Basilica and Shrine of Our Lady of Lebanon – North Jackson, OH
The text below is excerpted from a conference I gave yesterday at the Basilica and Shrine of Our Lady of Lebanon in North Jackson, OH, as part of their Assumption festivities.
Incidentally, what a wonderful place. I can’t say enough good things about the rector, Chorbishop Anthony Spinosa, who is bi-ritual – Maronite and Latin – and offered very beautiful liturgies in both rites since I’ve been here. His flock is doubly blessed indeed.
The people gathered here are very devout though not exclusively “traditionalist.” (It has been a pleasure to run into some people I’ve known for some time; having met at traditional conferences in the past.)
I have to say that I’m especially grateful for the opportunity to engage an audience like this; knowing that some of what I presented is new to them. As for the conference from which the following is taken, I have little doubt that this is the case, and likely presented a challenge to many here present…
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On Christian Marriage
In his Encyclical on Christian Marriage, Casti Cannubii, Pope Pius XI quotes St. Augustine, who, according to the Holy Father, provides “a splendid summary of the whole doctrine of Christian marriage.”
Specifically, Augustine states:
These are all the blessings of matrimony on account of which matrimony itself is a blessing; offspring, conjugal faith and the sacrament. This we regard as the law of marriage by which the fruitfulness of nature is adorned and the evil of incontinence is restrained.
It’s important to note that this citation to “the law of marriage” is not a reference to civil law, or even Church discipline; each of which can change over time. Rather, Augustine is referring to the Divine Law, that which never changes.
Elaborating on the threefold blessing of marriage, the Doctor of the Church says:
As regards the offspring it is provided that they should be begotten lovingly and educated religiously.
Pope Pius XI elaborates on this point, saying:
This is also expressed succinctly in the Code of Canon Law – ‘The primary end of marriage is the procreation and the education of children.’
The entire canon to which the Pontiff refers reads:
The primary end of marriage is the procreation and education of children; its secondary end is mutual help and the allaying of concupiscence. (1917 Code of Canon Law)
If we really want to know, understand, and embrace the true and unchangeable meaning of Christian marriage; we really need to think about what we just heard.
The primary end of marriage is the procreation and education of children. The mutual help of spouses and the allaying of concupiscence? These are secondary.
There has been no small amount of confusion on these points from the time of Vatican Council II on forward.
And why is that?
Well, there were any number of Council Fathers who thought that this hierarchy of the ends of marriage – a teaching held throughout the centuries – should be de-emphasized.
The reason? An affinity for ecumenism. In fact, as any serious student of the Second Vatican Council can attest, ecumenism and seeking common ground with Protestants served as the impetus for much of what the Council produced.
In the present case, it may be helpful to know that the Anglicans had begun permitting birth control in 1930 (the same year in which Casti Canubii was promulgated), and from that time up until the time of the Council, contraception grew in acceptance throughout much of the Protestant world in general.
Now, the Council Fathers weren’t about to open the door to contraception use for Catholics – not that many of them wouldn’t have done so if given the opportunity – but at the time, Pope Paul VI, who presided over three of the four Council sessions, had already appointed a Commission to look into the so-called “question of contraception,” and many of the bishops there present just assumed that permission was forthcoming.
All of that said, the central point for our purposes is simply this:
By permitting birth control, the Protestants had clearly chosen to give pride of place in marriage to the mutual help of spouses; even to the exclusion of the procreation of children.
For the Church to continue stressing the primary ends of marriage as precisely this – the procreation and education of children – this would create what the ecumenists would certainly have considered a so-called “obstacle” to Christian unity.
And so, they desired to see the teaching de-emphasized.
Pope Pius XI would have disagreed with this strategy.
In his magnificent 1928 encyclical on the ecumenical movement, Mortalium Animos, he wrote:
The union of Christians can only be promoted by promoting the return to the one true Church of Christ of those who are separated from it…
In other words, the path to Christian unity (which, incidentally, isn’t just a lofty goal, but rather a present reality within, and a permanent mark of, the Holy Catholic Church alone) isn’t paved with compromises, but rather with conversions. This is another conference for another day…
For our purposes, it’s enough to recognize that misguided ecumenical fervor played a part in the downplaying of the primary ends of marriage from the time of Council to the present day.
