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But your requirement simply for "openness" to procreation is satisfied by dissenting position #2. What I'm focusing on (for now, at least) is #1. If procreation is a "necessary" condition of marriage, that means a couple incapable of having a child together (through primary or secondary infertility, or menopause, or any number of medical reasons), then they will never be really married, because they cannot fulfill a necessary condition of marriage. Adoption is not procreation, and not a single father East or West has suggested a requirement that an infertile couple adopt. Which means that procreation cannot be a necessary condition of marriage. One can hold, as the Orthodox tradition does, that procreation is normative nut not necessary for marriage. And the biblical witnesses you give on sex despite infertility make the case against the view that procreation is the only good thing in sex -- the view held by Augustine and Clement of Alexandria, both of whom believed that desire for one's spouse was sinful. On these points, these fathers depart from the Orthodox tradition. I think it is difficult for an Orthodox person to defend dissenting position #1 which is one reason I'd like to see some sourcing here. If there are indeed Orthodox who hold #1, I'd like to see citation; something published in support of the claim. --[[User:Fr Lev|Fr Lev]] ([[User talk:Fr Lev|talk]]) 13:28, June 28, 2018 (UTC) :I’m not sure you understand this position or what is meant by “openness to procreation”, which may be the result of my poor explanation. If you do end up removing this dissenting position, I hope at least that you only do so after understanding it. According to position #1, only sex which does not involve an active/conscious attempt to prevent that sex from resulting in a child being conceived is acceptable. I.e., each and every sexual act has to not be associated with some deliberate attempt to prevent conception. As a result, natural family planning, wherein there is a deliberate and conscious effort to only have sex during infertile periods, would be unacceptable. As a result, this position differs from position #2, in which natural family planning is deemed unacceptable. :According to position #1, procreation itself is not necessary for marriage to be “valid” or “good”, but a desire for procreation and an appropriate engagement in marital relations are! Each of these biblical and Traditonal witnesses involves couples who want children but cannot have them! They do not involve couples consciously evading children, or happy about their infertility. It is not the children themselves that are necessary for a Christian marriage, but the intention for children, and not trying to frustrate sex’s natural tendency to result in children.:I have argued above that it is the only recognisably Orthodox view when one looks holistically at the Fathers who’ve commented on sex and contraception, but if you do not, then I’m not sure I can stop you from removing it. No synods or Orthodox theologians that I know of have expressed it in this manner, to their discredit.--[[User:Gmharvey|Gmharvey]] ([[User talk:Gmharvey|talk]]) 11:37, June 29, 2018 (UTC) You say that #1 is different from #2 because #1 involves abstinence only, whereas #2 involves NFP. Since NFP uses only abstinence, it would seem that you need to define the abstinence in #1 more clearly. The content of the action (or rather, inaction) is exactly the same. So if the only salient difference is the intention behind the non-action, don't you need to say more than simply that the intent cannot properly be to plan the timing or number of children conceived? What precise intentions would make it okay? What about a married woman who is told by her doctor that another pregnancy would likely kill her? #1 would mean no sex with her husband, at least until after menopause, perhaps decades away? And do you restrict this to only married individuals having sex together? While the Church clearly teaches that sex belongs only within marriage, does the belief that every act of sexual intercourse must be open to procreation trump all other moral values? Should a person who, while sinning by having sex outside of marriage, never use contraception to avoid pregnancy or disease because the procreation is always more important than mitigating the potential consequences? And what of a husband who, perhaps through a blog transfusion, has contracted HIV. Are he and his wife doomed to abstinence only and, even then, only if they are morally certain that no thoughts of contraception enter their heads? --[[User:Fr Lev|Fr Lev]] ([[User talk:Fr Lev|talk]]) 11:48, June 29, 2018 (UTC) : #1 is also different from #2 in that it offers some kind of coherent picture for what kind of sex is the Christian ideal (and why) and how other forms (fall short). #2 differs in that it seems to arbitrarily include one form of contraception while excluding others.:NFP clearly involves a different kind of abstinence to the abstinence involving a longer period of time than a few menstrual cycles. You can’t separate actions and (non-actions) from intentions. In NFP, there is a co-ordinated plan to intentionally only have sex during sterile periods. Openness (the absence of any attempt to divorce procreation from sex) is the precise intention that would “make” such sex “okay”. :This is the ideal – perhaps there are grave circumstances in which dispensations can be given, but they would have to be examined on a case-by-case basis. I don’t know what you mean exactly by “trump all moral values”? Let’s look at each of your cases:::1. A married woman told by her doctor that a pregnancy would likely kill her: contraceptive techniques have failure rates, so that even sex with such contraceptives would involve putting the woman’s life in danger. The natural approach seems to be abstinence, or removing the defective/diseased organ which is putting her life in such danger (e.g. a deformed fallopian tube likely to result in ectopic pregnancies or a uterus with a weakened wall that is vulnerable to rupture).::2. Extra-marital sex: Why would a person who is having extra-marital sex and thereby knowingly transgressing the Church’s moral standards want to follow the Church’s instruction on contraception? Are we concerned that people who don’t subscribe to the Church’s standard that sex should only be inside marriage might accidentally just subscribe to the Church’s standards on contraception? This would not seem to be a concern.::3. Husband with accidental HIV: This case is similar to #1. While sex with barrier contraception would reduce the risk of transmission, it would still involve putting his wife’s life in danger, given the risk of breakage. Ideally, this couple would abstain (I’m not sure what your aside about “thoughts of contraception” meant), or obtain treatment (which I understand is prohibitively expensive in some countries) that would so reduce the husband’s viral load that he became effectively unable to transmit the disease to his wife. ":Perhaps there are circumstances of extreme financial strain in which contraception might be allowed (ideally NFP – I agree that of the contraceptive methods, this seems the least transgressive of the ideal set forth in #1). However, here the greater sin lies with the Orthodox community of which that couple are a part for not offering financial assistance to this couple. :"Doomed to abstinence"? From what tradition does that concept arise?:I’d also like to revise my earlier statement: No synods or Orthodox theologians that I know of have expressed this position. But could you find a single Orthodox bishop that would excommunicate someone for holding this position? Surely the lack of such a bishop is evidence for this position being a valid Orthodox dissenting position.