Section — Clark, New Questions, Old Answers
Just Cause Defined
The last theoretical consideration to make is that of what constitutes a “just cause” for recourse to the use of periodic continence in the first place, thus completing the exegesis of the two parts of the 1932 dubium justifying the use of NFP – “just and grave causes” and “upright motives.” We have already established that, following as closely as possible to the reasoning of St. Thomas while not contradicting the papal literature, the request for the marital debt can be made within the context of intentional recourse to natural infertile periods for the sake of a legitimate easing of the movement of concupiscence. This leaves the question of what justifies the use of the habit of avoiding procreation in the first place. In other words, we have established what constitutes “idle speech,” but now we must ask what constitutes an “unjustified broad mental reservation.” There can indeed be such justification, because the sexual act, as St. Thomas so clearly teaches in the Summa Contra Gentiles, requires rectitude both with regard to the nature of the act itself and with regard to the care of potential children.134 Proper regard for the care for potential children could include avoiding their actualization as real children. 134 See SCG III, ch. 122, 4-6.
Pius XII in his “Speech to Italian Midwives,” and St. Paul VI in Humanae Vitae, both lay out several categories of “just causes” for using NFP. Pius XII lays out the following doctrine:
Serious motives, such as those which not rarely arise from medical, eugenic, economic and social so-called “indications,” may exempt husband and wife from the obligatory, positive debt for a long period or even for the entire period of matrimonial life. From this it follows that the observance of the natural sterile periods may be lawful, from the moral viewpoint: and it is lawful in the conditions mentioned. If, however, according to a reasonable and equitable judgment, there are no such grave reasons either personal or deriving from exterior circumstances, the will to avoid the fecundity of their union, while continuing to satisfy to tile full their sensuality, can only be the result of a false appreciation of life and of motives foreign to sound ethical principles.135 135 Pope Pius XII, “Address to Participants in the Conference of the Italian Catholic Union of Obstetricians,” (Vatican City: Libreria Editrice Vaticana, October 29, 1951).
St. Paul VI has an essentially identical take with very similar categories:
If therefore there are well-grounded reasons for spacing births, arising from the physical or psychological condition of husband or wife, or from external circumstances, the Church teaches that married people may then take advantage of the natural cycles immanent in the reproductive system and engage in marital intercourse only during those times that are infertile, thus controlling birth in a way which does not in the least offend the moral principles which We have just explained.136 136 Pope St. Paul VI, Humanae Vitae, §16 (Vatican City: Libreria Editrice Vaticana, July 25, 1968).
Many interpretations could be made of these paragraphs.137 However, we can see the connection between the “medical” motives of Pius XII with the “physical condition” of Humanae Vitae, and likewise the “social” with the “psychological,” and the “eugenic” and “economic” with the “external.” At least, this is one way to connect these unexplained categories. While surely there is no question that circumstances like living in an active warzone, having a wounded uterus, or being in a faltering marriage due to a schizophrenic spouse are grounds for the use of NFP to space births, the economic question is perhaps the thorniest. However, solving the economic question also could give some indication of how to interpret the less extreme instances of motives which would fall into the other categories. 137 See Brugger, Christian, “Just Cause and Natural Family Planning,” June 16, 2010, Washington, D.C., Zenit
I propose that there is a strong analogy between the duty to have children with the duty to give alms.
The teaching of St. Thomas on almsgiving is that it is an act of mercy, which is part of charity.138 Justice demands the relinquishing of what belongs to some specific person or group, such as returning a deposit or loan, or such as paying wages which were fairly agreed upon – these acts are not acts of charity in themselves. Charity demands that one give of one’s own wealth to others who are in need, motivated by friendship with God, Who cares for those who lack what they need to flourish in the natural order. 138 ST II-II q. 32, a. 1.
