one must remember that as late as mid 19th century, we had Pius IX’s
Vatican people kidnapping a Jewish boy within the papal states because a Christian
maid had baptized him secretly. The concept of laity having extensive rights was
believed neither by Popes nor by laity in the sense that we now take for granted.
Bill,
Yes, I am aware that there are theories about “Thesaurus” being written by somebody else. I don’t know what foundation is used to back up these claims. New Advent mentions a name in the footnote, if I remember correctly.
While it is not the popular view, one should at least consider the possibility that certain spheres of theology vanished from everyday practice here and there in history. During the papacy of John XXI, Church didn’t care that much about contraception. It was one of many prohibitions caused by scruples of the age. Thomas Aquinas probably wouldn’t touch the subject, if it weren’t for Augustine’s writings. In such state, it was possible for Pope to write such book, simply because issue was not “hot”. You have similar situation in Easter Europe regarding blood sausages. This food, deeply rooted and connected to various festivals, was forbidden by the Church hundred years ago. Today even bishops eat them. If they would start scrupulous theological analysis, they would either forbid them, or say that they were wrong all the time.
As for castrati, I am aware of the practice. One has to confess: Church was always against castration. Clergy simply gave jobs to singers who were castrated “by acccident”. There was never Church institution which was systematically mutilating children. But they knew the nature of “accidents” and did not protest.
Sash
Read the whole castrati story in your public library in a major encyclopedia….not snippets from the internet. Adieu.
Bill,
I will, if you said so. I hope this is not really adieu.
Some food for thought…
For a nice overview of the church’s teaching about condoms this is very helpful especially the section about the history of the Church’s teaching on contraception.
AIDS AND CONDOMS THE TEACHING OF THE CHURCH – BISHOP CESARE BONIVENTO PIME
Excerpt:
The Decretals of Pope Gregroy IX are from the same time period as the “Thesaurus Pauperum”.
This article about the identity of Peter of Spain is very interesting.
This ebook about Gilbert of England states that some historians hold that “Thesaurus Pauperum” was written by the father of Peter of Spain.
Excerpt:
Take care and God bless,
Inocencio
J+M+J
Inocencio,
John Noonan Jr., a Federal Judge and Catholic history of ethics author could only find two Popes prior to modern times who wrote anything albeit little on contraception….your Gregory and Sixtus V…ironically the Pope who brought the castrati into the papal choirs. Have you personally come across any others.
Your refernce above to homocide is repeated in the Catechism of Trent but with a contradiction….it is mentioned as to the 5th commandment vis a vis contraception but the section on the Incarnation in the same catechism says that ensoulement in man is delayed but was not delayed in the case of Christ. Aquinas held for delayed ensoulement. So in one catechism, one finds two different views. In the Theological
Studies periodical during the 1980’s, Catholics debated the two views. Geneticist
schooled authors saw immediate personhood in the fertilized egg due to the matter of
the cell being human; while embryology schooled authors said the cell mass may divide
into identical twins around day 14 precluding an individual existing prior to then and that
in general, there could be no individual as long as the cells remain totipotential to
becoming this member or organ rather than that member or organ. Abortion as an act
is now infallibly condemned in Evangelium Vitae which had polled all bishops of the
world who all agreed….but as one theologian noted, the front end of abortion…the earliest day…is not infallibly defined because they did not agree on that….the initial
copies of EV italisized what they agreed on but the italics have now vanished in the
online Vatican version. Is it day one….or is it 14 days…or otherwise. This is why we need a funded think tank at Rome that only works on such problems because this one is science related. Now it is left to whether this University prof or that one cares to write on the topic in a journal. A one time half dollar tax on all Catholics would fund it forever.
Bishop Cesare’s denial of stoic tradition is noteworthy. For example, when he writes “In succeeding decades, Justin the Martyr, Origen, Lactanicus, St. Ephrem, Epiphanus, Ambrose, John Chrysostom and Augustine repeated the Church’s stand on contraception. It was wrong because it imitated the malpractice of the pagans, it placed carnal pleasure before the love that wants children . This is simply not true. Most, if not all of these theologians have actually accepted the pagan stoic theory of sexulity as purely procreative act. To have relations for any other reason then begetting was against the natural law. Love of the spouses was secondary in the act. You could love a woman without sexual relation. This is backed up by their concrete approach to NFP. To repeat, once again, St. Augustine: Is it not you (Manichaenas) who used to counsel us to observe as much as possible the time when a woman, after her purification, is most likely to conceive, and to abstain from cohabitation at that time? From this it follows that you consider marriage is not to procreate children, but to satiate lust.”
Isn’t it ironic that Casti Conubii mentions so much Augustine, but utterly fears to get him in full perspective?
Why did situation change in 20th Century? I actually don’t believe it was the secular pressure. Much more likely Catholic Church didn’t have the theological infrastructure to face the reality of it’s teaching in the past. When people required guidance regarding sexual matters, Church realized they can’t share the knowledge. It was too much even for radical conservatives to hold the ground that sexuality is only for procreation. Could one imagine what would happen if we kept the “original” tradition? We would probably be Amishes by now, both by influence and position as religion.
On the other side… could we choose? If something was taught, what is to be done? Boycott it in encyclicals and call all thing “unbroken”? Really, what is Ordinary Magisterium’s stance on past? That Church did not teach stoicism? That would be the denial of faith. They are avoiding this hot potato for decades. And each day more and more people are questioning them regarding this matter.
