One of the aims of Catholic Intimacy is to address real moral situations in marital life that are often not talked about by prominent Catholic voices, but which nevertheless affect ordinary couples, couples who earnestly want to love and serve Christ and His Church in their marriages.
One such situation, which can become increasingly common especially among married couples with young children, is the unexpected need to end the marital act abruptly, sometimes without either spouse reaching climax. Given the Church’s clear teaching on the immorality of contraception and unnatural sexual acts, this raises an important and delicate question: Does disrupting the act of sex frustrate the natural end of the marital act in such a way that would make it intrinsically evil and therefore gravely sinful?
While it is clear from traditional moral theology that the deliberate use of the withdrawal (or “pull-out”) method is intrinsically evil because it is contraceptive in nature, some may wonder whether that logic would also make it intrinsically evil simply to cease sexual relations during the marital act itself, especially in cases where there appear to be serious reasons for stopping, such as:
- A childcare emergency (e.g. a baby crying or waking suddenly)
- A sudden medical concern (e.g. pain, bleeding, nausea)
- An unexpected inability for the husband to climax
Some might argue, following this line of logic, that such an interruption is intrinsically immoral simply
because it prevents the act from reaching its intended completion. However, a closer analysis of Catholic moral theology suggests otherwise, which will help shed light on where precisely the malice of the unnatural use of the sexual faculty truly lies.
Though it is often lamentably expressed in this way, it is simply not the case that frustrating the end of the marital act consists merely in the cessation of the act before completion, but in deliberately and intentionally rendering the act infertile by adding some countermeasure against an otherwise fertile act of intercourse, as is the case of contraception or voluntary pollution. There is therefore a distinction between actively frustrating the natural end of intercourse and simply stopping the marital act before completion. The former is intrinsically evil, the latter is not.
Nevertheless, this does not mean that such an act is morally neutral. The interruption of intercourse, particularly when there is a risk of male climax outside the vagina (i.e. pollution), does carry a real moral danger. That danger, however, is not because the act is intrinsically evil, but because of the serious risk that the situation may result in pollution or near occasions of sin. Thus, in order for such an interruption to be morally licit, a proportionate reason would be required to justify it.
This distinction is strengthened by recalling the difference between:
- An incomplete sexual act (a non-consummated act), and
- A complete sexual act (a consummated act; i.e., one that terminates in orgasm).
If the marital act is interrupted in such a way that there is no intention to procure orgasm outside the act, and it simply remains incomplete, then there is no necessary grave malice against conjugal chastity or justice in ceasing such an act, provided the reasoning above is respected. Nevertheless, because of the proximate danger of pollution in such situations, there must be a proportionately grave reason to justify it.
This is where traditional moral manuals provide helpful clarity. In Moral Theology by McHugh and Callan, we read the following principle:
“Unimputable pollution is caused by a lawful act from which one foresees that pollution will ensue, there being no proximate danger of consent to sin, and the pollution being only permitted, and that for a proportionately grave reason.”1
In light of this, spouses may take comfort in knowing that if the marital act must, on rare occasions, be interrupted due to a serious external cause, and there is no willful intent to cause or consent to sin, then they have not acted contrary to God’s law. Still, prudence, prayer, and communication should always guide couples through such moments, ensuring that love and reverence for God and each other remain at the center.
- McHugh, J. A., & Callan, C. J. (1929). Moral theology: A complete course based on St. Thomas Aquinas and the best modern authorities (Vol. 2). Joseph F. Wagner, Inc.