St. Thomas, like many commentators and manualists who followed him, including St. Alphonsus Liguori, see the obligation of almsgiving as standing in relation not only to the needs of those receiving alms but also in relation to the benefactor’s socio-economic class.139 It is in fact vicious on St. Thomas’ account for a wealthy man to make himself significantly poorer by almsgiving, except in special cases. This provides us with a framework to understand the economic issue of having more children. If having another child is likely to move the couple downward a socio-economic class or even merely to force them to live altogether out of keeping with the class they belong to, they possess a serious enough reason to avoid pregnancy until that condition is removed.140 The more serious the motive (or reservation) in this regard, the stronger the intention to avoid children can be with its accompanying restriction to the use of only the infertile time, ranging from merely “not intending to have children” to “strongly intending not to have children.” 139 ST II-II q. 32, a. 6; cf. O’Neill, James David, “Alms and Almsgiving,” The Catholic Encyclopedia, 1907, New York: Robert Appleton Company. 140 This is evaluated with due regard to the likelihood of twins, triplets, etc., the likelihood of a problematic gestation which will require expensive medical treatment, the likelihood of serious physical or mental deformities in the child requiring extraordinary assistance, and the likelihood of other special problems which could cause economic strain.
It might be responded that the duty to have children is one of justice, not of charity. In fact, this is true, both in terms of the requirement to will that one’s potential children offer due worship to God (as an act of religion which forms part of a rightly ordered conjugal act, as explained above), and also in terms of the common good of one’s society which demands the production of virtuous children, especially on account of the social and economic privileges which a married couple is rightly afforded in virtue of their marriage (as an act especially proper to the general virtue of legal justice, which has the common good as its object).141 However, this second aspect of justice refers not to a “legal debt” but “moral debt,” that is, a debt of fittingness rather than one of strictly demarcated right. Having children is the sort of thing which a couple ought to do so that their community can flourish.142 The will to offer their children as virtuous citizens to society is the natural counterpart to the supernatural offering of children to God as saints: benefitting the Church Militant and the Church Triumphant by raising up saints they have brought into the world through their marriage is also the sort of thing a couple ought to do. However, given that this offering is one of moral debt and not legal, and it is an offering not from one’s possessions but of “creation” and of increasing the burden upon oneself in terms of duties toward dependents, the analogy with almsgiving seems especially appropriate. Likewise, all are bound to give alms – according to their state in life and their present disposition. Having renounced marriage altogether would excuse one from having children, and renouncing temporal possessions altogether would excuse one from giving alms as it is only possible to do metaphorically, since one would not really be giving of one’s own possessions. Yet those who are married are bound to have children, not necessarily “here and now,” but “here and there,” just as one cannot be bound to give alms to a particular person (for then it would be justice), but rather one has discretion and must give “here and there” to those in need. 141 Legal justice is a “general virtue,” that is to say it is part of every virtue insofar as its object (the common good) is affected. (See ST II-II, q. 58, a. 6) However, a due act can be more directly in correspondence with what the common good demands, and therefore it follows that it can be more closely related to the general virtue of legal justice. NB: “legal justice” is not to be confused with the commutative justice arising from “legal debt.” (Much less is it to be confused with distributive justice issued in a courtroom – that is, “justice in a legal environment.”) 142 An extended study of the moral tradition on the duty to procreate would be a worthy project. I simply note that Pius XII and St. Paul VI explain the existence of such a duty in other places in the texts just quoted – the “Speech to Italian Midwives” and Humanae Vitae. The ancient and medieval authorities usually describe procreation as the primary end of marriage – the end thus defines “what one ought to do,” without further need to explain a duty to pursue that end – that is to say, what else does one marry for? (St. Thomas, however, does allude to a duty to procreate in ST II-II, q. 142, a. 1, ad. 2.) In witness to this, I offer the words of St. Justin Martyr (died c. 165): “But whether we [Christians] marry, it is only that we may bring up children; or whether we decline marriage, we live continently.” (First Apology, ch. 29; Translated by Marcus Dods and George Reith. From Ante-Nicene Fathers, Vol. 1. Edited by Alexander Roberts, James Donaldson, and A. Cleveland Coxe. [Buffalo, NY: Christian Literature Publishing Co., 1885.] Revised and edited for New Advent by Kevin Knight. http://www.newadvent.org/fathers/0126.htm.) See also Dr. N. Orville Griese, The Rhythm in Marriage and Christian Morality, The Newman Bookshop (Westminster, MD: 1944), p. 46-47. He compares the failure to have sufficient children to a priest with no assignment who refuses to give occasional sacramental assistance in a nearby parish church out of desire to stay in solitude with his own private mass.