And what did we get as a result?
The 1983 Code of Canon Law (for the Latin Church), the one that replaced the text from which Pope Pius XI quoted, reads:
The marriage covenant, by which a man and a woman establish themselves a partnership of their whole life, and which of its own very nature is ordered to the well-being of the spouses and the procreation and upbringing of children, has, between the baptized, been raised by Christ the Lord to the dignity of a sacrament.
Notice that this text is stripped of all reference to a hierarchy of the ends of marriage.
It lumps the partnership of man and woman, spousal well-being, and the procreation of children into one group, but worse still, it mentions them in that order, giving one the impression that the ends of marriage as previously understood and taught by the Church have been reversed.
They haven’t. They can’t be. Why not? Because we are talking about Divine Law!
Even so, if one is led to believe that the procreation and education of children is no longer the primary end of marriage, then they will naturally come to believe that avoiding pregnancy is no longer such a big deal. Right?
And we wonder why so many Catholics contracept, or have what is sometimes called “a contraceptive mentality,” which can include the abuse of temporary continence in order to avoid pregnancy apart from a grave reason…
So, how might all of this lead one to subtly and unknowingly undermine the true meaning of marriage?
Consider, if you will, those Catholic parents who counsel their children upon marriage to take time out to save a little money, to do some traveling, to buy a nice house, and only then to consider having children.
This happens frequently, and not necessarily because these people are not committed Catholics or in any way insincere, but more often than not because no one has ever bothered to pass on to them the immutable Faith concerning the primary ends of marriage, in plain language, as Pope Pius XI and those who came before him did.
This is great example of the deadliest kind of attack on marriage and family such as we are experiencing it in our day; an attack resulting from confusing, ambiguous or misleading propositions put forth by our churchmen, sometimes even in official texts, that ultimately serve to obscure sure Catholic doctrine and render a service to the Enemy who prowls about the world seeking the ruin of souls.
God help our churchmen, and God help us!
As a father of 8 children, my wife and I never used contraception. But: FYI….in 1974 we were paying and average of $96.10 weekly for groceries. Today that figure would be $469.85 weekly. In short the cost of living puts a great strain on family budgets.
At one point I worked at 3 jobs at once to support our family. I never had time to breathe and my wife was the main parent to our children. Contraception was out of the question but I can fully appreciate the concern of today’s families.
Louie, I have to congratulate you on stepping up to the plate on writing about the teachings by the Catholic Church on the hierarchial purposes of marriage. Way to go ! It’s great seeing someone else besides me actually tooting this horn for a change. Keep up the great work!
“In short the cost of living puts a great strain on family budgets.”
God always provides when it comes to large families. All that is needed is for the parents to trust in God. They don’t and that’s why Catholics contracept.
What you write concerning the “ecumenical” motives of those at Vatican II may be true, but contraception use among “Catholics” preceded the Council, and was already being promoted by many in the hierarchy, just as it was by our first “Catholic” president, J.F.K, who led the way with his U.S. public and foreign policy propaganda for population control.
When Pope Paul VI’s “commission” report was leaked to the press, it revealed that 60 of 64 theologians and nine of the 15 cardinals on it, wanted the Church to lift the ban on artificial contraception. When the Pope went against them and sided with the minority, producing Humanae Vitae, it resulted in a public firestorm of protest and dissention.
Fr. Bernard Haring of Rome–said to be a ” leading moral theologian” at the time– called upon Catholic women and men to “follow their consciences, rather than the pope’s decree.” Many parish priests agreed and gave sermons to that effect, as did educators. The wayward sheep were eager to comply.
According to government stats, “two years after the decree, two-thirds of Catholic women were using contraception.”
