www.byzcath.org Forums Faith & Christian Life Faith & Theology Birth Control

Dear David and Jenny,

West and East hold the same "substance" of faith and in this we are perfectly united.

But as to how we understand that same substance and express our respective spiritual patrimonies - the East differs from the West in every detail, including in how we understand the Trinity.

We pray for the dead, as does the West, yet "Purgatory" is a foreign idea for us.

We believe in the total holiness of the Mother of the Word Incarnate and liturgically celebrate the Conception of St Ann and the Dormition of the Mother of God and Her being taken to heaven, body and soul, by the hand of Her Son. We consistently believed this for centuries before Rome came to define those doctrines in the way it did.

So while we don't express our faith using the new Roman dogmas, we have always maintained the ancient Apostolic understanding of the Mystery of the Salvation of Christ Who brings us into the life of the Holy Trinity through His Incarnation by His Most Holy Mother to enable us to participate in His Body that is the Church of the Saints of all ages.

Alex

[QUOTE]Originally posted by DTBrown:
[QB] http://www.melkite.org/bishopQA.htm

Birth Control: How do Melkites view birth control?

Bishop John's Answer:<<<

I think we've been through the Bishop John Says routine before. Bishop John is a fine man, and a good pastoral bishop, but very much out of tune with the rest of the Melkite synod, as you know quite well. If you were to ask who has greater stature within the Melkite Greek Catholic Church--John Elya or Joseph Raya, I don't think that you would have much of a contest. And that you also know very well.

Dear Stuart,

Archbishop Raya is truly my ideal of a great Bishop of the East.

I particularly love his work on the Akathist to the Name of the Lord Jesus in which he included scriptural "Breaths" and meditations.

Although, as I've said, I don't want to hear anything about "no birth control."

Any suggestions on how best to conceive, Mr. Know-it-all?

Alex

[QUOTE]Originally posted by Orthodox Catholic:
[QB]Dear Stuart,

>>>Archbishop Raya is truly my ideal of a great Bishop of the East.

I particularly love his work on the Akathist to the Name of the Lord Jesus in which he included scriptural "Breaths" and meditations.

Although, as I've said, I don't want to hear anything about "no birth control."<<<

In reviewing Kyr Joseph's words, I think we need to focus on the following paragraphs:

In the embrace of love, Christian couples are chaste. They are perfectly and entirely for each other. "I am my Beloved�s and my Beloved is mine" (Canticle of Canticles). In genuine faith, they assume their human and spiritual responsibilities, and choose the best ways, pleasing to God, to achieve what they have set out to do. Birth control is in some way their responsibility. Vatican Council II has clearly established that conscience is the most sacred core and sanctuary of a man. There he is alone with God, whose voice echoes in his depths.

****

Kyr Joseph's quote from Evdokimos is also very important:

The Church "addresses herself to evangelical metanoia, and hopes to change man and woman into a new creation, to render them charismatic; She exorcises demonic powers and protects the Gate of Life; She discerns among the spirits, and shows the pathways to ultimate liberation; She does not define the rules of social life, and does not prescribe panacaeas. . . " (p.175).

as is Kyr Joseph's commentary:

The Church should never refuse to advise when advice is sought, but should not try to manipulate the intimacy of husband and wife. Patriarch Maximos IV of Antioch, Alexandria and Jerusalem proclaimed at the Council of Vatican II, "The Church does not penetrate into the nuptial chamber. She stands at the door."

The last paragraph, however, is the kicker:

The Byzantine Church does indeed believe that the Sacrament of Crowning establishes the man and woman as prophets, king and queen of supernatural worth, and robes them with the Royal Priesthood of Christ. Their dignity is real. Consequently, their vocation will be to form personal decisions, and to judge situations, in order to find solutions to the individual circumstances of their lives.

