Contraception: A Psychological Prostitution

By Dominic Pedulla MD

Here is my own speculative TOB-enabled scientific  interpretation: the gift of  bearing new life belongs uniquely to the woman. In God’s plan for the woman, in particular, to be truly happy in the conjugal relationship she must be able to be fully and unconditionally loved for who she is; that is, accepted fully for the unique person she is, without any compromises.

Because her identity is more mysterious on account of this hidden life-giving power (than, say, the man’s is), she of necessity and without being able to do anything about it must communicate her life-giving identity as part of her person when in the conjugal act she communicates her whole being. This existential nakedness (“apocalypsis”, “unveiling”), though only remotely hinted at by the more obvious, physical nakedness of the conjugal act (remember John Paul II said the body is the sacrament of the inner mystery of the person) is the place for the deep and intimate self-revelation the woman will express in this act.

This is dangerous territory! It is a dangerously intimate self-revelation but also self-exposure. In fact, affirming love and the need for authentic procreative self-actualization appear to be so important that they constitute the only reasons sufficient for nature to permit this intimate and dangerous core self-exposure.

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Dominic Pedulla grew up in New York City and the professional inspiration was his father who is a doctor and his mother who is an R.N. His mother was the one who gave him an early respect for women and a keen understanding of their dignity. He started the Edith Stein Foundation because all that keen interest and because of the obvious assault on that dignity that he felt was being practiced within the medical profession.