Why Natural Family Planning (NFP) is a non answer

The problem with NFP is the results in practice.  It is the case among people with years of experience who practice in a disciplined way that NFP has a pregnancy rate of .6-1.8% which is in line with chemical methods (study). But actually doing this is rather difficult, for example in the study cited above 13% of the women who had originally expressed interested in NFP refused to continue to use NFP in practice, even with extensive support services made available to them.  Support far beyond what can be given in a widespread way.

When NFP is used by people who take it semi-seriously they have 7.5% chance of getting pregnant per cycle, to put that in perspective couples having frequent sex with no contraception of any type have 28% chance of pregnancy per cycle.

Because differences like this, though generally not this large, are common, when measuring birth control effectiveness: means are evaluated using a "typical use" scale not a "perfect use scale".  So for example condoms when used every time and with a spermicidal gel have a 98% effectiveness rate (i.e. with perfect use a sexually active woman will get pregnant only 2% of the time).    When used by actual people mistakes happen and the actual actual effectiveness rate is measured at 85%.   Where NFP methods are heavily used unintentional pregnancy rates among sexually active women are about 24%. Considering we are talking several decades of sexually active fertility even a 10% failure rate would mean 2-3 extra children over the course of a woman's lifetime.

Western women seem to be heading towards a fertility rate of 1.3 children per woman, and even in America non immigrant woman are at 2.1 children per woman; NFP simple doesn't seem effective enough in the absence of heavy use of abortion.

Moreover, there is a bit of irony.  If one adopts the currently fashionable definition that life begins at conception NFP greatly increases the incidence of implantation failure, which would be miscarriage under this definition, by encouraging sexual activity during the period when women still conceive but the fetus tends to fail to implant successfully. NFP, the Catholic church's recommended practice causes vast vast numbers of natural abortions over the course of a couple's life. So I would strongly disagree with the church, that it is not the intentional killing of children, if one defines life to begin at conception, and one defines "intent" in any consistent way.

The church is simply aiming for an irreconcilable situation:

1. They have over the last 200 years redefined abortion to apply much earlier than quickening, i.e. when the woman first feels fetal movement. This eliminates the sorts of birth control methods that were popular in previous centuries, which we would today call "abortion inducing drugs". It also introduces the moral issues with NFP I cited above.
 
2. They have redefined marriage to be primary about sex rather than primary about property and legitimate heirs. Thus there is no longer any distinction made between non-marital and marital pregnancy, as well as making much distinction between adultery and fornication. This to some extent is compounded in our society that has moved towards late marriage.
 
3. They dismiss artificial contraception of virtually any type as immoral. Thus eliminating the only means humans have discovered that in a widespread and reliable way is capable of keeping a woman's fertility down to 1-3 children per lifetime without heavy use of abortion (in the modern sense of the word).
 
4. They do aim for their standards to be adopted in a widespread way, and not seen as just theoretical goals that no one in practice actually follows.

When people talk about supporting birth control what they mean is keeping the fertility numbers down at the 1-3 children per woman over the course of their life. Standards of living correlate very strongly with per capita energy consumption. Energy production is not substantially boosted by population, it should be thought of as a limited resource growing slowly. High energy demand, effectively high energy prices, have been "a" if not "the" primary cause of global economic growth being constrained for the last 2 generations.  That is, what is primarily preventing 3rd and 4th world people from having a good standard of living are these high energy prices. While technology is allowing us to boost energy production somewhat every percentage point of population growth is a percentage point of growth not available to raise the living standards of the poor.  This tradeoff translates into millions of lives lost every year, not even discussing quality of life. Quite simply, overwhelming number of people, even people who care deeply about the sanctity of life, on this planet would prefer less children being born to everyone being subjecting to grinding poverty.

If the church wants Humane Vitae to be taken seriously they either need to indicate:

i) What is the unknown secret for massive energy production to allow for a growing population?

ii) How to maintain fertility at the rate of around 1-2.25 children per woman over the course of their life in practice using NFP?

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See also

• Time of Implantation of the Conceptus and Loss of Pregnancy

Keith Drury on Abortion

Do Evangelicals really believe a fetus is life?

Just about every evangelical I’ve ever met tells me they are absolutely opposed to abortion. Almost every one of them believes that life begins at conception (a few say in 2-3 days at that cell division). My evangelical friends seem absolutely sure that abortion is murdering a person. And I agree with them on these points.

