This is not the Catholic viewpoint at all. Read Christopher West's "the Good news about sex and marriage" for a lay person's discussion of Pope John Paul's discourse on the role of sex in marriage. It is quite different than what the fundamentalists preach. Sex is a gift from God to married couples, and it is a sin for either to withhold it from their mate. Not only that, but it is not strictly for procreation as many believe the Catholic Church teaches. The Catholic Church, rather, says it is a sin to deny sex to your mate, and it is a sin to use artificial means to block conception. I should add, that sex is also not an entitlement for either spouse, rather it is a gift to be shared.
What I did find in my own M is that lack of sex was only a symptom, not the underlying problem in my M. Open communication has made a huge difference in my marriage, as well as in our sex life. If you haven't already, you might try going to a marriage encounter weekend. The dialog techniques they taught there turned around our relationship, and while it has been a rocky road, we've made definite progress. I'm finally getting around to reading "How to Stay Married & Love It: Solving the Puzzle of a SoulMate Marriage (Paperback)" by Nancy Landrum, and was pleasantly surprised that they highly recommend a dialog technique called mirroring that is effectively the same thing as the WWME dialog, except without the formality. Folks, as hokey as this mirroring feels when you start out with it, this stuff really works. The book might be the way to approach it for those of you who are turned off by the religious bent of the WWME weekend. Hairdog and Cemar, I'm thinking especially of you two, might be worth a shot getting this book and trying it out. They say it can work even if only one of the partners embraces it (something they didn't tell us with WWME).
I guess my point is, try to take your focus off the sex, focus on intimate communication, especially the listening. Grow your closeness that way, and the sex will likely follow. Mrs NOP, I think that is the message you've been saying all along too, right?
