Most Rev. Jose C. Sorra, DD,
Bishop-Emeritus of Legazpi Diocese
- There are two accounts of creation found in Chapters 1 & 2 of the Book of Genesis. The first account tells us that: “God created man in his own image, in the image of God he created him: male and female” (1: 27). The next verse contains God’s very first command to them: “God blessed them saying: ‘Be fruitful and multiply; fill the earth and subdue it’.” (v. 28).
We thus see that God’s first purpose of blessing them in marriage is that it be life giving.
- In the 2nd account of creation in Genesis, the Lord God said: “It is not good for man to be alone. I will make a suitable partner for him” (2: 18).
Yes, God wants husband and wife to be intimate partners and helpmates, supporting each other in mutual lasting love.
From this verse, we learn that the 2nd purpose God has for marriage is that it be love-giving.
Accordingly, marriage exists to communicate — both life and love. Thus, Marriage is defined as “the covenant of love and life” between man and woman, as planned by God – not between man and man, or woman and woman.
- Two Purposes of Marriage. The two purposes of marriage are so mutually interconnected as to be inseparable. Let us recall that Jesus himself ruled out divorce by applying these words to the union of husband and wife: “They are no longer two but one flesh. Therefore, what God has joined together, let no one ever separate” (Mk 10:8).
As one bishop-theologian explained this intimate union, spouses form an organic entity – like the head and the heart which is not a mechanical one, like a lock and key. For the separation of the head and heart from the body – unlike the removal of a key from its lock – entails the death of the organism. So, too, with divorce.
- Similarly, it was God who also combined the love-giving and the life-giving aspects of marriage — in one and the same act. Therefore, you husband and wife can no more separate through contraception what God joined together in your marital act than you can separate through divorce what God had joined together in marriage union itself.
- The Body Language of Marital Love. Let us digress for a moment before we explain what the Church teaches about contraception. According to St. Pope John Paul II, God designed married love to be expressed in a special language, namely: the body language of the sexual act. In fact, sexual communication uses other terms but which mean the same, such as: sexual intercourse…or to know (carnally)…to procreate … to conceive…etc. Now with this in mind, let’s pose some practical questions:
- Is it normal for a wife to insert ear-plugs, while listening to her husband?
- Is it normal for a husband to muffle his mouth, while speaking to his wife?
These examples appear to be so abnormal as to be absurd. Yet if such behavior is abnormal for verbal communication, why do you, husband, tolerate your wife using a diaphragm or the pill, or tolerate your husband using a condom during sexual communication?
- Worse still, how can one justify a husband having a surgeon clip his robust vocal cords, or a wife having her healthy ear-drums surgically remove? Yet in the area of sexual communication, how do such horrible examples differ from a vasectomy or tubal ligation? Isn’t it the task of a surgeon to remove an organ only when it is diseased and threatens human life?
If the testes or ovaries are not diseased, on what grounds are you frustrating their purpose? Could it be that we have already been so brainwashed into the culture of death that our feminist zealots do now consider babies a disease from which you must immunize yourselves through sterilization or abortion under the euphemism of “Reproductive Health Care”?
- The Book of Genesis tells us that we have been created in the image and likeness of God! Now Jesus has revealed God’s inner life to us –as a Trinity of Persons having an intimate mutual relationship and communication with one another.
Accordingly, if we are God’s own image and likeness, the body language of the marital union between husband and wife must reflect God’s own inner life, namely: the mutual love between the Father and the Son, which is the Person of the Holy Spirit.
- From the first page to the last, the Bible is a Love Story. It begins in Genesis with the marriage of Adam and Eve, and it ends in the Book of Revelation with the wedding feast of the Lamb – the marriage of Christ and his Bride, the Church. From all eternity God craves to give himself to us in marriage. No one had ever expressed that fact more graphically and beautifully than the prophet Isaiah who wrote:
“As a young man marries a maiden,
so will your Maker marry you.
As the bridegroom rejoices over the bride,
So will your God rejoice over you” (Is 62:5).
- Contraception: Partners telling lies with their Bodies.
We all know in faith that God fashioned our body, male and female, to communicate both life and love. Now every time that husband and wife deliberately frustrate this God-designed twofold purpose – through contraception, they are acting out a big lie to each other and even to God himself. Why?
- The body language of the marital act says: “Darling, I love you and I’m all yours,” but the contraceptive device adds, “except for my fertility.” So in actual fact, they are lying to each other with their bodies, whose marital act at that moment denies what their romantic words of endearment express to each other.
- Even worse, they are tacitly usurping the role of God. For by frustrating the purpose of the marital love, they are telling God:
“You may have designed our bodies to help you transmit life with your infused immortal soul, but God, you made a mistake – a mistake we now intend to correct. You may be the Lord of our lives – but not of our fertility.”
