Pope Paul VI was instantly unpopular for Humanae Vitae; 45 years later he is a prophet; Catholics should read this

Humanae Vitae at 45: A Personal Story

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  Pope Paul VI at a desk at the Vatican. It was 45 years ago July 25 that the pope promulgated his encyclical, "Humanae Vitae," "Of Human Life," pictured right. (CNS photos)

Frank Maurovich  |  Jul. 25, 2013

 

For the faithful it (birth control) is a sad and agonizing issue, for there is a cleavage between the official teaching of the Church and the contrary practice in most families.

—Former Patriarch Maximos IV Saigh
of the Melkite Greek Catholic Church
quoted in What Happened at Vatican II, by John W. O’Malley

Recalling that today, July 25, is the 45th anniversary of Pope Paul VI’s encyclical Humanae Vitae makes me cringe. In fact, I am pained whenever the 1968 papal decree comes up for discussion. I feel like a person who has witnessed a tragic event and made an intense effort to turn over a key piece of evidence — the “smoking gun” — that would make the truth known only to see lawyers either misplace the evidence or fail to use it effectively. I contend the evidence I am talking about would have been climactic—making it virtually impossible for Pope Paul to ignore changing the church’s current birth control policy, or conversely, if used today, make it relatively easy for Pope Francis to correct the church’s second “Galileo affair.”
For readers not around 45 years ago when Pope Paul promulgated the decree that renewed the Catholic Church’s ban on all artificial forms of birth control, it may be helpful to offer a brief review of that history. The ban was first imposed by Pope Pius XI in 1930, six months after the Anglican Lambeth Conference allowed its church’s married couples to decide the issue by themselves. In October 1964, several Catholic bishops raised the issue of birth control during a discussion of marriage and the family at the Second Vatican Council. Cardinal Leon-Josef Suenens of Malines-Brussels pleaded with his brother bishops to study the issue and “avoid another Galileo affair. One (failure of the church to keep abreast of scientific advances) is enough.”
Pope Paul, however, had taken the birth control issue off the council’s table, announcing that it would be decided by his interaction with the Pontifical Birth Control Commission. In June 1966, the commission turned over its final report, asking the Holy Father to take into account “the fruitfulness of an entire marriage” rather than focusing on individual sexual acts. Two years later, Pope Paul published his decision in Humanae Vitae, in which he acknowledges “the value of conjugal love in marriage and the relationship of conjugal acts to this love” but reasserts, “The church…teaches that each and every marital act must of necessity retain its intrinsic relationship to the procreation of human life.” (HV#11)

Read it all: http://ncronline.org/news/vatican/humanae-vitae-45-personal-story