Contraception and Anglicanism...

May be a bit dated, but this was my senior Moral Theology term paper:

Anglicanism has, for the last 76 years, accepted the practice of contraception with, at first tacit and reserved, and now seemingly unconditional, approval. Within that time, the traditional teaching of the Church has been challenged on a number of other subjects – the role of women, homosexuality, and even the creedal definitions of the Faith. All the while, divorce rates spiked. The purpose here is not, in a discussion of contraception and the Anglican position towards it, to pinpoint any slippery slope and the date in which it began. It is rather to re-evaluate the contemporary position from the perspective of current controversy and to argue for a second look at marital sexuality in terms of fullness.

By way of a disclaimer, two considerations must be made. It is the prerogative of this paper to assume that proper Christian sexual relations take place within the context of heterosexual marriage. This is primarily to keep the waters from being muddied, and secondly, to keep recent developments in Anglican moral thought in the background rather than the foreground of this discussion. Secondly, the definition of contraception will not include oral contraceptives, but only artificial methods, so that there may be freedom, firstly to evaluate the thought of the Lambeth Conferences of 1930 and 1958, and to eschew any consequences of evaluating a contraceptive method which includes, quite often, destruction of human embryos. Further, it is not wished that dubious assertions of any moral “need” to use contraceptives for personal health be entertained, but rather the use of them in normative marriages which would otherwise produce healthy children. In question is primarily whether the sacrament of marriage is endangered by the use of contraceptives.

Thus, we begin with where we are today. The Episcopal Church has allowed for the consecration of an active homosexual, living with his male partner, to the Episcopate. It has also tacitly approved the development of rites for same-sex unions. This discussion has spread around the world. If there has been any recognition of a slippery slope, this should be credited to the Archbishop of Canterbury, Rowan Williams:

In fact, of course, in a church which accepts the legitimacy of contraception, the absolute condemnation of same-sex relations of intimacy must rely either on an abstract fundamentalist deployment of a number of very ambiguous texts, or on a problematic and non-scriptural theory about natural complementarity, applied narrowly and crudely to physical differentiation without regard to psychological structures. I suspect that a fuller exploration of the sexual metaphors of the Bible will have more to teach us about a theology and ethics of sexual desire than will the flat citation of isolated texts; and I hope other theologians will find this worth following up more fully than I can do here.

If there is a slippery slope of moral thought involving the approval of contraception in the Anglican Communion, we are certainly downhill. But, what of the merit of Williams’ assertion? It is clear that Williams is making the case that sexuality need not include procreation. This is a revision of Anglicanism’s historic position, and he is quite clear that revision of official teaching on contraception is the turning point. He writes: “If we are afraid of facing the reality of same-sex love because it compels us to think through the processes of bodily desire and delight in their own right, perhaps we ought to be more cautious about appealing to Scripture as legitimating only procreative heterosexuality.” It is the presupposition of +Williams that he is not looking at the individual sexual act, nor the wholeness of a marriage being procreative in intent. In the 1930s it was the particular genius of Anglicanism that found a way to look comprehensively at the intent and good of marriage, but where has this left us? Could it be that, unwittingly, admitting purely unitive acts of intercourse by approval of contraception, we have affirmed Williams’ statements? Further, if the procreative good is excluded, even in individual acts of intercourse, does it follow that a human sexual relationship need not be procreative at all, and thus admit that homosexual practices are indeed good and holy, contrary not only to those “very ambiguous texts” but also to the whole of the Judeo-Christian tradition regarding marriage?
As an aside, for a long time, Anglicanism held that procreation was the sine qua non of marriage. John Noonan writes:

The old theory, in its anxiety to preserve the lawfulness of virginal marriages, had recognized no obligation in marriage to procreate. A marriage was lawful and valid in which intercourse, and consequently procreation, were abstained from. “The Anglicans assuredly err,” taught Vermeersch in 1934, when they say there is a duty for married persons to have children: “The multiplication of the human race is sufficiently provided for so that no precept is given that it be undertaken.” In this traditional analysis, the obligation to procreate attached to the exercise of the marital act, not to the entrance into matrimony.

While this discussion of virgin marriages presupposes that they are exactly that – virginal, it is helpful to note that marriage need not be procreative at all. It is for this reason that this paper deals with the act of intercourse itself, and also the entire sexual relationship between man and wife, and the marriage goods themselves. This may seem to some to be a mirroring of the Roman position in one sense, but it is quite clear that contraception concerns sex, and indirectly marriage. Further, Malthusian forecasts of impending extinction of the human race, either for the reason of too many mouths to feed, or no mouths at all, will not here be entertained.

