Perfectly Coherent
Recently I shared a graphic on social media which applauded the decision by several Alabama fertility clinics to pause their IVF services after the Alabama Supreme Court ruled embryos created via in vitro are children and should have the full benefit of protection under Alabama State Law. After seeing my graphic an acquaintance reached out to me to ask why I’d approve of the decision to suspend IVF.
Q: I am prolife , but I wonder why clinics would pause IVF? Is there more to it ? Just curious. I have multiple friends who only had babies through IVF.
A: Because the Alabama courts ruled that embryos are children and are protected by law. In IVF it is common practice to destroy unused embryos or for embryos to remain frozen indefinitely. If we believe life begins at conception (embryonic stage is even a step beyond this definition) then common practices in IVF destroy or harm a unique human life created by God. Catholics are forbidden to use IVF for this and other reasons having to do with the nature of conception and the purpose of the marital act.
Hope that helps. It’s a hard teaching but one that is grounded in the Truth of Catholic moral teaching.
Admittedly, the nature of social media does not allow for truly in depth exchanges of ideas. My answer barely touched on the reasons why the Alabama decision is good. The Church’s teaching on Catholic sexual morality is complicated, misunderstood, misrepresented and yet incredibly cohesive and beautiful. It is a difficult subject to tackle but one I’ve considered deeply since becoming Catholic 28 years ago.
When my husband and I decided to raise our family in the Catholic Faith I read everything about the Faith I could get my hands on. One of the first Catholic publications we received was the diocesan newspaper and the first issue was completely devoted to highlighting the sacrament of marriage. A range of topics were explored, including the indissolubility of the marriage bond, the importance of welcoming children into a marriage, the continued relevance of the papal encyclical Humanae Vitae, the efficaciousness of Natural Family Planning, etc. Before reading this periodical I had no idea that the prevalent use of contraception was something Catholics completely rejected. As I read I began to happily and wholeheartedly believe that the Church which held marriage, children, and family in such sacred esteem had to be the True Church. This cohesive instruction on marital fecundity placed me firmly on the path to conversion.
The Church’s consistent mandate against contraceptive use is one of the most difficult for people to understand and accept, but if you look at Her guidance on human sexuality and the sacrament of marriage as a whole you see how consistent the precepts are. This post has been one I’ve wanted to write for many years. I know it is a complicated, challenging and controversial set of questions to tackle, with the potential to offend and hurt. I hope to approach these difficult issues with compassion and gentleness without compromising the Truth. What I am presenting is authentically Catholic and truths of the faith we all must know and assent to. Supported with biblical passages, admonitions from Church fathers, and quotations from the Catechism, I hope to make a clear case for the perfect coherence of teaching on human sexuality as taught by the Universal Church; unchangeable and true past, present, and future.
Male and Female
And God created man to his own image; to the image of God he created him; male and female he created them. And God blessed them, saying: Increase and multiply, and fill the earth, and subdue it, and rule over the fishes of the sea, and the fowls of the air, and all living creatures that move upon the earth. Genesis 1: 27-28
We are created beings. When I was a kid I remember a common saying, “God doesn’t make mistakes.” I haven’t heard that one in quite awhile. The reality of our being created as male and female contradicts the ever more popular notions of gender dysphoria and gender fluidity. We were bestowed with a unique identity at our conception. Not only a biological fact but a theological and philosophical truth.There is something else behind transgenderism driving the unrest. Part of it is a denial of having been created by a loving God to be uniquely male and female which has led to deep self-loathing and self-destruction. While the Church has compassion for those experiencing gender dysphoria, She does not condone or support the denial nor mutilation of our biological gender.