One other thing. This teaching clearly showed something was wrong with the hierarchy. People who listened them during those centuries destroyed their marital life. And religious one as well.
Regarding Pope Gregory IX, the pope who claimed heresy can be seen by vast number of cats in the town, I affirm his stance. The question of contraception became hot once again during his reign, and he captured the tradition of Early Medieval times which generally followed the idea of sex as purely procreational thing. This does not change that Pope John XXI was allowing contraception, or whatever Dominican monk brought Thesaurus to Catholic universities. (I acknowledged that there are disputes about authorship in few posts before- but the success of the book shows at least possibility of Church approval).
All this, of course, doesn’t mean contraception should be allowed. But it is evident that truth is much more then mainstream is willing to share with flock.
Sash
You are correct on blanket denunciation of the pagan approach being too brief at minimum. Here is Saint Jerome in Book I of “Against Jovinianus” section 49, line one….stating his dependence on their views:
” 49. Aristotle and Plutarch and our Seneca have written treatises on matrimony, out of which we have already made some extracts and now add a few more…”.
Online at new advent…see whole section. Note how he calls the Stoic Seneca…”our Seneca”. This is very odd when one realizes that Seneca actually believed like other Stoics in the right of a father to execute…kill….his children up to the age of about 14….pater potestas.
Bill Bannon,
I have never read John Noonan Jr. book only a reference to it in Sex and the Marriage Covenant by John F. Kippley.
This was the quotation from John Noonan’s book:
Have you personally come across any papal statements contrary to Gregory IX, Sixtus V, Pius XI, Paul VI about contraception?
As for ensoulement I base my understanding on the fact that from the moment of her conception the Blessed Mother was free from Original Sin and the fact that if a single human cell is living it must have a soul or two if it is twins.
Sash Milthon,
May I please see the documentaion of any statement that Pope John XXI made allowing contraception during his eight-month pontificate.
This article is more food for thought, CONTRACEPTION AND THE INFALLIBILITY OF
THE ORDINARY MAGISTERIUM – JOHN C. FORD, S.J. & GERMAIN GRISEZ
Take care and God bless,
Inocencio
J+M+J
Bill,
Yes, I know that old “Our Seneca” writing. It seems that Church Fathers liked pagan philosophers too much to take them what they were. They utterly wanted to make these people Christians, since they favoured their writing so much. Clement of Alexandria and Justin Martyr went so far to say that philosophy was to Greeks what Law was for Israelis- the path to salvation. Problems are that, aside the love for wit and wisdom, Greeks were pagans and acted as pagans.
Innocencio,
If Thesaurus Pauperum was indeed writen by the Pope (as most-but not all- historians agree) then allowance is objective. One should note that, when detecting the stance of Church towards contraception, people usually quote statements of theologians (and usually fail to deliver the right context). Now why would a quote of Augustine be more important then quote of John XXI? Why is first an official stance in the past, and second a footnote in the History?
As for infallibility of the Ordinary magisterium, I repeat once again my question. Is this body teaching that Christians of the past forbade contraception on any other ground then stoic obsession that sex can only be practiced for procreational purposes? If this is so, they are teaching a historical error, thus a moral one as well- very well seen in case of Natural Family Planning. And if bishops of the past forbade NFP, then you don’t have the terms to proclaim doctrine infallible, since the requirements for such title don’t exist (There is no consensus of the bishops on the matter). Add the fact that in present day Canadian bishops refused to draw their documented dissent on Humanae Vitae (winnipeg Statement) and did that two times (last one in 1998!).
Sash Milton,
You already acknowledged that whoever wrote Thesaurus Pauperum did so before Pope John XXI’s pontificate.
Please admit you cannot produce documentation that Pope John XXI allowed contraception or stop saying that he did. Just because you want/need it to be true doesn’t make it so.
The Decretals of Pope Gregroy IX make clear the stance of the Church. If you can produce documentation otherwise I would very much like to read it myself. I don’t give a lot of weight to my personal opinion or yours.
Lord, Have mercy on both our souls.
Take care and God bless,
Inocencio
J+M+J
Inocencio,
The problem in this area can be seen in footnote 4 of Humanae Vitae where Pope Paul VI references the tradition he has just refered to behind his concept. The footnote is long and lists sources who are entirely modern except for the first item, The Trent Catechism, 1566. After that first item, the entire list postdates 1880 because he wanted to use Popes and it was really a tradition of theologians….Augustine being key as Fr. Hardon has noted….along with Jerome and later Aquinas all three of whom saw sex as primarily…primarily concupiscence which marriage and procreation tamed and justified.
John Noonan Jr. noted that the sex act was not linked to loving someone in a Church document til Casti C. in 1930….and that is thanks to the layman, Diertrich von Hildebrand. But that over emphasis on sex as concupiscence and not as love is why 28 Popes could countenance and cooperate with 300 years worth of boys being castrated for singing purposes. If sex is primarily negative, castrating boys is ok.
He did not list as tradition Pope Gregory who also said couples should atone for the
pleasure they had in sex nor did he list Sixtus V who excommunicated couples for
contraception ( rescinded by his successor) and yet Sixtus V initiated the castrati in the
papal choirs and executed thousands of criminals in Rome. Both men, had they been put on the list of footnote four, would have given the press an opportunity for displaying
the bizarre nature of the Church’s past on the topic. But it was not just the Church. Western culture was negative on sex with Leonardo da Vinci calling sex “the beast with two backs”….and he was a layman…. as was de Sade later who too saw sex as unconnected to love.