The trouble with the evangelical church however we teach our people the opposite. We teach by our actions and rituals that the fetus may be “sacred” but is not a “real” life. This contradiction between what we say and what we do will eventually erode our commitment to being anti-abortion. When a church pronounces one thing with their mouths but practices something else in ritual and actions the kids see it and know they aren’t serious about their stated beliefs—“What we do speaks louder than what we say.”

So, how does the church communicate in ritual and actions that the fetus is less-than-full-life? I could list a dozen but I’ll only give three and let you finish the list.

1. When a baby is born we place a rose up front and announce the birth from the pulpit. We do not put the rose there when the baby is conceived or when the mother knows she is pregnant. What does this ritual say every time we do it? The message is clear—it is at birth that something happens. Whatever the woman had inside her before birth was sacred—but it is not worth the rose celebration. Our roses-at-birth/breath quietly says “they were pregnant with a fetus but now they have a child.”

2. When a one-week old child dies we do not have a funeral, people take off work and few send sympathy cards. A miscarriage in the church is seldom treated like the death of a ‘real” child. Often even the cells are disposed of just about like the cells of an aborted fetus. Since as many as 1/3 of all pregnancies end in a miscarriage, the church teaches regularly and systematically that these “miscarriages” (often not called “unborn children” in this case) aren’t as important as “real” children. (Please don’t argue it is too expensive for fetuses but we can afford it for [real?] children.)

3. We dedicate a child only when they are breathing and out of the womb. The child does not need to be a witness to the ritual of dedication but we wait until they are breathing to do it. Why? What does this say to our people? It announces that a breathing life is worth dedicating to God, “potential life” in the womb must wait. Why don’t we dedicate the life to God which we believe begins before the life breathes.

Evangelicals (and Catholics) are right on the issue of abortion. We’ve been busy fighting for the cause in the world and I applaud that. However while we’ve been out fighting the anti-abortion battle we’ve forgotten that we practice pro-choice behaviors in the church. We’ve been acting like a breathing life is more valuable in some way than fetus life—and this is exactly the position of the pro-choice folk. We talk pro-life and behave pro-choice. Which will our children adopt—our talk or our walk?

So what should a church do? I have an answer but I already know hardly any evangelical church will do it. Here it is: A church who believes a fetus is really the equivalent life as a breathing child should:

1. Have a meeting. It will only take an hour. But most of the regular church folk need to be there.

2. Make a list. Simply present the issue then brainstorm a list what we’d do differently if we acted like a fetus was of equivalent value to a breathing child. What would we stop doing? Start doing? What rituals would we relocate to another time slot? Ignore my list and make your own.

3. Vote on the ideas one by one. Decide what ones we’ll do as a church

4. Pick a starting date. Once you’ve decided on the actions that will communicate what we really believe then pick a date when we’ll implement the new actions and rituals “from that day forward.”

I already know few (if any) evangelicals will do this.

How do I know this? Because I wrote most all of the above ten years ago—in 1994—and that column has been read by more then 5000 people since—and, to my knowledge I do not know of any church that seriously changed these practices (and others too numerous to mention). I say this: our practice is the only true indicator of what we really believe. The truth is we do not believe “life begins at conception” and we do not believe “a fetus is an unborn child of equivalent worth as a born child.” If we believed it we‘d behave it. So once again I play the prophet’s role. And once again I’ll be ignored and dismissed. For the most part few or no evangelical church will change its practices to reflect its stated beliefs.

This is the real issue for us evangelicals to discuss. Why we are so unwilling to act in line with our stated beliefs. Why is this? Where will it eventually lead? You tell me. (Again, ten years later.)

Keith Drury 1994, (and now again in 2004)

(I’ll keep nagging the church even though ignored.)

Keith@DruryWriting.com

____

Of course we know the real answer to Keith Drury's question is no. I asked these questions earlier to make the same point.

1. Should women who miscarry be charged with involuntary manslaughter? What if they did something like trip because they weren't be careful, negligent homicide?
2. If life starts at fertilization then what should we do about all these couples carelessly having sex 9 or days after ovulation. According to NHS these are the implementation failure rates for the average women in days after ovulation:
   
• 3% by day 9
• 26% on day 10
• 52% on day 11
• 86% on day 12 or more
Death rates this high certainly mean that late sex constitutes negligence in the extreme

Pelosi was right

REP. PELOSI: I would say that as an ardent, practicing Catholic, this is an issue that I have studied for a long time. And what I know is, over the centuries, the doctors of the church have not been able to make that definition. And Senator--St. Augustine said at three months. We don't know. The point is, is that it shouldn't have an impact on the woman's right to choose. Roe v. Wade talks about very clear definitions of when the child--first trimester, certain considerations; second trimester; not so third trimester. There's very clear distinctions. This isn't about abortion on demand, it's about a careful, careful consideration of all factors and--to--that a woman has to make with her doctor and her god. And so I don't think anybody can tell you when life begins, human life begins. As I say, the Catholic Church for centuries has been discussing this, and there are those who've decided...

