FORTY YEARS ago today, Pope Paul VI issued probably the most controversial encyclical letter in the history of the Catholic Church. In Humanae Vitae, he reaffirmed the Church's official ban on artificial contraception, stunning the Catholic world at a time when there were strong expectations of some easing in the traditional teaching.
The ban was becoming such a sensitive issue at a time of a world-wide pressure for population control that Pope John XXIII had set up a Pontifical Study Commission in 1963 to study United Nation policies on the matter. It was also to make recommendations to the Holy See on what action the church should take in the light of increased acceptance of contraceptive birth control in western society. Pope Paul increased the size of the commission but also removed any discussion of the matter from the Vatican II Council, then meeting, by announcing that he would issue his own statement on the birth control issue. Nevertheless, the Council document "Gaudium et Spes" (Joy and Hope) on the place of the church in the modern world, in its reference to marriage, dropped the traditional phraseology on the primacy of procreation over conjugal love.
The pontifical commission produced a majority report which called for a reassessment of Catholic teaching which could open the way to allow artificial contraception in marriage in certain circumstances. A "pastoral" document on responsible parenthood released at the same time supported this view. A small number of commission members rejected any proposed change in the Church's teaching.
While the hopes of those pressing for change were thus raised, Pope Paul agonised for over a year before issuing Humanae Vitae with its authoritative insistence that every conjugal act must remain open to the transmission of life. In a church which was experiencing the liberating effects of Vatican II and an opening up to closer relationships with other churches, the reaffirmation of the ban on artificial birth control was traumatic.
Some hierarchies, such as the Dutch, Canadian and the German, issued statements emphasising the role of individual conscience in such an intimate matter.
Forty years later, there is little or no reference to Humanae Vitae from Catholic pulpits or altars. The laity, elevated to a new role in the council documents, have gone about making their own decisions on family planning methods according to their consciences and often with pastoral advice from their clergy. But the ban on artificial contraception is still the official teaching of the church and under Pope John PaulII, support for it was a test of suitability in the appointment of bishops.
The present pope, Benedict XVI, omitted any reference to Humanae Vitae or procreation in his encyclical on love, sexuality and charity, Deus Caritas Est. More recently he told an international congress on the 40th anniversary of the encyclical that it was "a sign of contradiction but also of continuity of the Churchs doctrine and tradition." That about sums it up. No great enthusiasm but no readiness to change.