A Sweet Time
People have never talked so much about themselves and fostered dialogue and communication in order to shore up their matrimonial union (or their common law partnership). We've been told over and over again: "In the old days, people did not communicate with each other. They didn't know how to love each other."
And yet, people have never been so divided, divorced from each other. Matrimonial meetings organised by psychologists, social workers and communication specialists don't seem to change much. We finally get the feeling that communication produces misunderstandings between people instead of fixing matters up.
Maybe cats and dogs are right not to scrutinise each other too much. A dog wags its tail to express joy and playfulness. The cat translates the dog's behaviour in terms of his own, seeing anger and a readiness to fight. The cat therefore arches its back and wags its own tail. The dog believes its invitation to play has been accepted, comes in barking and the fight breaks out.
Men and women are sometimes like cats and dogs, each interpreting the other's words and actions according to personal feelings without understanding the meaning in the other sex's feelings. And the more these people talk, the more they hurt each other. The better they act, the worse they do.
Take for instance, the gentleman's kind and consoling words to his wife when she came back from her hairdresser unsatisfied with her hairdo: "Don't worry, dear," he said. "You never did get a satisfying hairdo."
He was sure he had reassured her. For him, the crisis was over. He was sure the absence of reaction from his companion expressed agreement. Yet, the silence was the result of utter astonishment. What could have come out of a further dialogue? Would the comforter entrenched in his generous attention recognise how uncouth he had been? And could his victim express the expected gratitude after such a slap?
In other words, dialogue and communication are possible only if people have the dictionary that gives meaning to the words that spring from the heart. And the only way to get this dictionary is to give unconditional priority to one's spouse. It's not enough, but it's indispensable. Without this, dialogue simply becomes a more sophisticated way to subjugate one's "companion". Dialogue becomes another weapon in the arsenal of the war of the sexes. Logically, disunion will spread with dialogue. The more people talk, the more their intention to colonise the other are revealed. At first, people talk to each other and discover they are apart. They can then get professional help and each rapprochement will simply confuse the issue until the common bond is revealed to be an illusion. Then each partner puts his case into the competent hands of a lawyer, where the true nature of such a dialogue finally becomes evident: to win against the other. Then, convinced of his own right and seeking lost comfort, one can enter into simultaneous monologues with another person who has undergone a similar trauma.
Jean-Charles was being offered a career opportunity and a promotion. His wife refused to move to another city. He told me: "She's stuck in cement. She doesn't want to leave her mom. And yet we would be only two hours' drive from her. What do you think?"
He clearly understood his situation as a clash between the betterment of his career and his spouse's imbecility. For her part, she probably feared that her husband's career was becoming his mistress, robing her of his attention and his affection. Right or wrong, she felt that a chill would envelop them, far away, and she did not have the resolve to go into the wild with him. For each of them to spell out repeatedly their selfishness wouldn't help. Misunderstanding would grow with each rapprochement, since the reality seen by one had no longer anything to do with the reality perceived by the other.
I just answered: "Love her. Put her first."
If we had known Jean-Charles' wife, Danielle would have told her: "Follow your man. Live for him."
By putting her husband first in her heart, she would have been warm in any freezer and felt the cold of his absence in any oven. Conversely, seeing his wife's firm support, her husband could have laid the world at her feet rather than run from her into the world.
Astonished by our answer, Jean-Charles confessed: "You are the only person to tell me this. Everybody else says I should chuck the wife."
Unfortunately that is what he ended up doing a few years later. Since the two had become one flesh, their daughter suffered from its sundering. But she was young and was expected to be understanding towards their misunderstanding. So she had to cope with having four parents and eight grandparents.
Before their undoing was finalised, we had become more intimate with both. They expressed separately their hurts and their future dreams. To each we truthfully answered: "We happen to know the person that best fits your heart's desire. It is the person you are married to."
They had evidently described the person they had loved during courtship, the one they had then chosen to be their faithfully loving spouse. Then they had made a break they did not want to mend. A strange and yet so apparently banal story.