It may be helpful to our purposes to look at what Anglicanism has affirmed in history as to the nature of marriage, both among the divines as well as authors directly previous to the last century. The first cause of marriage listed in the Book of Common Prayer is the procreation of children, that they may be “brought up in the fear and nurture of the Lord, and to the praise of his holy Name.” In passing, it may be said that the Church has recognized the marriage of couples who cannot conceive, if not for the first cause, for the latter two. Further, these causes ought rightly to be understood as normative and relatively unconcerned with special cases. The second is that marriage is a remedy against sin, for those who do not have the gift of “continency” that they may keep themselves undefiled. Already we see the classic Anglican emphasis on sanctification and holiness. The third is their mutual help, that they may have one another, thus there is an emphasis on mutuality. It should be noted that even though procreation in Anglicanism is an intent of marriage, it is the marriage which provides for the raising of children who are consecrated to God. This may happen, and quite well, with adopted children, foster children, and indeed, with no children at all, but the children of the community or parish church.

The Book of Homilies, under Queen Elizabeth I, states that “married persons must apply their minds in most earliest wise to concord, and must crave continually of God the help of his Holy Spirit, so to rule their hearts and to knit their minds together, that they be not dissevered by any division of discord.” So, the mind of the married couple is ruled by truth, has the help of the Holy Spirit so that their hearts and minds may be united and not divided. But, what does this have to do with sexual relations between them? The craving of the help of the Holy Spirit has its mind set upon becoming holy, becoming set apart for God’s use. This sermon also calls us to look at children as a blessing of God. The focus is not on biology, not only for the reason that such biological activities are still veiled in mystery, but that marriage is seen in unabashedly sacramental terms. This mutuality further includes sexual intercourse as the ultimate act of self-giving, both in the procreative and the unitive good.

Richard Hooker denotes the clear difference between wives and concubines, and it is brought up here to note that there is a theology of marital union in sex different from anything else. Hooker notes:

Apparent it is that the ancient difference between lawfull wife and a concubine was onlie in the different purpose of man betaking him selfe to the one or the other. If his purpose were onlie fellowship there grew to the woman by meane no worship at all but the contrarie… The worship that grew unto hir being taken with declaration of this intent was that hir children became by this meane legitimate and free; hir selfe was made a mother over his familie; last of all she received such advancement of state as thinges annexed unto his person might augment hir with.

We see that the ideal of marriage includes the aspect of worship, both between spouses and also to God. It is clear that for the concubine, she becomes the object of the opposite of worship, namely that of utility. She is put to the use of the man for his own physical gratification by her, rather than being his worshipped equal, endowed with all his earthly goods. Thus, the distinction is made between utility and worship in marriage, and thus in marital sexual relationship, and in this relationship a mutual gifting of the whole person to the other. In so doing, the man and wife offer themselves and their family to God for sanctification. This, however, cannot be the case with a concubine. The concubine does not share in the wealth of the man, nor do her children.

Here, it is noted that the sexual relationship of the man and the woman in marriage is but one aspect of a complex sacramental union between them. But, their outward and inward lives, public and private are to be reflective of this mutual self-giving, to the extent that nothing is retained. It is not an arrangement of utility, but rather the mystic and practical union of human souls for their sanctification.

Sex, however, and not marriage is what the Lambeth Conference of 1930 deals with, as noted by Francis Hall. He writes:

The reference here is to the accepted biblical and Christian doctrine that marriage has the secondary, two-fold, end of cherishing mutual love and of reducing lust. ‘Marriage,’ however, is the New Testament term in this connection rather than ‘intercourse.’ It is true that marriage’s primary end of procreation cannot be fulfilled without intercourse; but the secondary ends of affection and self-control can be, and frequently are, fulfilled in high degree by the grace given in Holy Matrimony and made effective by the bond of mutually accepted and sanctified purpose and self-discipline. On the other hand, a mutual affection which has to be cultivated by an intercourse made safe only by elaborate and unnatural precautions is certain to fall below the holy level of truly Christian marriage. And indulgence of sex appetite under such conditions is calculated to emphasize rather than to reduce the burning of carnal passion.

It is clear that one mistake of prevailing Anglican thought is that sexual intercourse is the only necessary activity for the increase of the unitive good of marriage. The unitive good, indeed, includes far more. Hall is quite correct in noting that contraceptives allow for intercourse to be far more for the purposes of utility and “carnal passion” than for what the unitive good of marriage truly is – worship. Of course, the Lambeth resolution of 1930 denounces the use of contraceptives for utilitarian and hedonistic motives while allowing that they may be used in certain instances. The 1930 resolution reads:

…in those cases where there is such a clearly felt moral obligation to limit or avoid parenthood, and where there is a morally sound reason for avoiding complete abstinence, the Conference agrees that other methods may be used, provided this is done in the light of the same Christian principles.

There is little elaboration upon what “morally sound reason” there may be for avoiding complete abstinence. But, one suspects that the reason includes lack of continence on either part. But, again, the focus is on sex and not marriage. It ought rightly to be both, including a full vision of both.

