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I’m writing this in the middle of March, so Alleluia’s and Gloria’s and Resurrections and Ascensions are the just pie in the sky nonsense and me and my billion strong Catholic cohort are lumbering through the lonely days of Lent, eagerly awaiting the promise of new life that comes at Easter.

What is Easter to a Catholic?

• It is a relief from the self-imposed and ecclesiastically imposed mandates of Lent.
• It is the end of the intensity of Holy Week
• It is the celebration commemorating Christ’s glorified walk with us.
• It is the time to mark the coming of the Holy Spirit on Our Lady and the Apostles and the beginning of the Church.

Moreover, it is a time to rejoice in the fact that even though Jesus rose into Heaven, He has left us a Helper, built us a Church and given us His mother.

If you’re not a Christian or not one of us who uses a fancy liturgical calendar then you may think that

Easter Bunny

is the holiday after

Not St. Patrick

which happened a few weeks ago and is gone until next year.  But, just as Christmas day is the beginning of the Christmas season, Easter Sunday is the beginning of the Easter Season. Likewise, both events are the ends of their respective seasons of preparation (Advent and Lent); seasons of joy after seasons of penitence.

After being on Christianity.SE for a while (only the robots signed up for the beta before me) I know I’m writing mainly to my Christian brothers who haven’t given much thought or may even be disdainful of marking times and seasons.  So, since I know I’m not writing to many Catholics who would find this extremely boring.  I’ll give the short version of the Lent/Easter season and you can tell me how boring it is, seen through a new pair of eyes.

As the calculation for Easter Sunday changes every year, I’ll just use this year’s calendar to highlight the principle feasts, solemnities and other observances.

So that’s how Catholics warm up to celebrate Easter. We all have our own traditions; our own cuts of meat we prefer. But as a whole, it’s the liturgical celebrations that bind us all together. Unfortunately, in this American’s experience, we don’t properly know how to celebrate Easter. The priest wears his white duds, the Easter flowers wilt and are composted, the decor of the physical church remains pretty paschal (or was it pastel). But the body that compromises the church, well, we don’t whoop it up as much as we ought.

We get our Alleluia’s and our Gloria’s back at Mass. We can order burritos without worrying about what day it is. If we pray the Angelus, now we pray the Regina Coelli. But unless one is somehow attuned to a wavelength coming straight from the Source of Unending Joy. There’s really not a whole lot else to do, or is there…

Thus passeth the 7 Sundays of Easter and the various moveable feasts affected thereof. So, get out there and celebrate or, at the very least, know what to expect when you go in to a Catholic Church!

¹ A bane to timeclock programmers like me.

^+J+M+J+ Shameless plug for Marian Consecration

Next week the Affable Geek is going to take us back and remind us Why we need Good Friday. While Catholics have moved on to Easter and baseball, we all remember that

“As much as we love the Brewers, unlike Jesus, they didn’t die for your sins.” – Archbishop Jerome Listecki

This is the Eschewmenical blog so in the spirit of Eschewmenism, I won’t be mincing any words. What I seek to present is an authentic Catholic stance on what said church teaches on the role of contraception in the family. I am a lay Catholic and not even remotely a theologian, so what I write is my opinion. But it is the opinion of one who both seeks to learn what his faith teaches and be obedient to it.

What is the Catholic Church’s position on Contraception?

No.

In practice, many priests will instruct people to follow their consciences, but a well formed conscience, a well formed Catholic conscience, a properly catechized and well formed Catholic conscience, an obedient and properly catechized well formed Catholic conscience will eschew adding anything to sexual relations to prevent conception as a means to regulate birth.

This is one of those hard teachings, like eating the Flesh of Christ. Surprisingly, it is not one of those teachings that makes people leave the Catholic Church.

only 16 percent [leave the Catholic Church] because of the church’s teaching on birth control.

The Hidden Exodus – National Catholic Reporter, Apr 2011

For a multitude of reasons, only one being conscious disobedience, a majority of Catholic women have used some form of contraception in their lifetime.  As a Catholic catechist, I find it hard to slip in teaching about contraception while talking to 7th, 8th and 9th graders.  But, fortunately, the United States government has given me ample opportunity to do so!

