Natural Family Planning International

To teach Natural Family Planning, do you need an expensive PowerPoint projector along with an expensive spare light bulb?  We don’t think so.
        We have access to a PowerPoint program and projector, but we don’t use them.  Instead, we teach directly from our manual, Natural Family Planning: The Complete Approach.   We sit at a table facing the attending couples at their tables.  All of us have the manual from which we teach.   When we asked our attending couples during the first few courses we taught if they would like us to use PowerPoint, we thought they would prefer the “modern” way, but the couples said “no.” They said it was much more personal this way.   We also use a minimum of electricity.
       In the past, we have taught with slides and we have taught with PowerPoint, but we have come to enjoy this simple teaching method. At the time we began teaching for our current pastor about two years ago, we read a review of a book which stated that PowerPoint is now boring and no longer holds one’s interest, that you can grab their attention more by writing on a blackboard or on a napkin!
       This style of teaching can be done even in poor areas that do not have electricity on a regular basis.   If somebody has a computer and Internet access, manuals can be copied from our website when the electricity, computer, and printer are working.  The manuals can also be purchased from the publisher in many countries.   Teaching can also be done outside during the day if natural light is needed. This way of NFP teaching requires little in the way of materials and money.  It requires no equipment.   It is “green.”

Sheila Kippley
Natural Family Planning: The Complete Approach

Part 3 of the right NFP course
The right kind of NFP course can and should teach the most basic lesson in morality “do good and avoid evil.”   Thus it can be an effective vehicle for bringing about authentic renewal within families, the Church and the culture.

      Do good by learning all three common God-given signs of fertility and knowing your times of fertility and infertility in normal cycles.
      Avoid evil by not engaging in contraceptive behaviors and the use of potentially abortifacient drugs and devices.
      Do good by being generous in having children, looking upon them as gifts from God, and bringing them up in the ways of the Lord.
      Avoid harm to your marriage by making sure that your marriage acts reflect the unreserved gift-of-self you vowed on your wedding day.
     Do good by caring for your babies with ecological breastfeeding, thus taking care of their psychological needs as well as providing optimum nutrition and postponing the return of fertility in a natural way.
     Avoid harm to your health by not using potentially harmful methods of birth control.
     Do good by believing that the Holy Spirit guides the Church through its Magisterium.
     Do good by joining the effort to build a culture of life.  Work with NFP International to spread all the goods news above.

What should couples learn in a well balanced NFP program?
What couples should learn is far more than just an inexpensive and effective method of spacing babies.   What they will learn in a well-rounded NFP program will include the following:

How the fertility-menstrual cycle functions
The common signs of fertility and infertility
The importance of well-balanced nutrition for healthy fertility
Natural ways to enhance fertility
The practical, health-related reasons for making the NFP-only decision
The moral and religious reasons for the NFP-only decision
The most accurate way to estimate the due date
Exclusive breastfeeding
Ecological breastfeeding
The return of fertility after childbirth
How to manage special situations
Rules for determining the least amount of abstinence consistent with the available evidence.

John F. Kippley
Sex and the Marriage Covenant
www.NFPandmore.org