1603 "The intimate community of life and love which constitutes the married state has been established by the Creator and endowed by him with its own proper laws. . . . God himself is the author of marriage."The vocation to marriage is written in the very nature of man and woman as they came from the hand of the Creator. Marriage is not a purely human institution despite the many variations it may have undergone through the centuries in different cultures, social structures, and spiritual attitudes. These differences should not cause us to forget its common and permanent characteristics. Although the dignity of this institution is not transparent everywhere with the same clarity, some sense of the greatness of the matrimonial union exists in all cultures. "The well-being of the individual person and of both human and Christian society is closely bound up with the healthy state of conjugal and family life." --Catechism of the Catholic Church
Despite the catchy quip: “Love is Love”, marriage is not merely a contract of love between two consenting adults. It is a covenant between a man and a woman that is naturally fruitful and ordained by God. Of course, ideally love comes into it, but not in the way the culture portrays it. The love between a husband and wife takes on many forms: eros, philios, but most importantly caritas, the same type of love Christ has for His Bride, the Church. This love is not self-seeking. It is self-less. It seeks the good of the other before self. Anything outside this covenant relationship is harmful and not fruitful but sterile. The congruency of discipline in this regard yields sex outside of the sacrament marriage as sinful because it is so harmful: pre-marital, extra-marital, and same sex relations inclusive. While heterosexual relations outside of matrimony may indeed be fruitful, by the very fact that they bypass the bond of marriage they inflict extensive damage upon everyone involved.
Permanence
Have ye not read, that he who made man from the beginning, Made them male and female? And he said: For this cause shall a man leave father and mother, and shall cleave to his wife, and they two shall be in one flesh. Therefore now they are not two, but one flesh. What therefore God hath joined together, let no man put asunder. --Matthew 19:4-6
No one is permitted to know a woman other than his wife. The marital right is given you for this reason: lest you fall into the snare and sin with a strange woman. "If you are bound to a wife, do not seek a divorce"; for you are not permitted, while your wife lives, to marry another. --Saint Ambrose
1639 The consent by which the spouses mutually give and receive one another is sealed by God himself. From their covenant arises "an institution, confirmed by the divine law, . . . even in the eyes of society. "The covenant between the spouses is integrated into God's covenant with man: "Authentic married love is caught up into divine love."
1640 Thus the marriage bond has been established by God himself in such a way that a marriage concluded and consummated between baptized persons can never be dissolved. This bond, which results from the free human act of the spouses and their consummation of the marriage, is a reality, henceforth irrevocable, and gives rise to a covenant guaranteed by God's fidelity. The Church does not have the power to contravene this disposition of divine wisdom. --Catechism of the Catholic Church
The sacrament of marriage forms a permanent bond which cannot be broken. Sadly, while this is still the authoritative dogma of the Church, by all appearances, She seems to no longer stand by this position. Case in point, recently implemented reforms to the tribunal proceedings have streamlined and reduced the cost of seeking an annulment, making it easier to dissolve the marriage contract. Despite the obvious incongruence here, the true understanding of sacramental marriage is that it is unbreakable. The consequences of allowing for marriage bonds to be broken so readily are vast and devastating. There is unlikely one among us who has not been touched in some way by divorce and its pervasiveness in our culture. The Church used to stand in stark contrast to the world in this regard, but today Her marriages are ending at nearly the same rate as the secular world.
Fruitful vs Sterile
“Why do you sow where the field is eager to destroy the fruit, where there are medicines of sterility [oral contraceptives], where there is murder before birth? You do not even let a harlot remain only a harlot, but you make her a murderess as well. . . . Indeed, it is something worse than murder, and I do not know what to call it; for she does not kill what is formed but prevents its formation. What then? Do you condemn the gift of God and fight with his [natural] laws? . . . Yet such turpitude . . . the matter still seems indifferent to many men—even to many men having wives. In this indifference of the married men there is greater evil filth.” --Saint John Chrysostom
Therefore We base Our words on the first principles of a human and Christian doctrine of marriage when 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. --Pope Paul VI in Humanae Vitae
2366 Fecundity is a gift, an end of marriage, for conjugal love naturally tends to be fruitful. A child does not come from outside as something added on to the mutual love of the spouses, but springs from the very heart of that mutual giving, as its fruit and fulfillment. So the Church, which "is on the side of life" teaches that "it is necessary that each and every marriage act must remain ordered per se to the procreation of human life." "This particular doctrine, expounded on numerous occasions by the Magisterium, is based on the inseparable connection, established by God, which man on his own initiative may not break, between the unitive significance and the procreative significance which are both inherent to the marriage act." --Catechism of the Catholic Church
Of course it sounds appealing--sex without consequences. It is indeed a lie. Contraception subverts God’s Will. That should be enough if we seek to serve Him, but the corruption caused by pervasive contraception use is even greater across the board. Marriage is a sacrament in which both the unitive and procreative are inseparable. The intrinsic fecundity of marital love is a vital aspect of this particular Catholic teaching. Contraception separates sex from fruitfulness and makes it a free-for-all, reducing the relationship between man and woman to a mere sexual encounter in which no permanent bond need be made. Among the contraceptive practices: masturbation, coitus interruptus, barrier methods, chemical contraceptives, and sterilization all are immoral and do not conform with instruction on human sexuality as ordained by God.