--[[User:Gmharvey|Gmharvey]] ([[User talk:Gmharvey|talk]]) 02:55, June 30, 2018 (UTC) For now, since I am short on time this weekend, you have some odd notions about theology and heresy! Just because no synod has endorsed a position does not mean it is therefore consistent with Orthodox theology, praxis, or tradition. Bishops don't excommunicate people for holding a theologoumenon, but for stubbornly teaching something that is explicitly contrary to the defined Faith. I am not saying #1 is heretical, only that I don't see it as a recognizably Orthodox position. It posits a view of contraception that, despite its biologically deterministic view of natural law, even the Roman Catholic Church doesn't hold. And you haven't offered any evidence that it is held as ''a'' view within Orthodox tradition beyond yourself and a few people you know. OrthodoxWiki is not about expressing purely private opinions, but about documenting -- with sources whenever possible -- Orthodox Christianity. There must be at least a handful of Orthodox Christians in the world who are flat-earthers, or who are 9/11 truthers, or who hold that we never landed on the moon, or that it is immoral to wear tie-dye jeans (a fundamentalist school near me has held that), but none of those are recognizably views held in the Orthodox tradition, even if a bishop would not excommunicate someone for holding them. --[[User:Fr Lev|Fr Lev]] ([[User talk:Fr Lev|talk]]) 11:42, June 30, 2018 (UTC) :Fair enough, I’m about to go away for a week myself. I think there’s a difference between #1 and 9/11 truthers etc: that #1 arguably represents what Church Fathers have said about contraception, whereas 9/11 truthers’ beliefs have no grounding in Church Tradition. Admittedly, some Church Fathers have been flat-earthers (e.g. St John Chrysostom), however the Church Fathers aren’t great sources for scientific models of the world (but are great sources for moral instruction). In any case, I’ve now included a source for #1 , an article written by an Orthodox theologian. Will this do?:I’m not sure what you mean by “biological determinism”, and “even the Catholic Church” – please clarify. I understood biological determinism as referring to the belief that people’s behaviours are predominantly governed by their biological make-up (genes, physiology etc.), as opposed to their environment (i.e. nature vs. nurture). Are you using the term in some other sense that is unfamiliar to me? ===Hayward article===While I wouldn’t classify Hayward as an Orthodox theologian, and while this wasn’t published in an academic or even popular journal, at least it is "something." However, there are numerous problems with this flawed piece of polemics. Off the top of my head:1. He writes, “As Orthodox, I have somewhat grave concerns about my own Church, which condemned contraception before 1970 but in recent decades appears to have developed a “new consensus” more liberal than the Catholic position.” This is patently false. Apart from the case of the Church of Greece’s 1937 encyclical (which does not support his condemnation of NFP), he argues on the basis of individual church fathers — not the Church, which has never issued a decree against limiting the number of children out of unselfish reasons. 2. He claims, ““The Orthodox Church has issued such statements {about contraception) more than once.” Name them. And, more precisely, name them that condemn even NFP, as Hayward does. 3. Strangely, despite having claimed that the Church has spoken many times against contraception, he complains: “And so for Zaphiris to point out that the Orthodox Church has never “defined” a statement about contraception—a point that would be obvious to someone knowing what sorts of things the Church does not “define;” “defining” a position against murder would, for some definitions of “define,” be like drinking a sandwich—and lead the reader to believe that the Church has never issued a highly authoritative statement about contraception. The Orthodox Church has issued such statements more than once. Saying that the Orthodox Church has never “defined” a position on a moral question is as silly and as pointless as saying that a man has never drunk a roast beef sandwich: it is technically true, but sheds no light on whether a person has consumed such a sandwich—or taken a stand on the moral question at hand. Zaphiris’s “observation” is beginning to smell a lot like spin doctoring.” In addition to trying to use a severely narrow definition of “define,” he undercuts his own claim that the Church has spoken authoritatively about contraception, and he is also wrong about the Church not doing so on other moral issues, concerning which the Church in ecumenical council (e.g., the Quinisext Council on abortion, AD 692) and individual synods on abortion, homosexual marriage, etc.4. He quotes from Zaphiris: “We have offered these remarks in the hope that they can contribute to a common basis for an ecumenical discussion on the contemporary human problem of contraception.” Hayward replies, “Orthodox who are concerned with ecumenism may wish to take note of this statement of authorial intent.” In other words, any readers who are worried about the alleged “heresy” of ecumenism, should dismiss this article. That’s a fallacious attempt to discredit the article. 5. He also mischaracterizes and impugns the article as “lobbyist” in nature.6. He seems to trace Orthodox what he would incorrectly describe as the “post-1970”) view of contraception to this article. Evokimov wrote in 1962, citing a Russian article from 1960, and Phillip Sherrard wrote his reply to Humane Vitae in 1969. 7. He argues that the prohibition of even NFP is “absolute,” and that it “admits no oikonomia in its observation,” adding that, even if it did allow economy in its application, it would be leniency in applying a “grave moral principle.” 