I believe the sexual revolution of the 60’s, had already separated true Catholics from the in-name-only crowd, and selfish, worldy motives rather than concerns about unity with protestants, were really at the bottom of it all, along with ignorance of Church teachings and lack of holy fear of the Lord.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/how-the-catholic-church-almost-came-to-accept-birth-control/2012/02/21/gIQAdy1JYR_story.html?utm_term=.073b0e478243
Couldn’t agree more!
Humanae Vitae is THE worst document alive in regards to the final nail on the coffin for the distruction of marriage. HV completely capitulated on the hierarchy of purposes of marriage by saying that one can plan in thought, word, and deed to have recourse exclusively to the infertile period in order to avoid having children. This absolutely is heretical as it blatantly separates procreation from sex during conjugal relations any way you try to slice it. PLEASE let us wake up and see the evil and the dishonesty that was let loose with Humanae Vitae which in turn redefined marriage’s purpose from an encyclical and it is why we have over 90 percent of Catholics contracepting to this day. It is precisely because of the hypocritacal practice and promotion of NFP when it teaches the planning to have exclusive recourse to the infertile period in order to avoid having children that has accelerated contraception. Of course the seeds against the hierarchy of purposes was beginning to be planted as early as the late 1800s. Pius XII helped this along with his private letter to the Italian midwives while at the same time trying to restate the hierarchy of purposes which came out looking like he was talking a double speak.
Catholics do not use contraception.
A document worse than HV was the document that Pope Pius XII wrote “reforming” Holy Week. That was the beginning of the destruction of the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass and the destruction of the Catholic religion.
Not only that, in the months before HV was published, expectations of Catholics were allowed to swing toward the approval of contraception. When the bomb was finally dropped, Catholics left the Church in droves. There was the double whammy of a flawed document compounded by a flawed delivery.
Hope you realize the point was not to praise of HV, but that so many in the hierarchy at the time had already been corrupted regarding contraception.
This is re Anastasia’s comment.
I grew up in an economically-poor family. However, the lack of material well-being should not be ascribed mainly to the fact that that the number of children was nine rather than three or four. In any case, when I was a child in the 1970s many people in Ireland were yet very good people who tried to live according to the Faith and moral law, and I knew of many families with many more children. In fact, I did not even think of my family as “big” – it was just average then. People have been falsely indoctrinated into thinking they must have a certain amount of money, or the ability to pay for certain things before they can marry, or have another child. How did good Catholic families who struggled to eat and keep a shelter for their families over the centuries behave? They trusted in God and His Holy Will and never thought about controlling when their God-given children were conceived. The prevalence of such false notions as children being a burden or material poverty being a bar to marriage and procreation has come about as a consequence of the prevalence of acceptance of controlling or preventing or interfering with conception, which is God’s purview.
I agree that there are problematic aspects of Humanae Vitae, but we should be grateful that the fundamental conclusion was correct: that artificial contraception is intrinsically evil and therefore never morally permissible. Pope Paul VI struggled with this decision for quite some time. Here is a quote from Cardinal Giuseppe Siri many years afterward, who in large part attributed the correct judgment of the Pope to the tenacity of faithful laymen:
“As to the anguish of Paul VI regarding Humanae Vitae, it was real because I knew of it somewhat closely as I continued to visit the Pope and so I learned that they were laymen rather than priests, who saved the truth of that Encyclical. This is what remains in my mind of the things that I heard and maybe I heard from Paul VI himself: indeed, that the laity were more determined than the clergy, if I’m not wrong, (this) may have come out of an interview with Paul VI, but now I do not remember it well. Moreover, Paul VI was a man who easily was subject to the anxiety of doubt. I have witnessed (it) more than once. Problematic? I would say no; of course, I do not allow myself to judge.”
