When Did the Catholic Dogma Against Artificial Contraceptives Start to Exist?
It was during the time of Pope Paul VI. In 1963, Pope John XXIII established a six-man Pontifical Birth Control Commission to study whether the use of artificial birth control methods, which were just starting to take off then, violated Church teachings. After his death, his successor Pope Paul VI expanded the commission to 72 members to consist of cardinals, bishops, theologians, medical doctors and Catholic experts from various fields. It also included lay Catholic leaders, and among those invited were McClory and his wife, since the Christian Family Movement they founded was one of the biggest Catholic organizations at that time. The overwhelming majority in the commission concluded that artificial birth control did not violate the Church’s teachings, and that Catholic couples should decide for themselves what methods to use. However, a Jesuit theologian wrote a dissenting report, signed by three other theologian-priests, a bishop and—this proved to be most crucial—by the ultra-cons