The claim is being made repeatedly that Pelosi is incorrect in these statements. The reality is whatever one's current opinion may be her knowledge of history and doctrine is accurate. For example in Summa Theologica Aquinas unequivocally rejects the opinion that semen carries with it some supernatural force that causes ensoulment. Rather in his opinion ensoulment occurs almost 2 months after coitus / fertilization. He separates off the sensitive soul, that is the soul capable of responding to sense input from the intellectual soul, that is the soul capable of engaging in reason. So in his view sex produces a human like animal by itself but the creation of an actual human requires the work of God and has a non material component. He goes so far as to consider the current right to life position (that the intellectual soul is created by fertilization), traducianism, a heresy:

I answer that, It is impossible for an active power existing in matter to extend its action to the production of an immaterial effect. Now it is manifest that the intellectual principle in man transcends matter; for it has an operation in which the body takes no part whatever. It is therefore impossible for the seminal power to produce the intellectual principle.

Again, the seminal power acts by virtue of the soul of the begetter according as the soul of the begetter is the act of the body, making use of the body in its operation. Now the body has nothing whatever to do in the operation of the intellect. Therefore the power of the intellectual principle, as intellectual, cannot reach the semen. Hence the Philosopher says (De Gener. Animal. ii, 3): "It follows that the intellect alone comes from without."

Again, since the intellectual soul has an operation independent of the body, it is subsistent, as proved above (Question 75, Article 2): therefore to be and to be made are proper to it. Moreover, since it is an immaterial substance it cannot be caused through generation, but only through creation by God. Therefore to hold that the intellectual soul is caused by the begetter, is nothing else than to hold the soul to be non-subsistent and consequently to perish with the body. It is therefore heretical to say that the intellectual soul is transmitted with the semen. (Summa I.118.2.0)

Doctor Hogan of International Catholic University translates into modern language:

The soul is the substantial form of the human being. A substantial form requires matter capable of receiving it. In the case of the human being this means that the human soul can exist only in a highly organized body. What is being presented here is a theory of serial ensoulment -- first a vegetative soul, then a sentient soul, and finally a rational soul. The animation of the new being is immediate at fertilization. But the soul that animates the body is commensurate with the kind of life lived by the body and the degree of organization of the body. So in the early stages the body of the human being is animated by a vegetative soul which organizes the operations of nutrition and growth -- vegetative activities. As the new being develops in complexity and activities, such as sensation a new soul, an animal soul, replaces the vegetative soul. As the development in complexity continues and as the development of sense organs and nervous system progresses, another threshold is crossed. When the material substratum is sufficiently disposed, the rational soul appears and the human being as human being is constituted. (Medical Ethics / Abortion)

The Catholic Encyclopedia gives a very good description of how diverse the opinions have been on Creationism (soul is created by God and exists apart from the body) vs. Traducianism (fertilization creates a soul).

