Modern day prophesy and NFP Awareness Week

On this day 43 years ago, Pope Paul VI promulgated the encyclical Humanae Vitae ("On Human Life").

Humanae Vitae (it's short; read it!) reiterated the Church's unchanging teachings on human sexuality, specifically the truth that contraception and sterilization are incompatible with human dignity and the nature of married love.

Coming as it did in the midst of the sexual revolution and the advent of the Pill, Pope Paul's letter was met with shocked disappointment, resistance, and even anger on the part of those who had anticipated a change in the Church's teaching.* In the aftermath of the encyclical's release, dissenting Catholic academics and clergy actively encouraged the laity to disobey the Pope and reject the Church's moral teaching of 2,000 years.

In many ways, all hell broke loose.

Pope Paul VI paid a great personal toll for writing those pages, which have since become a modern day prophecy. Who can deny that what he predicted then has come true with a vengeance? Take a look [emphases mine]:

Responsible men can become more deeply convinced of the truth of the doctrine laid down by the Church on this issue if they reflect on the consequences of methods and plans for artificial birth control. Let them first consider how easily this course of action could open wide the way for marital infidelity and a general lowering of moral standards. Not much experience is needed to be fully aware of human weakness and to understand that human beings—and especially the young, who are so exposed to temptation—need incentives to keep the moral law, and it is an evil thing to make it easy for them to break that law. Another effect that gives cause for alarm is that a man who grows accustomed to the use of contraceptive methods may forget the reverence due to a woman, and, disregarding her physical and emotional equilibrium, reduce her to being a mere instrument for the satisfaction of his own desires, no longer considering her as his partner whom he should surround with care and affection.

Finally, careful consideration should be given to the danger of this power passing into the hands of those public authorities who care little for the precepts of the moral law. Who will blame a government which in its attempt to resolve the problems affecting an entire country resorts to the same measures as are regarded as lawful by married people in the solution of a particular family difficulty? Who will prevent public authorities from favoring those contraceptive methods which they consider more effective? Should they regard this as necessary, they may even impose their use on everyone. It could well happen, therefore, that when people, either individually or in family or social life, experience the inherent difficulties of the divine law and are determined to avoid them, they may give into the hands of public authorities the power to intervene in the most personal and intimate responsibility of husband and wife.    {HV, 17}

Research fellow Mary Eberstadt went into great depth illustrating how these predictions played out in the ensuing four decades, using empirical evidence from secular sources to vindicate Humanae Vitae and Pope Paul VI. If you have the time, it's worth the read, here.

*For more on what was happening at that time and behind the scenes, go here.

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Now, it's no coincidence that the week marking the promulgation of Humanae Vitae is also designated as Natural Family Planning (NFP) Awareness Week.

So, if anyone missed the wildly popular Natural Family Planning post which ran in March (thanks Alison!), now would be a great time to read it, here. A quick and painless way to promote NFP this week is to simply hit the facebook "recommend" button at the end of that post (or tweet it to your friends, link to your own blog, etc.). You'd be surprised how many people have never heard about NFP, or how many are curious about NFP but would never ask on their own.


And for a humorous series of short videos on "NFP vs. Contraception" made by some clever seminarians, please visit the blog Making God Laugh, where polkadot has them posted.  :)

Try to spread the word this week, as all our voices do add up. We've got the power of the New Media and social networks to reach people in 2011 in a way that Pope Paul VI never could back in 1968. Let's not let him down.