On the preembryo, you are solving the quandary in a hurry by creating your own cell division facts….good luck with that. 60% of preembryos do not survive the journey to implantation in nature. Are those all souls? Tiny humans? Did Christ come to save 40% of human beings and the rest are in Limbo?
The great theologians of the past century simply stepped back and said there is way too many questions. If there were not, Popes would be on cspan explaining everything and taking all questions. They are not.
bill bannon,
It was a tradition of the Church not theologians. As for people, Catholic and not, having a poor understanding of Church teaching that will always be the case. Are sinful people part of the Church…Yes, always have been always will be. As for the Church avoiding subjects because of bad press please be serious. No matter what the Pope says it gets bad press or purposely taken out of context to further an agenda. As this topic shows there may be shortage of vocations to the priesthood but none to the papacy.
That is why I don’t give a lot of weight to personal opinions. Can you document any popes who taught contraception was good? If you can please cite the source so I can read it.
As for ensoulement I stand by my understanding and will respect Jimmy’s rules about going to far off topic.
Take care and God bless,
Inocencio
J+M+J
“Just because you want/need it to be true doesn’t make it so.”
Amen, Inocencio. I hope you’re having a blessed Advent.
Inocencio
You wrote:
” Can you document any popes who taught contraception as good?”
Answer:
None and only 6 who taught the natural methods were good. 259 Popes would have refused to teach the natural methods.
Use NFP….that is not the problem. The Catholic problem is going beyond your own bedroom and calling other people worldwide… murderers…based on inconclusive and geneticist science only while neglecting embryology and its problems with 60% preembryo failure rates in nature, totipotentiality of cells until an embryonic axis appears
and the cell mass dividing at c.14 days into 2 entities becoming identical twins.
Using NFP is good……the bonus of calling other people murderers based on one sided science is a stupid evil that may have turned millions of very literate people away from the Church. The non literates and fleeing Protestants will keep the figures up but Benedict has expressed dark doubts on the 1.2 billion figure.
NFP is good. The ego bonus attached to it of judging the world as murderers is evil.
bill bannon,
I make the same request of you, please document where 259 popes refused to teach natural methods which is the tradition of the Church or stop saying it.
God is Author of life. He can give it or take it. I accept His way are as far above mine as the heavens are above the earth, do you?
Bioethicist Fr. Joseph Howard made clear in a lecture that I attended that at the moment of conception we have an actual person not a potential person. If you google his name you can read to your hearts delight his understanding which based on reason and faith. Or you can contact him through his website here.
The article below is from his website JohnPaulbioethics.org.
Food for thought…The Moment When New Individual Human Life Begins
– C. Ward Kischer, Ph.D. and Dianne N. Irving, Ph.D.
Excerpt:
Actually judging murder as the deliberate taking of innocent human life is good and just. Please count me happily among the non literates of the smaller Church that PBXVI has commented about.
Take care and God bless,
Inocencio
J+M+J
Bill912,
I am having a very busy and blessed Advent, thank you!
You remain are in my prayers please keep me in yours.
Take care and God bless,
Inocencio
J+M+J
Inocencio
So you and your scientific sources must conclude that 60% of humans in the universe never live past pre implantation. Limbo must be a mob scene. Most of humanity is there by your science.
We know about the other 259 Popes because of the process from 1853 onward as the beginning of the natural methods being approved and the uproar from clergy against it being anything more than a lesser evil for onanists. The premier moral theologian, Arthur Vermeesch, who helped in the writing of Casti Connubii, 1930, later in 1934 still recommended it as a lesser evil not as a good and said that Pius IX did not approve of these methods but only meant using the time after menopause. The local Bishops Council of Malines in 1937 still 7 years after Casti Connubii declared that the natural methods would lead to abortions when it failed and that it was only again a lesser evil for habitual onanists. The whole story of that period is found in chapter 14 of Noonan’s ” Contraception” which you yourself quoted above. As late as 1942 an author from the Catholic University of America was rejected by most of his peers for saying the Church saw the natural methods as licit and not as a lesser evil. Permission first came in 1853 and 1880 from the Vatican to use the natural methods but most clergy interpreted those permissions as being the permission of a lesser evil. So Pius XI was the first Pope to permit the infertile time and the moral theologian who helped him write CC later said Pius meant menopause. All of that tells you that the other 259 Popes would not have taught it in that climate that the natural methods were a good. Augustine’s dispargement of them reigned supreme until Pius XII for the majority.
Innocencio,
I have acknowledged that, if Pope John XXI wrote Thesaurus, he wrote it during his duty as official doctor of previous pontiff. Thesaurus was thus published most certainly by Church infrastructure, and no resistance was found. The fact that he wrote it during the previous papacy only shows that his predecessors didn’t mind his stances. Also, after taking the position, John XXI did not stop Thesaurus from spreading. Is this a document? No. Does it matter? No. How Church acted is important.
If the story above is true, your opinion is as good as mine. The fact is outside of our personal goals or wishes. We could both think the same, that wouldn’t change the fact that John XXI was the pope who allowed contraception. And actually encouraged use.
