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Contraception and chastity
Contraception and Chastity was first published by the CTS in 1975. Its fresh and incisive defence of the Church's teaching has helped many to appreciate the reasons for that teaching.
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About the author
G.E.M. Anscombe
58 books120 followersGertrude Elizabeth Margaret Anscombe, better known as Elizabeth Anscombe, was a British analytic philosopher. A student of Ludwig Wittgenstein, she became an authority on his work, and edited and translated many books drawn from his writings, above all his Philosophical Investigations. She wrote on the philosophy of mind, philosophy of action, philosophical logic, philosophy of language, and ethics. Her 1958 article "Modern Moral Philosophy" introduced the term "consequentialism" into the language of analytic philosophy; this and subsequent articles had a seminal influence on contemporary virtue ethics. Her monograph Intention is generally recognized as her greatest and most influential work, and the continuing philosophical interest in the concepts of intention, action and practical reasoning can be said to have taken its main impetus from this work.
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Displaying 1 - 7 of 7 reviews
November 7, 2024
Excellent, concise, to the point. Evangelicals are so lost when it comes to sexual sin, even within marriage. They don't realize how liberal they've become without natural law and the Christian tradition of marriage, chastity, and sexuality. We need far more pastors willing to speak boldly against contraceptives as an objectively harmful thing, and not something cute to be left up to conscience. Catholics are truly much further ahead on anthropology than we are.
“You cannot point to the known fact that Christianity drew people out of the pagan world, always saying no to these things. Because, if you are defending contraception, you will have rejected Christian tradition.”
“But Athenagoras, the Ecumenical Patriarch, who has the primacy of the Orthodox Church, immediately spoke up and confirmed that this was Christian teaching, the only possible Christian teaching.”
Listen free here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MZCBi...
“You cannot point to the known fact that Christianity drew people out of the pagan world, always saying no to these things. Because, if you are defending contraception, you will have rejected Christian tradition.”
“But Athenagoras, the Ecumenical Patriarch, who has the primacy of the Orthodox Church, immediately spoke up and confirmed that this was Christian teaching, the only possible Christian teaching.”
Listen free here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MZCBi...
September 2, 2025
I liked how she did not cite a single Bible verse that refutes contraception and resorted to talking about natural law😂😂😂😂😂😂😂😂😂😂😂😂😂😂😂
August 10, 2021
This is the first volume by Elizabeth Anscombe that I have read, and I believe she did not write any other volumes for the Catholic Truth Society. This is the tenth volume that I have read in the CTS Explanations series. In the last few years I have read over 200 books and booklets from the Catholic Truth Society. Based on the CTS number books the highest in this series I have encountered is EX49 and the list at the back of the book there are at least 49 books in this series.
Some have eBooks, some are out of print, and a few are still available both in print and digitally. This is a fascinating series, it tackles some hard questions. And they give clear and concise summary of Catholic Teachings on those topics. The description on the back of this book is:
“Contraception and Chastity was first published by the CTS in 1975. Its fresh and incisive defence of the Church’s teaching has helped many to appreciate the reasons for that teaching.Elizabeth Anscombe taught philosophy at Oxford for many years and was Professor of Philosophy at Cambridge between 1970 and 1986. She died in 2001. The present edition of the pamphlet has been prepared by her daughter and literary executor Dr. Mary Gormally.”
The chapters in this volume are:
Foreword
I. The Church, the world and chastity
II. Discussion of the historic teaching on contraception as an offence against chastity in the broader sense
III. Discussion of the teaching of ‘Humanae Vitae’
IV. The virtue of chastity
This volume was published in 1975 it was updated in 2003, and the ebook edition was released in 2017. The original edition of this came out just seven years after Saint Pope Paul VI’s Humanae Vitae. And this volume draws heavily from that work, and expands upon it. The writing in this volume is very academic. Most of the books from the CTS I have read are very accessible, but this one will take a little more effort and work on the readers part. The author Gertrude Elizabeth Margaret Anscombe, who was better known as Elizabeth Anscombe, was a British analytic philosopher.
The book is very well written. But it is full of a great deal of information. It was net easy to read an engage with, but it was well worth the effort. Some of the passages I highlighted during my read through are:
“As Anscombe argues, to accept contraception is, if we reason it through, to leave ourselves with no clear and compelling reason for avoiding personal unchastity.”
