One hundred years ago, no one thought birth control was okay. In 1920, the Anglican Communion declared,
We utter an emphatic warning against the use of unnatural means for the avoidance of conception, together with the grave dangers—physical, moral and religious—thereby incurred, and against the evils with which the extension of such use threatens the race. (Lambeth Conference 1920, Resolution 68)
By 1930, they had changed their tune to: “The Conference believes that the conditions of modern life call for a fresh statement from the Christian Church on the subject of sex” (Lambeth Conference 1930, Resolution 9). Ominous words. The conference proceeded to follow this logic on to alarming conclusions:
[I]n those cases where there is such a clearly felt moral obligation to limit or avoid parenthood, and where there is a morally sound reason for avoiding complete abstinence, the Conference agrees that other methods may be used, provided that this is done in the light of the same Christian principles. The Conference records its strong condemnation of the use of any methods of conception control from motives of selfishness, luxury, or mere convenience. (Resolution 15)
This landmark declaration rendered the Anglicans the first major Protestant denomination to approve of artificial contraception. Since then, most others have followed suit.
Despite the Anglican Church’s outcry against “selfishness, luxury, [and] mere convenience,” these vices have come to dominate the sphere of sexual ethics and even legislation.
The FDA approved the first birth control pill in 1960, an oral contraceptive called Enovid. In 1965, the Supreme Court struck down a Connecticut law that criminalized birth control. The decision Griswold v. Connecticut legalized birth control for married couples under the “right to privacy.” In 1972, the right to contraception was extended to all individuals, married or unmarried, with Eisenstadt v. Baird.
In Fr. Sebastian Walshe’s natural law arguments against contraception, he astutely points out the similarity between the logic of birth control and the logic of gay marriage. No one need invoke the magisterium or the Bible to observe that the primary purpose of marriage is the procreation and education of children. This has been a governing societal norm for ages, and its abandonment augurs ill. Once the primary purpose of marriage is forgotten, the floodgates open for hosts of unnatural vices. Griswold and Eisenstadt led seamlessly to Obergefell.
The Anglicans of 1920 understood what their successors forgot:
In opposition to the teaching which, under the name of science and religion, encourages married people in the deliberate cultivation of sexual union as an end in itself, we steadfastly uphold what must always be regarded as the governing considerations of Christian marriage. One is the primary purpose for which marriage exists, namely the continuation of the race through the gift and heritage of children; the other is the paramount importance in married life of deliberate and thoughtful self-control. (Lambeth Conference 1920, Resolution 68)
Not only did all churches condemn birth control as recently as 100 years ago, but even the government once prohibited the distribution of artificial contraceptives. The Comstock Act, a federal law which is still on the books, was written in 1873 to prohibit “mailing obscene or crime-inciting matter.” It goes on to define “crime-inciting” as “intended for producing abortion, or for any indecent or immoral use,” but this is an amendment as recent as 1971. The original Comstock Act also forbade anything intended for “preventing conception.”
The likelihood of criminalizing birth control at this point is slim. But Comstock gives a great to-do list for those who want to see the populace flourish: 1) criminalize abortion 2) ban contraception. How could we make abortion and birth control illegal again? Let’s look at the “due process” and “equal protection” clauses of the 14th Amendment that loomed so large in the Obergefell decision in favor of gay marriage: “[N]or shall any State deprive any person of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law; nor deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws” (Section 1).
This sounds a lot more like a right to life enshrined in the Constitution than a penumbra of privacy justifying birth control and gay marriage. Give babies due process and equal protection. Don’t deprive them of life.
In The Abolition of Man, C.S. Lewis observes that man’s “power over nature” is often just some men’s power over other men:
What we call Man’s power is, in reality, a power possessed by some men which they may, or may not, allow other men to profit by. . .And as regards contraceptives, there is a paradoxical, negative sense in which all possible future generations are the patients or subjects of a power wielded by those already alive. By contraception simply, they are denied existence.
President Trump wants to fix the birth crisis. What if, instead of subsidizing IVF, he promoted a natural means of procreation? Want to make America great again? Then make contraception illegal again.
This article was originally published on Crisis Magazine.