But, the Lambeth resolution of 1958 is far more open on the question. The reason is that the unitive good has now been elevated to the same level as the procreative. Again, the fixation of the unitive good is on intercourse, not the other means by which it may be cultivated. The conference is fixated upon warnings against selfishness and self-indulgence in the marital act, and it seems to concentrate on the fullness of marriage in a general sense, to the neglect of the specific. The Conference States:

The Conference believes that the responsibility for deciding upon the number and frequency of children has been laid by God upon the consciences of parents everywhere: that this planning, in such ways as are mutually acceptable to husband and wife in Christian conscience, is a right and important factor in Christian family life and should be the result of positive choice before God.

The reasoning is that if the unitive good matches the procreative in importance, and is no longer merely secondary, then sexual intercourse may fulfill one without the other. This opens the door for in-vitro fertilization on the one hand, but for contraception on the other. What seems to be forgotten is that the unitive good of marriage may be purely in that both the man and the woman restrain themselves, to be devoted to prayer, and sanctification by the Holy Spirit. Further, it concentrates on the marriage as a whole, rather than on the instances of intercourse within it. What is forgotten is that virtue consists in virtuous acts. The Conference further places the entire weight of decision upon the conscience of the individual.

This raises the question: what exactly does contraception do? Put crudely, a man may have sex with his wife, retaining the giving of himself by use of a condom. He need not think: “what if we conceive?” or “what will another child cost me?” for he has only put forth the cost of the condom. Is the pleasure deficient? Perhaps so, as the sexual relationship is clearly not what God had intended – it no longer allows conception at all. Secondly, if we are honest, the question must be asked: how is this any more than masturbation? How is it that this act is not selfish? It is as if we have glossed over the problem of sexual lust in marriage, which degrades God’s purposes – that man and woman may be brought together to be made holy through their union, a union which does not need to include intercourse, nor (contrary to classically Anglican understandings) procreation.

Thus, we are brought to ask yet another question. What of the fullness of the sacrament of marriage? If we define marriage as simply having two aims – that of procreation and that of unity between man and woman, then we have a terribly diminished view. It is the conviction of classical Anglicanism that marriage has far more at stake – namely the sanctification of the human soul, the family, and self. What is called for is unity indeed, but not merely unity between man and wife, but unity between man and wife and God. The couple is to be inherently focused upon God, and thus aiming for the moral and spiritual perfection of themselves, to be aimed on the same for their spouse. It is often assumed to be the inverse. The Christian marriage is to be marked with prudence, temperance and fortitude.

Thomas Aquinas notes that prudence is not merely “smarts” but that “a prudent man is one who sees as it were from afar, for his sight is keen, and he foresees the event of uncertainties.” It is, in short, “right reason applied to action.” But, the reason is to be controlled by the principles of God, and in this case the principles of marriage. It also concerns command, what action is taken after counsel. One might argue that prudence might keep a family from growing to be too large, but prudence concerns the action taken, and contraception is not the only option. The chief option, if we are to focus upon sanctification is mutual restraint and the control of lust. This is the difficult and high moral road, yet the open availability of contraceptive devices has made it nearly unseen.

In terms of temperance, a moral virtue as opposed to an intellectual one, we can take temperance to mean that which makes the marriage good. The marriage is good in that it consists and perseveres in good actions. If a portion of the acts are contrary to natural law, or contrary to restraint from lust, then the highest good is not the aim. Thus, it may be said that the temperate marriage is able to take delight in the good of marriage itself, the union wrought by God, rather than in the passion thereof. Contraceptives allow couples to engage in sexual intercourse which is not distinctly marital. On a practical level, it is quite clear that contraceptives have allowed for a sizeable shift in the sexual thinking of society – that sexual relations outside of marriage are now normative and bear little consequence because of the impact of contraceptive practice. Further, if sexuality concerns passion and not worship, utility and not sanctification, is there any integrity in a theology which precludes homosexuality?

The question of fortitude is important in that it requires of the Christian doing what is right in the face of danger. There are many dangerous aspects to procreation – poverty, medical complications in pregnancy and delivery, and even the consideration that in many countries it is illegal to have more than one child. These make the Christian’s completion of right action difficult, but they do not make this action morally wrong. Contraception provides a means by which negative consequences of intercourse may be removed, making the practice itself questionable.

The Christian is to be cognizant of all these factors, but most of all to set the mind upon the Kingdom of God, to be a subject of it. This requires faithfulness in each act, and thus each act of intercourse. Virtue consists in virtuous action, and the question is begged of Anglicanism: what virtue is there to be found? Divorce rates are high, and AIDS epidemic has spread worldwide, and homosexual activity is being entertained as a possible expression of valid sexual activity. What has been lost is the unique Christian perspective on marriage – that it is not merely utilitarian, nor merely sexual, nor merely procreative, but a full and sacramental relationship of self-giving and worship. Our current controversies may, in part, be found in this jettisoning of our unique position, and the allowance of contraception has indeed been part of that loss.

LMN+