NFP

[Don John of Austria]

[quote name='Oik' date='Sep 8 2005, 02:40 PM']Don, I disagree. We will have to agree to disagree here. :
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That I think we can do.

[Brother Adam]

[url="http://www.rtforum.org/lt/lt103.html"]Link[/url]

IS NATURAL FAMILY PLANNING A 'HERESY'?

by Brian W. Harrison

When we hear the Church's teaching on the transmission of human life coming under attack, the attackers are usually those who want to justify contraceptive practices. They denounce especially the alleged "rigorism" or "obscurantism" of Popes Paul VI and John Paul II, who have continued to insist, like all their predecessors in the See of Peter, that it is always gravely sinful for spouses to manipulate, pervert or interfere with the conjugal act in such a way as to impede the possibility of procreation.

However, in recent times there has also been a growing tendency among some traditionalist Catholics to attack the encyclicals of the above Popes from the opposite direction. There are now quite a few magazine articles, booklets, and websites which loudly complain that recent papal teaching on this subject is not too severe or rigoristic, but too lax and permissive. They denounce Paul VI and John Paul II and "the post-conciliar Church" for explicitly permitting and encouraging those procedures now known generically as 'periodic continence' or Natural Family Planning (NFP). As is well known, these expressions refer to the identification and exclusive use of the naturally infertile period of the wife's cycle for having conjugal relations, in circumstances where a married couple has sufficiently serious reasons for wanting to avoid the conception of a new child. Ironically, such traditionalists often join forces with those at the opposite end of the theological spectrum – the liberal 'Catholic' dissenters – in claiming that there is no moral difference between NFP and the use of condoms, pills and other contraceptives. Using the self-same epithet employed by many of their liberal arch-enemies, they refer sarcastically to NFP as "Catholic contraception", claiming that if the Church were logically consistent she would either allow all methods of birth regulation (the liberal proposal) or forbid all methods (the traditionalist proposal).

This 'traditionalist' criticism of NFP exists in various degrees. And I should begin by acknowledging that, in its milder forms – that is to say, when it is directed more against some modern pastoral policies and practices rather than at the Church's authentic doctrine about NFP as such – the criticism seems to me reasonable and just. From what I have seen and read in my years as a priest, I agree with such critics that, among those promoting NFP, there is sometimes a one-sidedness or lack of balance. Married or engaged couples are often taught the legitimacy and the technique of the ovulation or sympto-thermal methods of NFP, but with little or no mention of that other part of the Church's teaching which insists that couples need "just reasons" (Humanae Vitae, 16; Catechism of the Catholic Church [CCC], #2368) for using NFP if they wish to be free from blame before God. (Indeed, quite frankly, I think we really need now from the Magisterium some less vague and more specific guidelines as to what actually constitutes a "just reason".) Very often, such couples hear nothing at all of the fact that "Sacred Scripture and the Church's teaching see in large families a sign of God's blessing and the parents'generosity" (CCC no. 2373). Still less frequently are they informed that, according to the Magisterium, merely temporal or worldly considerations are in themselves inadequate criteria for deciding when NFP can be justified: "Let all be convinced that human life and the duty of transmitting it are not limited by the horizons of this life only: their true evaluation and full significance can be understood only in reference to man's eternal destiny" (Vatican Council II, Gaudium et Spes, no. 51, cited in CCC no. 2371). Taking into account the whole spectrum of biblical and Church teaching in this area, I personally think that we need to bring back the word "grave" into the discourse about family planning. That is, we should be teaching that the temporal or worldly problems to be anticipated by another pregnancy and birth (mainly of health or poverty) need to be really grave in character before a married couple is entitled to conclude that they have a "just reason" for them to use NFP. (I said "bring back" above, because, as I shall show in this article, that key adjective, "grave", has in fact been used by the Magisterium in this context, in certain decisions that have been generally forgotten, but by no means repudiated.)

Having said that, we must now go on to point out the serious error of those Catholic "traditionalists" who go much further than simply to rebuke an unduly lax, permissive and one-sided pastoral approach to NFP, and who claim that the practice is, in principle, immoral, and that it also stands condemned by the previous ordinary (or even extraordinary) magisterium of the Church. Never has the use of quotation marks around the word "traditionalist" been more apt than in this case, because, as we shall see, there was never at any stage a Catholic "tradition" – not even a lower-level, 'non-infallible' tradition – against the use of periodic continence. Practically as soon as the first rudimentary methods of estimating the infertile period arose, with the advance of medical science in the mid-19th century, the See of Peter immediately and explicitly gave its blessing to this practice!