* * *
Let us go back to our own banal and yet apparently extraordinary story. Danielle's period was late. She was tired and her breasts were becoming sensitive. We had not talked over the possibility of having another baby. There had only been my sweet wife's doubting suggestion. We could have chanced it, but this was improbable. Or was it possible? Possible, maybe. But probable? I didn't know. Still living under the medical corps' ban, I hadn't made up my mind yet to have my beloved risk a possible rupture of the uterus and a possible ending of her life. The pendulum was still swinging. Sometimes I was overwhelmed by the folly of such a risk. At other times, the two caesareans medically conceded as possibilities got the upper hand. Considering past practice, they should probably end up winning, but they had not yet. We were still inside the year of interdiction.
For her part, Danielle was going through another interdiction. She had talked of a slight uncertainty when in fact she had felt a strong probability. Officially we were uncertain. The important decision concerning both of us had not been taken. It could not therefore be borne by the two of us. Nature had to bring in its verdict, a verdict Danielle apprehended and yet hoped for more than she apprehended it.
A late period can be as perturbing as a pregnancy. The symptoms alone were not conclusive. And the hubbub of the Christmas holidays could explain the disorder in our wife and mother's feminine equilibrium.
Then the pregnancy was confirmed. Instantly, Danielle's doubts were replaced by an overwhelming joy: a child, out of their flesh and blood, would be born in September. She told me.
I answered: "Heck!"
Not "heck" because of Mireille. "Heck" because of the risk. "Heck" because we had failed. "Heck" because of the risk Danielle was running. And mainly "heck" because of my unpreparedness. I didn't know what to say. I wasn't thinking about Mireille. For a brief moment, I found myself incorrectly considering a pregnancy as a "thing".
Danielle didn't react to this hurt, which it was because Mireille (the name came later) was living inside her. Mireille was unconditionally present. Mireille deserved something better than a "heck". Never more would a child be her private certitude.
The "heck" merely expressed a caring for Danielle. An honest caring, even if it was all wrong toward Mireille. It was a sincere caring. Which shows how sincerity can be stupid. But what else could one expect from a fellow who had been out of the game all the time and who is introverted. I needed a "heck", even out of place, if only to give me time to adjust.
And the "heck" didn't last. The wavering left, and was followed by an eruption of joy and pride towards this woman who had put our love ahead of our lives, who had preferred someone to us and yet through us.
* * *
"You should have fewer children and take better care of them…," an exasperated lady who liked us reproached Danielle.
But our household was going fine, except for our eldest daughter who was taking us through a rough insight into the teen age years.
Some say teens are a modern-day invention because youngsters, who should otherwise be admitted to adulthood and responsibility, see these perpetually receding through never-ending studies and the impressive rising cost of family life. There may be some truth in this matter, considering King Louis IX of France (Saint Louis) led an army to retake Paris at the age of thirteen…
Well, modern teen agehood was in our midst. Neither our daughter, nor ourselves, were prepared for a novelty that wounded both the feelings and the relationship of all concerned. This situation brought up the matter of the generosity of our flesh.
Would it be better now to put a stop to our procreative adventure and take a greater care of its produce? Wasn't the caesarean crisis a God-given sign that enough was enough? Many people saw it that way and our daughter's problem seemed to be confirming it.
Yet, this way of thinking went exactly against the data. The risk of pregnancy was an altogether different matter from the adolescence crisis. Danielle could have had a perfect bill of health and yet an adolescence crisis would still have incited people to say we should take greater care of our daughter. Therefore, the question was whether a new baby, biologically advisable or not, could jeopardise the attention and care we gave to one of our children undergoing a crisis.
To answer correctly, we had to take into account both the nature of our daughter's trial and the effect the arrival of a new brother or sister would have.
With adolescence, our daughter became self-centred. The smallest chore was a terrible exploitation. The laws of the home were unbearable. Any kind of favour given to her was considered as a due and her personal whims outweighed any other person's needs.
"We don't see you anymore," the other children complained to their mother.
"But I'm always here, doing my work," she answered. "You are the ones who no longer keep me company."
To keep mom company meant to be in some public area and risk the eldest's fury whenever the latter wanted to say something or do something.
The Me-Devil was running wild inside our daughter.
