Just against abortion

In this whole morass of complaint and denunciation about sex, it seems that conflation is the game afoot.

Conflation is "unity in confusion" -- that is, bringing two terms together in a union where meaning is diminished, if not completely effaced.

Here is one example. One well-known ecclesial community insists on conflating contraception and abortion under the single term "birth control."

They also conflate the morality for which a Christian is responsible with the ethics that any citizen must follow. In turn, they conflate ethical behavior with public policy, and wrap that conflation in the flag of the "public square."

Abortion is the destruction of a pre-born human. Contraception is the prevention of fertilization -- the obstruction of the sperm from penetrating the egg.

An abortion can be accomplished by dilation and curettage (as most of us in the old anti-abortion movement know pictorially). It can also be accomplished by the introduction of certain abortifacient drugs, like RU486.

In either case a human is destroyed, whether in fetal or zygote form.

However, this destruction does not happen when a condom is used (in the best of circumstances). A membrane stands in the way of fertilization and mechanically frustrates the sperm from its appointed task. A spermicide accomplishes the same objective, with the destruction of sperm before fertilization (but not the embryo or a zygote). A birth control pill prevents the release of an egg from the ovary into the fallopian tube.

This is an important distinction, because it should be plain that the two terms, “abortion” and “contraception,” should not be nested in the same category.

Such a category that contains both terms is bound to cause trouble, and some of that trouble is unnecessary.

It is interesting that contraception is accomplished, also, when non-mechanical means are employed. Like coitus interruptis. Like other acts of non-intercourse sexual activity (this must be said in an age when adolescents and former Presidents engage in so much linguistic perversity about this topic).

And – here’s the main point – like the deliberate scheduling of sexual relations while consulting fertility cycles.

Yes, "natural family planning" is just as contraceptive as the use of condoms or birth control pills.

Saying otherwise requires a casuistic intellectual program that evades the simplicity of moral demand with Pharisaical panache.

Conflating contraception with abortion unnecessarily weakens the fight against abortion.

I have heard, in the last few weeks, a Republican primary candidate reflect on the issue of contraception, especially since Roman Catholic bishops were threatened, seemingly, with being forced to furnish contraceptives to employees of Catholic hospitals and other institutions.

I should say here that I oppose any coercion that would force someone to act against their moral practice. I say this not because I am a libertarian, because I am certainly not that. And I am not consistent either -- at least, not in a superficial manner. I would support the forcing of Jehovah's Witness parents to give proper medical treatment to their dying children. I support the government's interest in taking the side of Terry Schiavo's parents (who wanted to prolong her life) against her legal husband (who was already co-habitating with another woman).

Neither the Jehovah's Witness nor Ms. Schiavo's husband represented a motive to protect life. The preservation of life -- the true "pro-life" position -- should have been preferred (it wasn't).

Thus, no Roman Catholic should be forced to pay for any abortion. Nor should they be forced to pay for any contraception (even though I disagree with some of their scruples against contraception).

Santorum (who is the Republican mentioned above) opined recently that the historic opposition to contraception was due to the possibility that contraception leads to promiscuity.

This, I think, is one of the main reasons why contraception is conflated with abortion, and why it is so consistently opposed. There are a raft of articles (both in print and on the web) and books that bewail contraception for contributing to the fall of civilization and the decline of morals.

I do not disagree. Indeed, contraception probably does “help” promiscuity. If fertilization and pregnancy exist as mere deterrents to sex (much like capital punishment may be said to be a deterrent to crime), then the modern wide availability of contraception certainly opens the way to deterrent-free sex.

It is true that such sexual behavior is a hallmark of modernity. Sex is unnaturally removed from its natural setting in marriage and is isolated within a frame of temporal eros (at best) and (more probably) simultaneous lust and/or masturbation.

