The Lambeth Conference

Mauritius Times – 70 Years

By Peter Ibbotson

“The recurrent Lambeth Conferences, while having no authority beyond the moral and spiritual status of those who attend them,” says the Rev Dewi Morgan in his book ‘Lambeth Speaks’, “provide the world Church with a reasoned survey, under the guidance of the Spirit, of its whole life in the contemporary situation.” It was at the Lambeth Conference of 1958, attended by 110 bishops who included the Rt. Rev Hugh Otter-Barry, then Bishop of Mauritius, that the Anglican Communion considered the problems, the interlocked problems of birth control and family planning.

The result of the bishops’ consideration is what I wish to deal with this week; but let me first include one more quotation which refers to the effect and authority of the successive Lambeth Conferences. The Bishop of Peterborough has written a foreword to ‘Lambeth Speaks’; he says, “Over the years the Lambeth Conferences have played their part in the making the Anglican Communion a more worthy instrument of God’s purpose.” Note the last seven words: “a more worthy instrument of God’s purpose” — the Lambeth Conferences are not the deliberations of mere men, but they are the deliberations of men assisted by God; and the results of the Conferences are God inspired. Whoever challenges the validity of what is decided by the bishops is challenging also the validity of God’s purpose and inspiration.

The family was deeply considered by the 1958 Conference. In the official Report of the Lambeth Conference, 1958, bishops said that “The Biblical revelation does not limit the function of sexuality and the family to the reproductive purpose. Equally deep-rooted in Genesis is the reflection of the second half — the need of man and woman for each other to complement and fulfil each other.” These two relationships lead to a third, the place of the family in giving responsible security to the children. These three functions, say the bishops, are interwoven, are rooted in both human experience and God’s revelation: “The procreation of children, fulfillment and completion of husband and wife in each other, and the establishment of a stable environment.”

Planned parenthood, using modern birth control technique means that parents can better fulfil the third of these functions while not ignoring the first two. Children can be procreated; the use of contraceptive appliances (not relying on the, in fact, unreliable ‘jours agénésiques’, the Vatican roulette) means that husbands and wives can complement and fulfill each other free from the fear of accidental (or unwanted) conception. When the occurrence and number of children are planned, the stability and security of the family environment are assured.

From birth control, Lambeth went on to consider the worldwide situation of overpopulation; in other words, it went from the personal application of the problem to the general. In one of the pre-Conference documents, The Family in Contemporary Society, we read, “The rate of population growth in the world has never been so rapid as at the present time, and it is estimated that in one generation the world population might increase by 45 per cent.” Thus, in any consideration of world population problems, we cannot afford time for reflection; time is just not on our side.

“The Pope,’ says Rev Dewi Morgan, “has suggested the conquest of space might provide the answer. Perhaps he is right, but the world cannot wait.” Mr Morgan goes on to quote, relevantly, The Family in Contemporary Society, “The problem of over-population today cannot be left to solve itself; the starvation of millions, the remaining ‘natural check’ (excluding annihilation in atomic war), is an intolerable affront to the conscience of mankind.”

Population growth in Mauritius

Population growth in Mauritius is seven times its pre-war figure. The actual population in 1960 is already higher than that forecast for 1960 by the commission on population some years ago. The indication is that the pressure of population in this tight little island will rapidly be much greater than has been expected. Action is needed and needed quickly. There are many other countries like Mauritius where population presses: Hong Kong, Bermuda, Singapore, Trinidad, Barbados, Puerto Rico, Ceylon; but the big difference between them and Mauritius is that in all of them, something has been done and is still being done.

In all the island territories I have just listed, there are family planning associations, here are birth planning associations; there are control clinics; and the overwhelming pressure of population growth is at last being checked. And in all these territories, two of which (Trinidad and Puerto Rico) are by the Vatican regarded as Roman Catholic countries’, not only is there a family planning association, but the family planning association receives government subventions.

VERB. SAP.

And what did the bishops at Lambeth say about family planning and its moral aspect?

“The responsible procreation of children is a primary obligation. The question, how many children? Is one on which no general counsel can be given. The choice must be made by parents together, in prayerful consideration of their resources, the society in which they live, and the problems they face… But the procreation of children is not the only purpose of marriage. Husbands and wives owe to each other and to the depth and stability of their families the duty to express in sexual intercourse the love which they bear and mean to bear to each other. Sexual intercourse is not by any means the only language of earthly love, but it is in its right use the most intimate and the most revealing… Therefore, it is utterly wrong to urge that, unless children are specifically desired, sexual intercourse is of the nature of sin…

In other words, family planning can be offered humbly before God and followed with a clear conscience, “The priest called to celibacy controls his procreative powers as does the nun in her holy vows,” says Dewi Morgan; “Any normal husband and wife married twenty years with less than, say, ten children, have presumably practised some form of birth control, and the Church has never condemned it.”

Nor does the Anglican Communion condemn family planning. But the Roman Catholics may say, neither do we. We are against artificial methods of birth control; you can use the jours agénésiques but you mustn’t use artificial means — the sheath, the cap, the pill.

But Lambeth, 1958, went beyond not condemning family planning. The bishops tried to give helpful advice about details. Their official report says: “The means of family planning are in large measure matters of clinical and aesthetic choice, subject to the requirement that they may be admissible to the Christian conscience. Christians have every right to use the gifts of science for proper ends.”

In other words, Christians, in the view of the 110 bishops assembled at Lambeth and guided in their deliberations by God, have every right to use artificial means of contraception, since these means are “the gifts of science”. The jours agénésiques so beloved of the Roman Catholics are said to be the gift of God. A parallel exists between birth control and other fields of scientific study. For example, the God-given gift of water supply can be uncertain and unreliable, but the scientists steps in with his schemes for irrigation” and thus ensures that the God-given water can be properly used. The God-given jours agénésiques are unreliable; but the scientist steps in with his artificial birth control appliances and makes contraception more reliable. If we can rightly use the gifts of science to control nature in the one case, why cannot we rightly use those same gifts to control births? No straightforward answer to that question exists in Roman Catholic propaganda, as far as I know; I am prepared to be enlightened.

The bishops of Lambeth stressed “the responsible procreation of children” — note ‘responsible’. Roman Catholic propaganda against birth control could well note that Anglican stress, and act vigorously and indeed rewardingly in Roman Catholic countries to redress the irresponsible procreation of children that one so often finds there. According to the Caracas ‘Daily Journal’ of February 7th last, for example, the number of children abandoned in Venezuela is a tragic reflection of the poverty and ignorance in that country.

Among the poor there is abysmal ignorance even of Catholic-approved methods of birth control; illegitimacy is rife because no stigma attaches to it, Thousands of mothers, abandoned by their men, in their turn abandon their illegitimate children. The answer is not just raising money to support out of charity these casually begotten waifs; the answer is also “fundamental reforms in education law and custom”. Much could be achieved by the spread of information about birth control measures (even if only about the jours agénésiques); a paternity law is also needed, compelling a man to recognize and support any child whom he begets. Venezuela is a Roman Catholic country; the state of many of its children is like that of many children in other Roman Catholic countries, e.g. Sicily. To Roman Catholics who condemn birth control and seek to impose their views on people of other religions, we can rightly say: “First put your own house in order; then we’ll listen to you.”

But those of us who are members of the Anglican Communion know that the Roman Catholics are wrong in condemning birth control. We know that birth control is not an affront to God; we know that our bishops are right in saying that birth control is not a sin.

7th Year – No 300
Friday 27th May, 1960

Mauritius Times ePaper Friday 11 April 2025