Why do we spare from such a charge “Divino Afflatu” of Pope St. Pius X, which changed the Roman psalter and explicitly forbade the use of the traditional Roman psalter used completely unchanged since St. Pius V (who himself redistributed some of the psalms of Sunday Prime to weekday Prime)? This reform, though undetected by most laity due to their lack of contact with the Divine Office, severed the connection the traditional Roman liturgy makes between feasts and certain psalms for the majority of the feasts of saints, and is an exercise of papal power over the liturgy that was arguably unprecedented. It is usually defended on the grounds that it did not introduce any new heterodox content. But did the new Holy Week introduce such things, or is it just different? I think the NO is a different animal than even the new Holy Week and the 1962 books (which are pretty bad and obviously intended to be transitional).
I whole heartedly DISAGREE that ” We should be grateful that the fundamental conclusion was correct: that artificial contraception is intrinsically evil and therefor never morally permissible.” while the encyclical espouses NFP.
HV instilled in everyone with half a brain that so called NFP, because it doesn’t use chemicals, is better and not sinful like artificial contraception because, after all, the biological body is the ‘go green’ sacred cow and somehow the mind, thought, words and acts and intentions are secondary and don’t count. In other words it is all about protecting and respecting the functions of ones natural body but not one’s soul or God’s laws. This is vicious and contrary to morality.
The Holy Bible, Tobias 6:22; 8:9 “And when the third night is past, thou shalt take the virgin with the fear of the Lord, moved rather for love of children than for lust, that in the seed of Abraham thou mayest obtain a blessing in children… [Tobias said:] And now, Lord, thou knowest, that not for fleshly lust do I take my sister to wife, but only for the love of posterity, in which thy name may be blessed for ever and ever.”
Tobias 6:16-17 “Then the angel Raphael said to him [Tobias]: Hear me, and I will show thee who they are, over whom the devil can prevail. For they who in such manner receive matrimony, as to shut out God from themselves, and from their mind, and to give themselves to their lust, as the horse and mule, which have not understanding, over them the devil hath power.”
For they who in such manner receive matrimony, as to shut out God from themselves, and from their mind, and to give themselves to their lust, as the horse and mule, which have not understanding, over them the devil hath power.” (Tobias 6:16-17)
St. Clement of Alexandria (c. 198 A.D.): “To have coitus other than to procreate children is to do injury to nature.” (The Paedagogus or The Instructor, Book II, Chapter X.–On the Procreation and Education of Children)
St. Caesarius of Arles (c. 468-542): “AS OFTEN AS HE KNOWS HIS WIFE WITHOUT A DESIRE FOR CHILDREN…WITHOUT A DOUBT HE COMMITS SIN.” (W. A. Jurgens, The Faith of The Early Fathers, Vol. 3: 2233)
St. Augustine, On Marriage and Concupiscence, A.D. 419: “It is one thing not to lie [with one’s wife] except with the sole will of generating [children]: this has no fault. It is another to seek the pleasure of the flesh in lying, although within the limits of marriage: this has venial fault [that is, venial sin as long as one is not against procreation].” (Book I, Chapter 17.–What is Sinless in the Use of Matrimony? What is Attended With Venial Sin, and What with Mortal?)
St. Jerome, Against Jovinian, A.D. 393: “But I wonder why he [the heretic Jovinianus] set Judah and Tamar before us for an example, unless perchance even harlots give him pleasure; or Onan, who was slain because he grudged his brother seed. Does he imagine that we approve of any sexual intercourse except for the procreation of children? … He who is too ardent a lover of his own wife is an adulterer [of his God and of his wife].” (Book 1, Section 20; 40)
St. Augustine, De Conjugiis Adulterinis, A.D. 396: “Since, therefore, the institution of marriage exists for the sake of generation, for this reason did our forebears enter into the union of wedlock and lawfully take to themselves their wives, only because of the duty to beget children.” (Book II, Chapter 12)
Pope St. Clement of Rome (1st century A.D.): “But this kind of chastity is also to be observed, that sexual intercourse must not take place heedlessly and for the sake of mere pleasure, but for the sake of begetting children. And since this observance is found even amongst some of the lower animals, it were a shame if it be not observed by men, reasonable, and worshiping God.” (Recognitions of Clement, Chapter XII, Importance of Chastity)
Athenagoras the Athenian (c. 175 A.D.): “Therefore, having the hope of eternal life, we despise the things of this life, even to the pleasures of the soul, each of us reckoning her his wife whom he has married according to the laws laid down by us, and that only for the purpose of having children. For as the husbandman throwing the seed into the ground awaits the harvest, not sowing more upon it, so to us the procreation of children is the measure of our indulgence in appetite.” (A Plea For the Christians, Chapter XXXIII.–Chastity of the Christians with Respect to Marriage)
St. Finnian of Clonard (470-549), The Penitential of Finnian #46: “We advise and exhort that there be continence in marriage, since marriage without continence is not lawful, but sin, and [marriage] is permitted by the authority of God not for lust but for the sake of children, as it is written, ‘And the two shall be in one flesh,’ that is, in unity of the flesh for the generation of children, not for the lustful concupiscence of the flesh.”