8. He follows St Jerome, et al., in supposing Gen 38.9 to be about contraception, which it is not, missing that Leviticus indicates that spilling seen is a matter of ritual impurity only, requiring only a ritual bath, and not the “death penalty” the story says God enacts against Onan. 9. In response to Zaphiris’s argument from scripture about the right to sexual relations within marriage (1 Cor 7.4-5), Hayward attacks not the argument but the fact that Zaphiris used the word “right,” which leads Hayward to go down a several-paragraph rabbit trail on rights’ based moral claims that don’t touch Zaphiris’s point. 10. He empathies quotations from St John Chrysostom that are not clearly on point, such as from his 24th homily on Romans, which is arguably only about abortions and abortifacient contraception. He doesn’t acknowledge that when St John Chrysostom does talk about Onan, he does not identify his sin as one of contraception.I do not claim to subscribe to every one of the reasons Hayward gives in his article. Themain point of citing him was to give an example of another Orthodox Christian who’d independently come to a similar position on contraception as myself (to this end I’ve added another source to the article). I sympathise with a number of Hayward’s points, and disagree with others. :I too don’t follow his “roast beef sandwich” analogy or his reference to ecumenism. Nor do I think he’s accurate on the “pre-1970” point, as you’ve pointed out. However the point in its more accurate form still stands: i.e. is there a single Orthodox figure (council, bishop, theologian, layman) that endorses any form of contraception as acceptable pre-20th century? That point, with its implication that local Orthodox churches have been insidiously affected by the sexual revolution of the 20th century, remains unmet. :How does point 7 of yours relate to this article being a “flawed piece of polemics”?:Regarding point 8, I’m not sure what you mean by Gen 38.9 not being “about contraception”? It clearly involves an act of contraception. No Church Fathers that I know of have claimed that Onan was slain purely for an act of contraception. However some have in their commentary noted that Onan’s use of a contraceptive method was an unnatural thing. As for Leviticus, the ritual purity laws contained therein regarding spilling of seed would seem to refer to voluntary emission of semen within the sexual act (not coitus interruptus) or to an involuntary emission (i.e. nocturnal emission).:Regarding point 9, regardless of whether Hayward’s quarrel with right-based morality is relevant (I’m inclined to agree that it doesn’t seem so), Zaphiris’ argument from scripture seems fairly tenuous – it’s the same old non-sequitur of “sex isn’t only about procreation but also marital unity, therefore it’s fine to actively remove any procreative potential from a sexual act”. :Regarding point 10, I found Hayward's point that Chrysostom condemned medicines of “atokia” in the 24th Homily to the Romans interesting – the implication being that this was a more general word for medications that prevented “tokia” or childbearing (i.e. an umbrella term for contraceptives and abortifacients). As for Chrysostom’s discussion of Onan, where exactly does he do so? I’m interested in looking at such a passage. Even so, if there wasn’t an explicit identification of Onan as sinning in using coitus interruptus, that wouldn’t constitute an endorsement.:I was also interested by Hayward’s quotation of St Gregory of Nyssa, no confidante of Jerome’s, Epiphanius’ or Augustine’s - I didn’t know that he also expressed an opinion on sex within marriage which emphasised the importance of its procreative aspect. What did you think of that? Or of St Nicodemus the Hagiorite’s identification of the Sin of Onan with the spilling of seed (see other source I’ve now included for dissenting position 1)? Or of St Maximus the Confessor’s comments: “In relation to women, for example, sexual intercourse, rightly used, has as its purpose the begetting of children. He, therefore, who seeks in it only sensual pleasure uses it wrongly, for he reckons as good what is not good. When such a man has intercourse with a woman, he misuses her.” (400 Chapters on love)?:I’d also be interested in the criteria you use to classify or identify theologians. --[[User:Gmharvey|Gmharvey]] ([[User talk:Gmharvey|talk]]) 11:12, July 9, 2018 (UTC) This is taking too much time, so just a few remarks. (1) No one is asking that sex between a couple is unrelated to procreation, all things being equal. The quote from St Maximus the Confessor doesn't really say what you seem to want it to say. He criticizes the man "who seeks in it ONLY sensual pleasure...." Moreover, I would not categorize the unitive aspect of lovemaking ever as "ONLY sensual pleasure." This is perhaps why, e.g., the Roman Catholic Church does not classify NFP as contraception. Besides, the ''Song of Songs'' is pleasure through and through, with no mention of children or childbearing! As for St Nikodemos, his theology ways in many ways quite Catholic - I shouldn't be surprised that he took a Roman view of Onan. Verse 18 of the Leviticus passage deals with emissions stemming from intercourse; vv 16-17 dealt with nocturnal emissions. The Eastern Fathers (with the exception of Epiphanios), along with the Rabbis, did not see Onan's sin as one of contraception. It was his disobedience of God and the law on Levirate marriage. There was no law about ''coitus interruptus'', much less a death penalty for it. One final comment on Onan, this time from Jacob Milgrom's Leviticus commentary: "May a married couple practice ''coitus interruptus''? The example of Onan (Gen 38.8-10) is irrelevant. His act is condemned because he refused to act as the levir and thus denied an heir to his deceased brother.... the silence of our text would permit the inference that birth control was not prohibited as long as the couple had reproduced. This, indeed, is the opinion of the rabbis: two males according to R. Shammai.... and one male and one female according to R. Hillel...." :I think you might be surprised to find how similar the traditional Eastern view might be to the traditional Western view regarding marital sex. Western, or Western-affiliated fathers like St Epiphanius, haven’t been the only ones to emphasise that the procreative aspect of marital sex is essential. Gregory of Nyssa clearly expresses it as his ideal, as does Maximus the Confessor (although the latter doesn’t discuss the relationship of the unitive aspect of sex to the procreative in the same terms as in dissenting position 1, as you’ve pointed out). Regarding 1, while this quote of St Maximus’ is not saying exactly the same thing as dissenting position #1, it does clearly state that he believes the purpose of procreation to be essential to the sexual act. As for Nicodemus taking the “Roman” view of Onan, there is, as far as I know, no “Eastern” view on Onan apart from St Epiphanius of Salamis. Can you point specifically to discussions of Onan’s sin by any Eastern Fathers other than St Epiphanius? As for rabbinic commentary, while it is interesting, I don’t take it as authoritative