- Pope Paul VI prophesied essentially the same thing when he issued his Encyclical Humane Vitae (July 25, 1968): There is an inseparable link between the two meanings of the marriage act: the Unitive meaning (love-giving) and the Procreative meaning (life-giving).This connection, he added, was established by God himself, and man is not permitted to break it on his own initiative (HV, n. 12).
- Pope Paul VI went on to condemn every form of contraception as being unworthy of the dignity of the human person. A tsunami of angry dissent erupted over this teaching. Catholics and non-Catholics alike, as well as even many clergy, religious and lay criticized and berated the Pope, as “the celibate old man in the Vatican” for failing to read the signs of the times…
- Many scoffed at the evil consequences that Pope Paul VI predicted if the use of contraception escalated. Among his predictions were:
1) an increase in marital infidelity;
2) a general lowering of morality, especially among the young;
3) husbands viewing their wives as mere sex-objects; and
4) governments forcing massive birth control programs on their people.
- Four decades thereafter, the moral landscape is strewn with the following stark reality:
1) In the USA alone, the divorce rate has more than tripled;
2) about 1.4 mil. abortions take place every year since contraception started there in the 1960’s;
3) Over 850,000 teenagers become pregnant each year, one third of these pregnancies end in abortion;
4) three out of 4 child-births by teenagers are out of wedlock or are husbandless young mothers;
5) the number of sexually transmitted diseases has expanded from 12% then to 50%;
6) in China with its 1-child policy, the male babies are summarily aborted; thus, the current shortage of men with the present ratio of one (1) male to seven (7) females; and
7) sterilization is forced on unsuspecting poor women in the third world countries (U.S.A. Department of Commerce, Bureau of Census).
There have been many a Catholic, who make use of the contraceptives but seem not to have any qualms, claiming that they are merely obeying the Church teaching to follow the dictates of their conscience.
- Yes, that is true – provided that it’s a properly formed conscience – formed perhaps by a Catholic Jesuit or Dominican. It must be a conscience that is conformed to the Natural Law and the Ten Commandments, just as we have to adjust our clocks and watches to Sun Time (i.e., (Greenwich mean time). If a clock goes too fast or too slow, it will soon tell us that it is bedtime — at dawn. And to say that we must accommodate our individual conscience to a be havior that clearly contradicts God’s law is to say that we must rule our lives by the clock — even when it tells us that night is day.
Conclusion. For pastoral guidance, we wish to give out at least some doable suggestions that may be facilitated for you through the leadership of our Diocesan Family Life Commission, namely:
- All pastoral workers for the Family Life Apostolate and also youth ministers should try to secure and study the liberating book of Pope John Paul II’s Theology of the Body and share it with others, especially with Parents and educators.
- Priests, religious and lay catechists should once again put more stress in their homilies, marriage-preparation catechesis and seminars on the basic Church teaching dealing with Marriage and Family Life, which should include responsible parenthood, covering also contraceptives.
- Parents and teachers should look into the kind of Sex Education Curriculum of the schools of their children – particularly, What and Who are handling or teaching this delicate sex-subject matter.
- An adequate honest-to-goodness instruction in should be made part of all marriage preparation programs.
May the Good Lord through the intercession of Mama Mary, the model Mother of the Holy Family inspire and bless you all with greater courage and deeper wisdom and dedication in building up our homes into a truly “Domestic Church” that reflects the Trinitarian Love-Life of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit. Amen.
REFERENCES
John Paul II, Pope, The Theology of the Body: Human Love in the Divine Plan (Pauline Books & Media, 50 St. Paul’s Avenue, Boston, MA)
Lexicon, Pontifical Council for the Family (2006 Human Life International, 4 Family Life Lane, Virginia 22630, USA)
Pope Paul VI, Encyclical Letter: Humanae Vitae (Promulgated, 25 July, 1968, Vatican City.
Pope Paul VI’s Humanae Vitae – Vindicated, (J. C. Sorra: Crumbs III, “From the Beginning” In the Light of Pope John Paul’s Theology of the Body), Inkwell Publishing Co., Inc. Bo.Kapitolyo, Pasic City.
West, Christopher, Theology of the Body Explained (Pauline Books & Media, 50 St. Paul’s Avenue, Boston, MA)
Wojtyla, Harrol, Love & Responsiblity (Reprinted 1993, Ignatius Press, San Francisco, USA)
United States Department of Commerce, Bureau of the Census. Reference Data Book and Guide to Government Printing Office, 1997 (117th Edition), Washington, D.C., United States Government Printing Office