So much for the philosphical or purely rational aspect of Creationism; as regards the theological, it should be noted that while none of the Fathers maintained Traducianism -- the parental generation of the soul -- as a certainty, some of them, notably St. Augustine, at the outbreak of Pelagianism, began to doubt the creation by god of the individual soul (there was never any doubt as to the created origin of the souls of Adam and Eve), and to incline to the opposite opinion, which seemed to facilitate the explanation of the transmission of original sin. Thus, writing to St. Jerome, St. Augustine says: "If that opinion of the creation of new souls is not opposed to this established article of faith [sc. original sin] let it be also mine; if it is, let it not be thine" (Ep. clxvi, n.25). Theodorus Abucara (Opusc. xxxv), Macarius (Hom. xxx), and St. Gregory of Nyssa (De Opif., Hom., c. xxix) favoured this view. Amongst the Scholastics there were no defenders of Traducianism. Hugh of St. Victor (De Sacr., VII, c. xii) and Alexander of Hales (Summa, I, Q. lx, mem. 2, a. 3) alone characterize Creationism as the more probable opinion; all the other Schoolmen hold it as certain and differ only in regard to the censure that should be attached to the opposite error. Thus Peter Lombard simply says: "The Catholic Church teaches that souls are created at their infusion into the body" (Sent. II, d. xviii); while St. Thomas is more emphatic: "It is heretical to say that the intellectual soul is transmitted by process of generation" (I, Q. cxviii, a. 2). For the rest, the following citation from the Angelic Doctor sums up the diverse opinions: "Regarding this question various opinions were expressed in antiquity. Some held that the soul of a child is produced by the soul of the parent just as the body is generated by the parent-body. Others maintained that all souls are created apart, moreover that they are united with their respective bodies, either by their own volition or by the command and action of God. Others again, declared that the soul in the moment of its creation is infused into the body. Though for a time these several views were upheld, and though it was doubtful which came nearest the truth (as appears from Augustine's commentary on Genesis 10, and from his books on the origin of the soul), the Church subsequently condemned the first two and approved the third" (De Potentiâ, Q. iii, a. 9). Others (e.g. Gregory of Valencia) speak of Generationism as "certainly erroneous", or (e.g. Estius) as maxime temerarius. It should, however, be noted that while there are no such explicit definitions authoritatively put forth by the Church as would warrant our calling the doctrine of Creationism de fide, nevertheless, as a recent eminent theologian observes, "there can be no doubt as to which view is favoured by ecclesiastical authority" (Pesch, Præl. Dogm., V, 3, p. 66). Leo IX (1050), in the symbol presented to the Bishop Peter for subscription, lays down: "I believe and profess that the soul is not a part of God, but is created out of nothing, and that, without baptism, it is in original sin" (Denzinger, Enchir., n. 296). That the soul sinned in its pre-existent state, and on that account was incarcerated in the body, is a fiction which has been repeatedly condemned by the Church. Divested of this fiction, the theory that the soul exists prior to its infusion into the organism, while not explicitly reprobated, is obviously opposed to the doctrine of the Church, according to which souls are multiplied correspondingly with the multiplication of human organisms (Conc. Lat. V, in Denzinger, op. cit., 621). But whether the rational soul is infused into the organism at conception, as the modern opinion holds, or some weeks subsequently, as the Scholastics suppose (St. Thomas, Q. i a. 2, ad 2), is an open question with theologians (Catholic Encyclopedia)

The fact of the matter is that Nancy Pelosi is absolutely 100% correct in her assessment of Catholic history. Quite simply to hold the currently fashionable position that ensoulment occurs at fertilization is to deny that identical twins have unique souls. A position that was until recently absolutely denied by the church.

The argument is (again quoting Hogan):

First because the soul is the substantial form of the body, the rational soul cannot be present until there is a body present that is significantly complex and organized to receive the soul. Second, a formal cause is present only in a finished product. An actual human soul cannot be united with a virtual human body. Third, there is no human body in the zygote. Fourth inasmuch as all the positive features of the human body derive from the soul, until the soul is present there is no human being.

________
See also:

• Professor Pennington's list of church positions through time
• Religious Tolerance's list of Catholic positions
• Wikipedia, Christianity and abortion
• Bishops Respond to House Speaker Pelosi’s Misrepresentation of Church Teaching
• Cardinal Justin F. Rigali and Bishop William E. Lori Response from Catholic Bishops. This response is misrepresenting her argument. 

5 Questions about abortion

1. In the Scandinavian countries and the Netherlands women who have access to free abortions  in convenient state clinics have few abortions per million women than women in the USA, at a rate between one third and one quarter of the USA rate. This is due to excellent sex education and easily available birth control. That is if the USA were to make birth control easily accessible and free we could have a 70% decrease in abortion.  Yet the "pro life" movement has hindered birth control availability in the USA at every turn.  Why? 
2. Should women who miscarry be charged with involuntary manslaughter?  What if they did something like trip because they weren't be careful, negligent homicide?  
3. If life starts at fertilization then what should we do about all these couples carelessly having sex 9 or days after ovulation. According to NHS these are the implementation failure rates for the average women in days after ovulation:
   
• 3% by day 9
• 26% on day 10
• 52% on day 11
• 86% on day 12 or more
Death rates this high certainly mean that late sex constitutes negligence in the extreme.

4. Statistics show that things like good education, economic opportunity and higher wages for people at the bottom of the socio-economic ladder reduce unplanned pregnancy and abortion.  Why the opposition to social programs from the pro-life movement, when these policies could save hundreds of thousands of lives per year?  
5. Can we name one country that has banned abortion where the lives of women have improved within 20 years of the ban?