Pope Gregory IX, if he based his decretes on writings of Augustine and Thomas Aquinas (Jerome? Pope Gregory the Great? Justin Martyr?), forbid contraception on the ground that sex is only for procreation. As such, his work can be used as an argument only on shaky grounds. It certainly can’t be used to prove current stand on the issue, since NFP is clearly as contraception as condom using this logic.
Every theologian and pope which held the same opinion on the nature of the sexual act, condemns NFP, as bishop of Hippo.
Happy Advent time to every soul searching the truth. And those who found the truth.
bill bannon,
I already stated I accept God is the Lord of Life. It seems you do not.
I would recommend that you not base your faith or understanding on what popes have not said but on what has been clearly and repeatedly stated.
Since you keep referring John Noonan Jr.’s book I will ask you are you saying he was wrong when he stated:
Also since you mentioned him above, have you read Dietrich von Hildbrand’s LOVE, MARRIAGE And the Catholic Conscience? If not I would humbly suggest you should. I am happily rereading it because of this discussion.
St. Augustine, like the Apostle Paul he is referring to the forbiding of “marriage in the proper sense” namely attempting to seperate the procreative from the unitive.
He makes that clear and shows the constant teaching of the Church when he states:
This is the same situation we are faced with today. Namely “catholics” trying to seperate the unitive from the procreative. What God has joined together let no man tear asunder.
Lord, Have mercy on both our souls.
Take care and God bless,
Inocencio
J+M+J
Sash Milthon,
Then numerous sources of documentation should be readily available so I can read them for myself what was actually written minus any later editions. Also please include the documentation that definitely shows that it was written by the future pope. Since you admitted you cannot produce any documentation and you opinion is merely based on speculation please stop saying the same thing over and over again it will not make it true.
You may accept that you can read the mind of past popes but I do not accpet that. All you have done is speculate what you want to be true. My experience has been that people who have difficulty with the Church’s teaching contraception claim it is a theological problem but refuse to recognize it is a moral problem for them.
I wish you a joyful Advent of soul searching.
Take care and God bless,
Inocencio
J+M+J
Afraid to put my toe in, again, but, a few points…
It certainly can’t be used to prove current stand on the issue, since NFP is clearly as contraception as condom using this logic.
No, it is not. NFP is accidental contraception; using a condom is deliberate contraception. One may make use of an accident, morally, but not a deliberate evil. Contraception means, literally, against conception (or against the beginning). In order for there to be contraception, there must be the possibility of conception. If conception is the number 1, contraception via condom would be -1. They negate each other, logically. NFP would be a zero. It does not alter the value of 1. It does not negate it because conception is not possible so there is nothing to oppose or be contra to.
The Catholic problem is going beyond your own bedroom and calling other people worldwide… murderers…based on inconclusive and geneticist science only while neglecting embryology and its problems with 60% preembryo failure rates in nature, totipotentiality of cells until an embryonic axis appears and the cell mass dividing at c.14 days into 2 entities becoming identical twins.
Genetics and embryology cannot, ultimately contradict each other. As to the twin problem, I see no reason why there can’t be one soul in the original embryo and another one added when the cell twins. There is no problem with twins. Neither is there a problem with totipotent cells, because the existence of a soul does not depend on the types of cells, but on the potential of the cells as an organism. This is pure Aristotelian and Aquinian thinking via hylomorphism. Aquinas defined the soul as:
“the first principal of life in those things in our world which live.”
Totipotent cells are HUMAN cells. If one has to wait until the human is fully developed firthe addition of a soul, then kids could be killed until puberty by that logic, since they are not fully developed. It takes form and matter to make a human. You seem to want to split this unity into embryologists (form) and matter (geneticists). That does a disservice to the unity of the science of biology.
I suggest two books to read:
D’Arcy Thompson, On Growth and Form, who pretty much started the modern science of morphogenesis
and
Rene Thom, Structural Stability and Morphogenesis
Towards the end of his life, Thom (a Fields Medal winning mathematician) came to hold the Aristotelian view of morphogeneis in the cell. His theory, more than any, is the modern mathematical basis for embryology.
The Chicken
Chicken
Where are the Aquinas quotes on the rational soul preceded by the two other souls?
I was born at night but not last night. And stop with the reading list technique of debate or I’ll send you here:
http://www.ts.mu.edu/content/54/54.1/54.1.6.pdf
Innocencio,
When Augustine wrote…
“But there is no marriage where motherhood is not in view; therefore neither is there a wife. In this way you forbid marriage.”
He wrote it three sentences after…
“Is it not you who used to counsel us to observe as much as possible the time when a woman, after her purification, is most likely to conceive, and to abstain from cohabitation at that time, lest the soul should be entangled in flesh? This proves that you approve of having a wife, not for the procreation of children, but for the gratification of passion.”
Both extracts are from his epistulas against Manichaeans and Donatists.
Now, can you please stop accusing Bill for making claims about things popes “didn’t say”, and me for reading pope’s minds? None of this accusations are holding ground. As a matter of fact, you have to prove that popes of Medieval times didn’t find NFP as contraception (I challenge you to do it). Otherwise, we could charge you with the same accusation (of reading Pope’s minds). But that is not what Church is all about.
My experience is that people who talk about Humanae Vitae don’t know about Church Father’s stance on sex as purely procreational activity.