As for the attention, she made sure she got all she wanted. And when she didn't want any of it, she insisted on not being bothered. An abundance of brothers and sisters mattered for naught.
In this context, to deprive everyone and herself, of the chance to be generous towards a new-born babe would have no effect on her self-obsession. It would simply confirm a right of selfishness over love. In more pedantic jargon, let us say it would not have been pedagogically correct. On the contrary, the arrival of a child that could only beg for attention might allow her to de-centre herself in favour of someone else. That had always been the effect of every new-born on the rest of the family.
At noon, with everybody around the table, Danielle broke the good news. The children exploded with joy. Christine hugged her mother. Her heart welcomed a baby brother or sister, greeted her mother and partook in our common bliss.
We had made the correct choice.
* * *
Our family doctor took in the news of the pregnancy without a flicker and put all his abilities at his client's disposal, as usual. He agreed with our surgeon, and with what then appeared to be the whole medical profession, that one should not risk a natural birth, especially in the case of a multiparous woman such as Danielle. How many pregnancies did she have? Ten children, add two miscarriages, subtract one twin (who shared her sister's pregnancy): 10+2-1=11. This was the twelfth pregnancy.
Caesarean, it had to be. When? Two weeks before term. Why? To be sure the body didn't start contractions prematurely and risk a rupture of the uterus.
"I will therefore deliver on time," Danielle said with an inviting smile.
The doctor didn't understand.
"All my pregnancies have lasted nine months and a half," she said with a small exaggeration. "Two weeks before term, means nine months.
The doctor conceded the point but insisted that we shouldn't chance the slightest risk. At the first sign of a contraction, in due time, it should be a hospitalisation and a caesarean. Danielle agreed on the principle since she had won the fact.
In order to ascertain the child's measurements, we were allowed an ultrasound scan when at four and a half months.
Would we want to know the child's sex? We used to prefer keeping the surprise for the end. But we had now had three boys in a row and everyone in the family was rooting for a girl. To avoid a disappointment at birth and to bask in the perfect joy of baby's arrival, we chose the foreknowledge.
The hospital in La Pocati re did not have an ultrasound scanner, so we went to neighbouring Rivi re-du-Loup. Since the school year was in full swing, Danielle went alone. On the bus, a nun introduced herself. Danielle did not know her, but was not unknown to the latter who worked in our town. The nun told of her great admiration for our family and particularly for Danielle and congratulated her on the latest pregnancy.
The previous evening, a friend who operated on European standards had noticed that our eldest daughter's agitation perturbed our household and had given her prescription: "You've got to be firm with her. You don't know how to educate her." Back from Rivi re-du-Loup, our sitter who operated on Quebec standards and who had a door banged on her by our daughter, pitched in her sense of things: "You are far too rigid with your daughter." What could we say? Neither gentleness nor strictness calmed the storm. The only thing we could do was to hold our ground in the crisis. The nun's kind words had momentarily dispelled the air of censorship. But it was the blurred sight of "Mireille", all parts accounted for, that was an eleventh-time mother's best comfort. Our baby was a girl.
That evening, for the first time, we could invoke our baby's patron saint by name even before she was born.
* * *
I still had moments of concern for the way the pregnancy might end. And Danielle still had some nightmares that ended in a pool of blood. The threats has been hard-hitting enough to perturb our subconscious. On the other hand, consciousness and conscience both bathed in the satisfaction of a choice agreed upon and in a profound peace. Danielle's full femininity blooming of her husband's open masculinity was guiding our family on a sure road.
The decision having won on the side of a child, the medical prognosis allowing for three caesareans became stronger than any uncertain terror. Action had preceded words and the spouses once again shared a secure unity.
But we had been scared. And we started thinking about the contemporary scare concerning the child. People appeared to always talk the same way on that subject: "We have two children. We don't want any more in order to be able to take greater care of the children (even sometimes "of the child") we have." And so, pedagogy drove off the school of life.
"My wife isn't very healthy. She must save her strength to take care of the child we have." Yet, the best therapy against one's ills is to stop thinking about them and start helping other people.