One of the tragic difficulties of this entire melancholy conversation about “birth control” is that it must be done in the grievous context of sex ripped out of the home, and thrust out into the front yard. Sex is whole, and its meaning is intact, only when it persists under the veil of mystery and play, and within the order of marriage.

But now, sex has become a clinicalized hybrid of sport and therapy. Even Christians have gotten into the pseudo-science game of technique and orgasmic quest, with “Christian sex therapy” as a possible choice in the “helping industry.” More children are born to young mothers outside of wedlock (if that is a meaningful word). More couples engage in cohabitation. More one-night stands are part of the first-date curriculum. More transgressive behaviors are attempted for the cause of experiencing greater intensities. Sexual orientation is hypothetized and objectively defined (in isolated extrapolation), but only exists as a predictable disordered intensification on anyone’s continuum.

Theos-free eros has displaced agape, and has produced only a myriad of idiosyncratic sexual dervishes, whirling down ever-constricted vortices toward a zero-point of goetic philautia.

I am not disgusted here. I am worried by this state of things. There is a difference, so predicate your response on that important distinction.

(But enough of that sermonic excursus – suffice to say that the intensity of such disorder and transgression should always incite some sort of prophecy.)

Prior to the wide availability of contraception (especially the pill), women were obliged to risk pregnancy at every fertile intercourse. If a pregnancy was not wanted, one of two things happened. The first was mandated by a Church: sex was simply avoided.

But this avoidance -- called "natural family planning" -- seems, too, to violate the Scriptural maxim of St. Paul, who directed married couples to fast from intercourse only upon mutual agreement, and only for the ascetical purposes of prayer. While it remains to be seen what St. Paul actually thought of "procreation-only" sex, it must be said that St. Paul does not, in this Scriptural discussion, encourage the cessation of sex for purposes of birth control.

Frankly, I do not think that sex is reserved only for procreation. I know that many voices in Tradition say so, and I do not complain about anyone who takes this strict position. I do say that sex belongs in marriage: it is debatable whether sexual arousal has any place outside of marriage. It certainly plays a part in all romance: it should be, in a nicer world, rooted in the romance of courtship.

But it cannot be denied that the deprivation of contraception lays a disproportionate burden on women. This is a sad historic fact that bothers everyone of good will. Some, unfortunately, repress the reality of the fact. 

In an age of bad medicine and little contraception, the frequency of women dying in childbirth was much higher than it is today. There have been no males who have died either from childbirth or pregnancy. I know that in the prayers of the Church we pay attention to that differential: but there ought to be some acknowledgment of this fact in conversations about public policty.

And in any age (and probably moreso before widely-available contraception), transgressive husbands avoided childbirth by taking their wares elsewhere: so I suppose that male adultery, too, is a form of contraception (or "un-natural family planning").

Let us consider, now, an unlikely possibility. Let us suppose that contraceptives were not available at all. The first noticeable difference in this hypothetical world is that the number of abortions would have sky-rocketed. To say otherwise is a near absurdity. There are two reasons for this increase of infanticide. One is that most human beings live outside the contours of the Christian community, whether Orthodox, Roman, evangelical or mainline protestant. Thus, most human beings give no consent to the old interdictions of the church against certain transgressions. There may be some yet who harbor very latent notions about Natural Law, but these notions are becoming more latent under the hegemony of consumerist globalization.

And, let us be honest here about the second reason: the Christian community has not been all that effective in inculcating the interdictions of Holy Tradition. Thus, there will be more “Christian” abortions (as have happened indeed).

But it is the second noticeable difference that I want to consider mainly. Christian families who are more obedient to traditional dogmas will be larger. “More than two” will become more the rule than the exception. The “quivers” will be fuller. Certain less noble agenda will have been accomplished: some demographic objectives – that is, the preservation of a certain dominant status – will have been realized merely by the presence of more preferred children (if only the native Americans, four centuries ago, would have had their own Buchanan sounding the alarm, as in “The End of Red America”).