Masked Chicken,
How can you say that NFP is accidental? The unfertile period of a woman is not an accident, it is a part of nature. NFP’s system is based on the idea that sperm will be destroyed because it has no egg to fertilize. Those who use NFP, use it with exclusive wish to destroy semen. The only way how this system is “open to life” is in case that it fails to predict when egg will come. In other words, fertilization is ACCIDENT in case of NFP, not contraception.
Also, let us not forget the logic of original tradition: The only reason for sexual act is conception, thus having relations on days when it is impossible-because it is impossible- is making -1:1 relations to the act.
bill bannon,
I followed your link have you read these documents?
INSTRUCTION DIGNITAS PERSONAE ON CERTAIN BIOETHICAL QUESTIONS
INSTRUCTION ON RESPECT FOR HUMAN LIFE IN ITS ORIGIN AND ON THE DIGNITY OF PROCREATION REPLIES TO CERTAIN QUESTIONS OF THE DAY
Sash Milthon,
Yes…that is why I provided the link so the context would be easy for anyone, well almost anyone, to see.
Your quotation of St. Augustine, out of context, is the one of the few times you have provided documentation and I had to provide a link to the entire text so it could be read in context. You seem to honestly believe you know better than the Church the teachings of the Church. You consistently say that popes, fathers of the Church and saints are wrong in their teaching. You do not have that authority and that seems to be the crux.
I accept the authority and the teaching of the Church and you do not. Please understand that I did not comment on this post to convince you of anything. I leave you to your itchy ears and speculations.
Take care and God bless,
Inocencio
J+M+J
Inocencio
Lol…..define “followed your link”. And if you say “read” in answer, define “read”….distinguishing among skim…speed read…reading proper.
Inocencio
Please describe what kind of the context you think objective reader will see from your link? It is very obvious what Augustine teached. He claimed “only marriage is an excuse for such intercourse” (sexual) and “This proves that you approve of having a wife, not for the procreation of children, but for the gratification of passion.” He attacks the heretics defending his theory that sex is only for procreation. This is additionally covered elsewhere in his work, when he claims original sin is transfered from parents to children because of sex, and that apostle Paul allowed marriage because good things don’t need allowance (marriage is wrong because it involves sex). Not to mention his idea that sex in marriage is always at least venial sin, if not done purely for procreation.
I do not believe I know Augustine better then Church. Such rhetorical maneuvers only show that you do not believe in your own arguments, and need to put extra weight by accusing me of boasting. How on Earth could anybody do anything better then Holy Spirit’s own people? But if the Church Fathers, during centuries, teached that sex is only for procreation, then no authority is capable of changing their thoughts. They can call them wrong, but can’t say they thought something else.
Those who accept these teachings as objective fact, live the Church. Otherwise, we are all modernists who want Church to be something that it isn’t.
“Otherwise, we are all modernists who want Church to be something that it isn’t.”
An example of inadvertantly swerving into the truth while looking into a mirror.
Bill912,
Please don’t do that. I really want to have a decent, Catholic discussion with fellow faithful.
Chicken
Summa Theologica Part I Question 118, article 2, reply to objection 2 in case you are going daft trying to find it….he saw the nutritive soul arriving first then incorporated into the sensitive soul which is later incorporated into the last arriving rational soul so that there is always only one soul but the rational arriving last which may be the reason Trent’s catechism on the Incarnation held for immediate ensoulement only in Christ.
” We must therefore say that since the generation of one thing is the corruption of another, it follows of necessity that both in men and in other animals, when a more perfect form supervenes the previous form is corrupted: yet so that the supervening form contains the perfection of the previous form, and something in addition. It is in this way that through many generations and corruptions we arrive at the ultimate substantial form, both in man and other animals. This indeed is apparent to the senses in animals generated from putrefaction. We conclude therefore that the intellectual soul is created by God at the end of human generation, and this soul is at the same time sensitive and nutritive, the pre-existing forms being corrupted.”
Some as my link showed still hold for his late arrival of the intellectual soul (this area does not fall under infallibilty). It, delayed ensoulement, also serves to mollify an awful possibility in the God commanded stoning of the adultress which was supposed to be done quickly first by the witnesses with the community then joining. What if the couple had been in a remote house for some days such that there was a preembryo within her and then the witnesses discover them and stone her? They are more likely stoning a person within her too in the immediate ensoulment scenario….but not as likely in the delayed ensoulment scenario….but it is still possible in both.
Here’s the easy version from same reply but at the beginning:
” Reply to Objection 2. ….. Consequently it must be said that the soul is in the embryo; the nutritive soul from the beginning, then the sensitive, lastly the intellectual soul.”. St. Thomas Aquinas ST
I don’t know what to say. I read the article you provided. She completely ignores the idea of teleology in favor of a process theory of development, which, in my opinion, is of questionable philosophical value, since her process theory is based on a mere partial understanding of a very complex process. She seems to be picking and choosing the parts that agree with her theory and ignoring the rest. The idea of a pre-embryo is a cute idea – it fits in nicely with the Protestant idea that what happens immediately after conception is nothing but masses of cells and can be easily aborted. This is not, as far as I know, a Catholic interpretation of the data. Her arguments do not seem like a search for truth, but the defending of an agenda.