2354 Pornography consists in removing real or simulated sexual acts from the intimacy of the partners, in order to display them deliberately to third parties. It offends against chastity because it perverts the conjugal act, the intimate giving of spouses to each other. It does grave injury to the dignity of its participants (actors, vendors, the public), since each one becomes an object of base pleasure and illicit profit for others. It immerses all who are involved in the illusion of a fantasy world. It is a grave offense. Civil authorities should prevent the production and distribution of pornographic materials. -- Catechism of the Catholic Church
Hardly a “victimless” sin, porn is another form of human trafficking enslaving both participants and spectators. Like contraception, pornography separates the unitive and procreative aspect of human sexuality and is rendered a sterile act.
The Ends do not Justify the Means
2376 Techniques that entail the dissociation of husband and wife, by the intrusion of a person other than the couple (donation of sperm or ovum, surrogate uterus), are gravely immoral. These techniques (heterologous artificial insemination and fertilization) infringe the child’s right to be born of a father and mother known to him and bound to each other by marriage. They betray the spouses’ “right to become a father and a mother only through each other.” --Catechism of the Catholic Church
This is probably the toughest sell, especially coming from the mother of seven living children, and from a Church which encourages families to welcome children. Infertility is a painful cross. Thanks be to God, there are a multitude of fertility treatments which are morally compatible with Church law. Unfortunately, there are many which are completely irreconcilable. Among these are surrogacy and in vitro fertilization. Please know, I am not personally standing in judgment or condemning anyone reading this who has undertaken either of these methods to become parents. I am merely presenting Catholic teaching. As a faithful Catholic, I do agree with and assent to this instruction because it is fully in harmony with the complete understanding of the purpose of human sexuality. Both surrogacy and in vitro fertilization separate the unitive aspect from the procreative. In surrogacy, a woman is brought in from outside the bonds of marriage and paid to become pregnant outside the marital act and to carry a child, which will be delivered to the contracting party; literally human trafficking. In vitro fertilization appears on the outside to be a miracle of science, but it is fraught with immorality. There are layers within the process, each subverting God’s Will. The marital act itself is missing. The way in which the father’s contribution is collected is immoral (see contraception). Fertilized eggs are tested for viability, leading to the destruction of those embryos determined to be inferior. To create one living child in the lab results in multiple other children being discarded. Despite good intentions the means are corrupt and should not be pursued.
Regardless of what you may read or hear concerning the Church’s supposed position on any of the above views of sexual morality, what I’ve presented ARE perennial and universal mandates of the Catholic Church. They are unchangeable no matter what anyone at any level of authority may say. One of the most beautiful features of our humanness is our unique co-creative relationship with God. The Church has been the only institution which has clearly and cohesively instructed and upheld every facet of what human sexuality, ordained by God, should look like. The Church’s comprehensible guidance in this regard is why I decided to become Catholic. As children of God, we are called to fruitfulness, not sterility.
Resources and further reading:
Alabama Supreme Court Affirms Frozen Embryos are Children
Alabama IVF Facilities Halt Operations After Court Ruling Affirming Embryos are Children
Defending a Higher Law: Why We Must Resist Same-Sex "Marriage" and the Homosexual Movement
Made This Way: How to Prepare Kids to Face Today's Tough Moral Issues by Leila Miller and Trent Horn
Impossible Marriages Redeemed: They Didn't End the Story in the Middle by Leila Miller
Fight or Die: 12 Weapons for Combatting Porn Addiction
Fertility Care Centers of America (NaProTechnology)
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