But this dream, as nice as it might be, neglects some cultural realities. A Christian “quiver-full” society is impossible in an industrialized consumerist society.

Give me a distributist, home-guild economy and a justice-based culture (free of race-based bigotry), and I’ll join you in a contraceptive-free agenda. Give me a welfare program that protects marriage and fatherhood, too. Give me, too, a respect for labor that recognizes the possibility that the working poor work a lot harder than the rich.

Why does this have anything to do with sex?

Because sex is meaningful only in marriage – a marriage that is free to grow into eternity … a marriage that is sustained by feasting, sacrament, prayer and fasting and forgiveness … a marriage painted, over time, into an icon of Christ and His Church.

Such a marriage is more likely in a true Christian culture -- a culture that has not been found wanting: rather, in GK's words, it has not been tried. In such a culture, conceptions need little rationalistic planning (to coin an Oakshottian phrase). And before you accuse me of being irresponsibly eschatological, bear in mind my sort of Orthodox eschatology has nothing to do with LaHaye (and neither does my regard for sexual technology).

Marriage is not made meaningful by sex – which seems to be the idiotic notion of the time.

Rather, sex is made meaningful by marriage. And marriage is being attacked not by politics (another idiotic notion) – but by the more profound movements of a stupefied culture and bestial economy.

If Christian marriage were free of the caustic environment of this advertising age – an age so given to soliloquy, hyper-comfort and rebellion against the Apostles – then fertility would need no artificial controls.

But as it is, fertility needs prayed on, and obeyed on.

Sex that is understood within the design of prayer and fasting, childlike wonder, duty and devotion, eternal chastity, play and nuptial celebration, a shy winsomeness and freedom and kenosis -- that sort of sex needs no legislation against contraception.

Faithful obedience and contraception are not mutually exclusive.

It would be better if the Roman Catholic (and Orthodox and evangelical) public position would be simply "anti-abortion." Not advertised or identified as "pro-life," because that term has been confused almost hopelessly. The "pro-life" term is weakened (in the bombast of many) by a simultaneous rejection of other liberal, anti-libertarian motions: like universal healthcare, racial justice and equality, environmental protection and safety nets for the poor.

The anti-abortion agenda is inherently “liberal” in that it asks the state to curtail individual choice: just as the state is asked by liberals to demand offerings for universal safety nets and national parks.

It is also “conservative” in that it asks individuals to respect the vestiges of Holy Tradition. They can call these vestiges “Natural Law” if they want to.

What I ask of people who call themselves conservative in this hot mess of sexualized political so-called “debate” is that they first stop being right-wing (or left wing) in their outlook, and simply embrace a disciplined and Christian rule of conversation …

… a conversation that will be, simultaneously, conservative and liberal. 

Comments

[Fr N]

Admittedly I am behind in my reading...

I agree with Fr. Joseph and TM. Contraception is part of the argument so long as it effects abortion - which it can and in many cases does. http://www.nichd.nih.gov/health/topics/contraception.cfm - a government site outlines the potential abortive nature of contraceptives.

Moreover, St. Basil specifically rules out any artificial distinction between the "formed" and "unformed" conceptus (The Rudder, pp. 789-790). Thus, any abortion is seen as an evil - irrespective of method(s).

NFP is about moral discipline, commitment, and love; NFP does not impede theosis or the Mystery of Sacred Matrimony. Given the foregoing, criticism of NFP as simply an equivalent means of contraception is a false argument. NFP is about not about the "sarx" - it is about "soma."