regarding Orthodox moral teaching or interpretation of scripture. Do you? Yevamot, which I think Milgrom uses to find Rs. Shammai and Hillel’s opinions, is particularly strange, insisting among other things in 34b, that Tamar broke her hymen with her finger, that sexual intercourse cannot result in conception the first time, and that both Er and Onan engaged in anal sex with Tamar. Yevamot also seems to imply that heterosexual anal intercourse is permitted on occasion.:Interestingly, when we look at the text of Genesis 38, there was no command from God in Genesis 38 regarding Onan’s taking Tamar as his wife and “raising up seed unto his brother” – it was, in fact, a command from his father, Judah (no model of Christian morality). Moreover, there were no laws regarding ritual impurity as this was Pre-Sinai and the giving of the Mosaic law. All we have is that Onan disobeyed his father, and that something about Onan’s action was so displeasing to God such as to merit death. :Regarding Song of Songs, just because it emphasises the loveliness of physical union and does not mention childbearing does not mean Scripture justifies actively divorcing the procreative aspect of sex from the unitive aspect. Moreover, it’s traditionally considered to be a dialogue between Solomon and one of his lovers (whether it’s one of his 1000 concubines or wives, we do not know). This is hardly a book from which Orthodox Christians should take their cues regarding sexual morality, is it?:The Roman Catholic Church does classify NFP as contraception (see Humanae Vitae), however classifies it as the only acceptable form of contraception (for casuistic reasons which defy my understanding – again, see Humanae Vitae) aside from total abstinence.:To summarise the argument to date, I’ve offered Fathers’ views either condemning contraception and/or emphasising the essentiality of the procreative aspect of sex within sexual acts. You’ve tried to dismiss each of these, either by claiming that they’re not Fathers (Clement), that they’re too “Western” (Jerome, Augustine, Caeserius) or Western-affiliated (Epiphanius, Nicodemus), or that they don’t actually mean what they say (Nyssa, Maximus, Chrysostom). At the same time you haven’t produced a single Orthodox voice pre-20th century which endorses a single form of contraception. If I haven’t persuaded you on this basis (even regarding the ridiculousness of Evdokimov’s comment on the issue of birth control not being raised in the age of the Fathers), then I’m not sure I have much hope at this stage. Consequently, I’ll have to change tack. I’m assuming that we both agree that heterosexual anal intercourse within marriage is not good for a couple (please correct me if that is not the case). What exactly is it that is wrong about this kind of sex in your view? I ask this to find out the rationale behind your picture of sexual morality.--[[User:Gmharvey|Gmharvey]] ([[User talk:Gmharvey|talk]]) 10:32, July 10, 2018 (UTC) Rabbinical commentary from the time of Jesus and before is certainly relevant to understand the context of the NT. The two leading schools, those of Shammai and Hillel, are clear that the duty "to be fruitful and multiply” was considered met by a couple’s having had two children. The Hebrew religion that was the setting for the teaching of our Lord and his Apostles did not believe that sex within marriage not aimed at procreation was wrong. Nothing in the NT suggests any change in thinking in the direction that sex within marriage was only for procreation. Read St Paul in 1 Cor 7 — he clearly believes (as Chrysostom will also believe centuries later) that marriage is primarily about avoiding fornication.  What scholarship I recall says that the levirate law of marriage preceded the Mosaic covenant; the later merely codified it. The more obvious sin attributed to Onan is greed. If he were to provide his late brother with a son, then his father’s estate would go to Er’s son and not to Onan himself. It seems to be about inheritance, just as with the struggle between Jacob and Esau. Instead of that, you want to read into the Genesis account of Onan a view that not only isn’t found elsewhere in Scripture, but which also contradicts what we do find in Scripture (such as the rules in Lev 16 previously discussed, the celebration of sexual love with no mention of children that we find in the ''Song of Songs'', and St Paul’s account in 1 Cor 7).  I have found your use of patristic sources quite unconvincing. Firstly, you read into them more than is found in the text and misrepresent what they actually say in some cases. You hold up Hayward’s citation of Nyssa, which you mischaracterize as emphasizing that “the procreative aspect of marital sex is essential” and saying that Nyssa “clearly expresses it as his ideal.” Even Hayward acknowledges that Nyssa is extolling virginity and contrasting it with “marriage, which he bitterly attacks…” Nyssa indicates that Isaac’s marriage to Rebecca was “not the deed of passion,” but that is because he “was past the flower of his age” (although I don’t think of 60 as being past the flower of my age!). But that meant Isaac and Rebekah had been having sex for 20 years before she conceived. I would add that Nyssa’s claim that Isaac "cohabited with her till the birth of her only children, and then, closing the channels of the senses, lived wholly for the Unseen…” does not reflect the biblical account, which says nothing to suggest Isaac abandoned the marriage bed to concentrate solely on God. IF Maximos is saying that procreation is the “only" purpose for sex, then I would venture to say that the Church has not accepted his opinion on the matter. But I’m not convinced that is what he is saying, as he is criticizing in that passage the person who seeks intercourse “only” for the purpose of sexual pleasure, and since to say that the purpose of intercourse is to have children is NOT to exclude other purposes (i.e., the unitive), I think it is more likely that you are trying to make more of what he said than his words warrant. Chrysostom is clear that procreation is not the primary purpose of marriage, and that it isn’t necessary, as we have already filled the earth. Secondly, you seem to treat the Fathers (and Scripture, judging by the emphasis you place on the Onan account) as proof texts. You find some isolated quotations from some Fathers and then imagine that you have established the mind of the Church Fathers. You take quotations where individual Fathers are talking about abortion and sterilization and people having sex outside of marriage or with prostitutes and then imagine that you have established the patristic view on whether a married couple, not acting for any unworthy motive, may avoid conception in order to limit the number of children they have or the timing of those children. I believe that this is why you fail to accept Evdokimov’s point about birth control not having been raised by the Church Fathers. Thirdly, you act as if the Fathers all have equal weight and on all issues, when that is not the traditional Orthodox view. As Metropolitan Kallistos Ware writes, “with the Fathers the judgement of the Church is selective: individual writers have at times fallen into error and at times contradict one another. Patristic wheat needs to be distinguished from Patristic chaff.” It is not surprising that an Orthodox press prints homilies of Chrysostom on marriage and family life, but not Augustine or Jerome on marriage and family life! I am not surprised that there are a number of writers in the Church's history, mostly monastic, that express a rather dismal view of marriage as something inferior to celibacy and who can tolerate sex within marriage only for the sake of procreation.  