****

So, respect for the vocation of the couple crowned in Christian marriage requires respect for their unique roles as king and queen of their little realm, priests of the domestic Church, called upon to make serious moral decisions "in Christ", according to their needs. As Kyr Joseph notes, the way of the Eastern Churches is not to rigidly bind all to a juridical code, nor is it to prescribe panacaeas. Rather, it is to hold up an evangelical ideal, a icon of a way of life, and to encourage all to strive towards it, recognizing that not all are at the same point in their spiritual development, and that "one size does not fit all". The Church advises, it exhorts, but in the end, it has to recognize that it cannot intrude into the nuptial chamber, just as His Beatitude Patriarch Maximos IV said so eloquently at Vatican II. The decision, in the end, belongs to the couple, arrived at through prayer and contemplation, consistent with the Church's constant respect for human life. But it is clear that the Christian East places its emphasis on the chastity of married life, and on the intent with which the married couple approach such intimate decisions, than it does on the means by which they choose to implement those decisions. Contraception is not necessarily an invitation to promiscuity, nor is it necessarily a renunciation of the purposes of Christian marriage, any more than the use of natural family planning, or even the renunciation of any sort of family planning is an endorsement of Tradition. A married couple can engage in NFP solely for the purpose of avoiding childbearing altogether, so that they might indulge in selfish pursuits (an "enhanced lifestyle"). Conversely, a couple might decide, after prayerful consideration, that the use of an artificial contraceptive is the best way for them to space out their childbearing, so that they can more fully live their vocations as husband and wife, mother and father. And, of course, outside of marriage, it makes not one whit of difference what sort of family planning one uses--the act itself is still sinful.

So, it is impossible to make a priori pronouncments in this case; each one is sui generis, and depends upon the circumstances of the couple, and the reasons for, and means by which they reach the decision that they believe is right for them.

Dear Stuart,

But still no advice on how best to conceive.

I can understand this in Kyr Joseph's case. But you . . .?

Thanks for the painstaking presentation, Professor, and may God bless you and yours always!

Alex

[QUOTE]Originally posted by Orthodox Catholic:
[QB]Dear Stuart,

>>>But still no advice on how best to conceive.<<<

Work, work, work. Nasty job, but somebody's got to do it. Close your eyes, and think of Canada, or something.

>>>I can understand this in Kyr Joseph's case. But you . . .? <<<

I've already notched my gunstock twice, thank you.

>>>Thanks for the painstaking presentation, Professor, and may God bless you and yours always!<<<

Somehow, Alex, I get the sneaky suspicion that you are laughing at the Irish-Catholic preoccupations of your American cousins.

Comment:

I'm married. I can't imagine ruining marital intimacy by using contraception.

Question:

If the Church issues "legalistic" rulings against murder, homosexuality, abortion, etc., then why can't it make an accross-the-board ruling against contraception?

Comment for Dave:

Several Orthodox priests with whom I have communicated have indicated that they were taught the pill is wrong and can never be used, and this is what they tell their flock.

In Christ,

anastasios

Only for Alex:

Simply "rositas."

Now, that's pregnant with meaning!


AmdG

John Paul II's "theology of the body" is glorious and after being exposed to it, my wife and I can't imagine ever poisoning our love with contraception. It is revolting and immoral. So what if all the people in the pews are not obedient? If everyone jumped off a cliff, would you? The Christian faith is not determined by what the majority do in their private life. The Christian faith is determined by our King Jesus and guarded by those he set in authority. I'm preaching to the choir, I know. But I find it downright discouraging to hear Eastern Christians using their "easterness" to cop out of what is plainly part of the eastern deposit of faith regarding sexual ethics. No Christian prior to the last century ever questioned this given moral attitude against artificial contraception. This is part of the faith once delivered to the saints.

yours in Christ,
Marshall

Stuart wrote:


I don't think it's a matter of "my Bishop is better than your Bishop," Stuart. Someone asked what the position of Eastern Catholics was. You cited one. I cited another.

I have a lot of respect for Archbishop Raya. That doesn't mean he is correct on all points especially when he dissents from traditional Orthodox-Catholic teaching on artificial contraception. He obviously joined the bandwagon when almost everyone turned against the traditional teaching when Paul VI issued _Humanae Vitae_. I repeat (and no one has addressed this except for Anastasios): if the invention of the Pill was enough to make some Christians reconsider the traditional teaching on artificial contraception, how is that rationalized when we now know that one of the way the Pill works is to sometimes prevent the implantation of a fertilized ovum? For example, see:

http://www.icgold.net/mother/pill_abortifacient.html

Paul VI was right and prophetic. Those who threw out the traditional teaching on artificial contraception in their rush to embrace the new technology were wrong (including the dear Archbishop).

