Anglican-Catholic dialogue examines contraception

June 10, 2009

Debt relief and contraception were the two topics of the latest session of the Anglican-Roman Catholic Dialogue in the United States (ARC-USA). Theresa Notare, assistant director of the Natural Family Planning Program at the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops, presented a paper entitled “The Moral Regulation of Birth: Roman Catholic Teaching on Conjugal Love and Responsible Parenthood.”

In October, participants “will explore the fact that while the two churches share a range of convictions regarding the moral aspects of many questions of social justice, there are serious differences regarding issues in personal morality, especially those pertaining to sexuality.”

Eight decades ago, the Catholic Church and Anglican Communion were united in teaching that contraception was immoral. The Anglican Communion changed its position at the Lambeth Conference of 1930, prompting Pope Pius XI to write:

Since, therefore, openly departing from the uninterrupted Christian tradition some recently have judged it possible solemnly to declare another doctrine regarding this question, the Catholic Church, to whom God has entrusted the defense of the integrity and purity of morals, standing erect in the midst of the moral ruin which surrounds her, in order that she may preserve the chastity of the nuptial union from being defiled by this foul stain, raises her voice in token of her divine ambassadorship and through Our mouth proclaims anew: any use whatsoever of matrimony exercised in such a way that the act is deliberately frustrated in its natural power to generate life is an offense against the law of God and of nature, and those who indulge in such are branded with the guilt of a grave sin.

 

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Further information:

• Catholics, Anglicans Meet on Debt Relief, Contraception (USCCB)
• Pope Pius XI: Encyclical on Christian marriage (Casti Connubii, 1930)