And you argue this despite the fact that the Church has never condemned limiting the number of births except for abortion. No conciliar decree, no canon. Even the one local Church that has rejected artificial contraception, the Church of Greece, has not forbidden NFP. But somehow even they do not meet your personal, individual standard of what is Orthodox. Evdokimov cites this definition of marriage from the ''Orthodox Dogmatic Theology'' of Metropolitan Macarius of Moscow: "Marriage is a sacred rite. The spouses promise reciprocal fidelity before the Church; the grace of God is bestowed through the blessing of the minister of the Church. It sanctifies their union and confers the dignity of representing the spiritual union of Christ and the Church." And then from Evdokimov himself: "The account of the institution of marriage, found in the second chapter of Genesis, speaks of 'one flesh' without mentioning procreation at all. The creation of the woman is an answer to the statement, 'It is not good for man to be alone.' The nuptial community constitutes the person, for it is the 'man-woman' that is in the image of God. All the New Testament passages dealing with marriage follow the same order and do not mention offspring (Mt 19; Mk 10; Eph 5)" (''The Sacrament of Love'', p. 120). Metropolitan Macarius, BTW, was the primate of the Russian Orthodox Church in the middle of the 19th c., so he presumably isn't subject to your ''ad hominem'' about being "insidiously affected by the sexual revolution of the 20th century." But then, I don't see how you could reasonably make that assertion against the current Church of Russia, either. :Metropolitan Macarius does not, in that quote regarding his definition of marriage, endorse contraception. The challenge that there is no voice prior to the 20th century which endorses a single form of contraception still stands unanswered. The view that marriage (or sex) has its primary purpose in the union of a couple does not mean that the active separation of the procreative aspect of sex is good or acceptable. :I think we are going around in circles talking about Jewish commentary, what the Fathers’ really mean, the about which ones are valid, about whose use of Fathers’ count as proof-texts and whose are valid citations, and how to go about reaching a patristic synthesis. I get the feeling now that we will not get any further in this particular debate. :What may be fruitful is a discussion of what constitutes sex that is conducive to the flourishing of an Orthodox Christian. This may allow us to clarify what it is about our pictures of ideal sex that allow or do not allow for the use of contraception. Let us take an example case: anal intercourse between a heterosexual married couple. Acceptable or unacceptable? Why or why not? --[[User:Gmharvey|Gmharvey]] ([[User talk:Gmharvey|talk]]) 11:43, July 12, 2018 (UTC)  ===Is NFP rightly considered to be a form of "contraception"?===You are mistaken. Nowhere in ''Humane Vitae'' does the Pope refer to NFP as contraception. The only occurrences of a form of the word "contraception" refer to prohibited techniques. And, "Neither the Church nor her doctrine is inconsistent when she considers it lawful for married people to take advantage of the infertile period but condemns as always unlawful the use of means which directly prevent conception, even when the reasons given for the later practice may appear to be upright and serious. In reality, these two cases are completely different. In the former the married couple rightly use a faculty provided them by nature. In the later they obstruct the natural development of the generative process" (sec. 16). Moreover, it is clear that the US Conference of Catholic Bishops believe that NFP is not a form of contraception. See http://www.usccb.org/issues-and-action/marriage-and-family/natural-family-planning/what-is-nfp/why-nfp-is-not-contraception.cfm/ The same is true of Pope John Paul II who, in his Apostolic Exhortation on marriage, ''Familiaris Consortio'', wrote: "In the light of the experience of many couples and of the data provided by the different human sciences, theological reflection is able to perceive and is called to study further '''the difference, both anthropological and moral, between contraception and recourse to the rhythm of the cycle''': it is a difference whichis much wider and deeper than is usually thought, one which involves in the final analysis two irreconcilable concepts of the human person and of human sexuality." Moreover, this is also the explicit teaching of the ''Catechism of the Catholic Church'', which approvingly quotes the distinction between NFP and Pope John Paul II in its Sec. 2370. Also, it adds in Sec. 2399 "The regulation of births represents one of the aspects of responsible fatherhood and motherhood. Legitimate intentions on the part of the spouses do not justify recourse to morally unacceptable means (for example, direct sterilization or contraception)." :Sure, I take your point. But it all seems like meaningless distinctions. NFP and what you would classify as “contraception” share the purpose of trying to have sex that won’t result in children – i.e. the preferment of sterile sex to sex which can produce children. --[[User:Gmharvey|Gmharvey]] ([[User talk:Gmharvey|talk]]) 11:43, July 12, 2018 (UTC)   == Chrysostom Redux == Much was made above about an interpretation of a quote from St John Chrysostom by George Gabriel. So I have found an unambiguous quotation from a homily of St John that is clear about the purpose of marriage, where he makes clear that marriage no longer has the essential purpose of procreation.  "At the beginning, the procreation of children was desirable, so that each person might leave a memorial of his life. Since there was not yet any hope of resurrection, but death held sway, and those who died thought they would perish after this life, God gave the comfort of children, so as to leave living images of the departed and to preserve our species. For those who were about to die and for their relatives, the greatest consolation was their offspring. This was the chief reason for desiring children. Now that the resurrection is at our gates, we do not speak of death but advance toward another life better than the present, the desire for posterity is superfluous… '''So there remains only one reason for marriage, to avoid fornication, and the remedy is offered for this purpose'''.” (St John Chrysostom, ''On Marriage and Family Life'', pp. 85-86. :As mentioned above, saying that marriage’s essential purpose is not procreation but the avoidance of fornication does not mean that actively separating procreation from marital sex is a good thing. Non sequitur. George S Gabriel’s interpretation tried to connect the two by his talk of not having to make provisions for the act resulting in children (which is a pretty way of saying something a little different: i.e. that it is ok to make provisions such that your sex does not result in children). --[[User:Gmharvey|Gmharvey]] ([[User talk:Gmharvey|talk]]) 11:43, July 12, 2018 (UTC) ::I agree with Gmharvey, I believe that the primary purpose" of the marital act is the "expression" of the bond of love--the unitive. But this does not mean it is good to separate the procreative from the unitive. Right? Because in my view, it is precisely the couple's openness to share themselves completely without holding back anything, including their powers of reproduction, which is essential to the act's capacity to "symbolize" and so "express" their mutual love. Like two sides of the same coin, like heat and light. If you remove one of them the other is not there in the same degree. And if you take it as an act that is expressing something, you have to ask what is it that is doing the expressing. If not the sacrificial life-giving potential, then what exactly? It seems to me that St John was hyperbolically overstating his case for rhetorical effect. Nothing more. And even if we take this statement literally, that sex has no reproductive purpose, we still have to ask, 1) Is he alone among the Fathers in saying this, or is his view a part of a larger consensus? and 2) if he were here today what ways would he endorse as morally acceptable means to that good end of "avoiding fornication" without "desiring children"?--[[User:Ryan Close|Ryan Close]] ([[User talk:Ryan Close|talk]]) 15:01, August 22, 2018 (UTC) == The Theology of the Body == Father Lev, or anyone else who wants to chime in, I'm personally interested in this topic as I am trying to learn what the Church or the Fathers teach about it. And I am here in good faith to learn. Besides the very real practical results of such conversation, my intentions in brotherly argumentation are as always: stimulating colloquy, willingness to learn, and the desire not to "win" but to "win over" or "be won over." Of all the subjects discussed here, many of them are irrelevant to me because, of course, I already agree. I do not have a dualistic / platonic idea of the body and the soul, I don't hate the flesh or the created physical world, I don't despise the Sacrament of Holy Matrimony, I don't think that the celibate life is a "higher" vocation than the married life, I don't think the marital act is inherently sinful or evil, I don't think that it is only "excusable" when the procreation of children is part of it, and I don't think that the sin of Onan is relevant to this discussion. I do think that the sexual act is biologically ordained to procreation, i.e. that reproduction is it's telios. I do believe that the marital act is a beautiful Sign of the Gospel. I do believe that it "expresses" the bond of love between the husband and wife. Furthermore, I agree that responsible parenting (or the health of one of the spouses) sometimes necessitates limiting the number of children. I don't think that Christians must have 10–15 children. Christian couples should have recourse to some form of birth control for grave reasons. But I don't know which are the morally acceptable means to that good end. And to me this question might best be answered if we think about what happens when the unitive and procreative aspects of the marital act are divided. To that end, let me begin with something Fr. Lev has written here. Concerning St Maximus' comments::''In relation to women, for example, sexual intercourse, rightly used, has as its purpose the begetting of children. He, therefore, who seeks in it only sensual pleasure uses it wrongly, for he reckons as good what is not good. When such a man has intercourse with a woman, he misuses her.'' (400 Chapters on love)?He writes::IF Maximos is saying that procreation is the “only" purpose for sex, then I would venture to say that the Church has not accepted his opinion on the matter. But I’m not convinced that is what he is saying, as he is criticizing in that passage the person who seeks intercourse “only” for the purpose of sexual pleasure, '''and since to say that the purpose of intercourse is to have children is NOT to exclude other purposes (i.e., the unitive), I think it is more likely that you are trying to make more of what he said than his words warrant'''. Chrysostom is clear that procreation is not the primary purpose of marriage, and that it isn’t necessary, as we have already filled the earth. So if I understand Fr. Lev's position, the marital act should be '''*either*''' procreative or unitive or both, but not necessarily both every time. Openness to life ought to be measured "overall." The fact that sexual intercourse has as it's telios the reproduction of the species does not '''*preclude*''' other purposes. Is this a correct assessment of Fr. Lev's position? I think this point of view is summed up quite well by the Holy Synod of Bishops of the Orthodox Church in America in their 1992 affirmation::''Married couples may '''*express* their love in sexual union''' without always intending the conception of a child, but only those means of controlling conception within marriage are acceptable which do not harm a fetus already conceived.'' The affirmation teaches us that the marital act is meant to '''“express their love in sexual union.”''' I believe that this is true and that this is the purpose of the marital act. However, if it is to “express” something then this implies that it is a symbolic act, a kind of language. Language is shared meaning. Language enables us to express our thoughts and feelings with others by employing symbols. Spoken language employs the symbols we call locutions. In the marital act the bodies are speaking a “language” to one another. The loving union of husband and wife is the “meaning” that this language is meant to express. '''The primary question I am concerned with is whether or not a sexual act that intentionally rejects the very bodily and conjugal symbol of this love—namely the procreative power of the couples bodies—can still “express” the same thing—namely the union of love? Or does it actually express something different?''' “The Theology of the Body”, which presents the church with a glorious vision of the meaning of Holy Matrimony and the purpose of marital intercourse, might