Ignorant of this fact, not a few "traditionalists" are now claiming that, from an orthodox Catholic viewpoint, the very notion of "regulating" or "planning" births and family size is an affront to God, and betrays a lack of trust in his loving Providence. They claim that married couples are always morally obliged either to engage in regular conjugal relations without any intention of "planning" their family size (and so leaving that entirely up to God's Providence); or, if they are really convinced there are grave reasons for avoiding another pregnancy, to abstain totally from conjugal relations for as long as that situation lasts, without making any attempt to identify, and make use of, the naturally infertile moments of the wife's cycle.

Perhaps the most outspoken and uncompromising proponent of this pseudo-traditional view is Mr. Richard Ibranyi, a prolific 'sedevacantist' writer whose booklets, bulletins and website articles ceaselessly denounce the "apostate" Church of Vatican II and the "anti-Popes" who lead it. Ibranyi has recently published a 32-page booklet1 whose conclusions are nothing if not forthright and unambiguous. He declares: "All those who use Natural Family Planning commit mortal sin. There is a natural law upon all men's hearts and the practice of NFP violates the natural law. Pope Pius XI [in the encyclical Casti Connubii] teaches there are no exceptions and no excuses. No exceptions, even if your priest or bishop says it can be used."2

Well, did Pius XI in fact teach this doctrine in his 1930 document? To answer that question, we first need to set Casti Connubii (CC) in its historical context, since that encyclical was by no means the first statement coming out of the Vatican on this subject.

At this point we need to open a little parenthesis in order to clarify what sort of document does in fact constitute a genuine Vatican intervention. This is because some "traditionalists", including Ibranyi, refuse to accept as official, or even as authentic, any Vatican statement which is not published in its official journal, the Acta Apostolicae Sedis (AAS). Many readers will be aware that in recent years there has been something of a revival of the late Fr. Leonard Feeney's rigorist interpretation of the dogma "outside the Church, no salvation". And those who have kept abreast of this controversy will probably be aware that one of the main Feeneyite strategies is to deny the official character, and even the authenticity, of the famous 1949 Letter of the Holy Office to the Archbishop of Boston. Since this Letter, which rejects Fr. Feeney's doctrinal position, was never published in the AAS, his followers claim that it simply doesn't count as an authentic intervention of the Magisterium. (The Fathers of Vatican II obviously thought otherwise, since they cited it along with other magisterial sources in the Council's most solemn document.3) In another of his many publications, Richard Ibranyi, who happens to be a Feeneyite as well as a sedevacantist, refers to this document as "the so-called Holy Office Letter against Fr. Feeney" and brands it (in large, bold type) as "fraudulent".4

The Feeneyite error on this point is evidently based on a misapplication of canon 9 in the 1917 Code of Canon Law (paralleled by canon 8 in the 1983 Code), which states (among other things) that "universal ecclesiastical laws" must be promulgated in the AAS in order to be binding. Now, "ecclesiastical laws" are exercises of the Church's governing office. They are above all 'practical' decisions, establishing that something specific is to be done, or not to be done. Such decisions need to be carefully distinguished from those of the Church's Magisterium, or teaching office, which are above all concerned with the 'theoretical' task of clarifying the difference between true and false doctrine. Now, the 1949 Holy Office Letter clearly fell into the latter category. It decreed no penalty for Fr. Feeney or his 'St. Benedict Center', and issued no command to the Archbishop of Boston to take any specific action in this case. It limited itself to distinguishing authoritatively between true and false interpretations of the dogma under discussion. So there was absolutely no requirement for this Letter to be published in the AAS in order to be both genuine and official.

