CHRIST IN THE HOME
http://www.ewtn.com/library/FAMILY/CHRISTH1.TXT
BY RAOUL PLUS, S.J.
a Translation from the French
FREDERICK PUSTET CO., INC. Publishers NEW YORK AND
CINCINNATI
Nihil Obstat:
JOHN M. A. FEARNS, S.T.D., Censor Librorum
Imprimatur:
+FRANCIS CARDINAL SPELLMAN,
Archbishop of New York
New York, June 19, 1951
MARRIAGE
THE BELL OF LIFE
IN 1935 there was a project on foot to install a bell of life and a
dial of death in the heart of the city of Berlin. The plan may have
fallen through. A large bell was to boom out every five minutes; in
the interval a smaller bell was to ring nine times announcing to the
neighborhood that nine children were being born in Germany during
that time. Then an hour glass was to indicate to the passersby that
in the space of five minutes, seven Germans had gone to their graves.
Whether realized or not, the project was worthwhile. To announce the
increase of life is helpful; to call to mind the work of death more
helpful still, but not the least important is to point out the
triumph of life over death.
Today's meditation is to dwell on this last thought. It is not so
important now to contemplate the end of life and the responsibility
to be faced at that dread moment as to welcome the new cradles of
life and to determine whether I am increasing for my country as I
should the chiming of the life-bell.
In November 1939, a leader of a heavy artillery division at the
Maginot line wrote in a letter: "I have eighteen men in my sector.
They are between thirty and thirty-five years old; all except a few
are married; all of them together have only eight children!"
If, as good Political Economy points out the average number of
children per family for a country which does not want to die out is
three--two to replace the father and mother and a third destined to
fill the void caused by infant mortality--then those eighteen men
should have had at least fifty-four children among them. They had
eight. The deficit then: Forty- six.
There is of course no moral law that requires the married to have
three children. The example given here is simply a social or national
aspect of the problem. It has already been pointed out that the moral
law is determined not by the country to which one belongs--although
there might be a duty to give it a thought--but by the law of
chastity in marriage on the one hand and the law of fecundity on the other.
It might be well here to come back to these points. The law of
fecundity expects the parents to have as many children as they are
capable of rearing in a human and Christian manner. As for birth
control, the law of chastity sets the rule: nothing may be done
artificially to frustrate conception.
But to return to the social viewpoint--my country's future, society's
need: Of what good is it to cry out Long live my country! if my only
contribution is to her death?
More cradles than tombs! That should be our motto. How great is the
disaster when the contrary is true! Does not such an argument which
possibly has no force with weaklings or those too wrapped up in
themselves bear weight with me? It is not the most decisive argument
to encourage large families, but it is not a negligible argument.
Patriotic duty does not belong to morality in war time only. It
exists and binds conscience in peace as well. In another way perhaps
but just as imperatively.
Do I love my country? Do I love her enough to be willing to give her
children? Certainly not primarily for the time of war, but for
peace-time equally. The more valiant hearts and arms there are, the
more prosperous is the country. The true wealth of a people is their
wealth in men.
THE IMPOSSIBILITY OF HAVING CHILDREN?
WE HAVE seen clearly that it is a "serious matter" to prevent
conception by any voluntary positive act and if full knowledge and
complete consent of the will are present it constitutes a mortal sin.
If the marital act is performed, then God may not in any way--by the
opposition of the parents--be hindered from creating a soul.
--But we cannot, considering our burdens, increase the number of our children!
--That may be, responds the Moral Law; such a case is far from being
imaginary. But you do not enter upon marriage only for enjoyment. In
the plan of Divine Providence, pleasure is the accomplishment or the
result of duty fulfilled. To separate the pleasure from the duty, to
seek the first while evading the second is to go counter to the
divine plan. Sexual pleasure presupposes the normal exercise of the
generative function, the acceptance of the resultant burdens for
which it is, as Cardinal Mercier expresses it, "the providential payment."
--But when you consider the intimacy of life together, how can we
refrain for any length of time at all without giving ourselves to each other?
--There is every reason to believe that, without prayer and recourse
to the sacraments, you are right. But what is your supernatural
program? What are you doing to rise above the senses, to moderate the flesh?
--Can't we choose those times when fertility is least probable?
