Tag Archives: Chastity

The Rehabilitation of Chastity

Anthropology, Contraception, marriage, Moralilty, Sexual Ethics, Theology of the Body, Virtue, , , ,

In his book Love and Responsibility, the future Pope John Paul II lamented the demise of virtue, and in particular, the virtue of chastity.  A spirit of resentment has emerged in the modern psyche towards high moral standards and anyone who practices them.  What was once admirable, even if very few people could master it, is now met with scorn and rationalization.  Chastity is viewed as repression and psychologically harmful, especially in young people.  But in truth, without chastity there can never be any true love.  That is why John Paul II thought modernity needed a “rehabilitation of chastity” and set out a program in Love and Responsibility for accomplishing it.

An Elusive Definition of Chastity?

Part of the reason that such a rehabilitation is necessary is because chastity is rarely defined in positive terms.  St. Thomas Aquinas defined chastity as a sub-virtue of temperance, the virtue that controls the concupiscible appetite.  He points out that chastity “takes its name from the fact that reason ‘chastises’ concupiscence, which, like a child, needs curbing” (ST II-II, q.151, a.1).  Of course, modern sensibilities being what they are, any whiff of restraint, is seen as an assault against freedom. If chastity is to be revived then we must expand our view of it as “a purely negative virtue. Chastity, in this view, is one long ‘no’” (L&R, p.170).  What Fr. Wojtyla hoped to accomplish then is to see chastity as “above all the ‘yes’ of which certain ‘no’s’ are the consequence” (ibid).

Chastity’s alleged violation of freedom really seems like an assault on love.  But this is only because our view of love, especially between the sexes, is far too narrow.  When the love between a man and a woman is viewed as primarily based on the subjective emotional and sexual experiences of the individuals then chastity will always be something negative.  This is not love, but use.  The two people use each other in order to “feel” like they are in love.  They do not love the other person but they love the feeling of being in love.  And they will be “in love” with the other person only so long as they are able to cause the emotional response. 

As opposed to its counterfeit, love is something objective because it is based not upon on an emotional and sexual response that the other caused, but on the objective value of the other person.  Love must always be directed towards the person and the value that they have as persons.  As good and as powerful as the sexual value of a person is, it does not exhaust their value.  Love between the sexes incorporates that sexual value into the total value of the person as a person.

When use is substituted for love, then chastity “feels” like it is holding love back and keeping it from blossoming.  In truth, chastity is an indispensable ingredient for love because “its function is to free love from the utilitarian attitude” (p.169).  Chastity is not a ‘No’ to sexual pleasure but a ‘No’ to treating the other person as an object of sexual gratification.  It is a steady and habitual refusal to use the other person.  It is a habitual readiness to affirm the full value of the other person.  Returning to JPII’s words, “only the chaste man and the chaste woman are capable of true love. For chastity frees their association, including their marital intercourse, from that tendency to use a person” (L&R, p. 171).

Pleasure Freed by Chastity

The traditional definition of chastity, true as it is, does not exhaust its full meaning.  Chastity does not just moderate our sexual desire, but “liberates love from the attitude of use.”  It is then both a ‘No’ and a ‘Yes’—no to use, yes to love.  No longer under the sway of unbridled emotion, sexual desire is liberated to roam free and be directed towards the full value of the person.  Only the chaste man and woman experience true pleasure of sexual desire because it is governed by reason and directed towards its natural end. 

This is the great lie of those who would have us believe that chastity is mere repression.  Sinners always love company and seek a way to rationalize their own vices.  On the surface, and at least initially, it is easier to yield to sexual desire.  But pleasure is always fleeting and when chosen as an end always operates under the law of diminishing returns.  But John Paul II encourages his readers to persevere because virtue takes time and suffering because of our fallen nature.  Once it matures pleasure is restored to its natural place and, surprising to our untrained minds, actually increases.  The “in-between” time in which chastity feels like repression is certainly difficult, but once it grows, like a fully mature tree, it provides the sweet fruit of pleasure.  This reality only comes about however when chastity is seen as worthwhile.    

Fully rehabilitated chastity enables us to see that it is, like every decision that we make, both a no and a yes.  It is a no to a utilitarian relationship and a yes to the full blossoming of both spousal love and friendship.