The conclusion is that the illicit avoidance of having children is at least a sin against legal justice and also a sin against religion. The motives which inform this decision (i.e. for wealth, for ease of life, etc.) will further specify the precise nature of the sin.
In his “Speech to Italian Midwives,” Pius XII comments on the duty to have children in the following way:
The reason for this is that marriage obliges to a state of life which, while conferring certain rights also imposes the fulfillment of a positive work in regard to the married state itself. In such a case, one can apply the general principle that a positive fulfillment may be omitted when serious reasons, independent from the good will of those obliged by it, show that a similar demand cannot reasonably be made of human nature. The marriage contract which confers upon husband and wife the right to satisfy the inclinations of nature, sets them up in a certain state of life, the married state. But upon couples who perform the act peculiar to their state, nature and the Creator impose the function of helping the conservation of the human race. The characteristic activity which gives their state its value is the bonum prolis. The individual and society, the people and the state, the Church itself depend for the existence in the order established by God on fruitful marriage. Therefore, to embrace the married state, continuously to make use of the faculty proper to it and lawful in it alone, and on the other hand, to withdraw always and deliberately with no serious reason from its primary obligation, would be a sin against the very meaning of conjugal life.143 143 Pius XII, “Speech to Italian Midwives.” He continues: “There are serious motives, such as those often mentioned in the so-called medical, eugenic, economic, and social “indications,” that can exempt for a long time, perhaps even the whole duration of the marriage, from the positive and obligatory carrying out of the act. From this it follows that observing the non-fertile periods alone can be lawful only under a moral aspect. Under the conditions mentioned it really is so. But if, according to a rational and just judgment, there are no similar grave reasons of a personal nature or deriving from external circumstances, then the determination to avoid habitually the fecundity of the union while at the same time to continue satisfying their sensuality, can be derived only from a false appreciation of life and from reasons having nothing to do with proper ethical laws.” Note also that St. Paul VI opens Humanae Vitae by describing the transmission of human life as a duty: “The transmission of human life is a most serious role in which married people collaborate freely and responsibly with God the Creator. It has always been a source of great joy to them, even though it sometimes entails many difficulties and hardships. The fulfillment of this duty has always posed problems to the conscience of married people, but the recent course of human society and the concomitant changes have provoked new questions.” (Humanae Vitae, §1.)
We see that Pius XII sees the duty of the spouses to have children as being interwoven both with the logic of the use of marriage and with what is owed to the natural community (the State, the human race) and to the Church.
The summary of the principle is then the following: justice demands the payment of the marital debt, in proportion to the seriousness and reasonableness of the request, while charity demands due care for the needs of any potential children, in relation to one’s status in the family or in society. It is possible for someone requesting the debt to be owed its payment while his or her charity towards potential children is lacking. As St. Thomas indicates, the debt is owed even in cases where the child is foreseen to be seriously ill (but not in cases where there is clearly serious danger to the spouse, evidently over and above that of possibly contracting leprosy).144 In other words, the obligation of justice toward the spouse “outweighs” considerations of charity towards potential children. (The principal reason for this appears to be that the debt is owed to a real person, while charity is owed toward a potential person, viz., the child who may or may not be conceived.) 144 ST Supp. q. 64, a. 1, ad. 4; a. 3; a. 4. The example discusses the contraction of serious illness on the child begotten, which is a matter for charity. Ultimately, however, the debt must be paid if there is sufficient insistence, which is explained in the Reply to the Fourth Objection in Article 1 as being because it is better for a child to be diseased than not to exist at all.
