LifeNews.com
2012-07-26
7/25/12 — Pope Benedict XVI offered an encouraging message to the recent meeting of the Equipes Notre Dame (translation: Teams of Our Lady), a pro-marriage apostolate. The Holy Father invited all Christian married couples to be “the gentle and smiling face of the Church.” There is no greater way for couples to achieve this than to joyfully open their marriage to the gift of life.
In our secular contraceptive culture, it is assumed that a married couple will, as a matter of course, avoid pregnancy. Only for very narrow windows of time does a couple welcome the conception of a child, if they do at all. Contrast this with the Catholic marriage that makes openness to life the default position. Occasionally, a couple may prayerfully discern that for a limited period of time there exist grave reasons why they should not conceive. Instead of resorting to contraception, however, the faithfully Catholic couple relies on one of the methods of Natural Family Planning (NFP) and abstains from marital relations when conception is likely. As an added benefit, when the couple is ready to resume having children, the same fertility awareness system will identify when sex is most likely to result in pregnancy.