1. For today we have chosen the
theme of responsible parenthood in the light of Gaudium et Spes and
of Humanae Vitae. In treating of the subject, the Council document
limits itself to recalling the basic premises. However, the papal
document goes further, giving a more concrete content to these
premises.
The Council text reads as follows: "When it is a question of
harmonizing married love with the responsible transmission of life,
it is not enough to take only the good intention and the evaluation
of motives into account; the objective criteria must be used,
criteria drawn from the nature of the human person and human action,
criteria which respect the total meaning of mutual self-giving and
human procreation in the context of true love; all this is possible
only if the virtue of married chastity is seriously practiced" (GS
51).
The Council adds: "In questions of birth regulation, the sons of the
Church, faithful to these principles, are forbidden to use methods
disapproved of by the teaching authority of the Church" (GS 51).
Ruled by conscience
2. Before the passage quoted, the Council teaches that married
couples "shall fulfill their role with a sense of human and
Christian responsibility, and the formation of correct judgments
through docile respect for God." (GS 50). This involves "common
reflection and effort; it also involves a consideration of their own
good and the good of their children, already born or yet to come, an
ability to read the signs of the times and of their own situation on
the material and spiritual level, and finally, an estimation of the
good of the family, of society and of the Church." (GS 50).
At this point words of particular importance follow, to determine
with greater precision the moral character of responsible
parenthood. We read: "It is the married couple themselves who must
in the last analysis arrive at these judgments before God" (GS 50).
And it continues: "Married people should realize that in their
behaviour they may not simply follow their own fancy but must be
ruled by conscience—and conscience ought to be conformed to the law
of God in the light of the teaching authority of the Church, which
is the authentic interpreter of divine law. For the divine law
throws light on the meaning of married love, protects it and leads
it to truly human fulfilment" (GS 50).
3. The Council document, in limiting itself to recalling the
necessary premises for responsible parenthood, has set them out in a
completely unambiguous manner, clarifying the constitutive elements
of such parenthood, that is, the mature judgment of the personal
conscience in relationship to the divine law, authentically
interpreted by the Magisterium of the Church.
True conjugal love
4. Basing itself on the same premises, Humanae Vitae goes
further and offers concrete indications. This is seen, first of all,
in the way of defining responsible parenthood (cf. HV 10). Paul VI
seeks to clarify this concept by considering its various aspects and
excluding beforehand its reduction to one of the "partial aspects,
as is done by those who speak exclusively of birth control." From
the very beginning, Paul VI is guided in his reasoning by an
integral concept of man (cf. HV 7) and of conjugal love (cf. HV 8,
9).
Under different aspects
5. One can speak of responsibility in the exercise of the function
of parenthood under different aspects. Thus he writes: "In relation
to the biological processes involved, responsible parenthood is to
be understood as the knowledge and observance of their specific
functions. Human intelligence discovers in the faculty of
procreating life, the biological laws which involve human
personality" (HV 10). If, on the other hand, we examine "the innate
drives and emotions of man, responsible parenthood expresses the
domination which reason and will must exert over them" (HV 10).
Taking for granted the above-mentioned interpersonal aspects and
adding to them the "economic and social conditions," those are
considered "to exercise responsible parenthood who prudently and
generously decide to have a large family, or who, for serious
reasons and with due respect to the moral law, choose to have no
more children for the time being or even for an indeterminate
period" (HV 10).
From this it follows that the concept of responsible parenthood
contains the disposition not merely to avoid a further birth but
also to increase the family in accordance with the criteria of
prudence. In this light in which the question of responsible
parenthood must be examined and decided, there is always of
paramount importance "the objective moral order instituted by God,
the order of which a right conscience is the true interpreter" (HV
10.
6. The commitment to responsible parenthood requires that husband
and wife, "keeping a right order of priorities, recognize their own
duties toward God, themselves, their families and human society" (HV
10). One cannot therefore speak of acting arbitrarily. On the
contrary the married couple "must act in conformity with God's
creative intention" (HV 10). Beginning with this principle the
encyclical bases its reasoning on the "intimate structure of the
conjugal act" and on "the inseparable connection of the two
significances of the conjugal act" (cf. HV 12), as was already
stated. The relative principle of conjugal morality is, therefore,
fidelity to the divine plan manifested in the "intimate structure of
the conjugal act" and in the "inseparable connection of the two
significances of the conjugal act."
Taken from: L'Osservatore Romano Weekly Edition in English 6 August
1984, page 1
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