Artificial Birth Control In Unmarried Couples.

[cmotherofpirl]

Is an unmarried couple having sex and on the pill committing one sin or two? I would say two, but a priest just informed me the only sin here was fornication and the ban on artificial birth control only applies to married couples. I don't see how one can accept that as a legitimate answer.

[CatherineM]

Pope Benedict talked about how using a condom for gay men wasn't a sin in that they weren't using it to prevent pregnancy. That caused a lot of confusion.

I suppose it depends on how you view the contraception. If it is all about avoiding pregnancy, then it's a sin. If it is about breaching the unity between spouses, then it could be argued that if they are not spouses, there is no unity to violate. These are the same arguments some use for or against using NFP to space children. Do they have to be open to life if they are unmarried?

The bottom line is that it can be difficult to separate and segregate sins. Leading a sinful life opens us up to a variety of sinful behaviour. It's hard to see where one sin ends and another begins. Mud is made up of grains of dirt. Yet, it is difficult to see those grains individually when you slog through the mud.

It could be this priest is a big picture kind of guy, and wants to focus on getting them out of the sinful behaviour first.