St. Athanasius the Great (c. 296-373), On the Moral Life: “The law of nature recognizes the act of procreation: have relations with your wife only for the sake of procreation, and keep yourself from relations of pleasure.”
St. Clement of Alexandria (c. 150-215): “For it [the Holy Scripture] regards it not right that this [sexual intercourse] should take place either in wantonness or for hire like harlots, but only for the birth of children.” (The Stromata or Miscellanies, Book II, Chapter XVIII.–The Mosaic Law the Fountain of All Ethics, and the Source from Which the Greeks Drew Theirs)
St. Augustine, Against Faustus 22:30, A.D. 400: “For thus the eternal law, that is, the will of God creator of all creatures, taking counsel for the conservation of natural order, not to serve lust, but to see to the preservation of the race, permits the delight of mortal flesh to be released from the control of reason in copulation only to propagate progeny.”
Lactantius, The Divine Institutes 5:8, A.D. 307: “There would be no adulteries, and debaucheries, and prostitution of women, if it were known to all, that whatever is sought beyond the desire of procreation is condemned by God.”
Lactantius, The Epitome of the Divine Institutes, A.D. 314: “Moreover, the passion of lust is implanted and innate in us for the procreation of children; but they who do not fix its limits in the mind use it for pleasure only. Thence arise unlawful loves, thence adulteries and debaucheries, thence all kinds of corruption. These passions, therefore, must be kept within their boundaries and directed into their right course [for the procreation of children], in which, even though they should be vehement, they cannot incur blame.” (Chapter LXI.–Of the Passions)
Lactantius, The Epitome of the Divine Institutes, A.D. 314: “Let lust not go beyond the marriage-bed, but be subservient to the procreation of children. For a too great eagerness for pleasure both produces danger and generates disgrace, and that which is especially to be avoided, leads to eternal death. Nothing is so hateful to God as an unchaste mind and an impure soul.” (Chapter LXII.–Of Restraining the Pleasures of the Senses)
St. Clement of Alexandria (c. 198 A.D.): “Marriage in itself merits esteem and the highest approval, for the Lord wished men to “be fruitful and multiply.” [Gen. 1:28] He did not tell them, however, to act like libertines, nor did He intend them to surrender themselves to pleasure as though born only to indulge in sexual relations. Let the Educator (Christ) put us to shame with the word of Ezekiel: “Put away your fornications.” [Eze. 43:9] Why, even unreasoning beasts know enough not to mate at certain times. To indulge in intercourse without intending children is to outrage nature, whom we should take as our instructor.” (The Paedagogusor The Instructor, Book II, Chapter X.–On the Procreation and Education of Children)
St. Augustine, On The Good of Marriage, Section 11, A.D. 401: “For necessary sexual intercourse for begetting [of children] is free from blame, and itself is alone worthy of marriage. But that which goes beyond this necessity [of begetting children] no longer follows reason but lust.”
