Through the Church’s teaching, God invites us to a fuller, richer, deeper way of life and love.

October 7 – Respect Life Sunday kicks off a month-long celebration of human life by our family of faith in the United States. Respect Life Month proclaims the immeasurable value of every person from conception to natural death. The United States Conference of Catholic Bishops assists parishes, schools and other Catholic ministries with helpful resources. The theme is “Every Life: Cherished, Chosen, Sent” and highlights the call to build a culture of life as missionary disciples.

What Does Our Catholic Faith Offer? God’s love is generous, sacrificial, life-giving, and forever. As humans made in God’s image, we are called to imitate the eternal giving and receiving of love that is the Holy Trinity.

We can do this in a unique way through marriage—a vowed communion of a man and a woman who enter a “one flesh” union open to bringing forth a new human life. “The whole meaning of marriage is present and signified” in each act of marital sex, so the love-giving and life-giving purposes of sex should not be separated.

At the same time, for serious reasons, in exercising responsible parenthood, a couple may “decide not to have additional children for either a certain or an indefinite period of time.” In these cases, “the Church teaches that married people may then take advantage of the natural cycles immanent in the reproductive system and engage in marital intercourse only during those times that are infertile.”

Thanks to the research of countless doctors and scientists, modern, fertility awareness-based methods of natural family planning rival and even surpass the effectiveness of contraceptives while posing no risks to mothers or unborn children. In fact, couples using such methods report better sex, improved communication, and the ability to identify the underlying causes of infertility. (To learn more, visit www.foryourmarriage.org/family-planning.) In short, through the Church’s teaching, God invites us to a fuller, richer, deeper way of life and love.