Natural Family Planning International

This is the sixth installment of my commentary on The Human Body: a sign of dignity and a gift by Fr. Richard M. Hogan. For publication details, see the blog for September 9, 2007.

The last published data (1995) on the use of sterilization by religious classification indicated that Catholics, with a sterilization rate of 40+ percent, were by a small margin the highest users of sexual sterilization as their method of birth control. That certainly reflects negatively on American Catholics especially in the light of the teaching of Humanae Vitae in which Pope Paul VI condemned sterilization right after his condemnation of abortion. “Equally to be excluded, as the teaching authority of the Church has frequently declared, is direct sterilization, whether perpetual or temporary, whether of the man or of the woman” (n.14).

There are two sins involved with using sterilization for birth control. The first is the sin of mutilation, the destruction of a perfectly healthy bodily organ. In his booklet, The Human Body, Father Richard Hogan rightly says that this violates the dignity of the human body. It has long been classified as a serious sin against the Commandment, “Thou shalt not kill.” The second sin or series of sins is engaging in sexually sterilized intercourse. This is the sin of contraception.

A problem arises when the spouses repent of these sins. As Father Hogan notes, these sins can be forgiven. The problem is this: What do repentance, sorrow for sin, and a firm purpose of amendment require? Is it sufficient to confess the sin, do the canonical penance, and then go on living as before, enjoying the fruits of their sins every time they engage in a contraceptively sterilized “marriage act.” Or does the sterilized person have to undergo reversal surgery or do something else? Father Hogan says, “the Church does not require such a person to undergo an operation to reverse the sterilization procedure.” That is a misleading statement. True, there is no formal teaching document that spells out what is necessary after sterilization, but it is incorrect to think that formal documents are the only way in which moral teaching is conveyed in the Catholic Church.

There is a long-standing tradition in Catholic moral theology that reversal surgery is required if it can be done without being an extraordinary burden on health or finances and has a reasonable chance of success. As I stated in my work, Sex and the Marriage Covenant (SMC), “If reversal surgery were as simple and inexpensive as vasectomies and tubal ligations, then it would be morally required for all as part of their repentance. This is the common teaching of respected moral theologians. However, it is also a principle of moral theology that extraordinary burdens are not normally required as part of repentance” (p. 221). And I went on to name some well known theologians of the 20th century who supported the reversal-requirement position—Arthur Vermeersch, S.J., Hieronymus Noldin, S.J., and Joseph Farraher, S.J. (SMC notes, p.377).

Reversal surgery is common today. On an interstate highway near Cincinnati, there is a full-sized billboard advertising a vasectomy reversal service in Texas. Such surgery isn’t cheap, but it does not constitute an extraordinary burden for many couples today. Many couples seek reversals simply for a practical reason having nothing to do with morality: they want to have more children. Thus, for many couples today, reversal surgery will be a normal moral requirement because it does not constitute any sort of extraordinary burden. Thus it is incorrect to infer that the Catholic moral tradition does not require reversal surgery. After reversal, such couples will observe the wife’s signs of fertility and will abstain from the marriage act during the fertile time if they still intend to avoid pregnancy.

The real question focuses on the couple for whom reversal surgery would constitute truly an extraordinary burden. The question then becomes, what constitutes repentance? Does repentance require me to say in my heart that I wish I had not done the sin and that if the occasion came up again I would not do it over again? I think so. Is a person repentant if he says in this heart that he’s glad he did it and would do it over again if the occasion occurred? How can that attitude be called “repentant”?

Now apply the first notion of repentance to sexual sterilization. If a sterilized person says, “I wish I had not been sterilized and would not do it again,” that means that he or she wishes he or she were still fertile. In turn that means that if the couple were still fertile and did not intend to seek pregnancy, they would abstain during the fertile time. Next, imagine that it would truly be an extraordinary burden for the sterilized person to undergo reversal surgery. The spouses can still live as if they would if they had not been sterilized. That is, they still can monitor the wife’s fertility and abstain during the fertile time. In my opinion, engaging in the marriage act during the naturally infertile time is moot because their sterilization is not acting contraceptively at such times.

Father Hogan offers a different solution. He says that after the sterilized person has “confessed the sin and received absolution” the couple can engage in the marriage act without any further qualifications. “Morally speaking, in this case, the sterilized person is comparable to a naturally infertile person.” I strongly disagree. A better comparison is that the sterilized person is like the person who is living in the state that Jesus calls adultery: a valid marriage, divorce, and then a second civil but invalid marriage. If that person goes to confession, he will not be told by an orthodox priest that after saying his penance, he can morally engage in the marriage act. The requirement for morally living together is marital celibacy.

He then concludes: “Of course, knowing that a sinful act can be forgiven can never justify doing it.” Well, I agree, but throwing in that little warning after such advice is like using a garden hose to try to extinguish the fire engulfing a whole house.

