Rose Gioiosa wrote me in 1988 reminiscing about her work and promotion of natural child spacing. By then a nun with the Sisters for Christian Community, she recalled her marriage preparation work starting in 1980 in Boston. She coordinated the program which reached 1,000 couples during the first three years. The fourth year she restricted the program to 26 churches (Personal letter, August 2, 1988).
There were three sessions with the best time set on Sundays from 2 to 5 PM. At the first session, a priest talked about Church teaching on marriage as a sacrament, human sexuality and responsible parenthood, and communications and adjustments in marriage. Natural family planning slides were shown at this time. The second session was on similar topics but the presenters were married couples. Interestingly, these presenter-couples had to have experience with natural family planning and natural child spacing by breastfeeding. The third session was on the spirituality of marriage. It ended with the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass, the blessing of the engagement rings, and with engagement promises. Educational booklets and books were offered for sale. Natural family planning classes followed and couples were encouraged to attend these classes. Sister Gioiosa’s reflected that there were many different kinds of marriage preparation programs in those days “with not too much input on natural family planning or breastfeeding and natural child spacing.”(Ibid) She retired at the end of 1984.
How did she feel about the marriage preparation programs in general when she wrote me back in 1988? Here is her response: “I feel that a few sessions on marriage preparation are only a beginning. Our couples need the backing and good example of their own parents, relatives and other married couples, as well as good follow-up by their own parish churches and clergy, to support them and to continue this ‘beginning.’ ”
Rose Gioiosa was untiring in her promotion of breastfeeding and its effect of natural child spacing. Thanks to La Leche League, she reached many mothers through her Child & Family article. She also reached many couples through her marriage preparation work.
Our 6th anniversary for blogging occurs during this week. We have done almost 400 blogs during those six years.
Next week: Life of Dr. Otto Schaefer
Sheila Kippley
Breastfeeding and Catholic Motherhood
The Seven Standards of Ecological Breastfeeding