"We do not have enough money to have another child. We have to pay for our children's ballet lessons, and various other lessons. And when they get older, they will need a car and camps and what not. And private schools cost a lot." So they hope to give their child a better education by centering on him instead of giving him the chance to care for someone else.
Such arguments come by the thousands. But their conclusion is always the same. Anything is good to sterilise love. Now that we had offended the taboo of risky pregnancies, we noticed the shrivelling of human love in our world.
There was a shrivelling. If our world was right, then our ancestors were fools. But if our ancestors had not been fools, nobody would have seen the light of day after the beginning of humanity.
By boundless and coarse ignorance, our ancestors criminally gave us life. If our ancestors had been as "intelligent" as the people of our time, they would never have been so irresponsible as to have children. A regular or irregular family always comprises, at least momentarily, a father, a mother and a child (or more). And contemporary finesse had discovered that, until recently, to have a child was inadvisable for the father and the mother and even for the child.
First the mother: until recently, giving birth implied the risk of the violent death at delivery or in its aftermath. Nowadays, everyone should be bright enough to know that a woman must first think of herself and consider having a child only if she finds it personally profitable. Dying in labour can scarcely be considered profitable.
Then the father: until recently, the success of personal economic endeavour was terribly uncertain. The abundance of consumer goods produced by the industrial revolution (even with occasional imbalances) has allowed a previously unimaginable economic and social security. To give life to a child or, worse, to children, obliged a father to work all his life, at whatever trade he could find, till he was used up, in order to lodge, feed and dress them. This is quite incompatible with a higher vision of the quality of life allowing each to work at a trade of his liking with decent working conditions and vacations.
Then the poor child: he risked a life of poverty arising from his father's economic hardship and a life as an orphan if his mother died. This is an unacceptable life-style for someone who could not live without the advantages offered by the third millennium A.D.
Conclusion: if we are here, this must be the result of our ancestors ignorance, stupidity or criminality.
Chesterton would add: "If madness is a common to all preceding generations, it must be a hereditary disease." Hello heir!
Before her only caesarean, our surgeon had pleasantly chatted with Danielle about his past experience. He had done a caesarean on a woman who was having her seventh caesarean. "So, you see," he implied, "there's nothing to worry about: it's possible to make it even in some pretty extreme cases." And that case was presumed to be an extremist's extreme. The lady must have been utterly mad. Danielle would herself undergo a reasonable caesarean, an unpredictable one. The surgeon comforted her with the worst case scenario. At the same time, she was invited to quit while she was ahead. No journey towards self-immolation. Sanity had to prevail. She shouldn't be mad as the seven-time offender.
However, was it true that the end of the 20th Century was the only time in history that giving life to a child, to a human being, could be considered an intelligent action? What about all those centuries past and everybody during that time? Was the life that came from them to us the proof of the mental derangement of humanity or could it be the proof of a mental health quite different from what is considered today as mental health? Could it be that the woman with the seven caesareans had been right?
Didn't she have the better life, with her seven children around her? Hadn't she made a greater success of her life than so many dry husks building their solitude in our world? Harsh words? A harsher reality.
So Danielle started thinking the unthinkable: "If I must die some day, would it not be better to die in giving life instead of dying of some silly illness?"
She had lost her head. Or had she?
* * *
A Virginian friend who had "poped" shortly before and been received into Our Holy Mother Church was puzzled by the fact that an apparent dominant majority of laymen and priests dissented for the teaching of Pope Paul VI, and then of Pope John Paul II against contraception.
He had once experienced with his wife what he termed a "pagan" admiration towards their mutual love admitting no inner sharing with child. Their short Christian awakening before his wife died had not carried them to the shores of a conjugal love flowing into the gift of life. His experience deprived him of the perception that he had never "known" his wife according to the biblical expression. He lacked the feeling that he could have missed knowing this endearing woman, whilst they had attempted the lovers' fusion. Though he didn't feel it, he granted that God could possibly know more than himself on the matter of life. What he couldn't understand, he was willing to believe; in God he trusted. But he wanted to better understand. So we tried to put what we understood into words. We tried to find the answer to some of his questions…
* * *
Since July 25, 1968, many believers in Christ, as expressed by the Church of Rome, are having a hard time believing that Christ could be as unreasonable as the Church would have him be. Would Christ really be opposed to any use of contraception at all times and at all costs? Granted, Christ was crucified: but would he lay such a cross upon loving couples?
