What Would You Do to Lower Your Odds for Divorce by 31-41%?

    A recent study provides stronger scientific evidence validating the uncommon knowledge that periodic abstinence is actually good for marriages.  This study documents that divorce rates among couples who have ever used natural family planning are consistently 31-41% lower.  This is a powerful testimony and, personally, one of the reasons we stuck with NFP when it felt tough in early marriage.  

    We were attracted to NFP by the joyful example of Catholic married friends who challenged us to consider it.  We were convinced that hormonal birth control could never be an option after my husband's first couple years in medical school and reading the mechanisms by which the Pill works in the PDR or Physician's Desk Reference.  We stuck it out without resorting to condoms (though tempted!) during several years of challenging periodic abstinence to space our third child's birth because we knew studies showed (and the Church taught) it was good for our marriage in the long run, even though it was proving challenging IRL.  Why was it challenging?  To put it simply- we had unwittingly absorbed too many of our modern, self-gratifying culture's norms (still do!) and we both resented that we couldn't always have what we wanted, how and when we wanted it.  We had to learn to be patient when we didn't want to be patient and generous when we didn't want to be generous.  And to talk about that vulnerably.  And to trust in each other's love, even if it didn't look like what we wanted it to look like at that moment.  That, my friends, in our experience, is how NFP really works- it works on our hardened hearts by leading us to our knees in prayer to ask for the grace to be our best selves and love as Christ loves His Church, with arms open wide.  Learning to love like that, while still falling regularly, has opened my eyes to the Gospel story of the Wedding at Cana and how Christ can share His fine wine to the end.