A reader writes:
Please help me understand the Church’s teaching on this issue. Is it ok for a catholic single person to use contraceptives, if they do not want to end a sexual relationship with their partner, to avoid bringing a child into the situation? A priest said that God is not in this sexual act, so they cannot be coming between God and the child is not part of God’s will. (which I know God didn’t will the child to come into the world this way, but he permits the child to be born).
Here is what Pope Paul VI wrote in Humanae Vitae:
We are obliged once more to declare that the direct interruption of the generative process already begun and, above all, all direct abortion, even for therapeutic reasons, are to be absolutely excluded as lawful means of regulating the number of children. Equally to be condemned, as the magisterium of the Church has affirmed on many occasions, is direct sterilization, whether of the man or of the woman, whether permanent or temporary.
Similarly excluded is any action which either before, at the moment of, or after sexual intercourse, is specifically intended to prevent procreation—whether as an end or as a means [Section 14].
There are no qualifiers in this about this situation only pertaining to the case of married couples. What your friend is doing is disrupting the way God designed human sexuality to work.
Specifically, your friend is doing two things:
-
Separating the procreative aspect of the sexual act from the act itself (i.e., contracepting), and
-
Separating the sexual act from the marital context in which it is meant to occur (i.e., fornicating).
Your friend’s behavior thus is "coming between [them and] God"–and in two ways. They are compounding the sin of fornication by adding to it the sin of contraception.
Indeed, their use of contraception is facilitating their fornication. You note that the use of contraceptives is because your friend does not want "to end a sexual relationship with their partner, to avoid bringing a child into the situation." The contraception is thus facilitating your friend’s rejection of God’s will by letting her avoid making the choice between (a) ending the sexual relationship or (b) having a baby by a man she isn’t married to. The contraception is thus a sin in itself and it compounds the sin of fornication by lengthening its duration.
What your friend needs to do is to resolve to do what is right: End the sexual relationship and not have sex until marriage and, even then, not to use contraception.
The above-described sins are grave matter, meaning that if they are mortal if done with adequate knowledge and consent.
What the priest said was wrong and was a disservice to your friend.
God will hold him accountable for it.