Unfortunately, Fr. Hogan is by no means alone in his thinking. This is probably the most common confessional practice today. In reality, what Catholics “hear” is that they can get sterilized, go to confession, say a few prayers as their canonical penance, and be home free, enjoying the fruits of their sins for the rest of their lives. This makes a sad mockery of the idea of true repentance and a firm purpose of amendment.

Reread the top paragraph again. Maybe this sort of confessional practice explains the sad statistics. I believe that this practice ignores the reality of the body of the sterilized person and will treat that next week.

Next week: Sterilization in the light of the Theology of the Body.

John F. Kippley
Sex and the Marriage Covenant: A Basis for Morality (Ignatius, 2005)
Natural Family Planning: The Question-Answer Book, a short, readable, and free e-book available for downloading at www.NFPandmore.org .

This is the fifth installment of my commentary on The Human Body: a sign of dignity and a gift by Fr. Richard M. Hogan. For publication details, see the blog for September 9, 2007.

In his booklet, The Human Body, Fr. Richard Hogan attempts to explain why sexual sins are sinful. That’s an important effort, and he gets off to a good start by noting that “It is obvious to most of us that our sexual desires often ‘get in the way’ of a genuine other-directed love. When we ‘give in’ to our desires and act on them, we act selfishly. We act contrary to love. We fail to love ourselves and others. In effect, we sin.”

So far, very good. He then continues. “In acting against ourselves, we violate our own dignity and value because we use ourselves.” Here he makes no distinction between the good use and the bad use of ourselves and others; in his lexicon the word “use” always seems to have a negative meaning. Next he drags in his customary references to theology. “We act in opposition to the wonderful vision of the Church taught in the theology of the body. . . We act in opposition to the marvelous vision of the Church taught in the theology of the family.” I’m sorry, but I simply cannot imagine myself or anyone else having any good effect on a group of young people by saying that sexual sins are wrong because they are in opposition to the marvelous visions of the Church taught in those theologies. Talking about the theology of this and the theology of that simply puts a cloud of smoke between the teacher and the student.

Father Hogan then treats briefly of a number of sins against life and sexuality. Lust in general, pornography, intimate touching, masturbation, extramarital sexual activity, divorce and remarriage, contraception and sterilization, artificial reproductive techniques, abortion, and homosexual activity are treated in that order. He describes each one as contrary to human dignity. In fact, in each treatment he notes that “[the sinful activity] violates both human dignity and the wondrous vocation of love given to all of us as images of God.”

I agree. On the other hand I do not think that this is an effective way to teach the evil of these actions in our contemporary culture because the application of the concept of human dignity to any particular behavior is highly subjective. For example, back in the Sixties, the leaders of the so-called majority report of the papal birth control commission apparently thought that contraceptive behaviors did not violate human dignity. A bit of background is necessary here. The so-called minority report had criticized the majority’s acceptance of contraceptive behaviors as logically accepting oral and anal copulation, masturbation, and direct sterilization. The majority writers responded that their theory did not accept anal and oral copulation because “in these acts there is preserved neither the dignity of love nor the dignity of the spouse as human persons created according to the image of God.” It is important to note that they offered no such reply to the accusations regarding masturbation and direct sterilization. Most important, they offered no such reply regarding common contraceptive practices. In short, those who wrote that oral and anal copulations are contrary to human dignity must have thought that common contraceptive behaviors were within the bounds of human dignity. That’s what I mean by saying that the application of the dignity principle is highly subjective. You can read more on the birth control reports in my book, Sex and the Marriage Covenant, p. 307.

Another example of subjectivity in applying the principle of human dignity is the organization name selected by those who advocate the acceptance of homosexual sodomy and still call themselves Catholic. They use the name “Dignity.” It seems that they think that oral and anal sodomy is within the bounds of human dignity.

As mentioned in a previous blog, Father Hogan has publicly criticized the covenant theology of human sexuality as deductive, objective, and principled. What he finds objectionable about it is precisely what I think is advantageous. The covenant theology of sexuality states that sexual intercourse is intended by God to be exclusively a marriage act. The marriage act then becomes an objective standard by which other behaviors are measured. This standard is derived from the many biblical texts about sexuality. Every form of sexual behavior is condemned except honest covenantal sex. That is, all that is left is the marriage act. You will find a review of the biblical teachings on sex in Chapter 17, “Biblical Foundations” of my book, Sex and the Marriage Covenant.

Using the marriage act as the objective standard, we can then logically explain why adultery, fornication, sodomy and other sexual sins are sinful: they are not marriage acts. The standard also applies to marital contraception. The marriage act ought to reflect and renew the marriage covenant, for better and for worse. The whole purpose of marital contraception, however, is to say “We take each other for better but not for the imagined worse of possible pregnancy.” Regardless of any words they may say, their body language clearly says “but NOT for the imagined worse…”, and actions speak much louder than words.

Next week: Natural family planning and the repentant sterilized couple.

John F. Kippley
Sex and the Marriage Covenant: A Basis for Morality (Ignatius, 2005)
Natural Family Planning: The Question-Answer Book, a short, readable, and free e-book available for downloading at www.NFPandmore.org .