By Priscilla A. Greear - Florida Catholic
MIAMI | With the rising popularity of lifestyles “au naturel” and everything organic, the Catholic Church finds new cultural relevance with its longstanding classes on natural family planning.
In instructors Carmen and Alejandro Santamaria’s three-part classes in parishes around the Archdiocese of Miami, they connect the practice to a healthier, more holistic lifestyle to meet engaged and married couples where they’re at � such as Whole Foods and Orange Theory Fitness.
“I think a lot of people are receptive now, a lot of people want a healthier lifestyle and this is part of that. I think people are really hungry for this information so to be able to help them is something that we love to do. It’s a ministry for us,” said Santamaria.
Image taken from the U.S. bishops' annual National NFP Awareness Week, which was celebrated July 23-29, 2017.
Santamaria helps couples understand the woman’s reproductive cycle and pinpoint the most fertile period to achieve or avoid pregnancy. The classes teach couples how to chart the woman’s body temperature and cervical mucus through the Sympto-Thermal Method.
The Santamarias and four other local couples are all certified through the Couple to Couple League based in Cincinnati. Other certified instructors also teach the Creighton Model and Billings Ovulation Method that monitor cervical fluid. Effective this year, the Archdiocese of Miami requires all couples preparing for marriage in the Church to take an NFP class, either online or at a church.
“We say, ‘You’re going to go to Whole Foods and pay more for your organic chicken and then you’re going to put artificial hormones in your body in the form of a contraceptive. It doesn’t make sense,’” said Santamaria, who serves on the CCL national board. “They do all these things like go run all these marathons and we’re like, ‘You have the self control to run 26 miles and if you have to abstain a couple of days you can probably manage it.’ �
“Sometimes they are disciplined in their health but maybe in their sexuality they’re like no, they don’t see the correlation. I think the class helps them to see this is all correlated, one big thing, all part of God’s design.”
Angelique Ruhi-Lopez serves with her husband as the local CCL chapter coordinator. She explained that for those seeking to avoid pregnancy, the aim of NFP is fundamentally different than that of hormonal contraception, whose use among Catholics is the same as for the general population.
Photographer: ANA RODRIGUEZ-SOTO | FC
Carmen Santamaria and her husband teach the Sympto-Thermal Method of Natural Family Planning, which helps couples understand the woman’s reproductive cycle and pinpoint the most fertile period to achieve or avoid pregnancy.
“The aim is to respect human dignity and to respect God’s design for the way the human body works,” said Ruhi-Lopez, who holds a master’s degree in theology from Boston College. “One way is to put on an absolute chemical barrier, a physical barrier, and another thing is just to prayerfully discern and say ok, we’re not at a point where we can receive children right now, and use the natural rhythms of the body to postpone pregnancy � knowing full well that if there is human error or God chooses to act or whatever, we’re open to that.”
She cited from the 1968 encyclical “Humanae Vitae” that marriage should retain its “sense of true mutual love and its ordination to the supreme responsibility of parenthood.”
It states that depriving “the divine gift of marriage” of part of that essential meaning “is equally repugnant to the nature of man and of woman” and in opposition to God’s will. But “to experience the gift of married love while respecting the laws of conception is to acknowledge that one is not the master of the sources of life but rather the minister of the design established by the Creator.”
Instructor Victoria DeBayle said that most of her students have used some type of hormonal contraception but are very open to learning about NFP. “I’m there to share information. We’re not there to judge anyone for what they do. A lot of people have not even heard of NFP and don’t understand the Church teaching, they just hear the word no,” she said. “In general, we can do more as a Church to teach young Catholics about ‘Theology of the Body’ and NFP.”
DeBayle tries to adapt her classes according to individual needs. She recently had a married couple struggling with infertility. “There are some sections of the class where we talk more about that and how we use NFP to achieve pregnancy and we focused a lot more on that with them.”
Instructor Lucy Moas said that CCL has simplified the program and made it much more user-friendly in her over 20 years of teaching with her husband. Along the way she has seen many couples overcome infertility “because NFP helps them understand their fertility. The information they receive is helpful and hopeful. Others have discovered the root of their condition and have followed up with the doctors for a treatment plan.”
Santamaria used NFP to postpone pregnancy while going to law school but, once ready, immediately got pregnant with her son and daughter. Later she experienced infertility but in charting her cycles was able with her doctor to identify a thyroid issue. That struggle led the couple to push forward the time frame of their longstanding plan to adopt, with their adopted twins now in kindergarten.
“For us it’s been a huge blessing in our marriage. It’s helped us to communicate better and it’s helped me to be healthier. As a woman, it’s also very empowering,” Santamaria said.
The Couple to Couple League, founded in 1971, states that the Sympto-Thermal method is over 99 percent effective in “postponing pregnancy.”
Santamaria explained that it’s different than the rhythm method of the 1930s because it is customized to the woman’s individual cycle. And once you learn it, it’s free � no need to purchase an ovulation kit.
“I think that the method changes your heart as you learn and see that God has created a woman’s cycle,” Santamaria reflected. “I think the whole thing of people using it with a contraceptive mentality, I think that’s between them and God�Our fertility is a gift and we try to emphasize in the class that this is a gift�My fertility works fine and I can just learn about it and plan my family using it.”
Ruhi-Lopez publicizes classes in parishes and seeks new couples to serve as instructors or parish contacts. She and Santamaria are also planning a women’s health and fertility seminar Feb. 24. And she’s supporting St. Katharine Drexel Parish in piloting an updated, streamlined class in Spanish.
“We want as many couples on our team as possible. It doesn’t matter whether you are the Sympto-Thermal or Creighton or Billings method, we’re all in it together for wanting to spread this different vision of what marital love and marital family life can be,” she said.
Stephen Colella, archdiocesan director of the Secretariat for Parish Life, explained that an NFP subcommittee of a 2015 Task Force for Marriage Preparation shared data and stories of a “growing interest for NFP.” The subcommittee recommended that it be introduced in every approved marriage preparation program and that a full course be required for engaged couples as part of the archdiocese’s updated guidelines.
“Miami has a strong network in place through existing course options to share NFP with engaged couples so they could grow in understanding and intimacy to strengthen their marriage,” Colella said.
He noted that many engaged couples learning NFP have asked “how come nobody ever told us this before?”
“Although these may be difficult topics for some to discuss, we must share this good news with joy and faith in light of the ‘Theology of the Body,’ ‘Deus Caritas Est’ and now ‘Amoris Laetitia,’” Colella said. “Those of us who are encouraged to give witness to the beauty of what the Church is saying have found that the majority of the couples are very interested in learning more and have no other place to go to learn. Participants consistently rank this section of the ‘Transformed in Love’ group marriage preparation program as one of the highest.”
Related story: Creighton method aids couples experiencing infertility
CHECK IT OUT
� Couple to Couple League classes will be held Oct. 21, Nov. 11 and Dec. 9 at St. Gregory Churchin Plantation and on Nov. 16, Dec. 14 and Jan. 11 at Epiphany Church in Miami.
� To register visit http://register.ccli.org or for information contact Angelique Ruhi-Lopez at [email protected].
� For information on Billings Ovulation Method write Annie Acosta at [email protected].
� For the Creighton Model contact Sarah McKeown at [email protected] or Guadalupe Carral at [email protected] or visit creightonsouthflorida.com.