Pope St. Gregory the Great (c. 540-604): “The married must be admonished to bear in mind that they are united in wedlock for the purpose of procreation, and when they abandon themselves to immoderate intercourse, they transfer the occasion of procreation to the service of pleasure. Let them realize that though they do not then pass beyond the bonds of wedlock, yet in wedlock they exceed its rights. Wherefore, it is necessary that they efface by frequent prayer what they befoul in the fair form of conjugal union by the admixture of pleasure.” (St. Gregory the Great, “Pastoral Care,” Part 3, Chapter 27, in “Ancient Christian Writers,” No. 11, pp. 188-189)
Pope St. Gregory the Great (c. 597 A.D.): “Lawful copulation of the flesh ought therefore to be for the purpose of offspring, not of pleasure; and intercourse of the flesh should be for the sake of producing children, and not a satisfaction of frailties.” (Epistles of St. Gregory the Great, To Augustine, Bishop of the Angli [English], Book XI, Letter 64)
St. Maximus the Confessor (c. 580-662): “Again, vice is the wrong use of our conceptual images of things, which leads us to misuse the things themselves. In relation to women, for example, sexual intercourse, rightly used, has as its purpose the begetting of children. He, therefore, who seeks in it only sensual pleasure uses it wrongly, for he reckons as good what is not good. When such a man has intercourse with a woman, he misuses her. And the same is true with regard to other things and one’s conceptual images of them.” (Second Century on Love, 17; Philokalia 2:67-68)
St. Maximus the Confessor (c. 580-662): “There are also three things that impel us towards evil: passions, demons, and sinfulness of intention. Passions impel us when, for example, we desire something beyond what is reasonable, such as food which is unnecessary or untimely, or a woman who is not our wife or for a purpose other than procreation.” (Second Century on Love, 33; Philokalia 2:71)
St. John Damascene (c. 675-749): “The procreation of children is indeed good, enjoined by the law; and marriage is good on account of fornications, for it does away with these, and by lawful intercourse does not permit the madness of desire to be inflamed into unlawful acts. Marriage is good for those who have no continence; but virginity, which increases the fruitfulness of the soul and offers to God the seasonable fruit of prayer, is better. “Marriage is honourable and the bed undefiled, but fornicators and adulterers God will judge” [Hebrews 13:4].” (St. John of Damascus, also known as St. John Damascene, Exposition of the Orthodox Faith, Book IV, Chap. 24)
Gratian, Medieval Marriage Law (c. 1140): “Also, Jerome, [on Ephesians 5:25]: C. 14. The procreation of children in marriage is praiseworthy, but a prostitute’s sensuality is damnable in a wife. So, as we have said, the act is conceded in marriage for the sake of children. But the sensuality found in a prostitute’s embraces is damnable in a wife.”
Venerable Luis de Granada (1505-1588): “Those that be married must examine themselves in particular, if in their mind thinking of other persons, or with intention not to beget children, but only for carnal delight, or with extraordinary touchings and means, they have sinned against the end, and honesty of marriage.” (A Spiritual Doctrine, containing a rule to live well, with divers prayers and meditations, p. 362)
Sounds like a great bumper sticker. Where can I get one?
God bless your intrepid good work, Anastasia. Most souls are not able to hear the truth as they have so long been force-fed falsehoods, such as striving for holiness and holy way of life is for the few only, not every baptised soul. God bless you and your family.
Dear Anastasia, Have you opened a website on marriage and procreation? Thanks.
Not yet Linda but I haven’t ruled it out.
I hope that you will. You have a treasure to share. I had not read those quotes you posted above before. While I knew that NFP is just Catholic contraception, I did not know that HV was not a good document until you posted months ago. I think you have the knowledge of this topic that *must* be shared because the devil is doing his best to hide the truth and ruin souls.
Of course, HV states several truths. However, it distorts the truth and misleads people by implying that: procreation is not intrinsically the primary purpose of the marital act (and marriage, in principle); and that avoidance of the marital act in order to avoid conception is not generally licit but can be justified only in extremis.
Correction: the second distortion of truth is implying that the marital act may be avoided for the purpose of avoidance of conception other than in exceptional circumstances.
Wow. A great and much needed resource to refer to. Thank you.