The fact is, as anyone familiar with standard Vatican procedures knows, that ever since the AAS was established by Pope St. Pius X in 1909, there have always been a great many official statements and decisions of the Popes and Vatican Congregations, including doctrinal documents from the Holy Office and Sacred Penitentiary (in moral questions especially relevant to confessors in the Sacrament of Penance), that never get to be published in the aforesaid journal. Often they are first sent privately by Rome to bishops, and perhaps only years afterwards (as in the case of the 1949 Letter) get published in some Catholic journal or other. The fact that such a journal is not itself an official Church publication by no means implies (as Feeneyites often claim) that the Roman document which it publishes is unofficial. Apart from "universal ecclesiastical laws", which do indeed have to be published in the AAS, the inclusion or non-inclusion of other types of papal and Vatican statements in the AAS is a measure, not of their "official" or "non-official" character, but rather, of the degree of public importance which the Holy See attaches to them.5

Let us now return to the subject of Natural Family Planning. It was first necessary to clarify the question about the necessity or non-necessity of AAS promulgation, in order to forestall a ready-made 'traditionalist' objection to the argument that follows below. For it so happens that several key magisterial documents approving NFP were never published in the AAS. And since they were never even published in the English-language version of Denzinger (a key source of pre-Vatican II doctrine for laymen such as Mr. Ibranyi, who has publicly admitted his own ignorance of Latin), these decisions have apparently remained unknown to those Catholics who denounce NFP as a recent 'modernist' aberration or heresy. At least, I have never seen any of those decisions cited, or even referred to, in 'traditionalist' attacks on the use of periodic continence.

The first time Rome spoke on the matter was as long ago as 1853, when the Sacred Penitentiary answered a dubium (a formal request for an official clarification) submitted by the Bishop of Amiens, France. He asked, "Should those spouses be reprehended who make use of marriage only on those days when (in the opinion of some doctors) conception is impossible?" The Vatican reply was, "After mature examination, we have decided that such spouses should not be disturbed [or disquieted], provided they do nothing that impedes generation"6 By the expression "impedes generation", it is obvious the Vatican meant the use of onanism7 (or coitus interruptus, now popularly called 'withdrawal'), condoms, etc. For otherwise the reply would be self-contradictory and make no sense.

The next time the issue was raised was in 1880, when the Sacred Penitentiary on June 16 of that year issued a more general response (i.e., not directed just to an individual bishop). This time the Vatican goes further: not only does it instruct confessors not to "disquiet" or "disturb" married couples who are already practising periodic continence; it even authorizes the confessor to take the initiative in positively suggesting that method, with due caution, to couples who may not yet be aware of it, and who, in his prudent judgment, are otherwise likely to keep on practising the "detestable crime" of onanism. One could not ask for a more obvious and explicit proof that already, more than eighty years before Vatican II, the Holy See saw a great moral difference between NFP (as we now call it) and contraceptive methods (which Catholic moralists then referred to globally as 'onanism' of different types). The precise question posed was this: "Whether it is licit to make use of marriage only on those days when it is more difficult for conception to occur?" The response is: "Spouses using the aforesaid method are not to be disturbed; and a confessor may, with due caution, suggest this proposal to spouses, if his other attempts to lead them away from the detestable crime of onanism have proved fruitless."8 The editorial notes in Denzinger indicate that this decision was made public the following year (1881) in the respected French journal Nouvelle Revue Théologique, and in Rome itself in 1883 in the Vatican-approved series Analecta Iuris Pontificii.

Now, this was the doctrine and pastoral practice that all priests well-formed in moral theology learned in seminary from the mid-19th-century onward. So before Pius XI was elected, Blessed Pius IX, Leo XIII, St. Pius X and Benedict XV all clearly approved of this status quo established by their own Sacred Penitentiary, and never showed the slightest inclination to reverse its decisions of 1853 and 1880. The future Pius XI himself was not born until 1857, four years after the initial Vatican permission was given for periodic continence. So, like all other obedient and studious priests of his era, Fr. Achille Ratti would have learned and accepted this authentic Vatican-approved teaching which allowed NFP as a means of avoiding offspring. Hence it is seems most unlikely a priori that after being elected Pope he would have had any intention of condemning that practice. It is well known that the main thing prompting him to speak out about contraception at all was the fact that the 1930 Lambeth Conference of the Anglicans had scandalized all morally upright folks by teaching, for the first time ever in the history of those claiming the name "Christian", that unnatural practices, i.e., 'onanism', could be morally acceptable. Periodic continence simply was not the issue in 1930, and in fact, Pius XI did not choose to address that issue in Casti Connubii.

