Pavel and Veranika Siardziuk, Belarus, family and motherhood support Center «Matula»

www.matylia.by

Natural Family Planning in Orthodox Church

I want to start my speech with a quote from a prominent Russian philosopher Vasily Rozanov: “Connection of sex with God is greater than the connection of the mind with God, even greater than connection of the conscience with God.” In East Slavic mentality God and fertility are linked very strong but now this important area is in a catastrophic state.

In Russia-Ukraine-Belarus abortion rate is three times higher than in Europe, that tells us two things: the fact that our Slavic women are still much more fertile than Western, as well as the fact that our women are still not fully aware of this crime and sin. Abortion remains the main method of family planning.

Since Soviet times remains tight reproductive custom to have maximum two children per family. And even good pro-family policy in Belarus can not reverse the situation. On the mental level, the level of ideas there still a spiritual war for the souls of men and women, this war touches especially believers, our parishioners.

Until recently, the Fertility Awarennes Method (FAM) in Belarus was known only in the Catholic Church. This is due to the fact that Catholics reject any contraception, allowing for the planning of conceptions natural methods of fertility awareness and catholic practice to prepare for the marriage – every couple before marriage has 10 lessons of preparing, half of which is FAM.

As for the orthodox part of Belarussians (about 70% of the population is nominally Orthodox and about 5-7% of them are practicing), the attitude to contraception is very different. Russian Orthodox Church in 2000 clarified the view on abortion and contraception, IVF and possible methods of conceptions planning. However, the views of individual teachers and church authorities are not always similar, often they are absolutely different in this matter. The priests in parishes and monasteries continue to teach couples according to their personal beliefs and practices.

Let's see what is said about contraception in the Social Concept of the Orthodox Church.

(section XII.3 - bioethics)

1. Methods leading to abortion (IUD, hormonal contraceptives) are strongly forbidden and regarded as murder.

2. There is distinction between abortive and not abortive contraception with different degrees of responsibility for their application.

3. Refusal to have children in marriage is sinful.

4. The reason that justifies planning conception is: spouses are responsible before God for the comprehensive upbringing of children.

5. Among the acceptable means of conceptions planning is sexual abstinence for some period of time.

6. Should the sexual abstinence last long, for example, during the breast-feeding, restoration of mother's health (about 2-3 years)? However, one must remember the words of St. Paul addressed to Christian spouses: Do not deprive one another except perhaps by agreement for a set time, to devote yourselves to prayer, and then come together again, so that Satan may not tempt you because of your lack of self-control. (1Co 7:5).

7. Decision on the period of abstinence spouses must accept by mutual consent and consulting with the confessor.

Criterion when making a decision: preservation and strengthening of the family.

As we see, the Orthodox doctrine assumes that the spouses can use in extreme cases non-abortive contraception, but the better solution is periodic abstinence, but not so long as to harm the preservation of the family.

The statements above seem to lead us directly to the FAM, and the method had 13 years to get wide propaganda and dissemination among the Orthodox families. But at the moment the knowledge of the Orthodox spouses of the Natural Family Planning is connected only with the opinions of the leading Orthodox theologian Alexei Osipov: “by using this simple method, as the observation and reasonable abstinence, parents can choose the time for new life to develop in the most favorable conditions. Orthodox Church doesn't incline spouses to spontaneous, morally not controlled relations, and does not require total abstinence, as some preachers say”.

In Belarus, knowledge of Orthodox believers about Natural Family Planning is connected with the activity of family and motherhood support Center «Matula». Our Center opposes abortion, supports crisis pregnancy, educates young people  on reproductive health issues and chastity and works with couples practicing the FAM.

