It's a baby

[SLIGHT RANT/WARNING] [BIRTH CONTROL ISSUE DISCUSSED]

Now, since this topic is a team discussion between my husband-to-be and me, I took this to him before I posted it and asked if he was comfortable with my rant. He gave me the go-ahead to post and advised me to diversify my research. It has been two days since I wrote this, and I've had some time to think, pray and evaluate my thoughts since then. Something that Robbie pointed out was that I went to Planned Parenthood, an organization that supports abortion and other methods of birth control that I feel are against the spirit of Christianity, which is my personal belief system. (The morning-after pill, which the site called "emergency birth control," makes it impossible for a fertilized egg - a baby - to attach to the uterus and then grow. I feel that this is against my principles of respect for life from the moment of conception.) Anyway, I decided to go back through and comment on my own blog. The underlined remarks are my thoughts a few days after my initial writing of this little article.

I'm getting married in a little less than 17 weeks, and I'm super excited about it. Robbie and I have talked about family planning and decided that it would easiest for us to finish school before we started our family because we want me to be able to stay home if at all possible. Anyway, I've been doing birth control research because I'm an ignoramus on the subject, so I spent around 30 minutes this morning on the Planned Parenthood website gaining intel. I would typically not think to look at this site, but it was one of the first sites to pop up on my Google search, so I figured I'd look to see what kind of information they had on the different methods of birth control. I began to be annoyed rather quickly because of how often this kind of warning popped up.

IMPORTANT! IF YOU FORGET TO DO WHATEVER YOU NEED TO DO FOR THIS METHOD, YOU MIGHT BE AT RISK OF PREGNANCY.

Um. Excuse me? RISK of pregnancy like it's some kind of disease?! And another thing that this particular site did was never, not once, use the word "baby" or "child." It was always a pregnancy or a fetus or a fertilized egg (which in my book is a human life, a baby, a child, a person).

All of this ticked me off because if I had it my way, I would skip the whole birth control thing altogether. I would love my husband, enjoy his love for me, work to build a strong and godly family dynamic, and let God do our family planning. I would trust Him to provide jobs and opportunities to do ministry. And then my husband and I would raise a family to do some serious damage to this notion that children are an inconvenience, a burden. When I see a culture that views children as a problem in the present rather than hope for the future, I start to be scared for that culture.

I feel that I understand my dear little friend Shane Buxman better in this moment, because all I want to do is bang my head against a wall and say, "Words, come to Ariel!" I have a feeling that I need to wrestle with this idea more to truly find my footing. I may be saying that I disagree with birth control altogether, but I'm not really sure about that. I think I'm more concerned with keeping my perspective in line. In my planning for the next few years of my future as a new wife with a new husband, I need to always remember the number of lives depending upon our decisions. I need to remember that children are a blessing from the Lord. I want to always remember that God's plans are permanent, while the plans of men are tentative. And I need to be always willing to forgo my will for His. Is birth control a symbol of that for me?

I'm not sure.


My main problem with the idea of family planning is that I need to trust God. My main problem with the Planned Parenthood website was NOT that they had faulty information or that they attacked a religious group or anything like that. I understand that their main audience is people who are choosing to be sexually active with multiple people outside of wedlock. With that in mind, my main problem with the website was their approach to birth control, like if it doesn't work then the woman is doomed to be a mother and her partner has to learn to be a father. 

This offended me in a deep part of my soul, because as I fall in love with Robbie and look forward to our life together, I am excited for the other lives that will come into being because of our love. If the birth control didn't work and I was one of the hundred women who get pregnant even though they're on the pill or whatever we decide to do, I would still be thrilled! And I know that Robbie would be, too. Would it be hard? Inconvenient? Sure, but when are children easy and convenient? Anyway, God makes life and He lets us in on it through the beautiful gift of sex. Where is a better picture of God Himself than when a life, a soul!, is made through making love, through unity? Think about it! With God, love and life always belong together!

I understand the practicality of birth control, and I am not trying to oversimplify or spiritualize something that ought not be simplified and spiritualized. I just encourage people to think. If my one year at college has taught me anything, it's to think. Thank you for reading all the way through my rant and trying to hear my heart. Here's a lollipop. :) Just kidding. God bless!