The clearest proof that Richard Ibranyi's interpretation of CC – namely, that it condemns NFP as just another form of contraception – is incorrect is the fact that Pius XI himself very obviously did not interpret his own encyclical that way. Only a year and a half after it was promulgated, the Sacred Penitentiary yet again issued a statement on periodic continence, dated July 20, 1932. (Quite possibly this was because someone, somewhere, was trying to give an Ibranyi-style rigorist interpretation to CC.) This time the ruling, which simply referred back to the same dicastery's previous and positive response of half a century earlier, was eventually made public in the Roman documentary journal Texta et Documenta, series theologica (vol. 25 [1942], p. 95). The decision reads as follows (my translation):

"Regarding the Exclusive Use of the Infertile Period

"Qu. Whether the practice is licit in itself by which spouses who, for just and grave causes, wish to avoid offspring in a morally upright way, abstain from the use of marriage – by mutual consent and with upright motives – except on those days which, according to certain recent [medical] theories, conception is impossible for natural reasons.

"Resp. Provided for by the Response of the Sacred Penitentiary of June 16, 1880."9

Now, it would clearly be preposterous to plead that perhaps Pius XI "never knew" about this 1932 decision, right up to his death seven years later! In all probability he was the first to know about it! Certainly, it was made right under his own nose in the Vatican, and would have been mailed out promptly to the bishops of the world for the benefit of their moral theologians teaching future priests in their seminaries! How could the only Catholic bishop in the world not to know of this 'heretical distortion' (in Ibranyi's view) of his encyclical be the Bishop of Rome himself? Approved moral theologians everywhere continued to teach this settled and authentic doctrine about the legitimacy of NFP for just and grave reasons.10

If we look at what Pius XI actually says in CC, it is clear why he himself saw no contradiction whatever between his own encyclical and the settled doctrine of the Sacred Penitentiary decisions, both before and after the encyclical, which approved NFP. To begin with, if the Pope had wanted to get through a clear message to theologians and the Church in general that he was reversing the doctrine of his four predecessors, i.e., condemning that NFP which they had all permitted, he would never have used the language that he does in fact use in CC. He would almost certainly have used, for the sake of clarity, the accepted language of the theologians of that time, which was practically universal in speaking of sinful onanismus on the one hand (sub-divided into "strict" or "natural" onanism, meaning 'withdrawal', and "artificial" onanism, meaning condoms, chemical means, vaginal sheaths, or any other such 'appliances'), and on the other hand, continencia periodica or usus exclusivus temporum agenneseos, to refer to what we now call NFP. The Pope would have stated unambiguously that the latter, as well as the former, was now to be judged sinful and unacceptable.

It is interesting to note the difference between what Ibranyi says in order to expound his personal (and un-Catholic) doctrine on this matter, and what Pius XI says to expound the true and Catholic doctrine. Ibranyi's doctrine11 again and again repeats words like "plan" and "goal". It is summed up on p. 7, where he says that the essence of sinful contraception (defined by Ibranyi so as to include NFP as well as 'withdrawal' and condoms, pills, etc.) is "the desire to have marital relations while having deliberately planned to prevent conception". But nowhere does Pius XI stress "plans" or "goals" to avoid having children. He does not teach that such a "desire", or such a "deliberate plan", is essentially sinful. What the Pope brands as sinful is "frustrating the marriage act"12, that is, "frustrating its natural power and purpose". But when couples carry out conjugal acts on the infertile days exclusively, they are not "frustrating" the "natural power and purpose" of those acts which they perform on those days. For those particular acts do not have any "natural [procreative] power and purpose" to begin with! You cannot "frustrate" a non-existent power or purpose – or a non-existent anything!