Dave Ignatius DTBrown@aol.com

[ 07-09-2002: Message edited by: DTBrown ]

Anastasios wrote:


I'd love to see such remarks from Orthodox on the net. Any webpage references?

Everything I've seen so far has been to put down the Catholic understanding as "legalistic." Surprisingly, some Orthodox moral theologians allow for the use of the "morning-after pill" in emergency situations which essentially is a stronger dose of the hormones used in the Pill (with the goal of preventing implantation.)

[QUOTE]Originally posted by anastasios:
[QB]Comment:

>>>I'm married. I can't imagine ruining marital intimacy by using contraception.<<<

That is very good. It is, I hope, a decision you and your wife made together, in faith and love, as the path that was correct for your development in holiness. Realize, though, that one size really does not fit all, and what is right for you may not be right for other couples equally determined to live in holiness according to the gifts that God gave them.

>>>Question:

If the Church issues "legalistic" rulings against murder, homosexuality, abortion, etc., then why can't it make an accross-the-board ruling against contraception?<<<

That reason should be obvious: in each of those cases, we are either dealing with a practice which is condemned in Scripture (murder, homosexuality) or which has been associated with a practice proscribed in Scripture (abortion). With contraception, we are in a grey area. Certainly the Church has consistently spoken against contraception as it was practiced at various places and at various times (mainly because abortion was the only effective contraceptive), but in point of fact in the oikonomia even of the Latin Church tended to be more flexible (especially from the 19th century onward, when women became the backbone of the Church, cf. Eugene Podles on the subject). The fact is, the East has a different way of dealing with morally difficult and ambiguous situations: it holds up an ideal and tries to help the faithful live up to it, while the West issues legal injunctions (usually full of useful loopholes) and then walks away.

Comment for Dave:

>>>Several Orthodox priests with whom I have communicated have indicated that they were taught the pill is wrong and can never be used, and this is what they tell their flock.<<<

This is true, and there is nothing wrong with their approach, provided it is noted that it is their own particular understanding of Church teaching. There is no definitive Orthodox ruling on the matter, and as Arcbishop Joseph's position vs. that of Bishop John shows, there is no uniform Eastern Catholic position, either.

Anastasios wrote:


And Stuart replied:


Question for Stuart:

Those who feel that the Pill is wrong to use because it can cause a fertilized ovum not to implant are only following "their own particular understanding of Church teaching"? It might be wrong...but then again it might not be wrong. Is that what you're saying?

Dave Ignatius DTBrown@aol.com

Stuart wrote:

I]in point of fact in the oikonomia even of the Latin Church tended to be more flexible (especially from the 19th century onward, when women became the backbone of the Church, cf. Eugene Podles on the subject).[/I]

Stuart, I presume you are referring here to Leon Podles who wrote a book and several articles on The Feminization of the Church. I do not accept many of his theses along these lines and think he is rather off base. I have a few posts on my own blog giving some of my "whys" for my disagreements. URL for my blog, if anyone is interested, is: http://blogforlovers.blogspot.com

Podles is an editor of "Touchstone" to which I have subscribed for years. But I do not like his articles usually and the constant critcisms he hurls (and I find it a bit wacko to lay part of the blame for the feminization of the Church on figures like St Bernard of Clairvaux, Hans Urs von Balthasar and, yes, Pope John Paul II!!!!).

See for yourself!

Marshall, some good points...we are not spiritual lemmings, that's for sure...

And oikonomia must be considered, as Gerard has pointed out, both for East and West. Oikonomia is not "copping out" by doing what is easiest but should facilitate metanoia and a progression towards theosis. I know of several Orthodox priests who do use it for a cop out and publicly preach and teach contraception using oikonomia as their gun against "Latin rigidism", as a blanket "dispensation" to contracept at will. I have heard pro-contraception plaforms from the OCA, the Greeks and the Antiochians.