MARRIAGE, CONTRACEPTION AND SEX
EXCERPT FROM HOME SWEET HOME
By Scott & Kimberly Hahn, Catholic Converts
My second year of seminary was Kimberly’s first. Something
very curious occurred when she took a course on Christian ethics…I asked
Kimberly what topic she had chosen.
She said, “Contraception.”
“Contraception?! That was an option last year, but nobody
took it. It’s really just a Catholic problem. Why would you want to study
contraception?”
“I keep running into questions about birth control when I
give talks on abortion. I don’t know why, but I do. So I thought this would be
a good chance to find out whether or not the Bible has anything to say about
it.”
“Well, if you want to waste your time studying a non-issue,
it’s your time.” I was surprised but not really concerned. After all, there
really wasn’t a right or wrong way to look at contraception. Little did I know
how much her study would affect our lives.
A couple of weeks later a friend stopped me in the hall. “Have
you talked to your wife about her study on contraception?”
“Not really.”
“You might want to. She’s come up with some pretty
interesting thoughts about it.”
Given the subject matter, I thought I’d better talk to her.
I asked Kimberly what she found out that was so interesting about
contraception. She shared that before 1930 there had been a unified witness of
all Christian churches: contraception was wrong in all circumstances.
I conjectured, “Maybe it’s taken this long to work out the
last vestiges of Catholicism.”
She challenged me further. “But do you know what reasons
they give to oppose birth control? They have stronger reasons than you might
think.”
I had to admit I didn’t know the reasons. She asked me if I
would read a book on the subject. She handed me ‘Birth Control and the Marriage
Covenant,’ by John Kippley (which has since been revised and retitled ‘Sex and
the Marriage Covenant’). I was a specialist in covenant theology…
I looked at it and thought, Liturgical Press? This guy’s a
Catholic! A Papist!...I sat down to read the book. I thought, “This isn’t right
– it can’t be! This man is making sense. He was showing how marriage is not a
contract, involving merely an exchange of goods and services. Rather, marriage
is a covenant, involving an exchange of persons.
Kippley’s argument was that every covenant has an act
whereby the covenant is enacted and renewed; and that marital act ia a covenant
act. When the marriage covenant is renewed, God uses it to give new life. To
renew the marital covenant and use of birth control destroy the potential for
new life is tantamount to receiving the Eucharist and spitting it on the
ground.
Kippley showed that the marital act demonstrates the
powerful life-giving love of the covenant in a unique way. All the other
covenants show God’s love and transmit God’s love, but it is only in the
marital covenant that the love is so real and powerful that it communicates
life.
When God made man, male and female, the first command He
gave them was to be fruitful and multiply. This was to image God- Father, Son
and Holy Spirit, three in one, the Divine Family. So when “two become one” in
the covenant of marriage, the “one” they become is so real that nine months
later they might have to give it a name! The child embodies their covenant
oneness.
I began to see that every time Kimberly and I performed the
marital act we were doing something sacred. And every time we thwarted the
life-giving power of love through contraception, we were doing something
profane. (Treating something sacred in a merely common way profanes it, by
definition.)
I was impressed, but I was quiet about being impressed.
Kimberly asked me what I thought of the book; I said it was interesting. Then I
began to watch her pick off my friends, one at a time – some of the best and
the brightest changed their minds!
Then I discovered how all the reformers – Luther, Calvin,
Zwingli, Knox, and all the rest – held the same position as the Catholic Church
on this issue.
I grew disturbed. The Roman Catholic Church stood alone as
the only “denomination” in all the world with the courage and integrity to
teach this most unpopular truth…
Catholic or not, it was true. So we threw out the
contraceptives we were using and began trusting the Lord in a new way with our
family plans.
Recommended Related Insights:
- Catholic Answers http://www.catholic.com/magazine/articles/contraception%E2%80%99s-dark-fruits
- Pope John Paul II on Natural Family Planning http://iamacatholicbyheart.blogspot.com/2012/08/pope-john-paul-ii-on-natural-family.html
- Blessed Mother Teresa on the Value of Natural Family Planning http://iamacatholicbyheart.blogspot.com/2012/08/blessed-mother-teresa-on-value-of.html
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