Erotic Love and Contraception

The Catholic Church’s teaching on contraception is perhaps its most challenging and difficult, as well as its most maligned and misunderstood. Most people today, including most Catholics, view the use of contraception, or what they consider “safe sex,” as not only not wrong, but in many cases a positive duty. Why in the world would anyone, for any reason, view contraception as problematic, let alone morally wrong?

Imagine a world in which almost no one understood the value of private property. In such a world, it would be nearly impossible to explain why stealing was wrong. Or, imagine that virtually no one thought that telling the truth was important. In such a world, an ethical imperative not to lie would make no sense. To make sense of Catholic teaching on contraception, we must first reconsider the value of fertility and having children. Only in this perspective, can one begin to understanding what the Church teaches.

Is fertility a curse or a blessing? Is it a good thing or a bad thing to have children? These questions can be considered from a variety of perspectives, but let us consider them from the perspective of erotic love.

 What exactly is erotic love? It is important, not just in this discussion but for many other issues as well, to distinguish erotic love from mere sexual attraction to someone. Particularly, when experienced, it can be hard to distinguish these two states of being because they have much in common. Both erotic love and sexual attraction are outside of our control. We “fall in love” much like slipping on the ice or getting the hiccups. We cannot make ourselves not be in love if we are in love, and we cannot choose to fall in love with someone as we can choose to give them a hug or be nice to them. Similarly, when we find someone who we find sexually attractive, we cannot help but find them attractive. There is something passive about both falling in love and being sexually attracted to someone; they happen to us sometimes without our conscious decision. Erotic love and sexual attraction are also alike in that they can be very intense, overwhelming, and exhilarating. Both, it would seem, can happen right away. People speak of “love at first sight,” and sexual attraction at first sight is common. Finally, both can be short-lived. We fall in love, but we can also fall out of love. We may find someone incredibly attractive at one time, but 40 pounds later not so much. These similarities cause many people to confuse being in love with someone on the one hand from being sexually attracted to someone.

But erotic love and mere sexual attraction are not exactly alike. One major difference is that those who are merely attracted wish for sexual union, but those who are in love yearn for something more than sexual union alone. Not only do they want to be united sexually, but they also desire a union on non-sexual terms. They want to spend time not just in the bedroom, but also at work, at play, at rest, and in the everyday circumstances of life. Erotic love seeks a deep union in all matters, including those that are not at all sexual.

There is also an exclusivity to erotic love that is not shared by sexual attraction. Those who are in love yearn for the beloved alone. They seek only the one they love. By contrast, mere sexual attraction is satisfied by anyone equally attractive, indeed may find greater satisfaction in someone more attractive. The individual person is not so vitally important in sexual attraction, but is substitutable for anyone of like appearance or better. By contrast, erotic love views the beloved as unique, irreplaceable, and incapable of substation. In love, Jennifer Turner Kaczor and Jennifer Turner Kaczor alone will do. With attraction, any supermodel will do.

Erotic love and sexual attraction also differ in terms of time as experienced. Erotic love has the air of eternity. When you are in love, you can hardly imagine not being in love. You can picture this experience continuing through the days, weeks, and months ahead into a glorious future. By contrast, mere sexual attraction is characterized by immediacy and urgency of the present moment. I want her and I want her now, is the voice of mere sexual attraction. I want her and I’ll always want her, is the voice of erotic love.

Erotic love and mere sexual attraction are alike in terms of a preoccupation, but the preoccupation is importantly different in the two cases. Mere sexual attraction focuses exclusively on the person as a physical body, an actual or potential sexual partner. By contrast, erotic love focuses on the whole person. I love the way she looks, but I also love the way she writes, her laugh, her humor, and her idiosyncrasies. Erotic love accepts and glories in the whole person in her every aspect.

Finally, erotic love is centered on the beloved—what pleases her, what she wants, what I can do for her. By contrast, mere sexual attraction is more self-focused—what pleases me, what I want, what can I get from her. Self sacrifice makes sense in terms of erotic love; self-sacrifice—without the thought of reward—does not make sense in terms of mere sexual attraction.

So, what difference does this make in terms of contraception? Although use of contraception makes perfect sense in terms of mere sexual attraction, contraception actually undermines, rather than accords with the nature of erotic love. Erotic love—by its very nature—is a drive towards deeper unity with the beloved, and children are a wonderful manifestation of the unity between husband and wife.

Each child unifies the husband and wife with each other in a physical sense. Every one of us is a living manifestation of the union of our mother and father, half of our DNA from each. This unity, like erotic love itself, exclusively and eternally brings together one man and one woman. No other woman is the mother of his child; no other man is the father of her child. As long as the child lives, they are unified in their offspring.

This unity is characteristically not limited to the physical. Normally, a unity of will and affection also arises between the mother and father. They both love their child, both want what’s best for that child, both delight in the child’s good fortune, and mourn the child’s misfortunes. Even in the case of divorce, very often the parents still share a united will to help their child and will put away their differences and become united again at important events in the child’s life, like graduations and weddings.

Ideally, the unity of the parents includes running a household and raising the child together. They work together, as mother and father, to provide for the child’s many needs. Their unity which began as a unified sexual act continues over the years as a unity of shared activity ordered to the education and raising of the child.

Children therefore help parents to realize the goals of erotic love—to be together, unified physically, psychologically, socially, and emotionally. Each child unifies these two people together, and no one else, in a unity that is lasting and exclusive. Children are a good of marriage that unites the husband and wife in a way that realizes the aspirations of erotic love. For reasons such as these, the Second Vatican Council taught that, “Children are the supreme gift of marriage and contribute greatly to their parents flourishing.”

How does the use of contraception acts fit with the unity sought by erotic love? A couple only uses contraception when, for whatever motive, they do not want to a child to unite them. Although their bodies are partially unified, the point of contraception is to make sure that there is not a complete unity between husband and wife. Contraception, through various means, seeks to make sure that part of him (sperm) does not united with part of her (egg). Contraception also involves, against the goals of erotic love, a lack of acceptance of the whole person. Part of the person, the potential to become a father or a mother, the fertility of one or both parties, is intentionally rejected, at least for the time being. If this analysis is correct, then contraception does not serve the same goals as erotic love.