Our Center started to work in 2009 and has 4 certified teachers. About 50 couples learned the FAM, and only a third of them wanted to postpone conception, the others were so-called infertile couples or wanted health problems diagnostics.  However, the trained couples, after pregnancy often no longer use this method, and those who postpone conception, sometimes combine observation with contraception in the fertile days. This lack of motivation in our environment is due to several factors:

- The belief that a truly Christian ideal is in the refusal of full fertility control (and for family planning is offered abstinence during 240 fasting days every year). About 50 % of practicing couples have large families, among the priests the average number of children is 5;

- The absence of official opinion of Orthodox Church over the FAM (“temporary abstinence" in Social Concept is not equal to the FAM);

- An illusion that non-abortive contraception   is allowed: the main methods of family planning among the believers remain withdrawal, condoms, spermicides;

- Features of the Slavic mentality: strict and straight judgments but moral instability, staying passive in the circumstances;

- The consequences of the abortive Soviet practice of three generations of wives, husbands and doctors when killing a child was easily admissible “in difficult circumstances”.

Among the clergy and believers exists reverent attitude towards fertility and marital intimacy, respect for large families as the sign of God's blessing, the pride of men, having many children, the satisfaction of women found in care of children (in spite of angry feminists).

In the Orthodox Church there are two Church celebrations in honor of conception Our Lady and John the Baptist and even built monasteries consecrated to the conception. In the light of this attitude to fertility that has its roots in the Old Testament desire to having many children, any thought about planning spaces between children births is perceived as a limitation of God's will.

Such believers avoid the FAM, because they are afraid of God's anger, and the retreat of grace from the family. Some believers suppose that “God doesn't give children to couples observing fertility cycle for the purpose of conception instead of hope in God”, or “a condom is preferable to FAM, because it doesn't intervene with God's plan on the conception of a child in the given cycle”. From this point of view the FAM is a step down the ladder to heaven. But if a couple comes to FAM from contraception it is perceived by the clergy as an argument for the method.

Perhaps the idea of the constant cycle control does not coincide with the Slavic principles of «Suddenly» and «May be». In the framework of this mentality any cyclical changes can’t be guessed, they are always unexpected: “suddenly” there comes a change of seasons - winter, spring, unexpected menstruation,  pregnancy is always unexpected.

Of course, it is also connected with a long Soviet practice of hiding from the male part of the population such concepts as menstruation, the female cycle, pregnancy. Control of the whole process from conception to birth was women's prerogative, an unplanned pregnancy was her fault and she had to «solve the problem».

It may sound strange but such practice has nothing to do with Orthodoxy and folk culture. This is the result of feminism and long practice of legalized abortion, which grew 3 Soviet generation (legalization of abortion in the Soviet Union in 1920).

On the other hand we see a genuine interest to the FAM on the part of young believers: advanced, educated, free from the Soviet past. It is always nice to see an Orthodox man who loves his wife, protects her health and at the same time wants a lot of children (4-5) and wants to keep the joy and pleasure of marital life (in different aspects, not just sexual).

It should be noted that to promote the FAM among orthodox believers one should take into consideration some features of the Slavic mentality. This is a special pudency in the issues of sex, and the lack of tradition to discuss this topic in the family, from a Church pulpit, between spouses through concrete terms, not metaphor.

         We think that the FAM teachers in the Orthodox environment should avoid excessive physiology, there is not necessary for not married young people to examine the pictures of the reproductive organs and to talk  about methods of contraception. But with married couples and those preparing for the marriage - these questions should be paid a special attention to, because keeping silent often leads to IVF in the case of low fertility or to the situations when a woman uses contraception not letting her husband know about it.

During our lections we pay much attention to the hierarchy in the family, as for the healing fertility in the family everything should be in its own place - men should be masculine and women - feminine.We remind our listeners about the Church hierarchy: “the man's head is Christ, the head of the woman is the man”. This is very revolutionary in our post-Soviet feminist society.

The time has come so that in all the parishes the couples can get acquainted with the FAM, and to do so in a new Social Concept of Orthodox Church of the 2014 should be written: “FAM is the best means of conscious family planning for Orthodox spouses”.