“You see, what can’t be otherwise we accept; and so we accept death and its unhappiness. But possibility destroys mere acceptance. And so it is with the possibility of having intercourse and preventing conception.”
“Christianity taught that men ought to be as chaste as pagans thought honest women ought to be; the contraceptive morality teaches that women need to be as little chaste as pagans thought men need be.”
“If you can turn intercourse into something other than the reproductive type of act (I don’t mean of course that every act is reproductive any more than every acorn leads to an oak tree but it’s the reproductive type of act) then why, if you can change it, should it be restricted to the married?”
“But Athenagoras, the Ecumenical Patriarch, who has the primacy of the Orthodox Church, immediately spoke up and confirmed that this was Christian teaching, the only possible Christian teaching.”
“You cannot point to the known fact that Christianity drew people out of the pagan world, always saying no to these things. Because, if you are defending contraception, you will have rejected Christian tradition.”
“That is how a Christian will understand his duty in relation to this small, but very important, part of married life. It’s so important in marriage, and quite generally, simply because there just is no such thing as a casual, non-significant, sexual act.”
“The trouble about the Christian standard of chastity is that it isn’t and never has been generally lived by; not that it would be profitless if it were. Quite the contrary: it would be colossally productive of earthly happiness.”
This is one of those books that was likely unpopular when first published, and in many ways would be even more so today. It is a book that would upset many in society, but also many in the church who do not want to live this way. There is a term I am not fond of ‘Cafeteria Catholic’, but there are many Catholics who would reject this teaching, even though it is clear from this volume and church history that this has been the church’s teaching. Even if many throughout the ages have not lived up to it.
I am very thankful that I picked up and read this volume. As a father I want my children to do a better job of living their faith than I did in my youth. This book has some great information, and excellent teaching. Well reasoned and very clearly laid out and presented.
Another great read from the CTS in an excellent series!
Read reviews of other books by from the Catholic Truth Society on my blog Book Reviews and More.
Note: This book is part of a series of reviews: 2021 Catholic Reading Plan!
Some have eBooks, some are out of print, and a few are still available both in print and digitally. This is a fascinating series, it tackles some hard questions. And they give clear and concise summary of Catholic Teachings on those topics. The description on the back of this book is:
“Contraception and Chastity was first published by the CTS in 1975. Its fresh and incisive defence of the Church’s teaching has helped many to appreciate the reasons for that teaching.Elizabeth Anscombe taught philosophy at Oxford for many years and was Professor of Philosophy at Cambridge between 1970 and 1986. She died in 2001. The present edition of the pamphlet has been prepared by her daughter and literary executor Dr. Mary Gormally.”
The chapters in this volume are:
Foreword
I. The Church, the world and chastity
II. Discussion of the historic teaching on contraception as an offence against chastity in the broader sense
III. Discussion of the teaching of ‘Humanae Vitae’
IV. The virtue of chastity
This volume was published in 1975 it was updated in 2003, and the ebook edition was released in 2017. The original edition of this came out just seven years after Saint Pope Paul VI’s Humanae Vitae. And this volume draws heavily from that work, and expands upon it. The writing in this volume is very academic. Most of the books from the CTS I have read are very accessible, but this one will take a little more effort and work on the readers part. The author Gertrude Elizabeth Margaret Anscombe, who was better known as Elizabeth Anscombe, was a British analytic philosopher.
The book is very well written. But it is full of a great deal of information. It was net easy to read an engage with, but it was well worth the effort. Some of the passages I highlighted during my read through are:
“As Anscombe argues, to accept contraception is, if we reason it through, to leave ourselves with no clear and compelling reason for avoiding personal unchastity.”
“You see, what can’t be otherwise we accept; and so we accept death and its unhappiness. But possibility destroys mere acceptance. And so it is with the possibility of having intercourse and preventing conception.”
“Christianity taught that men ought to be as chaste as pagans thought honest women ought to be; the contraceptive morality teaches that women need to be as little chaste as pagans thought men need be.”
“If you can turn intercourse into something other than the reproductive type of act (I don’t mean of course that every act is reproductive any more than every acorn leads to an oak tree but it’s the reproductive type of act) then why, if you can change it, should it be restricted to the married?”
