Consensus Patrum

Warren said:

The bible arguments - it has already been demonstrated that those will be rejected regardless.

How would we know that they are going to be rejected if no Biblical arguments have been put forth?

While Onan sinned by breaking the Levetical law he also sinned by spilling his seed. This interpretation carries the weight of virtual any father who wrote about it.

What's missing from this is an exegetical argument. The appeal to consensus as binding and obligatory was already addressed, both in terms of being a fallacy and in terms of violating a commitment to sola Scriptura.

Of course, the universal consensus (if true) would carry some measure of weight, just not the level of weight you and Urbani seem to want it to carry.

I wonder how the consensus of the forbearers of the faith can so cavalierly be dismissed.

I explicitly said that a consensus might very well be taken into account and serve as grounds for caution. That is not "cavalier" in any sense of the word.

However, perhaps it is sufficient to note that Catholics regularly dismiss the "consensus" of generations of the church fathers on various issues, appealing to later fathers when the consensus of earlier ones does not support their position. That is routinely called an appeal to "development," but it is functionally the same behavior you are criticizing here.

You also need to demonstrate that the consensus is really addressing the same bioethical issues we have today. A critical concern with discussion of contraception in the ancient world is whether those church fathers who spoke to the subject thought all forms of contraception ended in an abortion due to what they thought was contained in sperm--a fully formed man. We need to take into account their understanding of biology; we cannot automatically assume their condemnations are directly and strictly applicable to how contraception is practiced in light of the discoveries of modern science.

(If I have the time, I might do a more detailed post looking at the early church's understanding of contraception.)

By the way, I am not so sure the consensus of the fathers is in support of NFP either. My understanding is that even NFP was discouraged as "contraceptive."

There is contention from Matthew that Urbani's claim about church history is unfounded

No, my issue with Urbani's claim is that he merely asserted it. The burden of proof is quite clear here.

Can Matthew or anybody else cite any church father or council document in support of purposefully spilling seed or contraception? If you can't, and he can quote fathers to the contrary, I think his point stands.

You are shifting the burden of proof. Not all that "charitable," I might observe.

There is an elementary distinction between citing fathers that approve of contraception and demonstrating that, as Urbani claimed, we are "expressly going against the teaching of every church father and even Reformed fathers and the christian faith for about 2,000 years."

If you want to temper and qualify Urbani's claim, do so. (I certainly would.) But a qualified claim still requires its own set of supporting evidence, such as citing relevant patristic scholarship. And the more you qualify the claim, the less force it has.

That prior to the 19th century the Catholic Church did not have many statements against birth control only highlights that prior to the 19th century most Christians understood this in good faith. There was no need for proclamations.

That imputes to many church fathers a stance for which you have not provided evidence. If a father did not speak to the issue, then he did not speak to the issue.

I don't think Urbani needs to prove that EVERY church father wrote against it. That would be ludicrous yet it seems to be the standard against which he is held.

If Urbani makes a ludicrous claim, he must defend a ludicrous claim. That, I might add, is hardly our fault. Or does your concept of "charity" require that we be responsible for the errors of our opponents?

Lastly, this is my first time to the blog but if name calling and simple lack of charity is the way visitors with differing viewpoints are treated here than no wonder people ‘bow out.’

It was fairly obvious that there was a "bowing out" due to a lack of substantive argumentation in support of the assertions made against contraception.

As for "name calling," that turns on your conception of "charity" and the norms of discourse--norms we need to have informed by Scripture, rather than our culture of non-offense and affirmation. There are plenty of examples of harsh language, even what would be called "name calling," employed throughout the Scriptures. Obviously there are important nuances that play out in practical ways, such as a distinction between how we address a defiant teacher of a false Gospel in public and an earnest, non-Christian seeker in private, and certainly "name calling" can be used out of an attempt to destroy another person, rather than an attempt to lovingly issue a strong rebuke. But just as there are potential dangers in utilizing the harsh rebuke, there are potential dangers in trying to be too kind and gentle. The emphasis on "charity" can become a pretext for excusing gross errors or the promotion of sanctimonious piety. It also serves as an escape hatch, where the moment someone engages in less than "nice" behavior they are no longer a credible opponent and all of their arguments can be summarily dismissed.