This model gives a way forward into thinking about other categories. For instance, a sufficient medical reason would probably not include the likelihood of gaining several pounds which one will be unable to lose easily (though this could be a legitimate social factor in an extremely unhealthy marriage where the wife is severely judged for her looks), but it could include worsening a preexisting heart condition that would render one unable to engage in the moderate recreations one is accustomed to. A sufficient social or psychological reason would likely not include standard postpartum depression or a slightly elevated level of stress, but it could include the foreseeable loss of mental energy to give the minimal amount of reasonably expected care to one’s other children or even to oneself. But one must be really honest with oneself about such things.
The distinction between intending to avoid pregnancy and the absence of an intention to achieve pregnancy (whether virtually or in any particular sexual act) must be insisted upon. The mere absence of an intention to achieve pregnancy seems to require much less serious motives than the positive intention to avoid pregnancy, but it does appear that it requires at least some kind of justification. As Pius XII teaches so clearly, the vocation to matrimony is also a call to build up a family when possible. However, it may be the case that circumstances are not quite so difficult to justify positively intending to avoid having more children but are difficult enough that it would require virtue beyond what the couple possesses to intend positively in a psychologically healthy way to have another child, somewhat analogous to giving alms here and now begrudgingly, or doing non-obligatory ascetical practices out of a false sense of duty.145 The couple would then be excused from actively trying to have more children, but they would not necessarily be justified in having intending not to conceive and subsequently having intentional recourse to infertile periods for relations. In practice, this means they are relieved from the duty of preoccupying themselves with achieving pregnancy – this latter state being the obligatory default habitual intention of the couple. If the virtual (but not actual) intention to have more children remains, that is, if they still really want more children but are not actively trying to maximize this possibility, then they are free in their use of conjugal activity, regardless of whether it is foreseen to be infertile or not.146 145 Cf. 2 Corinthians 9:7. 146 We see that there is then a kind of gradation of justification required to avoid venial sin which maps onto the recourse to the use of marriage within the context of periodic continence which also tracks the kind of intentionality towards children which the couple has.
Furthermore, it almost goes without saying, were they to decide to consecrate themselves to perpetual continence by mutual agreement for the sake of contemplative goods or the apostolate, this would also excuse them from having more children.
Dr. Griese’s text (The Rhythm in Marriage and Christian Morality) provides a list of excusing motives for periodic continence which seem to match this analysis. He classifies them by their relation to the probability of licitly excusing the practice permanently and temporarily: sufficient for permanent use, certainly sufficient for temporary use, probably sufficient for temporary use, doubtfully sufficient for temporary use, and certainly not sufficient for temporary use. This list is quote in full in the Appendix.
I conclude this section with some pertinent lines from Pius XII’s Address to Midwives, an allocution which has already been cited in this book several times:
It is not, moreover, necessary for Us to prove to you who have experienced it, how essential nowadays is that apostolate of appreciation and love for the new life. Unfortunately, cases are not rare in which even a cautious reference to children as a “blessing” is enough to provoke a downright denial and perhaps even derision. Far more frequently, in thought and in words, the attitude of considering children a heavy “burden” predominates. How opposed is this frame of mind to the mind of God and to the words of Holy Scripture, and, for that matter, to sound reason and the sentiment of nature! Should there be conditions and circumstances in which parents, without violating the law of God, can avoid the “blessing” of children, such cases of force majeure, however, by no means authorise the perversion of ideas, the disparaging of values, the belittling of the mother who has had the courage and the honour to give life.147 147 Pius XII, “Address to Participants in the Conference of the Italian Catholic Union of Obstetricians,” (Vatican City: Libreria Editrice Vaticana, October 29, 1951).