Can a learned bibliophile help me out, here?

[journeyman]

[quote name='jswranch' date='Apr 5 2006, 02:43 PM']Is it correct to say the use of contraception is a grave matter?
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I don't remember the cited authority, but this was mentioned during Father Phil's discussion on Lust at [url="http://www.secularoratory.com/capitalsins.htm"]http://www.secularoratory.com/capitalsins.htm[/url] . . . His Lenten talk on February 20 . . . your choice of outline, powerpoint slides or audio

[Ziggamafu]

I thought it was commonly held as universal teaching that contraception is a grave matter?

[journeyman]

[quote name='phatcatholic' date='Apr 4 2006, 04:26 PM']in her article [url="http://www.catholicculture.org/docs/doc_view.cfm?recnum=5822"][i][b]On the Primary Purpose of Marriage[/b][/i][/url], Jennaya Arias writes: "Traditionally speaking, the primary purpose of marriage is the generation and nurturing of offspring; the second purpose is the mutual help of spouses, and the third is the remedy for concupiscence."[b]1[/b]

what we are interested in is the footnote, which reads:[list][b]1[/b] Ludwig Ott, [i]Fundamentals of Catholic Dogma[/i] (Rockford, IL: Tan Books, 1974), p. 462. Here Ott references the 1944 decision of the Holy Office, which clearly reaffirmed that the primary purpose of marriage is the procreation and upbringing of children. Even though many (if not all) of the documents of the Magisterium on this topic since Vatican II have not explicitily organized the ends of marriage in terms of primary and secondary, nonetheless, none of these documents teach anything which cannot be interpreted in terms of the 1944 decision of the Holy Office. That in the Pope's mind, at least, no change has been made on this matter of Church teaching, can be seen in the Holy Father's work, [i]Love and Responsibility[/i], trans. H. T. Willetts (San Francisco: Ignatius, 1981), pp. 66-69. Therein, the Holy Father lays out, in no equivocal terms, the traditional teaching of the Church on this matter both as unchanged and as unchangeable. Although this work is non-magisterial in character, it is nonetheless quite significant insofar as it expresses the mind of the Holy Father. In the same section of the work, the Pope also makes the important point that the second end of marriage, namely, "mutual help," should not be translated as "mutual love," as it sometimes has been. This would be a mistake since it would seem to limit love between spouses to the second end of marriage, as if it were somehow separable from the first and third ends. Rather, the Holy Father teaches that love must be the indispensable moral environment in which the three ends of marriage are pursued. This present essay should be read as in complete agreement with what the Holy Father says on these matters.

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Ott's text

Section 2. Purpose and Properties of Marriage

1. Purpose

The primary purpose of Marriage is the generation and bringing-up of offspring. The secondary purpose is mutual help and the morally regulated satisfaction of the sex urge. (Sent. certa.) CIC 1013, Par 1.)
(Codex Iuris Canonici)

In their efforts to evaluate marriage as something more than a personal contract, many modern theologians, as against the traditional teaching of the purpose of marriage, whose principal exponent is St. Thomas, have submitted that the primary prupose of marriage is the mutual completion and personal perfection of the marriage partners, or their mutual love and unity. The Holy Office, in the year 1944, in answer to an enquiry, re-asserted the traditional teaching, according to which the primary purpose of marriage is the generation and bringing up of children, and according to which the secondary pruposes of marriage are essentially subordinate to the primary one. D 2295.
(Denzinger/Rahner, Enchirdion symbolorum, definitionum et declarationum de rebus fidei et morum)


CIC 1013
Canon 1013 (1917)
S. 1. The primary end of marriage is the procreation and education of children; the secondary [end] is mutual support and a remecy for concupiscence.
S. 2. The essential properties of marriage are unity and indissolubility, which in Christian marriage obtain special firmness by reason of the sacrament.

1013 was replaced by 1056 in the 1983 revision - which repeats only the second section.

Bouscaran and O'Connor Canon Law Digest (Vol VI, 1967 at page 590) notes:
Ends of Marriage: The Pastoral Constitution on the Church in the Modern World omits mention of the "primary" and "secondary" ends of marriage as such. Hence this aspect of the subject is open to further elucidation.

The concept of S. 1 of 1013 was restated in Canon 1055 - The Fundamental Nature of Marriage. (formerly Canon 1012)

Canon 1012 (1917)
S. 1. Christ the Lord raised the marriage contract itself to the dignity of a sacrament among the baptized.
S. 2. Therefore among the baptized there can be no valid contract of marriage without its also being a sacrament.

Canon 1055 (1983)
S. 1. The matrimonial covenant, by which a man and a woman establish between themselves a partnership of the whole of life, is by its nature ordered toward the good of the spouses and the procreation and education of the offspring; this covenant between baptized persons has been raised by Christ the Lord to the dignity of a sacrament.
S. 2. For this reason a matrimonial contract cannot validly exist between baptized persons unless it is also a sacrament by that fact.

Coriden, Green & Heintschel, The Code of Canon Law, A Text and Commentary (1985)

The comments note the new canon replaces "contract" with "covenant"

"Unlike canon 1013 of the 1917 Code, Gaudium et Spes avoided setting forth a hierarchy of ends of marriage. This omission does not mean that the purposes of marriage are arbitrarily determined by the spouses. By natural and divine determination marriage is ordered to the good of the spouses (bonum coniugum) and the procreation and education of children. The two ends are intimately related. They are what marriage is about. The unselfish giving in the context of the marital community promotes the natural and spiritual good of the spouses. Naturally, one may ask what acts or attitudes are necessary for the community of life. An exhaustive list is not possible since much depends on society, culture, and personality. Yet certain basic attributes are to be expected: heterosexual companionship, interpersonal friendship, spiritual and material support. Here we find that mutual assistance, formerly considered a secondary end, is now rightly included in the very essence of marriage.

. . . .

While the existence of a true marriage does not depend on procreation (marriages of the aged and sterile), there must nevertheless be an openness to procreation by all who choose this sacrament.

The fulfillment of this purpose of marriage is not exhausted with physical procreation. The spouses are obligated to see that the children procreated receive a Christian education. This formation takes place primarily in the context of the marital community wherein the children learn the meaning of love of God and neighbor through the loving example and instruction of their parents. Such an understanding of the comprehensive nature of the purpose of marriage is rooted in Augustinian and Thomistic theology.
fn cites to Augustine, De civitatte Dei 15 16; Aquinas Summa Theologiae 111 29 2; Raymond of Penafort, Summa de matrimonio 11 12

There is an updated text and comments volume dated 2000 ish -

[phatcatholic]

[quote name='Ziggamafu' date='Apr 9 2006, 04:53 PM']I thought it was commonly held as universal teaching that contraception is a grave matter?
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it is. no one has said otherwise.

[Ziggamafu]

hmm...yeah, it just seemed like some replies on this thread were acting like it wasn't common knowledge.

there have been some very informative replies to the initial topic and i still think they should be put into a tract or something.