This is my take on the idea of a pre-embryo and I am glad that this is, as far as I know, the consensus. I refer you to this web site which includes the following:
In 1979, Clifford Grobstein, a frog embryologist, coined the word “pre-embryo.”1 He subsequently admitted that the word was conceived in order to reduce the “status” of the early human embryo, whom he declared to be a “pre-person.”2 He held that since identical twins may occur up to fourteen days after fertilization, only a “genetic individual” is present, not a “developmental individual”, and that therefore an embryo, a “person”, is not present.3 This notion of a “pre-embryo” was also supported in 1979 by the bioethics writings of Jesuit theologian, Richard McCormick, in his work with the Ethics Advisory Board to the United States Department of Health, Education and Welfare.4
“The terms ‘pre-embryo’ and ‘individuality’ have been totally discredited, not only by all Human Embryologists, but have also been rejected by the Nomenclature Committee of the American Association of Anatomists for inclusion in the official lexicon of Anatomical Terminology, Terminologia Embryologica. These terms are not used in any official text book of Human Embryology.”5 They are also not used in the Carnegie Stages of Human Early Development. The scientific evidence indicates that from the moment when the sperm makes contact with the oocyte (ovum), human development is an integrated continuum in which one stage follows another throughout all of life until death, and therefore that the developing human being is both a ‘genetic’ and a ‘developmental’ individual from the first moment of its existence.
My reading list approach was not meant to be insulting and it was not an approach. You made the statement:
…based on inconclusive and geneticist science only while neglecting embryology
If, as I understand this, this is attempting to say that the results of genetics and embryology give fundamentally different results for determining life issues, then this is simply wrong. They are simply two different ways of looking at the same process – one from a molecular level and one from a structural level. They cannot, ultimately, contradict each other (once the science has been refined in both of them and we are very far from this).
My background in science is in quantum and statistical mechanics. Part of my study and current research has been in pattern formation in neural systems, so I know something about morphogenesis, the formation of large-scale patterns from small objects. Reaction-diffusion equations have been used since the 1950’s to model such things as how zebras get their stripes to pattern generation from DNA to how visual patterns are formed. My point was to provide a rebuttal to the notion that geneticists and embryologists are at odds with each other over how structure forms in the embryo. They are not and I simply referred to some well-known if early literature to support my point. If I came off as either condescending or insulting, I apologize. It was not my intention. My suggestion was not meant to sound like, “Here, read these and be enlightened,” but rather, “Read these to see what I am talking about.” The books prove, rather convincingly that DNA (along with other processes) can give rise to the same structures that embryologists see, so there cannot really be a difference in the truth between them. There are way too many other articles to prove this. I cannot see that pitting the two branches of science against each other is going to get anywhere.
Aquinas’s three soul idea does not make each soul different, but three stages in a process, the teleology of which is the same – to become human. The nutritive soul has the same teleology as the sensitive and the rational soul.
The paragraph on Grobstein also states,
He held that since identical twins may occur up to fourteen days after fertilization
Notice the hedge – may occur up to fourteen days. Twinning can occur much sooner.
Again, this seems to me to be supporting an agenda, not doing science.
To Sash Milton:
You wrote:
How can you say that NFP is accidental? The unfertile period of a woman is not an accident, it is a part of nature.
I was using the word accident in the philosophical sense – being periodically infertile is an accident of the monthly cycle. If that date occurs on November first and one has sex on that date, it doesn’t matter whether one is trying to conceive or not. The process is null, regardless if one is trying to conceive or avoid conceiving. It is not contraception, at least not material contraception, because there is no material to contracept. There is no egg. This is not deliberately frustrating conception because in order to frustrate something, it must first be possible to do what one is attempting.
If one has sex on that day without paying attention to whether or not it were a fertile day, the end result will be the same – no conception. We would not call that frustrated sex, since no one happened to be paying attention to the day. There is no blocking of sperm and egg. There is no egg, regardless of the intention. If I intend to kill you and draw my shoe off to fire it like a gun, it matters not whether I want to kill you or not. You simply cannot get killed that way.
If the couple decides to have sex on a day they cannot get pregnant, it doesn’t matter whether or not they want to have a baby on that day or not have a baby on that day. They simply can’t. One cannot give what one does not have. One cannot contracept something that isn’t there to contracept. NFP simply uses this period to have sex. The Church has never ever said that one may only have sex during the fertile period, so it has never said that NFP is really wrong, since to do so would preclude having sex only during the infertile period, which may happen purely by accident of time management, anyway, as in the case of a husband whose job causes him to travel and he just happens to be home during the infertile periods.
I hate to back out of a good intellectual fight, but I have had to go to confession once this week because of my comments in this particular article of Jimmy’s and I while am sure I have posted enough things in this post to be arguing for a week, I am bowing out of the discussion, however, for the good of my soul. I am afraid that these back and forth points and counterpoints do nothing but sow doubt and confusion among innocent people who happen to stumble on this site and I don’t want to be a part of that. My comments in this post may be feeding that doubt and confusion, but I thought I should say something in response to my earlier post.
This is Jimmy’s blog and I am content to let him deal with any confusion that may have resulted from the heated discussions in this combox for this article. This is his vocation. I try to add what light I can, but there is more heat than light being generated now and I think it wise to bow out of this. My apologies to anyone I may have offended in my comments. It was not my intention.