--Yes, if you have a sufficient reason, as you seem to have. And the
necessity of having to practice prudent and courageous continence
several days each month will in itself force you to a certain and
meritorious generosity.
--Even that is not possible for us; for then we would have to
renounce marital intimacies.
--Of course. But nowhere has it been said that marriage is a state
where one can allow himself every liberty suggested by his caprice
without exercising any judgment.
That is said nowhere; at least, not in any sane and honest books on
morality. Married persons are too quick to think that, because they
have not chosen "the state of perfection" in absolute virginity, the
great virtues are not for them.
Even in granting themselves what they may legitimately permit
themselves, the husband and wife have a large field for detachment.
They ought to be willing to profit by the opportunity and not reject
it on the plea of moral or physiological impossibility when it is
really because of their lack of stamina, of Christian spirit, and the
will to self- control.
How will such married persons aenemic in their spiritual life and
accustomed to denying themselves nothing, even when the cost is not
too great, deny themselves when a serious law binds them?
One must learn to will in order to know how to will. And if one falls
he must not excuse but accuse himself.
You are the Judge of my past, O my God. I offer You all its efforts
and its weaknesses. Give me the grace to be generous in the future.
THE ONLY CHILD
THERE is, as we have seen, a double duty involved in the marital bond:
--The duty of chastity: In no way to attack the law of life.
--The duty of charity or fruitfulness: To do one's best for the
production of life.
It is impossible--and that is self-evident--to set a definite figure
as the gauge of duty in procreation. A very competent authority on
this subject, Father P. Boisgelat, S. J., has this to say:
"Who keeps below his minimum possibilities fails in the duty of his
state of life and sins through selfishness. Who strives for his
possibilities and realizes them does his duty. Who exceeds the
maximum of his possibilities sins by imprudence and intemperance."
As for this level of possibility about which he speaks, it must be
determined by each one's conscience without selfishness and without imprudence.
"One must on his part confide in God, abandoning to Divine Providence
the possibility of unforeseen misfortunes, such as the unexpected and
early death of the father, a possible lower economic status in the
future, war. . .
"Duty obliges us to foresee only what is foreseeable and likely; all
the rest must be confided to God."
There are couples who eagerly desire one child but not several
children. They want the one either to have a tangible proof that they
have made a fruitful marriage or to create a precious and living bond
between them. They desire only the one because they do not want to be
encumbered; they do not want to limit the regular tenor of their
lives, the quality and variety of their wardrobe, and they are afraid
to run the risk to their health that every new birth might bring;
they dread the crying and the inconvenience caused by very little
children. These reasons and others just as selfish are worth nothing.
Serious reasons are necessary to dispense from serious duty.
The idea of limiting the family in order to give to the one (or to
the very small number) resources which will eliminate the necessity
of working or assure the whole benefit of the entire fortune is not
in itself selfish on the part of the parents. It is extremely harmful
however. We are not born to avoid work here below. Each one is
obliged to contribute his maximum effort to the welfare of society.
We are not here to reign, but to wrestle.
Parents do not manifest much esteem for the fruit of their blood if
they do not deem it capable of gaining, by its own power, a place in
life whenever it so desires.
Then, too, is there not always the danger that the only child will
receive too soft a training, that he will be spoilt and be of an
inferior character?
Should this only child die young, what anguish for the father and
mother! They themselves become the very first victims of their
damnable birth control.
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Lord, may everything we do begin with Your inspiration and continue
with Your help,
so that all our prayers and works may begin in You and by You be happily ended.
We ask this through Christ our Lord.
Amen.
<*}}}>< <http://halfthekingdom.mofuse.mobi/>Half the Kingdom!
on your Mobile <*}}}><
<*}}}>< <http://www.halfthekingdom.org/wordpress/>Half the Kingdom!
Blog <*}}}><
<*}}}>< <http://www.halfthekingdom.org/>Half the Kingdom! Main Site
<*}}}>< <*}}}>< <http://www.halfthekingdom.org/by-the-by/>Half the
Kingdom! By the by <*}}}><
Lord, may everything we do begin with Your inspiration and continue
with Your help,
so that all our prayers and works may begin in You and by You be happily ended.
We ask this through Christ our Lord.
Amen.
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