The point comes through clearly in the most solemn (and, in my judgment, infallible) passage of the encyclical. After referring to the recent decision of the Anglicans to permit contraception (though without mentioning them by name), Pius XI declares:

The Catholic Church, to whom God has entrusted the defense of the integrity and the purity of morals, standing erect in the midst of the moral ruin which surrounds her, in order that she may preserve the chastity of the nuptial union from being defiled by this foul stain, raises her voice in token of her divine ambassadorship and through Our mouth proclaims anew: any use whatsoever of matrimony exercised in such a way that the act is deliberately deprived of its natural power to generate life is an offense against the law of God and of nature, and those who indulge in such are branded with the guilt of a grave sin.13

The above is for the most part the standard English translation of this passage. However, I have used the words "deprived of" at the point where that translation uses the words "frustrated in". This makes the Pope's true meaning a little clearer. The Latin verb which he uses here is destituere. And as Latin dictionaries show, this verb, when used with the ablative, as in this case (naturali sua . . . vi), means precisely "to deprive of", "to strip" or "to rob". In such constructions, the accompanying noun in the ablative case is that thing of which the rightful owner has been "deprived", or which has been "stripped" or "robbed" from him. Now, of course, you cannot "deprive" anyone of something he never possessed to begin with. You cannot "rob" a man with no money, any more than you can "strip" him if he is already naked. Likewise, since conjugal acts carried out precisely in the infertile period do not, by the very nature of the case, have any natural procreative potential to begin with, it is obvious that they cannot be "deprived" or "robbed" of that potential.

Hence it is clear that Pius XI's solemn censure cannot be referring to NFP (periodic continence). He must be referring only to those conjugal acts which, if it were not for the unnatural intervention of one or both spouses, would have retained the said "natural power to generate life". In other words, the Pope's condemnation applies exclusively to conjugal acts carried out during what the spouses understand to be the wife's fertile period, but which they deliberately pervert (whether by 'withdrawal', condoms, pills, or any other technique) so as to deprive them of that fertility. They thus dare to raise their hands, as it were, against the approach of the Creator Himself; as if they were traffic policemen with the right to signal orders to the Lord, obliging Him to take a detour: "Stop! Halt! Go back! Not now! No entry allowed here for you!" Couples using NFP, on the other hand, are not guilty of any such presumption. They are respecting God's sovereignty over human life and death, and are simply following their God-given instincts, and using their God-given conjugal right, at those times when the Creator Himself has already made it clear, by the way He has fashioned human female biology, that He has no will to use their spousal love in order to create new life.



Pius XI's successor, Pope Pius XII, confirmed yet again the moral acceptability of NFP, for "grave reasons", in two allocutions of 1951 (on October 29, to the Italian Catholic Union of Midwives, and on November 26, to the National Congress of the 'Family Front' and the Association of Large Families). Since then, of course, we have had still further confirmations of the same doctrine from Popes Paul VI (in Humanae Vitae) and John Paul II (in Familiaris Consortio and many other statements). We are looking here at a long and totally unbroken tradition by which the See of Peter has approved the use by spouses of periodic continence in order to avoid conception, when their personal circumstances truly constitute a just cause for that avoidance. That sort of Catholic tradition ought to be enough to satisfy any Catholic traditionalist.

[Don John of Austria]

Agian do you have a point?

[Brother Adam]

No, no point. You are right no matter what and the doctrines of Don John trump that even of the Catholic Church and all her clerics so I guess it really doesn't matter eh?

I posted that for anyone who may have been interested in why you are wrong.

[Sojourner]

Bro. Adam, any chance you can summarize that? I've only got a few minutes here and there. No time to read full-on articles.

[Don John of Austria]

[quote name='Brother Adam' date='Sep 8 2005, 02:55 PM']No, no point. You are right no matter what and the doctrines of Don John trump that even of the Catholic Church and all her clerics so I guess it really doesn't matter eh? 

I posted that for anyone who may have been interested in why you are wrong.
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There are no doctrines in dispute here, no one ever said that NFP was Heresy, NOT EVER!


You really don't read very well do you, or perhaps itis because you don't read carefully, try this ---go back and reread the very first post, then start reading down the page, then come back and talk to us, until then please refrain from document dumps which have no bearing on the discussion at hand.