Saint John Henry Newman and Chastity

Communion of Saints, Defending the Faith, Friendship, Homosexuality, Moralilty, Sexual Ethics, Sin, , , , , ,

In the days leading up to now St. John Henry Newman’s beatification in 2010, NPR’s All Things Considered turned its consideration towards the question as to whether the Cardinal may in fact have been gay.  Never one to miss the opportunity to promote the LGBT agenda, Fr. James Martin retweeted the article on the eve of Newman’s canonization saying, “This doesn’t imply that the man who will become a saint tomorrow ever broke his promise of celibacy. And we may never know for sure. But his relationship with Ambrose St. John is worthy of attention. It isn’t a slur to suggest that Newman may have been gay.”  Although no one in the Church hierarchy is likely to correct Fr. Martin, it is both a slur and manifestly false to suggest that the saint may have been gay.  A comment such as this is not only disingenuous, but reveals the lavender glasses that color everything that Fr. Martin says and reveals his animus for true Catholic teaching.  In the 2010 NPR piece, Fr. Martin was interviewed and offered that, “It is church teaching that a gay person can be holy, and a gay person can be a saint.  And it’s only a matter of time before the church recognizes one publicly.”  This reveals a serious flaw in his thinking and shows why he is ultimately unfit to minister to those people who struggle with same sex attraction. 

The Saints and Heroic Virtue

The second step in the process of canonization is to be declared Venerable.  This declaration, which, in Newman’s case, occurred in 1991, declares that the man exercised all of the virtues, both theological and natural to a heroic degree.  The point of such an examination is to show how deeply grace had penetrated the man’s life enabling him to practice the moral virtues with ease and the theological virtues eminently.  Among these natural virtues, chastity plays a key role meaning that, in Newman’s case, the Church has declared that he practiced chastity to a heroic degree.  And herein lies the problem with Fr. Martin’s hypothesis, both regarding the new saint and any canonized saint in the future: you cannot exercise chastity to a heroic degree and also be gay.

This may seem rather harsh, until we examine the nature of virtue in general.  The role of virtue in the moral life is to habitually order our faculties towards their proper end.  These powers of the soul “train” the lower faculties to respond in accord with right reason.  The man who struggles with disordered anger, or what we would call the vice of anger, by developing the virtue of meekness not only is able to keep himself from angry outbursts, but actually so governs his feelings of anger that it is only felt when it is reasonable to do so.  A similar thing can be said about all of our other vices or disordered inclinations including Same-Sex Attraction.  Just as meekness roots out any disordered anger, chastity roots out all disordered manifestations of our sexual faculties and orders them towards their proper ends.  The man who is truly chaste would no longer experience SSA.    

Notice that I did not perform any of the usual moral hairsplitting that many people make regarding this topic between homosexual activity and the vice of SSA.  While this may have some value in assessing personal culpability, it has no place when it comes to the virtue of chastity.  To employ such a distinction, such as Fr. Martin does in this case only serves to muddy the moral waters making chastity harder, not easier.  It all stems from an error in thinking that chastity and celibacy are the same thing.  But they are most certainly distinct.  Celibacy has to do with restraining the exterior actions.  Chastity has to do with properly ordering interior inclinations.  A man may be celibate without being chaste, but an unmarried man cannot be chaste without also being celibate.  Fr. Martin seems to suggest that St. John Henry Newman fell into the former category—celibate without being chaste.  To suggest that a canonized saint wasn’t chaste is a slur, especially given that the Church has declared him to be a man of heroic chastity.

Deep down, Fr. Martin knows all this.  This is his motivation for trying to change the designation of SSA from disordered to differently ordered.  If it is merely that there is a different ordering, then the chaste person could in fact experience SSA.  But if it is disordered then it will be rooted out as the person grows in chastity.  There is no reason why a person who struggles with SSA (or to use Fr. Martin’s designation of gay) couldn’t become a Saint someday, but it will only happen after they have removed that vice (and all the others) from their lives.  In fact, there may already be some Saint that had this difficulty at some point, but to suggest that we might someday have a gay saint is like saying that we already have a fornicating Saint in St. Augustine.  St. Augustine is a Saint because he became chaste and rooted out all the sexual vices he had in his soul. 