JPII's 'Theology of the Body" takes an integrated and synthesized theological perspective - focusing on "soma" (the whole person) vice "sarx" (the flesh) - and I believe St. Paul focused on "soma." So, too, did Irenaeus and Clement. In an article entitled "Asceticism and Anthropology in Irenaeus and Clement" John Behr noted: "That which Adam lost in the apostasy was the strength of the breath of life, which would have kept Adam immortal, and his ‘natural and childlike mind’ or the ‘robe of holiness from the Spirit’, and both of these are the expressions or results of man seeing God through the creation, recognizing the fact that he is created and therefore dependent upon his Creator, an attitude of thankfulness and obedience. It is this recognition and disposition that enables man to live, whether animated by the breath of life or vivified directly by the life creating Spirit. The truly living man is the glory of God, and this is the one who was fashioned in the image and likeness of God. Having lost the strength of the breath, mans life is now mortal. But in Christ man has been given the possibility of living by seeing the Father, by receiving, as an adopted son, a pledge of the Spirit which prepares him to be fully vivified by the Spirit in a permanent fashion, thus rendering the likeness secure." This, I believe, is in consonance with JPII. Agree or disagree with the numerous talks (>100) on the 'theology of life' - aside from the various strictly-unique-to-Rome aspects of the talks (which is the Pope's prerogative) - I see little difference in the articulated interpretations of Paul, Irenaeus, Clement, and JPII vis-a-vis their intent to look at life from the "soma" perspective. (While brilliant, I wonder if Michael Oakeshott shared the same perspective?)

The real issue before this nation is not one of personal choice and contraception, but one of the imposition of an over-riding theology of the state.

I completely agree, perhaps, the issue is mis-characterized with the use of "pro-life" - when it reality is ought to be about "life" [period]...

I agree with the Assembly of Bishops and their objection to the HHS mandate regarding [quote] “contraceptive services” including abortion-inducing drugs and sterilization services [unquote].

[TM]

Thanks for you response - we will never settle such deep misunderstandings in this venue.

I will point out one thing:

"Theology of the Body" is a very apt and appropriate term since "Theology" means "the study of God", and since we are created in the image and likeness of God, body and soul, the Theology of the Body helps us to discover wonderful truths about God through the study and meditation on the human body, especially the sexual nature of the body, the most misunderstood aspect, but the aspect which most reveals in this physical world (both East and West) the God of Love.

God bless us all -
TM

[Fr. Jonathan]

Fr. Joseph, I think it should be clear from just a cursory reading on this site that there is no doubt that life begins at conception, body and soul.

I do not endorse the use of any particular birth control or contraception. I was simply writing a critique of the Roman Catholic denunciation of contraception and its concurrent commendation of natural family planning.

What I do endorse is that sex should be completely reserved for a traditional marriage; and that marriage, in turn, be characterized by communion, prayer, kenosis, fidelity to the church, chastity and fervent love.

I also suggested as well that the possibility of large families for every Christian marriage is more likely in a more just and less capitalistic environment.

[Fr. Jonathan]

First of all, TM, I am aware of the argument of The Theology of the Body, even though that odd mix of words is difficult accept in the Eastern Tradition. "Theology" is properly reserved for the relations of the Trinity. It would have been better to use the word "Ethic" or "Moral Science."

I am also aware of some of the difficulties raised by the pill. The possibility of a fertilized egg presents a problem for this form of contraception, and I do not deny this.

I find, however, the argument against contraception in general, where condom use in particular is regarded as, technically, "mutual masturbation," at least arbitrary, if not tendentious.

I persist in my critique of NFP as essentially contraceptive, and in violation of St. Paul's expectation of married couples to abstain only for the cause of prayer, not birth control.

You detected not a "tone," but an "argument" against the Catholic prohibition of contraception. My sympathies usually lie with the Roman Church on many issues, including those for social and racial justice.

I maintain my anxiety that the Roman position against contraception weakens the fight against abortion, due to needless conflation.

[TM]

I agree with some of your sentiments, but also take offense at your tone against the Catholic position (I am Catholic, and I also support the Church's position against contraception.)