(1) It would thus seem that a majority of practising Catholics and a majority of their priests do not respect nor believe this teaching to be a teaching of Christ. (2) Also, the Evangelical Protestants who are as uncompromising as the Church of Rome where abortion is concerned take no stand against contraception. (3) Finally, it must be admitted that the Church reasoning supporting the Church decree convinces few persons and suggests that we are in an area of blind rather than ardent faith. Indeed, is not the rhythm method of birth prevention — allowed by the Church — far more artificial in its loving patterns than a quick pill-a-day?
Yet, the position decreed by Paul VI in his encyclical letter Humanae Vitae, on July 25, 1968, simply reaffirmed the persistent Church position on the matter already clearly taken by Pius XII on September 12, 1958. And afterwards Pope John Paul II reiterated the same unequivocal Church opposition towards any means of artificial contraception in his apostolic exhortation On the Family, on November 22, 1981 and on various other occasions. Could there be method in this persistent madness?
1- On the first point above, it must be noted that majority rule has never been Christ's way while he walked about in Palestine, nor the way of his Church throughout history. In fact, his way was most theocratic and so unpopular as to have him crucified. Also, it is quite normal that a majority of his followers be unfaithful on one or another matter at any time in history. Witness the common failing of his own disciples when confronted by the cross. Next, remember that he has come for sinners and not for the just. His Church is regularly full of sinners. That is why each century's saints always seem to run counter not only to their time but to the run-of-the-mill Christian of the day.
2- Second point, some Christians of other denominations who are in agreement with the Church of Rome in matters pertaining to the sanctity of life, disagree in matters pertaining to the character of ... love. But there is nothing new here. It was already there in the matter of divorce. When the spirit of the times went divorcing, the Church of Rome proclaimed the indissolubility of marriage. Now the same spirit divorces sexual acts from their life-giving attribute, and the Church of Rome refuses such a divorce. The fact that on certain matters, there is unity between Christians of various denominations cannot be used to nullify the far more crying fact of division. Now, if the Catholics, in Faith, consider that Christ lives through the Church and uses the Bishop of Rome as the test of orthodoxy, they cannot be surprised that the unorthodox differ with the said Bishop's judgement on various matters, especially on those where the full weight of the spirit of the times is put against the judgement of the Rock upon which the Church has been built. On the contrary, that other "Christians" should fail here simply confirms that they are not standing within the unalterable Church of Christ.
3- Final point, the wisdom behind the Faith. Faith itself is not a "gnosis", an act of knowledge by understanding. It is an act of trust towards a person.
Truth is received there as revealed and not as demonstrated. But it is a fact that truth cannot be contradictory, and a revealed truth cannot be unintelligent, contrary to intelligence. Thus, it is the duty of believers, especially their leaders, to explain the conformity of their faith towards sane judgement. The Church itself had condemned the position that faith must be stupid. The Church would not have given birth to schools and universities if it did not greatly respect the human mind and understanding. Thus it is granted first that the decrees of faith are not the product of science but of revelation; second that this revelation must stand up to the questioning of true science. Therefore in this matter of contraception, it is the duty of believers to give evidence of the correctness of their position in terms of correct reason.
Before entering in the realm of the reasons for the refusal of artificial contraception, it may be useful to recall that the evidences of wisdom, though human, can be considered unevidential by certain minds because of inadequate habits of mind or because of disordered passions. This greatly enhances the difficulty before us, because it makes it difficult to determine whether a line of reasoning is correct or incorrect as a matter of evidence or as a matter of unpreparedness of the listener. For example, a few centuries back, duelling was considered as a correct means to defend honour. The Church forbade duelling, but was then often considered to be unreasonable, childish and churchy. In our times, it seems simply evident that there is no relation whatsoever between the ability to kill a man and one's own honour. The same goes for contraception which was once considered as evidently immoral and now seems to be evidently good. It is a sign of the sanctity of the Church that it manages to stick to the truth even when the truth seems to be the greatest lie of the day.
