When they say 98% of sexually active Catholics use birth control, are they including NFP?

[bulloney]

Natural Family Planning is an accepted "birth control" practice in the Catholic Church. It determines a woman's fertility by her temperature and discharges. If you want to avoid having children, you have sex when the body signs indicate the woman not in a fertile phase of her cycle.

I'm curious as to whether some of the Catholic women in this survey who said they use birth control are including NFP, or are they only including things like condoms and other products in the category of birth control.

[customerserviceguy]

1. It surely does

The intent is the same.

Besides, you know what they call people who depend on the rhythm method? Parents.

[muriel_volestrangler]

2. No; it excludes NFP, but is "Catholic women who have ever had sex have at some time used ..."

Here's the report:

Among all women who have had sex, 99% have ever used a contraceptive method other than natural family planning. This figure is virtually the same among Catholic women (98%).

Among sexually active women of all denominations who do not want to become pregnant, 69% are using a highly effective method (i.e., sterilization, the pill or another hormonal method, or the IUD).

Some 68% of Catholic women use a highly effective method, compared with 73% of Mainline Protestants and 74% of Evangelicals.

Only 2% of Catholic women rely on natural family planning; this is true even among Catholic women who attend church once a month or more.

http://www.guttmacher.org/media/nr/2011/04/13/index.html

(From the full report, linked at that page, using a condom, which they don't count as 'highly effective', is 15% for Catholic women, 14% for all women. The 'cross your fingers and hope you don't get pregnant, because you're not doing anything at all' method is used by 11% of all women hoping not to get pregnant, and also 11% of Catholics.)

[bulloney]

4. Your response, muriel. It says a lot about Catholics' attitudes toward their clergy

regarding birth control. As far as I'm concerned, having a celibate, single man dictating family and sexual issues to those who marry and have children would be like me telling a nuclear engineer how to do his job. And I have little knowledge and no experience in nuclear engineering.

I guess about every Catholic is what my pastor would call a "Cafeteria Catholic." When he throws that line out during mass, I immediately wonder if he expects all Catholics to blindly follow everything he and the RCC hierarchy tells them to do. Like, the RCC has a history of always being right.

I remember a church whose followers blindly followed their leader. Does the name Jonestown bring up any images?

[doc03]

3. Hmm seems like the Catholic church is more concerned about

someone getting a pill or a condom than they are about their pedophilia problem.