Your letter haunts me, because there is so much pain in it. I do not intend to lecture you on the virtues of self-control in marital chastity; on the contrary, I think it is you who could lecture us! I do not write to you alone, but to you and your wife. I hope and expect that by now she has read the letter you wrote to CCL and knows, in plain speech, how you feel.

What strikes me about your letter is that you are so eager to defend your wife that you don’t know who or what to blame for your frustration – so you blame “the method.” I, dear Sir, would not be so generous towards her! There is plenty your wife could have done — and still can do — to lessen abstinence and foster romance in your marriage. For starters, she can make the effort to read her temperature signs. She can read up on dietary changes that might decrease her PMS symptoms. We all know CCL is eager to help in these areas. As for romance? Well, that’s up to you – AND YOUR WIFE! I can’t offer any advice there except that there will be no progress until your wife actually agrees that romance is worth fostering!

You may be shocked to hear that I actually thought your letter was quite romantic! If everything you wrote was true — that your wife refuses “point blank” to take temperatures, tells you you haven’t “romanced her enough to earn sex” and in general reacts to your amorous invites as if you were asking her to do you an unpleasant favor — then you are the picture of a patient, long-suffering husband who is so in love with his wife that he is blind to her faults. If your wife were as considerate and sensitive towards you as you appear to be towards her, then I dare say you would not have had to write that letter!

Though your wife may excel in all her other roles, she lacks the virtue of generosity in her role as your lover. That is indeed one of the roles she promised to fulfill when she wed you. Marriage vows are like the Ten Commandments: you can’t keep some and forget about the others! I am not Catholic and I can’t recite passages from The Theology of the Body but I do understand that marriage is God’s plan for human sexuality and that He has pronounced sex “Good.” Your wife needs to see that every time she rejects you without good reason she rejects what God has called “Good.” Your wife’s lack of generosity is what has made NFP the “hideous nightmare” that you so painfully described. Would it be “generous” of your wife to “resign” herself to your advances out of a sense of “duty”? Perhaps. But she should join you in hoping for and working towards something better than mere resignation.

Point this out to your wife: this magazine, Family Foundations, is a publication that essentially celebrates sex! Granted, CCL doesn’t use that word the way Vogue or Cosmopolitan use it. But CCL wouldn’t exist if sex weren’t worth understanding, anticipating, and celebrating!

My husband and I have been married for three years – far less than your eighteen – and we have often talked between ourselves about how he is simply in the mood more often than I am. We call it the “Great Imbalance” between men and women. We laugh and lift our eyes to heaven sighing, “Lord, why did You make it so?” It appears to be a fact of nature, so He must have His reasons. My husband and I joke that if we both had his libido nothing would ever get done around the house …

In short, dear Sir, I am suggesting that NFP has not ruined your marriage. If your wife’s lack of generosity, combined with the reality of the “Great Imbalance,” are indeed the root causes of “method failure” in your marriage, then it is obvious that contraception will not fix it! For if contraception is the answer to the “sex problem” and sex is the answer to the “marriage problem” then why is divorce so rampant in modern times?

Yes, there are man-made drugs that can suppress your wife’s ovulation, prevent fertilized eggs from attaching safely to her uterus, even drugs that promise to artificially boost her libido! But is that really what you want? I think you love your wife too much to say yes. Let us pray now that your wife loves you enough to say yes – yes to her marriage vows, yes to the effort required to practice NFP “generously,” and most importantly yes to you!

P.S. I could not help but notice that the mention or question of children is strangely absent from your letter. Perhaps when all is said and done you and your wife will renew your wedding vows, plan a second honeymoon during Phase II … and leave the rest up the Lord!