Blinded by the Lavender Light

All of this reveals why Fr. Martin is ill-suited to minister to those who have SSA.  All he can see is gay.  In examining the life of John Henry Newman, it is quite obvious that he deeply loved Fr. Ambrose St. John.  But it is only someone who sees all things in a lavender light that would mistake the love of friendship with erotic love.  The aforementioned St. Augustine, on losing a friend said:

I was amazed that other mortals went on living when he was dead whom I had loved as though he would never die, and still more amazed that I could go on living myself when he was dead – I, who had been like another self to him. It was well said that a friend is half one’s own soul. I felt that my soul and his had been but one soul in two bodies, and I shrank from life with loathing because I could not bear to be only half alive; and perhaps I was so afraid of death because I did not want the whole of him to die, whom I had love so dearly.

This seems very similar to what Newman said at the loss of his friend “I have always thought no bereavement was equal to that of a husband’s or a wife’s but I feel it difficult to believe that anyone’s sorrow can be greater than mine.”  Would Fr. Martin have us believe that St. Augustine was gay or bisexual?  Or is it, that he is fundamentally incapable of acknowledging that there is a proper, non-sexual love between same sex persons in friendship?  One of the ways in which chastity is increased in the person with SSA is to acknowledge that to the extent that his love for the other person is real, it is really a disordered love of friendship.  Once this is realized the person is able to develop a healthy and ordered love for the other person.  What makes Fr. Martin unsuited then to help these people is that he would not admit to the true love of friendship.  Otherwise he would not make such a stupid comment about St. John Henry Newman, but put him forward as an example of how those with SSA might purify their love for a person of the same sex through authentic friendship. 

Losing the Weight of Vice without Dieting

Fasting, Virtue, , ,

“Lose weight without dieting!”  In a culture that is obsessed with diet and weight loss, headlines like this immediately catch our eye.  Most of these are fads, just like the diets they pledge to avoid, except for the latest trend—fasting.  Fitness articles and health gurus are now proclaiming the power of fasting to help lose weight.    That fasting has incredible health benefits should not surprise us as Catholics.  These cutting-edge scientists are really just regurgitating what the humblest of monks in the 6th and 7th Centuries already knew—that the spiritual benefits of fasting spill over to the body.  What they don’t recognize however is why this is so.  And in truth, neither do most of us.

This maxim that spiritual benefits of certain acts like fasting can spill over into the body is important for us to grasp.  Not only does it witness to our hylomorphism, but more to the point it sheds light on the fact that acts of virtue are good for the whole person.  We tend to see virtue as “a spiritual thing” that really only leads to frustration of our bodily powers.  But properly understood virtues perfect our powers and restore the soul as rightful governor of the body, enabling us to more fully enjoy our freedom.

Fasting, Virtue and Freedom

An example might help us see the truth in something we may unconsciously already know.  All things being equal, a man who is patient is also a man whose blood pressure is lower than a man’s who isn’t patient.  The reason we don’t grasp it at first is because conquering a vice like anger is very difficult at the beginning and, rather than calming the body, can have the opposite effect.  The man not schooled in patience is going to be further frustrated by the fact that he is holding back his frustration.  It can be downright painful in proportion to our viciousness.  So painful in fact that modern psychology tells us it is unhealthy repression.  In truth, pain is vice leaving the body.  But once the virtue matures in us, its fruits are felt in the body.  And like the fruit from a mature tree, it brings us pleasure, a pleasure that will be reinforced in the body.

At this point the reader may feel they have become victim to a little “bait and switch.”  We started out talking about fasting but somehow moved to virtue, using the example of patience.  The analogy was made because most of us don’t fast and most of us don’t realize that fasting is a virtue.  Fasting as a virtue means, that when habitually cultivated, it actually perfects our nature.  Put another way, we will never be perfect unless we fast.  Thus St. Thomas Aquinas says that fasting is a precept of the natural law.

