A venial sin?

Frans Jozef van Beeck's article both puzzles and intrigues me; not on account of its main thrust, but by an obiter dictum. He suggests that Humanae vitae implied that contraception is intrinsically evil, nevertheless may be, within marriage at least, merely a venial sin. This seems to contradict the doctrine that in sins against the Sixth and Ninth Commandments there is no parvity of matter: except for possibly insufficient awareness or not fully deliberate consent, all such sins are, by their very nature, mortal. At least that was the teaching of Fr. Claudius Acquaviva, fifth superior general of the Society of Jesus (1612), allegedly endorsed by Pope Paul V, and reiterated as recently as 1975 by the Holy Office (pardon me, Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith) in its Persona humana; and at any rate widely enough taught in moral theology courses, to make any college student of the 1950s think twice before doing what a then popular song suggested: "standing on the corner, watching all the girls go by ..." (or at least making sure he didn't "fully consent to the pleasure").

So has this rigorous teaching been quietly dropped? Quietly, as the long-gone strict prohibition of lending money at interest? Quietly, in order not to mislead the "simple faithful" into thinking that even such a commandment, "taught constantly and everywhere for four hundred years" could eventually (upon better psychological and medical insight) be changed? I sure would like to know.

EDMUND F. KAL

Fresno, Calif.

The author replies:

Like any teacher, I am happy to be taken seriously enough to receive requests for clarification and signs of disagreement.

I think David Smith makes a good point, albeit a bit ideologically. May I rephrase his remark by pointing out that all of us are tempted to live at the expense of others' lives, but that we can all be converted, especially by Jesus Christ, to "think of others as more important than ourselves"? Read Philippians 2, 3 (not 4!) to 11!

To my third correspondent I confess I still tell young people that knowing they were wanted at birth is a grace, regardless of the abortion issue. I also tell them that what their parents wanted was "a baby," and then they came--a divinely demanding surprise to their parents. All of us are more than the sum of our individual genetic codes, important as they may be.

Unfortunately, I must refer my sharp-witted fourth correspondent to one of my books for a detailed argument. Find the whole story in God Encountered, vol. Two/4B, section 170, especially numbers 10 and following.

FRANS JOZEF VAN BEECK, SJ