“But Athenagoras, the Ecumenical Patriarch, who has the primacy of the Orthodox Church, immediately spoke up and confirmed that this was Christian teaching, the only possible Christian teaching.”
“You cannot point to the known fact that Christianity drew people out of the pagan world, always saying no to these things. Because, if you are defending contraception, you will have rejected Christian tradition.”
“That is how a Christian will understand his duty in relation to this small, but very important, part of married life. It’s so important in marriage, and quite generally, simply because there just is no such thing as a casual, non-significant, sexual act.”
“The trouble about the Christian standard of chastity is that it isn’t and never has been generally lived by; not that it would be profitless if it were. Quite the contrary: it would be colossally productive of earthly happiness.”
This is one of those books that was likely unpopular when first published, and in many ways would be even more so today. It is a book that would upset many in society, but also many in the church who do not want to live this way. There is a term I am not fond of ‘Cafeteria Catholic’, but there are many Catholics who would reject this teaching, even though it is clear from this volume and church history that this has been the church’s teaching. Even if many throughout the ages have not lived up to it.
I am very thankful that I picked up and read this volume. As a father I want my children to do a better job of living their faith than I did in my youth. This book has some great information, and excellent teaching. Well reasoned and very clearly laid out and presented.
Another great read from the CTS in an excellent series!
Read reviews of other books by from the Catholic Truth Society on my blog Book Reviews and More.
Note: This book is part of a series of reviews: 2021 Catholic Reading Plan!
May 17, 2019
Sense and chastity
Elizabeth Anscombe provides a reasoned to the objections to contraceptive sex, both within and outside of marriage. She answers the objection that there is no difference between a wife using the pill and a couple who abstains during her fertile days, which we now know isn’t actually more than a few hours each month. We have just about stopped thinking about this. What she wrote back in the early 1970s is more needed than ever as the push toward recognizing homosexual unions, something that she foresaw, and abortion up to the day of birth, and even after birth (which they don’t dare call infanticide) picks up more and more steam.
Elizabeth Anscombe provides a reasoned to the objections to contraceptive sex, both within and outside of marriage. She answers the objection that there is no difference between a wife using the pill and a couple who abstains during her fertile days, which we now know isn’t actually more than a few hours each month. We have just about stopped thinking about this. What she wrote back in the early 1970s is more needed than ever as the push toward recognizing homosexual unions, something that she foresaw, and abortion up to the day of birth, and even after birth (which they don’t dare call infanticide) picks up more and more steam.
March 14, 2025
This has to be read with the criticisms of Winch, Williams and Tanner, and then with Anscombe's response to these (Ethics and Population (Schenkman: Cambridge, MS, 1976)).
https://global.uwi.edu/sites/default/...
https://global.uwi.edu/sites/default/...
August 1, 2019
If you're familiar with Catholic teaching on contraception, there will be nothing new here, but Anscombe was writing not long after the wide availability of the Pill appeared to have radically changed the context in which sexual choices had to be made. She sets out the arguments with her characteristic clarity.
To someone reading it in 2019, however, she is rather let down by her assumption that a Catholic audience will not need an explanation of why the Church rejects other non-procreative sexual acts. She takes this as a given and focuses on showing why contraceptive acts are equivalent to these. She recognises that non-Catholics will not share the premise, but she is evidently not writing for them, and she is probably working to a word limit (this being a 14-page article rather than a monograph.) Today, the premise has become distinctly controversial, and I'd like to see her grapple with it; if you know of a book or essay where she discussed it, do let me know.
To someone reading it in 2019, however, she is rather let down by her assumption that a Catholic audience will not need an explanation of why the Church rejects other non-procreative sexual acts. She takes this as a given and focuses on showing why contraceptive acts are equivalent to these. She recognises that non-Catholics will not share the premise, but she is evidently not writing for them, and she is probably working to a word limit (this being a 14-page article rather than a monograph.) Today, the premise has become distinctly controversial, and I'd like to see her grapple with it; if you know of a book or essay where she discussed it, do let me know.
November 27, 2024
Great. Listened in a day
Displaying 1 - 7 of 7 reviews