The point is that there is indeed a clear connection between the advent of contraception (which all Christian groups were opposed to until the Anglican's caved in the early decades of the 20th century) - a clear connection between contraception and abortion. Both are anti-child, anti-life, and both pull the sexual act apart - the proper sexual act is both procreative (reproduction) and unitive (bringing two people together) - when the unitive element is embraced and the procreative rejected, a myriad of problems develop, in relationships and in society. When contraception fails, abortion is employed, to deal with the unwanted "by product" of sex: a baby. Other forms of sexaul expression are deemed as equal to monogomous heterosexual marital relations.

Natural Family Planning (NFP) is not contraception, even if you say repeatedly that it is: NFP preserves the sex act in its entirety: the couple gives themselves totally to each other. They are not obliged as married couples to have sex every day - if they mutaully choose to have sex when the woman's body happens to infertile, then this is not contraception, it is prudence. The sex act remains full and intact in NFP.
However, when a condom is placed between them, the couple is not giving and receiving each other; it is not sexual intercourse in truth, but basically mutual masturbation. The sex act has become a selfish act.

You must also realize that one of the most common forms of contraception (The Pill) can allow an egg to be fertilized but then not be allowed to attach to the uterus, thereby causing an abortion without the woman's knowledge - also the Pill is very harmful to the woman's body in general. It also places a barrier between the wife and her husband, where in essence she does not receive him fully in the sex act, she rejects his sperm, to speak frankly. She has closed off her body to the reception of new life, but wants to enjoy the sex act nonetheless, although sex was joined by God to life and procreation.

There is so much more to this issue than you described, and more than what I have tried to explain here. I humbly suggest that you research more on the topic, read some books on John Paul II's teaching on "The Theology of the Body" (Christopher West has several good primers). Then you will be better informed to tackle this very complex issue.

Thanks and God bless,
TM

[Fr. Joseph]

A most relevant question is when you believe conception begins. If you think it begins at conception, then as an Orthodox Christian a couple may want to steer clear of any hormonal methods (pill, shot, patch, ring, etc) since these seem to work in three ways: preventing ovulation in the first place, altering the vaginal environment and/or cervical mucous to make it inhospitable to sperm, and PREVENTING IMPLANTATION OF A FERTILIZED EGG ONCE CONCEPTION HAS OCCURRED.

Now that being said: There is evidence that hormonal methods do not actually prevent implantation of a fertilized egg, and there is evidence that they do. It´s hard to tell for sure because so many conceptions (I´ve seen numbers of anywhere between 50-75%) fail to implant regardless of whether or not birth control is used. So we are not sure if the failure of a fertilized egg to implant, when the woman is on birth control, is actually due to the birth control itself or if its just because that´s the way mother nature is regardless.

[Stella]

Lotar: Exactly.

I have health issues making pregnancy dangerous. Well, by now, I'm old enough that it would probably take a miracle for me to become pregnant anyway. But, some years ago, I had breast cancer. Treatment did not render me menopausal, as it does for many, so you'd better believe I used contraception (non-hormonal) after that, because the estrogen load of pregnancy can easily trigger more breast cancer.

[Lotar]

I couldn't agree more. This whole business of casting contraception as a pro-life (I do like your calling it anti-abortion) issue only lends credence to the argument that pro-lifers are "really" about maintaining undue control over the personal lives of women.

[Fr. Jonathan]

Yes, I stand corrected: there are healthcare rationales beyond childbirth for contraceptives. I, too, am intimately aware of such endangerment.

Though none such acutely as your experience, Lotar.

Actually, my main point was to wage a critique against the conflation of contraception with abortion, and to haul out the old complaint that "pro-life" isn't lively enough.

[Lotar]

Father, I will say that I think the Catholic position is also insanity. It is an understandable insanity for me, because I shared in it for some time, which I cannot say for blood transfusions and the like. Nevertheless, even JWs have theological reasons for their irrationalities.