Fasting is a virtue because it perfects our will power especially with respect to our concupiscible appetites.  Recall that the concupiscible appetite or emotions are those that draw us to bodily goods like eating and sex.  Because these pleasures are so closely related, fasting not only governs our use of food but also, St. Thomas Aquinas says, is the guardian of chastity.  When we can habitually control our desire for food which is an absolute necessity, we can control the other desires of the flesh which are not.  Once our powers of eating are controlled by the will, we actually enjoy it more—we are able to feast without splurging and experience true joy.  In other words, eating becomes not just a bodily act but an act of the whole person.  We come to eat the right things, in the right way at the right time and thus increase our pleasure.  So too with the other powers of the flesh when the virtue of fasting comes full bloom.

Those experienced in fasting will develop a power of will that enables it to choose independent of the desires of the flesh.  Until that experience comes we should expect it to be hard and expect to fail.  The untrained body will rail hard against the spirit that attempts to bridle it.  But like a man trying to train a horse and not necessarily break it, it is always better to start at a level that is parallel to our starting point.  A bread and water fast for someone who does not fast will only lead to failure.  Instead begin by fasting at each meal, making one small sacrifice (leaving a bite on the plate, no salt, eating what is before you, etc.) each time you come to the table.

Additional Benefits of Fasting

Our intellectual powers also are perfected through fasting.  St. Thomas says that fasting enables the mind to “arise more freely to the contemplation of heavenly things.”  What he means by this is that through fasting our minds are freed from the day to day clutter that inhibits us most of the time.  Again anyone who has dabbled in fasting knows that all you can think about at first is how hungry you are.  But as time goes on you gain greater control over your thoughts and are no longer as concerned with the needs of the body.  Your body may be saying “I’m starving” but the will is telling it “stop whining, you are not starving.”  Eventually the will wins out and the body relents; creating a calmer atmosphere for thought.  Those schooled in fasting all can attest to a certain clarity in thinking that is not there when they are not fasting, but the habit of raising their minds above the humdrum remains even after fasting is over.

St. Thomas adds a third reason why we should fast and that is to satisfy for sins.  Catholics are well aware of the penitential value of fasting, or at least they ought to be.  But there is a related point that is worth examining because it goes to the heart of sacrifice in general.  Which is more pleasing to God, a fast that is hard or a fast that is easy?  I don’t mean hard or easy in the sense of rigor but more in how freely (without interior resistance) we are able to accomplish it.  Most of us would say that a sacrifice that is hard is more pleasing.  But that is not true.  The greater the person’s virtue, the greater their freedom in making the offering.  The person who does not yet have the virtue of fasting goes back and forth but the person with the virtue sets their will on fasting and never deviates.  The latter offers a greater sacrifice even if the rigor of the former is greater.

Want to lose weight without dieting?  Not just body weight, but also the dead weight of the vices of the “old man” (c.f Romans 6:6).  There is no better way than to develop a virtuous life of moderation that includes the virtue of fasting.  Like all the virtues fasting is hard at first, but with maturity it produces sweet fruits that are more enjoyable than the palatable pleasures passed up.  Why not begin today?

A Necessary Habit?

Mary, Sacramentals, Sacraments,

In an age of exaggerated ecumenism that is further fueled by a scientific witch hunt to burn all religious superstition, the Brown Scapular has lost much of its popularity.  With its innate connection to Marian devotion it remains one of the most powerful Catholic sacramentals even as it slides into disuse.  As a particular expression of Marian devotion, the Brown Scapular may have slid into disuse, but it remains a particularly powerful sacramental of the Church; one that is particularly needed in our time.  To place the Brown Scapular within the context of a healthy spirituality, we must first speak briefly about sacramentals in general.  It is not just the Brown Scapular that carries an air of superstition, but all sacramentals.  These sentiments are not unfounded as their patrons often treat them as such.  For many people, both Catholic and not, there seems to be little difference between sacramentals and something like a dream catcher.  Therefore it is fitting to lay the authentically Catholic foundation in hopes of returning the Brown Scapular to its primacy of place among these gifts of the Church.

The Church and Sacramentals

Each of the Seven Sacraments are an objective source of grace, even if the amount of grace a given individual receives is dependent upon their personal readiness.  Sacramentals, on the other hand, do not bestow grace, but rather aid those who are using them to receive grace.  The Sacraments have been instituted by Christ and the Church is merely the custodian of them while sacramentals are instituted by the Church as part of her binding and loosing authority.  In making the distinction between sacramentals and the Church’s Seven Sacraments, the Catechism summarizes, saying, “Sacramentals do not confer the grace of the Holy Spirit in the way that the sacraments do, but by the Church’s prayer, they prepare us to receive grace and dispose us to cooperate with it” (CCC 1671).

