A Response to a Question Posed to Sed Contra on NFP and the Contraceptive Mentality

Over the years, listeners of "Sed Contra," the podcast of the Sacra Doctrina Project, have asked questions about points made in the podcast itself. Here, we begin a series wherein we take our replies to such questions and make them public.

Regarding the episode “NFP and the Supposed Contraceptive Mentality,” a listener asks when it is permissible for a married couple to take recourse to infertile periods so as to be able to have sex while avoiding conception. Dr. Matthew Dugandzic replies:

There are two moral principles at play in answering this question. The first is the perverted faculty argument, according to which one may not use a faculty contrary to its intended purpose (see our previous episode on this). And this is why contraception is illicit and, as Pope Paul VI put it in HV, it is always wrong to deliberately separate the procreative and unitive meanings of the conjugal act. Using NFP to avoid conception does not do this, which is why it is licit in principle. But there is indeed another moral principle at play, which is that one ought to go forth and multiply, which applies to everyone, and married couples in particular promise to "accept children lovingly from God." Unlike the prohibition against contraception, which is a negative norm, the principle to be open to life is a positive norm. Negative norms bind always and everywhere (it is never morally right to commit murder), but positive norms do not bind one in every circumstances, but rather must be applied prudentially to different circumstances (we are not called to honor our mother and father explicitly at every moment of our lives). When it comes to going forth and multiplying, it is worth noting that this norm applies to everyone, even to those with vocations to the celibate life. The important thing to note here is that being open to life also means being prepared to provide for the needs of children materially, intellectually, and spiritually. Those who pursue a celibate vocation do contribute to the education of children by setting themselves apart for holy pursuits and sharing the fruits of those pursuits with their communities. Clearly, then, the norm to "go forth and multiply" can be applied to concrete situations in a wide variety of ways. When it comes to married couples, the default expectation is indeed that they will pursue their conjugal life in a fertile way, but they also must take account of their other obligations to their own children, including those whom they have and those whom they would have if they were to have more. Parents, being the ones primarily responsible for the education of their children, need to be sure that they have the means of educating any particular children that they might have should they choose to engage in the conjugal act. If, then, parents are legitimately concerned that they could not render to their children their due, given their financial, psychological, or other constraints, then they can licitly choose to take recourse to infertile periods to engage in the conjugal act in such a way as to render conception unlikely.