Hey gang! I'm still recovering from my surgery last week, so I'm posting another guest post by my husband, Mike, instead of my usual What I Wore Sunday post. If you like reading Mike's posts, he tries his best to post every Monday. Give him some comment love for taking a stand against the big V and embracing NFP!!!
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After my son Griffin was born I heard things like,
"Hey Mike, you getting that taken care of now?"
"You don't need any more because your family is perfect with your girl and boy."
"Trust me, two kids is enough."
"Are you done?"
We had a tough time with
Griffin when he was born as he was the loudest kid ever (affirmed by the hospital staff), kept us up all hours of the night (not out of the ordinary for a baby), and was all together a giant handful (and he still is). Vasectomy was a hot topic of conversation in our house at the time, and I kept trying to get my beautiful bride to agree to it.
Kate: No.
Me: Kate, I'll only be out of commission for a few days and back to normal.
Kate: No. Mike, I don't want the door to be closed.
Me: Kate, I do! I feel exhausted, and I'm done.
Kate: I think you should go to confession.
Me: What are they going to say to me? It's not like they're going to pay for all of our kids!
You get the idea...
A little background is in order.
I can clearly remember the last conversation my father started regarding the Catholic Church's stance on contraception. It was at my son Paul's baptism....in the vestibule of the church. I overheard my father say, "So we're sitting there in pre-cana, and the priest was through speaking about how bad contraception is. So I said, 'Hey Father, if I have 10 kids is
the church going to pay to have them all educated and cared for?" He started this conversation with the Pro-Life director for the Knights of Columbus at our parish...who had 8 kids.
This was a speech I had heard at least 10 times while growing up. As I grew older, I understood the logic behind it, and, having been a cafeteria Catholic at the time, it sounded fine to me. Contraception to me was
normal and what
normal and smart people used.
After we were married, my beautiful bride wanted to use NFP. Being an educated and
normal person, my answer was unequivocally
NO! I used the same response that my father used to the priest when he was in pre-cana, and that was that.
Most people I knew growing up were Catholic because they were
born Catholic, not necessarily
raised Catholic. I went through all of the sacraments growing up and attended CCD every Saturday, but I really had no understanding of what was actually going on. Going to church on Sunday was a chore (I thought), and i had no idea why I had to go. I was so bored that I became an altar boy because if I had to be there, I might as well make the time go faster. For the people I grew up with, I think this was a pretty similar sentiment. Additionally, the last time I received reconciliation before I was the age of 31 was right before my confirmation..when I was 14. Again, being a cafeteria Catholic, I wondered what a celibate priest, with no kids, was going to say to me.
In my teens and twenties, I definitely subscribed to the
relativist theory of religion. You know,
God knows what I've done, and I'm okay with it because I'm doing my best, or
He knows I'm a good person, or my favorite,
I believe in God, and that's good enough, so I don't have to believe/understand/follow what the church says. At the end of the day, I was right, and I was wrong. Being a libertarian, I would never force my will on anyone, and therefore, if people believe in moral relativity, good for them. However, the church is absolutely a way to sanctification, and a real good one at that.
Hopefully I've shown why I might have been pushing for the big V. Many of the men I knew had a vasectomy, and it seemed like the natural order in modern life. Our son had us at our wits end, and I had grown up with the belief/knowledge that God would understand
.
During this time, I found myself asking some friends their opinions of vasectomy, and as a result, I was growing conflicted. One of my favorites was, "Mike, my mom goes to church EVERY DAY, and
she said that God definitely wouldn't want you to have kids you couldn't take care of, so it's totally cool to get one." That one in particular didn't sit right for me, but I wasn't sure why.
Right around the time my son was born I became a Knight of Columbus. One of the first issues of the periodical for members discussed NFP and how one father wanted to have a vasectomy right after his second child was born. The reason was because he was concerned about being able to provide for his family. In the picture of him, his wife, and 4 children, there looked to be a real sense of peace. Obviously, being a Catholic periodical, he didn't get the vasectomy. Additionally, he spoke about how he and his wife had grown closer because of the use of NFP.
Over the course of a few months, I had become more involved with the Knights and became their program director. One of the men that came into my life was the man I spoke about earlier who my father had started the conversation with in the vestibule. I became intrigued how a man in his 70's could be so full of life and not absolutely exhausted from having all of those kids and grand kids One day he enlightened me, "Mike, they're not really yours; they're God's. If He doesn't want you to have them, you won't. If He does, you will, and you won't be able to stop it. One way or another, He will either put children into your life or He won't."
Some of my previous posts have spoken about how simple suggestions can have a profound impact. This was definitely one of those times. Quite honestly, the word
vasectomy from that time on made me cringe. In fact, it now brings about a feeling of sorrow for those that have had it. I almost feel like this is the continued emasculation of society, i.e. being fully a man is bad. My son, Paul, would not have been born if I had gone through with it, and I can't imagine my life without him. He was planned using NFP, and I now believe wholeheartedly in it.
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| Mike & Paul at the zoo |
So in answers to my first questions:
"Hey Mike, you getting that taken care of now?"
What my fertility? NO!
"You don't need any more because your family is perfect with your girl and boy."
It's perfect now with more, and it might be even more perfect in the future.
"Trust me, two kids is enough."
I'm sure it is for your family. We're not so sure; we might even go for four!
"Are you done?"
By the way, nothing infuriates me more than this question, like it's anyone else's
(insert expletive) business. NO, I think we're going to try and have a football team!!!
I'm going to close with two more things friends of ours said to me in regards to NFP and fertility--
"Mike, I really don't understand. Fertility is this wonderful gift that we're given, and people treat it like it's some kind of disease that needs to be cured!"
"Mike, when God sends a baby, He also sends a loaf of bread. Your baby will be taken care of, just put him in His hands."
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| our family |