In my own family, both of my sisters are or have been on the pill for medical reasons unrelated to sex. My wife and I are in the situation of me being on daily chemotherapy, which means, beyond the difficulty of raising children whilst on chemotherapy, we have the real possibility of birth defects and miscarriages. There are also cases of women whose lives would be endangered by further pregnancies - my wife's godmother had this situation. There are many cases where there are real medical reasons to use contraception, beyond just not wanting a baby.

[Fr. Jonathan]

That is a good point Lotar. But you said it first: JW "insanity," based on a ridiculous denial of medicine, vs. the RC rejection of contraceptives.

I am assuming here that at no time were the RC's going to be forced to provide abortion, or even provide plans to do so.

For myself, I harbor some doubts about contraception in general being thought of as a healthcare benefit. But that is me. I give a lot of weight to other voices -- historically, even the founder of Planned Parenthood, who at one time, at least, opposed abortion -- who saw the provision of contraceptives as a significant obstacle to injustices waged against women in the industrial age.

I, too, along with Stella (cf above), harbor worries about pharmacological contraception and its effects upon the woman's health.

I don't think I can agree with equalizing the lack of coverage for children (not sure what the antecedent here is) with the lack of contraceptive coverage for women in RC institutions.

But thanks all the same, Lotar.

[Lotar]

From what I have read, Plan B works by the same mechanisms as the Pill. Recent studies are showing that the efficacy of this drug roughly correlates with prevented ovulation. While both Plan B and the Pill theoretically can prevent implantation, it does not seem to do so, or the incident is so low that it is not distinguishable from the naturally occurring.

I do not understand why it is that you would not support the JW's insanity, but the RC's right to oddity should be protected. I'm uncomfortable with the idea - single payer would have been much better in that regard - but in the end I support women receiving decent healthcare. It all seems too "sexist" (for lack of a better word, not accusing) to say its not okay to prevent coverage for children, but it's okay in the case of women.

[Stella]

Great point, David. Thank you.

[David]

I agree with the statement that the bill as an abortificant is misleading and, I think a distraction. In the field of medicine and pharmacology, there are any number of procedures and medications - many of which are routinely administered for valid medical reasons - which could have noted side effects as being damaging to pregnancy in any number of ways. If you start down that path you are not going to end up in a place where you would want to find your pregnant wife or daughter or their unborn child. Sort of like pre-18th century midwifery perhaps?

[David]

Father, as you know - I am a big fan of lengthy discussions....homilies are a whole 'nother thing though!

[Stella]

Great post, Father, and thank you also for trying to bring more precision to the conversation about the pill. I am no fan of hormonal contraception for several reasons; I think it poses serious risks to women's health (except perhaps in the ways it's sometimes used for non-contraceptive treatments). But the idea that the pill causes abortions is vastly overblown in the pro-life community. I'm not saying it never could, but such occurrences are much more hypothetical and rare than generally admitted by pro-lifers. I wish that pro-lifers would be smarter, more honest, and braver about facing facts regarding the science that relates to their mission.

[Fr. Jonathan]

But David, I am always lengthy. Ask any victims of my homiletical excursions.

[Fr. Jonathan]

I say this with fear and trembling, because I do not want to be accused of being a "male-only discussion of birth-control."

But according to my better-informed informants, the prevention of the implantation of a fertilized egg is only a possible minority effect of synthetic progestin, which is mainly used (along with synthetic estrogen) to prevent egg release. I do not know of any report that indicates how many prevented implantations occur as a ratio to the incidence of pharmacological contraception.

[August]

I was taught that 'the pill' was an abortifacient. Conception could happen, but implantation in the uterus couldn't.

[David]

Wise words, Father. Sadly, in the state of our modern existence, lengthy exposition of provocative ideas is rather frowned upon. You get much more 'sizzle' from thirty seconds of meaty,but mono-syllabic words which are passed off upon the masses as representing 'ideas'. However, like a certain Asian food additive, these thirty second bites leaves one 'hungry' for more. When you don't get 'more' we are left with the polarized, frozen state of our body politic.