Pope Paul VI founded his refusal of contraceptives upon the evident fact that sexual intercourse has two simultaneous effects: the happiness of the couple and the giving of life. This simultaneousness is considered to be the expression of the will of God. Of course, the proponents of artificial contraception do not deny the fact of the simultaneousness of loving and birth-giving in the sexual intercourse: that is precisely the reason they are so active in proposing contraceptives. They simply deny that the fact is law. Therefore the challenge to the Christian mind is to prove that the fact is law.
Pope Paul VI appealed to the laws of nature, or rather to natural law. As a result of equivocation, this position was laughed away by a great many. In philosophy, natural law is a matter of insight by which means are ordered to a certain end, the end being the reason of the means. For example, if man is to be free, he needs true knowledge; thus lying becomes immoral, a sin against man. It is in man's nature to be free, and natural law would have us tell the truth. It is not a question of knowing how many persons are telling the truth, or whether lying is a prevailing social activity. However, the laws of nature as presented by the scientific method are in fact the ascertaining of the persistent way things carry on. Drop an apple from a tree and it will go down: Therefore, we are on to the law of gravity. Put so many couples together in an industrial society, and artificial contraceptives will spread: you have a law of nature in society; so it would seem.
Pope Paul VI suggested that artificial contraceptives are means that go against the end of sexual intercourse, and not that they are simply out of step with the prevalent use of intercourse or with biological mechanism. Once this equivocation is lifted, we are on the way to understanding the position of the Church on the matter of artificial contraception. It shall not be a question of social habit nor a question of bio-chemistry. It will be a question of the end of sexual intercourse itself tied in with the kind of being man himself is.
Basically, sex is the expression of love. When sex uses the beloved for private exploitation, the pleasure becomes the goal and the beloved becomes the means. When the beloved is considered as the goal — which is loving — then sex becomes the means. Thus a first step is to consider that loving will be the emptying of oneself in favour of the other in reciprocity. Decency will mean keeping sex for intimate love. Indecency, to make sex something public; and prudery, to ban sex both from public and private use. Sex is an intimate expression of the commitment of self to the other in reciprocity. Sex is love, is giving, is generosity.
Of course, the body is the expression of the living self or soul. Lovers do not enter into the body of the beloved as if entering into some "thing" of the person. They enter into the person. Any use of the beloved as of something makes her into a means of which self-enjoyment is the end.
Most acts of sexual intercourse are infecund, which is quite natural, since man and woman were made to be lovers in reciprocity and sex is the expression of this unity of two become one flesh. This fact is quite consonant with love as giving, as forgetfulness of self for the loved one.
Yet, generosity cannot close persons upon themselves, be they many. For example, the total selflessness of German soldiers dying for their fatherland, during World War II, did not make German egotistic nationalism any better for that. On the contrary, the national egotism devalued the personal generosity. In the same way, the total commitment of the lovers to each other can become stilled in a common egotism: that is why their true love can only grow in the direction of a common, a united, a shared generosity. Thus, within their most intimate privacy and ecstasy, there is a call of love by someone who would be the expression of their love and the proof that love goes beyond self: a free person, their child.
This does not mean that lovers must seek to give life to as many children as they mechanically can. Love must be human, that is, responsible. Man is given a mind to judge of his responsibilities, and a child or children are serious ones indeed. If the lovers find serious reasons not to give life, be they reasons of health, physical necessities or whatever, it is not only their right but may even be their duty to refrain from giving life. The obstacles to life-giving are not obstacles to mutual love; that is why the unity of flesh within sexual intercourse remains the true expression of selfless love... as long as this intercourse is not paid for by the mutilation of the generosity inscribed within the lovers' selves, that is, in their living bodies.
Artificial contraception attacks the being of the lovers and destroys its innermost generosity while pretending to allow the lovers to express their utmost mutual generosity. This is contradictory to the mind, the soul and the flesh of the lovers. This is what John Paul II says in his apostolic exhortation On the family: "To the language that expresses in a natural manner the mutual and total donation of the spouses, contraception opposes a language objectively contradictory, by which one is no longer totally given to the other; from this one gets not only a positive refusal towards the openness to life, but also a falsification of the inner truth of conjugal love which should be a gift of the whole person."