The Chicken
Masked Chicken
If you read some day the entire article, she reviews in survey form the disparate positions within Catholicism as to the world of theology journals and it is there that the geneticists lean toward quick ensoulement and embryology oriented people toward delay. For me the twinning problem is totally cogent against early ensoulement….Augustine ” in each body the whole soul is in the whole body, and in each part is entire”….Aquinas. ” it must necssarily be in the whole body, and in each part thereof.”
ps
You must know of the Chimeric rare person who is the result of two fraternal twin fertilized eggs merging into one cell mass and becoming one person. Immediate ensoulment would prevent it from ever happening since two souls can’t be in one person.
The Chicken,
I was using the word accident in the philosophical sense – being periodically infertile is an accident of the monthly cycle.
Once again, why would infertile period be “accidental” in monthly period? It is not it’s uncommmonity, it is regular part of the process. Sleeping is not an accident of the everday life.
If couple is using infertile period on sole basis that conception can’t occur, their intercourse is not open to life by intention. This is why Church forbade NFP in the past. It did not teach that couple can have sex only through fertile period, it teached that each and every intercourse must be preformed with desire to beget a child. Including those in infertile period.
I understand your wish to get out from discussion. I myself have similar frights regarding souls who might stumble on this discussion, and have spiritual problems with it. But what is alternative? To be quiet, and forget the questions, because of peace of mind? These things will be asked sooner or later, if not by faithful, then by our nemesis. Actually, they are asked by faithful for decades.
I wish God’s blessings to each and every one of us.
I’m usually just a lurker, but it seems to me the only disputed item here is whether artificial contraception is morally permissible for unmarried people because the Church has clearly taught that artificial conception is not morally permissible for married people.
My first question is this: Sex between unmarried people is a mortal sin (under the right circumstances) and that alone is enough to put the person in Hell. What difference deos it make if artifical contraception is also a mortal sin for unmarried people having sex? Hell is Hell. Isn’t that like giving two life sentences without possibility of parole for a combo torture/murder as opposed to one life sentence without parole for a murder without torture?
Also,I’m not clear on the whole “open to contraception” thing. I’m a convert, and before I became Catholic I had a vasectomy. Even though there is no chance for conception (I’m verifiably shooting blanks), my priest said it is OK as long as we are willing to accept a baby if God provides one. Of course we would. Abortion is not even a consideration. My priest also said I have no obligation to have a surgery to try to reverse the vasectomy.
However, condoms and the pill are not 100% effective like my vasectomy. My second question is: Why is OK for me to have marital relations with my wife when there is virtually no chance of conception as long as we’re open to having a baby if that is God’s will and not OK for another married couple, who is also open to having a baby if that is God’s will, to have marital relations when they have a greater chance of conception?
Tim
I’ll only take your hell question due to obligations here. Hell like heaven has degrees
otherwise a person who ended their life with only one mortal sin would be punished as much as someone who was a serial murderer.
If that is the case and all artifical contraception outside of marriage is a mortal sin, then the Church has an obligation to teach against it. However, it seems the Pope is saying just the opposite… the condom form of contraception under certain limited circumstances (i.e. unmarried couples where one partner is HIV positive and the other isn’t) may actually be an indication of a move toward morality (but not a good thing). Since we cannot do evil that good may come of it and the Pope can’t be wrong on a teaching of morals, that strongly implies that the condom form of conception under certain limited circumstances is NOT a mortal sin.
Maybe the theologically trained can figure all this out, but from the perspective of a layperson, it seems we have to go with what the Pope says. He is the Vicar of Christ and we must submit, particularly when we don’t understand the obvious complexity of the issue (3 souls? twin embryos? c’mon… I’m college educated and have a law degree and that completley lost me… *grin*). However, maybe I’m not getting what the Pope is really saying.
What are the parameters of this condom usage concession? Are they as limited as I see them or are the broader?
Tim
I’m back momentarily with scripture for hell’s degrees:
Rev 18:6 Render to her as she herself has rendered, and repay her double for her deeds; mix a double draught for her in the cup she mixed.
Rev 18:7 As she glorified herself and played the wanton, so give her a like measure of torment and mourning. Since in her heart she says, ‘A queen I sit, I am no widow, mourning I shall never see,’
On the condom, google ” principle of double effect” which a Pontifical College prof thinks applies here, Fr. Martin Rhonheimer, an Opus Dei priest. Google his Essay written on this for the tablet. The condom is not just a contraceptive for the HIV person but is a medical implement simultaneously which means it may be a neutral action having two separate effects at one time. Must go.
Something just occurred to me and I’d like to run it by everybody. As an attorney, I work at harmonizing new case law with precedent. One way I can see to harmonize the Pope’s teaching with prior teachings is by analogizing killing somebody to use of a condom:
The Church says killing somebody is a bad thing, but it is OK under certain circumstances (i.e. just war, capital punishment). However, it is a mortal sin when we murder somebody. I think that must be because with war the purpose of killing is to stop agression and with capital punishment the purpose of killing is to protect society and make an example for others, while murder is just for the purpose of killing somebody.
Similarly, sex between the two umarried people is already a sin. Adding a condom for the purpose of contraception would be another sin. However, let’s say the purpose of the condom was not to prevent conception. Maybe the couple would even love to have a baby. However, one partner is HIV positive and doesn’t want to infect his/her partner so they use a condom for that purpose.