shed light on this question. According to the “Theology of the Body” marital intercourse is not just sharing a touch or a sensation, not just one form of affection among others. Rather, as God designed it, marital intercourse is meant to be a true self-giving and the union of two selves without reserve. In this way it is the sharing of a power — an extraordinary, life-giving, creative, physical, sexual power. In the marital union, husband and wife are meant to experience the fullness of human vitality in its very source. And it is this procreative power that the couple share with each other that uniquely symbolizes and truly communicates the love and one-flesh union of a husband and wife. In other words, the sacrificial '''life-giving''' potential shared is the symbol, the sacrificial '''self-giving''' love is what is being expressed. By the "marital act" we are not speaking only of the biological configuration of bodies known as intercourse, but rather an act of the will, the voluntary mutual self-giving and receiving (?perichoresis?) of that life-giving potential which is the powerful expressive force that uniquely speaks of the bond they share. Furthermore, this is not a kind of sexual mysticism where carnality raises up to heavenly realities but rather a creational theology of the "meaning" of down-to-earth matrimonial love. It explains how the two ends of marital intercourse — the procreative and the unitive — are linked together and why they cannot be separated. By contrast, according to the Catholic “Theology of the Body,” in contraceptive sex no unique power is being shared except the power to produce pleasure, stripping the act of its true significance and ability to communicate. When the couple merely go through the motions of sexuality but reject each other’s fertility neither of them are giving themselves fully or accepting the other entirely. They are saying, "I want this genital feeling but I don't want to give you my fertility or receive your fertility. In this moment of intense intimacy I am holding back something and holding you back in a fundamental way." Contraceptive sex is an exercise in meaninglessness. The couple start to say one thing very beautiful with their bodies, something that speaks of love through the language of life. Then they deny that very thing in a refusal to fully know one another and nothing real is shared except sensation. By trying to found the uniqueness of marital oneness and express their love in an act of contradiction the spouses are haunted by the suspicion that their love making might be merely a false, hollow, selfish taking of pleasure. This vision of Matrimony and the sexual act of spouses could hardly be described as sex-negative or legalistic. Far from it. This teaching is about the truth, beauty, and goodness of creation (the gift of sex and marriage as God intended it), the ugly tragedy of the fall (the brokenness of sex as selfish grasping for pleasure), and the triumph of redemption (how The sacrament of Holy Matrimony turns marriage into a sign of the Gospel of the Kingdom and gives us grace to live our married lives together for the glory of God). In other words, we should read this as good news! In line with the OCA’s Affirmations on Marriage, Stanley Harakas teaches that the marital act '''expresses “the mutual love of spouses.”''' If the marital act is expressing something then it has a meaning. The husband and wife are speaking to one another in this act through their bodies. The sexual act isn’t supposed to be rendered meaningless or silent. It is on this basis that the Church cannot condone one night stands, the hookup culture, homosexuality, adultery, and other sexual activity that turns the sexual act into a contradiction, that makes it speak a lie. The question for me is does the act of contraceptive sex actually express the bond of love. '''Or does the couple’s mutual rejection of each other’s complete selves destroy the act's capacity to speak the language of the bond of love?''' Let me just put it like this. When we are in the Liturgy and we sing, “We praise thee, we bless thee, we give thanks to thee...” we intend to express the meaning behind these words. But if at this point of the Liturgy the people close their mouths nothing will be expressed. If, maybe, they start to sing something completely different then something quite different will be expressed. Only when the people sing the familiar words will the proper intention be expressed. Now the married couple has this intention, namely to express their bond of love. And in order to do this they must match their intention to the proper symbol. If they choose the correct symbol their intention will be truly expressed. The question is, what is it about the sexual act that can serve as this proper symbol? If the unitive and procreative are separable then what part of the act is it that is symbolizing the unitive expression? Is it merely the good feelings associated with receiving a certain genital sensation? Let me also comment on a quote from Fr Sergei Sveshnikov::''In such a worldview [i.e. that teaches that sex is only for procreation], any union of the spouses—the union of the souls, bodies, spirits, minds—is '''*completely devalued*''' in the absence of reproduction, and the sacrament of marriage completely loses its meaning in cases when reproduction is impossible for any reason.'' < https://frsergei.wordpress.com/2018/07/02/sex-and-contraception-in-a-christian-marriage/ > I don't know if I fully understand Fr Sergei Sveshnikov. However, the doctrine that the marital act must be both unitive and procreative does not mean that the union of naturally infertile couples is “completely devalued.” Far from it, they come together and share all that they are, including their damaged fertility, and together offer their joy, sorrow, and suffering to God in hopes of conceiving a child that they know they will love with all their hearts. There are wonderful examples of this in the history of salvation and I believe that it could possibly be a very beautiful and meaningful experience. In the terms of the "Theology of the Body", if an infertile husband gives everything he is to his wife and the infertile wife accepts all that her husband gives to her then the complete self-gift is present and the act communicates. Nothing is actually lacking. Except, of course, the contingent fact of an actual occurrence of conception, which isn't the ''sine qua non'' of the marital act's symbolic power to speak this "I love you." However, in cases where a naturally fertile husband and wife deliberately choose to reject each other’s powers of reproduction — "I'll take whatever pleasure I can from you but I don't want to share your whole potentially-life-giving person. I reject it and hide mine from you." — '''it seems that it just is the couple’s intention to empty that act of the very life giving power which makes it capable of expressing that love in the first place.''' If you science the very expressive power of the act how can it speak? How does it not degrade the whole experience to the level of mutual masturbation or the use of prostitution—a kind of marital fornication? If the doctrine is true then it is not the doctrine that devalues their act but they themselves. The pertinent questions, which have not yet been answered here, are:* Is the Theology of the Body as summarized above true, in part or in whole?