At least the rationalization hamsters are fecund

Natural, un-mutilated heterosexual intercourse has – qua kind of behaviour – an intrinsic relationship to the procreation of human life.  This is easily demonstrated by the fact that if all natural, un-mutilated heterosexual intercourse (as a kind of behaviour) ceased then human life would cease to procreate.  There is an intrinsic relationship between this specific kind of behaviour^[1] and procreation of human life.

Mutilated sexual acts (including but not limited to masturbation, sodomy, condomistic sex, and masturbation into a deliberately poisoned womb) do not have – qua kind of behaviour – this intrinsic relationship to the procreation of human life.  If all instances of this kind of behaviour ceased it would have no effect on the procreation of human life (except to the extent that people would substitute natural sex for unnatural sex: the cessation of unnatural sexual behaviours would certainly not impair procreation).

The Catholic Church teaches that all sexual acts must of necessity – in order to be morally licit – retain their intrinsic relationship to the procreation of human life, in just this sense.

Whatever one may think of the moral implications of this particular distinction in kinds of behavior, it is certainly both intelligible and entirely consistent with scientific facts.  Substituting a different meaning into the words “intrinsic relationship to the procreation of human life” does not actually alter the consistency of the original and actual meaning; let alone does such substitution falsify Catholic moral doctrine as a “empirically observable fact.”

In other words, in an “average” 28 day cycle, there is no potential for procreation in roughly 22 of the 28 days present. Sexual activity during this period has no “intrinsic relationship to the procreation of human life.” This is not my opinion, it is an empirically observable fact, like the Earth’s rotation around the Sun.

This kind of nonsense on stilts might make one wonder where the rationalization is coming from.

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[1] Knowledge about human fertility, or its lack, obviously does not alter the nature of the kind of behaviour itself. If all instances of (e.g.) sodomy (both by people who know lots about human fertility and those who know nothing about it) ceased, that would not impair procreation of human life.  If all instances of natural heterosexual intercourse (both by people who know lots about human fertility and those who know nothing about it) ceased, human procreation would cease.

Dubia

It is asked whether, following the affirmations of Pope Pius VIII and Gregory XVI, and additional rulings by the Sacred Penitentiary, it has now become possible to grant absolution in the Sacrament of Penance and thus to admit to Holy Communion a person who, while bound to observe the Church’s categorical and infallible condemnation of usury, deliberately and unrepentantly contracts for profits from a mutuum loan.  Can the expression “in certain cases” found in note 351 (n. 305) of the exhortation “Amoris Laetitia” be applied to unrepentant usurers and contraceptors?