I can say something like, “right now kids, you get a chance to be martyrs, ain’t that great?” and they say, “what’s a martyr?” and I say “a witness for Christ”.

Kathleen, doest thou obey me with a kiss

How does one be a martyr today? Rejecting the world’s teaching on contraception is a start.  This may bring down the world’s hatred, but that is a good thing.

But, how does the Catholic HHS secretary’s decision to force (as an end result) all Catholic institutions to violate their consciences make martyrs out of faithful Catholics?  Well, within marriage, we witness what we know to be true:

1. That every marital act is a renewing of the marital vows. A total gift of self.
2. That the intent of no marital act is to have as its end anything lower or different than the first. Not bonding on Fridays and babies on Tuesdays.
3. That the love between the spouses reflects the love of Christ for His Church. A total gift of self (which bears repeating).

One must not cave in to moral relativism, even if one does so in practice.  It is not difficult to tell that a few of the parents of the kids in my Catechism class either contracept or are sterilized.   I also know that some of the kids in my class rarely attend Sunday Mass.  However, I am proud of them for listening intently to me teaching the truths of the Church at this critical moment and caring about the fact that their church is being attacked. I hope they can go home and explain these things to their parents. I pray that they’ll all have a conversion of heart.

What is the Catholic Church’s position on Birth Control?

Yes, maybe.

If birth control ceases to be used as a euphemism for contraception. 

...if I did debate it, I would call it by its name

The name of Birth-Control, for instance, is sheer nonsense. Everybody has always exercised birth-control; even when they were so paradoxical as to permit the process to end in a birth. Everybody has always known about birth-control, even if it took the wild and unthinkable form of self-control. The question at issue concerns different forms of birth-prevention;

G.K. Chesterton – On Evil Euphemisms

Birth control, properly stated, is “Responsible Parenthood”. Not contraception, which is literally doing something to stop conception. That term is somewhere in Humane Vitae and it’s a shame it didn’t catch on.   Clearly all Catholic parents should be responsible ones, not having 19+ children out of a desire to be on television, or machismo, or a desire to cream thy enemy at the gates.  If little ones are to be continually added to the family, it must be done out of a desire to do God’s work.  God’s work, since the beginning of time, has been creating things and people.

The Catholic understanding of it is that if, for whatever reason, a grave reason, a couple can’t add to their family, they may continue having sex, but in a way that effectively does nothing to confound God’s work.  One may put up no artificial barriers to having children.

• No condoms or “onanism”, because they prevent the sperm from hitting its mark.
• No hormonal birth control, because they confuse the body into thinking it is pregnant.
• No Intrauterine Device (IUD) because of the abortifacient¹ effect in stopping implantation.
• No Plan-B (without an ovulation test) because it is an early abortion.
• No complete abstinence, without a good reason, because marriage is for the union of the sexes to create babies.

So, that leaves two choices.

• Make love often and leave everything up to God and nature.
• Plan when to make love following the scientific principles of ovulation (and breastfeed a lot after giving birth). (CCC 2270)

The last option is not called the Rhythm Method nor is it called the Calendar Method; it is Natural Family Planning. It is extremely effective if used properly, has no side effects, and its practitioners have an uncannily low divorce rate².

Natural family planning consists of charting signs of fertility:

Fertility signs include, temperature, cervix location and cervical mucous consistency/color

And it’s wonderful fun.  It really puts the couple in control of their fertility, and as a man that may sound ironic (even deranged, stupid or misogynistic) but it’s male fertility too!  I don’t want this blog post to seem too much like an advertisement for NFP. But, if ads for hormonal birth control say they treat symptoms of PMS, it should be noted that the above NFP chart gives men an accurate indicator of the onset of PMS. Men who practice NFP can be ready with calming poultices and be loving husbands before the first signs of PMS!

Next week Bruce Alderman will write about the Methodist take on contraception. I’ve got a feeling it’ll be a tad more pragmatic than the Catholic stance, but I learned from asking on Christianity.SE that Calvin may have been more or less against birth control so maybe I’ll be surprised!

_{1. IUD kills a fertilized egg (i.e. a tiny human person)}

_{2. Love, Sex and Babies, Jason Evert, Catholic Answers 2004}

_{3. and mark one off on your coitus record for me}