[argent_paladin]

I think that while DJ is correct in the main in his arguments, his intemperate and sloppy style has caused much unnecessary and unfruitful discord.
Somehow, the addition of the word "the" changes the entire meaning of a phrase: "manipulating the ovulation" vs "manipulating ovulation". And of course, he adds "of the woman" to distinguish it from male ovulation, I suppose.
I think it is necessary to distinguish (I wouldn't be a Thomist if I didn't distinguish) between an event and knowledge of the event. One can manipulate both an event or, analogously, the knowledge of an event. DJ's ambiguous use of "manipulate" left open an interpretation that he meant the former. Since manipulating the ovulation event is intrinsically immoral, that seemed to be his argument. However, he later clarified that his argument was that NFP manipulates the knowledge of ovulation, not the event of ovulation. However, it is more difficult to support that using knowledge, in itself, is immoral. Surely there has to be an act that results from this dangerous knowledge (in this case, knowing when ovulation occurs).
It is not intrinsically immoral for a married couple to have sex nor to abstain for a time nor to have knowledge of ovulation times. DJ asserts, however, that it is (or maybe, I'm not sure) immoral to BOTH have knowledge of ovulation and, based on that knowledge, to have sex during infertile periods. But that canot be intrinsic, but rooted in the intention. We must examine the intentions behind refraining from having sex during infertile periods.
If DJ is reminding us that one needs grave reason to refrain, he is completely correct. That is magisterial teaching. If he is saying that there are no grave reasons, he is mistaken. I don't think that is what he is saying however, but the imprecision and passion of his arguments leave open that interpretation.
(BTW, it is "track" not "tract")
I disagree that knowledge of ovulation is not inherent in the act of NFP. It is critical in forming the intention to refrain from intercourse. That would be like saying that the knowledge of the victim is unimportant in defining or assessing the act of murder. But, depending on that knowledge (i.e. if the victim was an aggressor, a convicted felon, an enemy soldier) it changes the essential nature of the act. Possessing knowledge changes intention, intention forms act.
I will soon start another NFP thread, which I think will engender a lot of discussion. I hope to have it up soon.
P.S. DJ, you are supposed to be hammering infidels, not fellow Catholics and brothers in Christ!

[Sojourner]

[quote name='Don John of Austria' date='Sep 8 2005, 03:08 PM']There are no doctrines in dispute here, no one ever said that NFP was Heresy, NOT EVER!
You really don't read very well do you, or perhaps itis because you don't read carefully, try this ---go back  and reread the very first post, then start reading down the page, then come back and talk to us, until then please refrain from document dumps which have no bearing on the discussion at hand.
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Thank you.

[Brother Adam]

[quote name='Don John of Austria' date='Sep 8 2005, 04:08 PM']There are no doctrines in dispute here, no one ever said that NFP was Heresy, NOT EVER!
You really don't read very well do you, or perhaps itis because you don't read carefully, try this ---go back  and reread the very first post, then start reading down the page, then come back and talk to us, until then please refrain from document dumps which have no bearing on the discussion at hand.
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Quite obviously you don't read very well.

That and your arguments are empty of Christian thought and charity, but this is not unusual for "More Catholic than the Pope" traditionalists.

Edited September 8, 2005 by Brother Adam

[IcePrincessKRS]

[quote name='Don John of Austria' date='Sep 8 2005, 03:38 PM'][b]Objectively NFP is not about understanding a womens body, that is notthe purpose of NFP I understand all about womens bodies,[/b]....  [b]NFP is about regulating the birth of Children, objectively it is only about that,[/b]
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This IS true, whether people like the way it sounds or not. If not to regulate birth then why the hell practice or learn NFP in the first place? I practice NFP, I have used it in good conscience to avoid pregnancy when I knew that it was not prudent for us to have another child.

We regulate the births of our children using NFP to know when to conceive. Objectively it IS about regulating. Our motives come in [b]subjectively[/b] and make the practice either morally right or wrong.

The moral permissibility and approval of the use of NFP by the Church is NOT in question here.

Am I the ONLY one around here who understands what DJ is saying???

Edited September 8, 2005 by IcePrincessKRS

[Carrie]

[quote name='IcePrincessKRS' date='Sep 8 2005, 05:32 PM']Am I the ONLY one around here who understands what DJ is saying???
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No.


Dj and I understood each other way back on page 2. :

[Jake Huether]

[quote name='Oik' date='Sep 8 2005, 01:13 PM']In that sense Jake, I then disagree.

If manipulation is to change the end result and God controls the end result in NFP, then NFP has notthing to do with changing the end result. Also, treating fertility diseases would then also count as manipulating. This is of course a stance that coulkd be tweaked if one made the distinction of positive, licit manipulation (as in life saving operations) and negative manipulations (as in plastic surgeory).