The only problem I see with this is this would work for married couples too, and the Church has already taught against condoms and married people.
However, we can distinguish in humanae vitae because it came out before AIDS. When AIDs came into play, the Church clarified the general teaching of in humanae vitae further to account for the situation of a married couple having sex and using a condom for the purpose of preventing infection of the other partner. It’s not a reversal, it’s just clarification for a situation.
How does that work out with theology? Probably a heresy, but hey… I’m a lawyer… what do you expect *grin*
Bill,
I wrote my last post before seeing you had made your post. It looks like my legal analysis would be correct under “double effect”. Am I correct?
Tim,
I think you are correct but others won’t. The real answer lies in whether the Vatican in months to come gives soto voce permission to health workers to recommend ideal us of condoms in all HIV situations and thus side with Fr. Martin Rhonheimer’s view rather than the lesser evil group. Then such permission will show up in the press. The Vatican still could do nothing at all if they think the harm to doctrine from massive misinterpretation outweighs the saving of lives. The Pope’s initial statement looked very limited…but his later saying it applies to females and transexuals is really what seemed to move into the policy arena.
Thank you Bill. Your viewpoint seems compelling, but I’d welcome other points of view (in layman’s terms PLEASE), because I’m not set on this by any means. I’ve used the legal harmonization method to argue exactly opposite positions in two different courts during the same week!
How is everybody else harmonizing the Pope’s teaching with Church Tradition? I’m assuming we’re all on board with the premise the Pope can’t err in teaching on faith and morals (you can argue the Pope is wrong, but frankly I’m just not even going to consider that possbility… otherwise I would have remained a Protestant). Are others who read this blog limiting the recent teaching to unmarried couples where one partner is HIV positive and the purpose is to prevent infection rather than to prevent conception, or are you expanding it to married couples in the same situation? Or, perhaps, have an entirely different take?
Tim Brandenburg,
What difference deos it make if artifical contraception is also a mortal sin for unmarried people having sex?
As you have said it yourself, mortal sin of premarital relation makes little difference whether contraception is used or not. But it is one thing to rob the bank, the other to rob the bank murdering people on the way. If for nothing else, it makes confession a little more complex, since person must confess both sins and correct his life on greater scale. Pope’s remarks on using condom were not in field of theology, he simply said that prostitute using protection at least has sense of responsibility towards situation regarding AIDS, and from this sense further responsibilities could be learned.
Why is OK for me to have marital relations with my wife when there is virtually no chance of conception as long as we’re open to having a baby if that is God’s will and not OK for another married couple, who is also open to having a baby if that is God’s will, to have marital relations when they have a greater chance of conception?
I don’t understand your question. It is ok for couple opened to life to have relations on fertile period. Usually people using NFP are not doing so, to avoid conception.
In your case, body has been changed for reasons you know. Having infertile relations with your lawful wife are fine, since their sterility is not your present will but result of the past acts. Similary as you can drive a car on smaller distances, because tank has been replaced due to accident in the past. Car still serves it’s purpose, and did not lose it’s nature as a vehicle.
I’m sorry, my post was incomplete. I meant how is my non-sinful situation different from the sinful married couple using contraception that is less than 100% effective but who are still open to having a baby if one comes along? I understand condoms are only 97% effectice even when used properly. That is still a better percentage than the 0.0% chance my wife and I have of conceiving.
From your post, I believe you are saying the difference is that I have no present intention to contracept but the other couple has a present intention to contracept. How does the 3% error margin come into play, if at all? How does the couple’s willingness to have a baby if one comes along come into play?
Try thinking in this way. Couple using condoms intends to lower their fertility to roughly 3% (if condoms are 97% efficient). You do not intend to lower yours for a bit. You have no moral obligation to rise the fertility, if that was advised by your priest.
I’m sorry, my post was incomplete. I meant how is my non-sinful situation different from the sinful married couple using contraception that is less than 100% effective but who are still open to having a baby if one comes along? I understand condoms are only 97% effectice even when used properly. That is still a better percentage than the 0.0% chance my wife and I have of conceiving.
From your post, I believe you are saying the difference is that I have no present intention to contracept but the other couple has a present intention to contracept. How does the 3% error margin come into play, if at all? How does the couple’s willingness to have a baby if one comes along come into play?
sorry for the double post.
Tim Brandenburg
Up above you has stated that the Pope is always infallible in morals. This is incorrect but I have seen even priests say the same thing online. Here is part of Ludwig Ott’s Introduction to Fundamentals of the Catholic Faith…online….end of section 8:
” With regard to the doctrinal teaching of the Church it must be well noted that not all the assertions of the Teaching Authority of the Church on questions of Faith and morals are infallible and consequently irrevocable. Only those are infallible which emanate from General Councils representing the whole episcopate, and the Papal Decisions Ex Cathedra (cf. D 1839). The ordinary and usual form of the Papal teaching activity is not infallible. Further, the decisions of the Roman Congregations (Holy Office, Bible Commission) are not infallible. Nevertheless normally they are to be accepted with an inner assent which is based on the high supernatural authority of the Holy See (assensus internus supernaturalis, assensus religiosus). The so-called “silentium obsequiosum.” that is “reverent silence,” does not generally suffice. By way of exception, the obligation of inner agreement may cease if a competent expert, after a renewed scientific investigation of all grounds, arrives at the positive conviction that the decision rests on an error.”