The combox on an earlier post revealed what I initially thought was an anonymous commenter’s belief that the Church was essentially required to abandon her teaching on contraception because such teaching “causes abortions” (never mind that the pill causes abortions.) Thanks to keeping the conversation going, our anonymous commenter explained that s/he knows several Catholic couples, and only one of them uses Natural Family Planning - so our commenter assumed that the Church must have approved some form of contraception down through the years.

Thankfully, our bishops have recently released several documents, including one called “Married Love and the Gift of Life,” which reiterates the Church’s consistent teaching on contraception. I have linked to an article all about it here; the headline is a bit of an editorial, but the article itself really sums things up well, both the positive and the negative, with statements to the effect that the Church’s teaching has been consistent since the 2nd century, as well as statements like, “for most Catholics, this document won’t change anything.”

I posit that there are 2 reasons why the latter quote is true: 1)ignorance - far too many priests have told their pre-marital counselee’s that either this teaching is not important OR it’s just about to be officially changed; and 2)rejection of Church teaching - which makes one a cafeteria Catholic (and endangers one’s communion with the Church.)

We have media sources that blow the trumpet of Catholicism out there contributing to both of these problems, as evidenced by the National “Catholic” Reporter’s current lead editorial. This whole thing leads me to believe that the way to solve this problem is to continue to speak the truth in love to current adults, but also to teach our children what’s right from the beginning.