Journey to the Truth

Posted By reynor | Filed Under Uncategorized

Posted By Anna Pier Day On May 23, 2008 @ 12:00 am for Catholic Exchange

I argued with the priest — the strong-willed one — who sat opposite me in the confessional. For every argument I presented, though, his response was the same: a calm, understanding, but firm, “There are no exceptions to the Church’s teaching against contraception.”

Truth be told, if the Church had been less wise and had made exceptions, our family situation might have qualified as one. A few months earlier, after the birth of our youngest son, I had suffered from an acute depression with accompanying suicidal thoughts and a brief psychotic episode that had landed me in two different mental hospitals. I had been torn away from my life as the stay-home mother of a toddler and a still-nursing infant for the two weeks of hospitalization my treatment required, and the whole experience had been devastating — not only for me, but also for my family and everyone who cared about us. As a result, my husband and I were very afraid of the possible ramifications of another bout of post-partum hormone fluctuations. And, having recently returned to the Church after a 20-year absence, I was finding her teaching against contraception very difficult to accept.

But there was something about the way this priest calmly stood his ground (even when I told him for the twenty-third time why my family should be exempt from this particular teaching) that made me believe he was giving me the Truth. So, after a few more weeks, my husband and I discussed natural family planning, and we (somewhat fearfully) agreed to try it.

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