Yet, how does the Church thus stand before natural birth-prevention methods?
The Church stands for love. Should lovers use their natural infecundity rather than artificial contraception to express mutual egotism, they would still detract from the sanctity of their love by making it selfish rather than selfless. Though the subject is rarely raised, this is the whole matter of the "serious" reasons to refrain from giving life.
However, as sexual intercourse is the expression of love, in as much as it expresses the generosity of the couple in mutual inloveness, such a loving is an act of God, and an act of love. Whether the lovers seek to give life or must refrain from giving life for serious reasons, they belong to each other and all acts of sexual intercourse done in a spirit of love are magnificent. When the couple must seriously refrain from giving life, from expressing their love in the life of another child, they must therefore refrain from expressing their mutual love during the periods of fecundity. For love cannot be simultaneously generous and ungenerous. That is why it is not contradictory to oppose the egotism of contraception and yet allow for the generosity of sexual intercourse during infecundity.
Certainly these thoughts cannot appear evidential in moments of crisis when the beloved are swamped by passion and an "understanding" society. And certainly these requirements of love cannot be lived when they are not grounded in the Loving Trinity. But then even Christ himself could not count on passions to get him through the Passion of Love and could only rely on the will of his Father to love fully, through death and resurrection. We are not facing a choice between different kinds of authentic love. We are facing a choice between love and selfishness. It may not seem evident to us. It becomes evident in trust, that is, in faith, and with a mind deepening the insight of revelation towards the secrets of reality.
* * *
Our friend still did not understand. He chose to believe. He could not see. But then, if faith is necessary, why, he asked, did not the Pope make a greater use of his power of infallibility? Or, to put it in his own words: "He's got the Bomb. Why doesn't he use it?"
"Maybe," we said, "because God doesn't work that way. «Blessed are the meek.» Christ could have entered the world as a powerful adult. Instead, he chose to enter the world as a baby in a manger. When Protestantism shocked the Christian world, papal infallibility in matters of faith was exercised, but had not yet been infallibly proclaimed. This point was clarified some centuries later during the Vatican Councils I and II. It seems a dogma must first be written in the blood of the saints before being recorded in ink. The more Christ spills his blood of love, the more his Church grows and the more Christ glows. In the same way, contraception could not become an important question before the birth of the industrial world. In the agricultural world, a child could be a helping hand for the present and an old-age pension for the future while childlessness could breed insecurity. Also, "the equality of women" in an anonymous society could not be a matter of great preoccupation in a society where women lived in the company of spouse and children during practically all their life. Pope Paul VI's Encyclical letter Humanae Vitae simply expressed everyday life for the vast majority of the people a short time ago. Whence came the scandal? Probably from the change of the times that no longer allowed for the confusion between a love respectful of the generosity of the flesh and the search for economic profit and an old-age pension. The challenge of love was made clearer. And the successor to the See of Peter had to assert the correct answer to a question formulated in our times. Therefore, Pope Paul VI prayed and studied and gave his answer, in the name of Christ. And the violence of the public reaction against the Christ-given answer seemed to petrify him. He just stood his ground on love while the world went free-loving. Then, defying all journalistic and computer predictions, the Holy Spirit chose a Pole, Karol Wojtyla, to become Pope under the name of John Paul II. The man was a Vatican II enthusiast, like Paul VI. And he upheld and deepened the constant Church teaching on the generosity of love. Presently, there are couples attempting to live the truth of spousal love in a surrounding world that is indignant and judgmental against them. In favour of them, we find Mother Teresa, teaching the poor to respect the dignity of their love through the knowledge and the respect of the fertility and the infertility of the feminine body. She is proving that some poor people can be more faithful to their love than many a rich person. This should be no surprise for disciples of Christ.
"In other words, it would seem that ex cathedra teachings (that is dogmatic teachings) of the Church are effects rather than causes of the growth of the life of Christ in his Church. Christ had to live, die and resurrect before the truths concerning redemption could be understood and taught. It is normal that his mystical body, the Church, lives analogously."
