VIEWS ON FAMILY PLANNING

Sir,—I am not a Roman Catholic but I have recently received minor mention in your columns. First, by Dr. Bernard Towers who, in his recent review of certain books on marriage and family planning, quoted from a letter I had written him concerning the sufferings of Catholic women who are forbidden the use of -contraceptives; and secondly, by one of your correspondents who criticises Dr. Towers for not dealing more firmly with my remarks. I would be grateful for space to make a few comments.
1. I am surprised by the illconcealed anger running through the letters of 'those who are critical of Dr. Towers "liberal" views. As a nonChristian I find this lack of charity and unwillingness to debate a vitally important subject sad and puzzling.
2. On the medical aspects of the birth control controversy, which your correspondent Mr. Hughes mentions, it is my opinion that all nonCatholic obstetricians would side with Dr. Towers, and not with Dr. Marshall, in pointing out the weaknesses and very
I imited usefelness of the safe period method of family plant-ti ng.
3. The phraseology of my original comments on the sufferings of Catholic women may have been "Marble Arch stuff", but truth can sometimes come from soapboxes as well as from essay on moral theology and volumes of Biblical exegesis.
I remain profoundly disturbed by the plight of the overburdened and unhappy Catholic mother, who may have already proved the short comings of the "safe period" all too convincingly, and who cannot. perhaps must not, run the risk of another pregnancy. Sadder still is the woman who, when all love has drained from the marriage. knows that she must still please her husband in order to keep the breadwinner in the home.
Such women are often inarticulate but they do exist and they demand our love and sympathy. I have had to care for them as an obstetric hue surgeon and I still meet them in a contraceptive clinic where I work. cannot lake part in this debate as ;1 member of your religion hut I would like to flPeeti lo 'Catholics both to recognise the extent of the personal suffering involved in the traditional Catholic attitudes to contraception and to show charity to each other and, above ail, to those Catholic wives and mothers for whom the safe period does not work.
Malcolm Potts Sidney Sussex College, Cambridge.
Sir,—In the CATHOLIC HERALD of July 23, Mr. Bernard Towers reviewed recent works on contraception, including my Contraception and the Natural Law. His remarks misrepresent my position, and I wish to submit the folldwing for the information of your readers.
First, Mr. Towers says I conclude "that the Church should pronounce even more forcefully against contraceptive practices, and should regard rhythm as permissible only for really grave reasons,"
My work is philosophic: 1 do not presume to say what the Church should dn. This question belongs more to theologians than to philosophers, and it can be determined only by the magisterium of the Church itself.
To explain why I wrote the hook, I mention that it would offer a rational foundation for ending the present confusion. But my conclusion, for which the whole book is the orpiment, is simply that contraception is intrinsically and seriously immoral—a thesis evidently so distasteful to Mr. Towers that he nowhere mentions it.
Secondly, I do not soy that rhythm requires "really grave reasons." All 1 ask is a good reason, and I never try to define that. The point of my discussion of rhythm is that although It is possible to choose rhythm simply as a method of contraception (and in that case it is seriously immoral), it also is possible to choose rhythm with an upright
All I try to show it that contraceptive techniques and rhythm must not he identified as merely accomplishing tire same end.
Third, Mr. Towers says that the ultimate objective in my view is "for married. people to sublimate all sex-drives in activities considered more ennobling." This one simply leaves my flabbergasted I do not believe what Mr. Towers attributes to me and I have never said or written anything like it.
Finally, Mr. Towers says that "in this cloud-cuckoo land couples might still 'couple' hut only when they desired to procreate".
Again, this is not my view at all. My true position is expressed on pp. 40-41 of my book: "The marital society is a human Rood in itself, noi only a means to procreation, and marital relations do have a role in fostering and expressing this union on its most basic psychosocial level."
My ethical objection 10 contraception is based on the convirtimt that it cannot be practised with full knowledge of what it involves iintiesS one sets oneself against a fundamental human Rood — the good of the beginning of new human life. I do not hold that sexual relations ought always to promote this good.
But I do argue that they ought always to respect it, both in will and in deed. if this respect is lacking, I believe that sexual activity inevitably degenerates into pseudosex. 'whether that be sexual perversions of various kinds or whether it be marital relations ,.111 [Wed of mil conjugal love. Germain G. Grisez. Georgetown University,
Washington, D.C.