NFP: Training Ground for Engaged Fathers

Today’s headlines shout out the lack of fatherly involvement in their children’s lives. From heroic single mothers working multiple jobs to make ends meet while trying to be both father and mother to their children to the proliferation of young men joining gangs in order to find that paternal guidance, skewed as it may be, the effect of men not living up to their call as fathers wreak havoc on our society. But rather than simply reading the cultural tea leaves to divine this malady I wish to offer the beginnings of a solution.

Scripture tells us that “the person who is trustworthy in very small matters is also trustworthy in great ones; and the person who is dishonest in very small matters is also dishonest in great ones.” (LK 16:10) Well, what are the great matters and very small matters in the issue of fathers not living up to the responsibility? Beginning with the obvious, the ‘great matters’ in this situation is paternal involvement. So if we desire fathers who are trustworthy in being good fathers we need to ensure that fathers are trustworthy in the ‘small matters’ or in those matters that precede and flow into the great matters.

For far too many men, the knowledge of a woman’s fertility comes down to a simple question- “did you take your pill?” Paying no attention to a woman’s natural cycles of fertility beyond inquiring whether or not the woman has taken enough synthetic hormones to overload her natural cycle and suppress her natural bodily function men in today’s permeating cultural norm bear little responsibility beyond being a living sperm donor in the dominant thinking.

I know this isn’t always the situation, and hopefully this situation is happening less and less frequently. But we can’t simply sit by and hope that the situation will improve. We have to actively try to charitably promote the truth of natural family planning as a practical way to begin to improve this situation.

By promoting a system that not only encourages but actually forces the man to learn about the fertility of a woman we begin to take steps. They may be baby steps, but they are steps nonetheless. They are steps towards improving communication between the man and woman. They are steps towards having men learn how to express their affection for their wives in creative ways. They are steps towards having men take responsibility for their wives and for their children, sometimes even before the children are conceived. A responsibility that allows men to be trustworthy in small matters. A trustworthiness that will inevitably lead to a trustworthiness in greater matters. A trustworthiness that will begin to turn the cultural tide toward a more proactive father. And what could help women more than men who know them and their bodies better, are involved in their children’s lives, are in constant communication about fertility with their wives, and show them affection in ways more than genital sexuality?