Even still, I don't see that NFP manipulates anything here. The woman consents, the man consents, the process charts biological markers. The couple has the option to share the marital embrace whenever they want, during any part of the charting really. It is left up to the couple here.

What is being manipulated? Even of the end result were to avoid preganacy (and even for inccorect reasons) the process is not inherently contraceptive on an objective level. It might be subjectively used as a contraceptive mentality, but this then falls on the couple, not on the method itself.
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Okay... so now I'm being misunderstood.

I never said NFP manipulates anything....

NFP [b]may[/b] be used to manipulate.

NFP on it's own is just a method of understanding something; namely, the fertility cycle of a woman.

And God doesn't "control" the end results of NFP. Man uses NFP to work with Nature, which controls the end result. God controls all things if you want to get technical, I suppose. But the end result of NFP is either to avoid pregnancy or to achieve it. Both of which are good in their respective place.

But to avoid pregnancy using NFP for immoral reasons is a manipulation of the ovulation of a woman.

So to is the use of NFP to achieve a pregnancy when it would be a clearly abusive or irresponsible move on the part of the parents.

NFP when used with the right intention is a gift from God.

[Brother Adam]

A better question is "why the hell" does this topic make peoples blood boil over

But maybe you are the only one who understands what DJ is saying. Because as far as I can tell your use of NFP is sinful in DJ's eyes if you use it to have sex during times that you know you are infertile to prevent yourself from having a child. The only way it would be permissible is specifically to always have children, and the only permissible way to avoid children is total abstience. Which we know is not Church teachign.

[IcePrincessKRS]

[quote name='Carrie' date='Sep 8 2005, 04:36 PM']No.
Dj and I understood each other way back on page 2.    :
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:

[argent_paladin]

I think you are being disingenuous, Don. You say that
[quote]There are no doctrines in dispute here, no one ever said that NFP was Heresy, NOT EVER!
[/quote]
But, then you said this:[quote]Those that are agianst NFP for birth control find that it is still an attempt to manipulate sex so that one gets the pleasure of sex without truely being open to life, it is a matter of intentionallity. The intent of NFP is often to not have children( it can of course be used to have children) and Traditionalist Catholics often oppose it on the grounds that it defies the meaning of sex and Divine Providence. [/quote]

You don't attribute the arguments in the first quote to yourself, but you don't present them objectively, but rather in a way that makes the reader suspect that you are sympathetic to them. If that is the case, then you are sympathetic to the argument that NFP for spacing births is not (note: not "may not be") "open to life". But then you say it is intentionality, not the act, which is correct. The rest is also consistent with the Magisterium.
However, your ambiguous grammar (especially the placement of "often" allows for various interpretations, some orthodox, some heretical.
Interpretation I: Many Traditionalist Catholics oppose it...
Interpretation II: Traditionalist Catholics oppose it on the grounds that it often defies...
Interpretation III: Traditionalist Catholics often oppose it (which I suppose would mean that they are inconsistent? Wouldn't they always oppose it if it meant defiance of God?)

I find the most obvious interpretation to be the worst. The first two are fine.

But then you also wrote the infamous sentence:
[quote]You can narutally space them by simply not having sex for a year or so, you don't have to manipulate the ovulation of the women, so that you can have your cake and eat it too. [/quote]
This, in contrast to the first quote, seems to be your own personal opinion. You are implicitly condemning NFP to space births as immoral because there are no grave reasons, since you believe that it is simple to not have sex for a "year or so". If you are correct, that it is simple, then you would be correct that NFP would be unnecessary and thus, you would avoid the manipulation.
And manipulation has very negative connotations (note how strongly people reacted against it). By using that word specifically, you implicitly condemned NFP. Also, by opposing "narutally [sic] space" with NFP, you are saying that *Natural* Family Planning is not natural at all.
This is why I say that you are being deliberately misleading. You say that NFP is not a heresy, but then you STRONGLY imply that it is not necessary (should never be done) and that it is unnatural. The worst part is, you do this by insinuation and implication, rather than actual arguments so that others who pick up on them and try to argue against it cannot. Make your argument clearly, without attacking others (like their reading comprehension) and don't use emotional language. That's all I ask.