* Could this kind of approach be used to explain the many patristic quotes, such as St Maximus' above, that speak of the procreative purpose of the marital act rather than having to attribute to them platonic, hyper-monastic, or stoic influence?* If it is false, what proofs of falsity can be offered for the sake of subjective feelings of certainty, so I'm left in no doubt as to what I should believe?* What alternate accounts can be given to people such as myself that find it an exceptionally beautiful vision of the marital act?::* For example, can anyone present a vision of contraceptive sex that is as beautiful and glorious as the above account of the life-giving marital act?::* Or, can anyone present an alternate anthropology where the unitive and procreative aspects of the marital act are truly separable in a way that continues to allow the marital act to be a Sign of the Gospel?::* Or, can anyone explain how the mere giving and taking of a sensation can be as beautiful and meaningful as the life-giving marital act?::* Or, how does one partner's desire to be given a certain kind of sensation and nothing else amount to the same self-sacrificial act of fully giving himself entirely and receiving his wife completely which would be the ''sine qua non'' of the expression of the bond of love?::::''(Note: when I say "life-giving" I mean "potentially-life-giving" since it is the couples voluntary mutual self-giving and receiving of that potential which is the powerful expressive force that uniquely speaks of the bond they share, not merely an exchange of touch. I don't want it thought that I am saying that only those acts that actually conceive a child are "life-giving" because it isn't the contingent fact of conception alone but the voluntary act of life-giving-love that makes it so.)''* If the Theology of the Body as summarized above is true, what does it actually mean? I don't think it is at all obvious that the account it gives of "contraceptive sex", even if true, necessarily proves that contraceptive sex is a sin. Thank you all very much for your time and I look forward to reading your responses and learning from each of you in good faith!Sincerely, --[[User:Ryan Close|Ryan Close]] ([[User talk:Ryan Close|talk]]) 17:55, August 21, 2018 (UTC) :Hi, I’m glad to have your input and thoughts on the topic. :You say that you don’t think Christians must have 10-15 children. Of course they don’t, and few Orthodox will argue that they do. But it does not follow that Christian couples should have some recourse to birth control in so-called “grave circumstances”. Married Christians do not have some kind of “right” to as much sex as they want for all their lives ''and'' a right to limit the number of children. The sense of “rights” is perhaps a dead end. The only important question seems to be: what is the ideal form of sex? What kind of sex is most perfect, most natural, most good, and most beautiful? As Christians, we are called to the perfect - anything less is to miss the mark. That an ideal is hard to attain does not make it any less of an ideal. And as you’ve beautifully put it, that idea of a man and woman both delighting in creation and delighting in the openness of this act toward creating new life, is what makes this kind of sex its ideal form. Any attempt to sunder the two degrades the act, either by isolating the unitive aspect and excluding the procreative by contraceptive techniques, or by isolating the procreative and excluding the unitive in artificial insemination or IVF. :In this sense, the Catholic “Theology of the Body” resonates strongly with me. However, it falls short when it twists on itself in order to justify Natural Family Planning, which necessarily involves the preferment of sterile sex to that sex which unites the unitive and procreative. NFP is sometimes justified as different to “artificial contraception” in that it uses the body’s “natural mechanisms” to have sterile sex. However, would this not equally justify anal sex or coitus interruptus? Surely, it is the approach to sex that matters – one’s intentions and sense of what sex’s telos is? Surely NFP does not essentially differ from “artificial contraception” in this regard?:I’m sorry if I didn’t address your list of questions directly. Please redirect my attention if you think I skipped over a crucial point in your argument. :As a long aside, I think that one has to recognise that the Sin of Onan is at least relevant to this discussion insofar as Fathers treat the sin as an example of disordered sex. As a result, I’d like to say a few things here regarding what’s written in the main article (although I’m aware it’s not your interest, please indulge me as it relates to the topic). Jerome, for example clearly sees Onan’s sin as a perversion of sex for its exclusion of the procreative aspect of sex. While Origen is claimed in the main article on this page to have not interpreted the passage as a condemnation of contraception, he certainly doesn’t imply that Onan was killed for disobedience to God regarding the levirate. Rather in his one-sentence interpretation of the passage he says: “Everyone who sows (speiron) in the flesh, and buries the works of the flesh in the earth, is similar to Onan, for which reason they shall be killed.” While this is not an explicit interpretation of Onan’s sin as regarding disordered sex, it is fairly implicit - within Origen’s figurative interpretation is an assumption that Onan himself was killed for improper “sowing” of his seed per se. Chrysostom is also claimed in the main article to have not interpreted it as a condemnation of contraception. This is strictly true. However, like Origen, he certainly does not imply that Onan’s death is due to his refusing to do God’s will regarding the levirate, and abstains from going into much detail about what exactly Onan’s sin was. He merely says that God killed both Onan and Er because they were “poniros“ (i.e. evil), using the same word for both Onan and Er and potentially implying that their sin was similar - consistent with an interpretation that they were both killed for perverse sex. As for Ephrem’s commentary on the passage, I can’t say anything of it as I don’t have access to it. Although I wouldn’t be surprised if he eschewed any commentary on the gritty detail of Genesis 38, as that wasn’t his style. I’d be interested to see the translated Latin text which was referenced on the main page. --[[User:Gmharvey|Gmharvey]] ([[User talk:Gmharvey|talk]]) 15:15, August 31, 2018 (UTC)