This sex education moment has been brought to you by Zippy Catholic

It is OK to intentionally avoid pregnancy for either short or extended periods of time. Really, it is OK. Relax. It isn't a moral dilemma.

Pregnancy can be avoided by not engaging in any sex for the period of time that pregnancy is being avoided. It is perfectly fine for married couples to refrain from sex, and the reasons for doing so don't have to be ironclad. In fact, there doesn't even have to be any particular explicit reason at all. (It would be wrong to refrain from sex as a way of being mean to one's spouse, of course, but I am in this post referring to mutual decisions reached by the couple).

So if you bought expensive nonrefundable tickets to go to Europe next year and you don't want to be pregnant on the trip, you can very straightforwardly and licitly avoid being pregnant on the trip. You don't even need a thermometer. (If you do need to use a thermometer, then the pregnancy avoidance method you plan to use is probably immoral in this case).

If one of you needs to work while the other finishes a degree, you can very straightforwardly avoid the difficulty of adding a pregnancy and a new baby to that mix.

And if you aren't a Kalahari Bushman - probably even if you are one - then you know how to go about avoiding pregnancy without any training or education. I don't have to give you any more hints than I already have.

On the other hand, making something that isn't a moral dilemma into a moral dilemma can be a problem. Usually when we take something that isn't a moral dilemma and turn it into one it is because we are trying to justify doing something we shouldn't.