If they don’t bestow grace, then why should we use them, especially since, as can often happen, they appear to be tools of superstition?  It is because in establishing (or blessing) a sacramental, the Church acts as an underwriter by attaching the prayer of the entire Church to that of the individual.  The prayer of a righteous man is powerful indeed (James 5:16), but the prayer of a righteous man joined to the prayer of Christ’s Mystical Body carries with it divine assurance to be heard (c.f. Mt 18:19).  This makes each of the sacramentals a powerful aid in the pursuit of holiness, even if they do not bestow it directly.  At that, they always require certain conditions on the part of the patron in order to be effective helps.   This awareness must always be at the forefront of our use of sacramentals to keep from plunging into superstition.

In this regard the Brown Scapular is particularly conspicuous because it carries with it a promise from Our Lady that “Whosoever dies wearing this Scapular shall not suffer eternal fire.”  Properly situated within the Church’s understanding of sacramentals, we can see why this particular sacramental might be especially popular and in a certain sense necessary.  Like all sacramentals, the physical Scapular is a sign pointing towards a deeper reality.   It acts as a sign sealing the covenant instituted by Christ on the Cross of the mutual entrustment of the Blessed Mother and each of the Faithful (c.f. John 19:26).  In that way it is like a wedding ring (another Catholic sacramental) that both signifies and, in a certain sense, seals the covenantal commitment of spouses.

Backed by the commitment of the Church, the Brown Scapular guarantees her constant Maternal protection and the wearer has a growing confidence in her most powerful intercession.  Just as the wedding ring increases the sensitivity of the spouses to the presence of the beloved, especially when they are not seen or felt, the Brown Scapular makes the “wearer more sensitive to the Virgin Mother’s loving presence in their lives” Pope St. John Paul II, Letter to the Carmelites on 750th Anniversary of the Bestowal of the Scapular).  It is worn as a “habit” suggesting that it is meant to represent the habit of committing oneself to the constant protection of the Blessed Virgin Mary both “now and at the hour of our death.”  Thus it also becomes a sign of the grace of final perseverance.

Just as it takes more than simply putting on a wedding ring to be married, so too with the Brown Scapular.  As Pius XII says, “For the Holy Scapular, which may be called the Habit or Garment of Mary, is a Sign and a Pledge of the protection of the Mother of God. But not for this reason, however, may they who wear the Scapular think that they can gain eternal salvation while remaining slothful and negligent of spirit, for the Apostle warns us: ‘In fear and trembling shall you work out your salvation.’” (Pius XII, Letter to the Order of the Brothers of the Blessed Virgin Mary of Mount Carmel).  To guard against becoming “slothful and negligent of spirit” we should seek to bring about the Triumph of the Immaculate Heart by adopting her spirit of fiat as our own.

Why We Need the Brown Scapular Now

Given ratification by the Holy See in 1908, the so-called Sabbatine privilege can be invoked for those who in addition to being vested in and wearing the Brown Scapular like a habit, also practice chastity according to their state in life and daily recite the Little Office of the Blessed Virgin.  Pope Leo XIII also gave permission for priests to commute the third condition and substitute a similar good work like a Daily Rosary to meet the conditions of modern life.  The promise, directly from the lips of Our Lady is that “as a tender Mother, I will descend into purgatory on the Saturday after their death, and will deliver them into the heavenly mansions of life everlasting.”

The point though is that the promise carries with it additional duties.  There is nothing superstitious about it, but both natural and supernatural encouragement to do those things that we know will lead to sanctity.  This is why one can’t help but see the coincidence in the timing of the ratification and Our Lady’s appearance to the visionaries at Fatima less than a decade later.  One of her great concerns that she expressed to the children was the number of souls who were going to hell because of lust—more than any other sin as a matter of fact.  Given the emergence of a hyper-sexualized culture, the problem has only become more acute in the century since.  So vicious has this attack become that it is only with help from above that we can even hope to achieve chastity.  The Brown Scapular becomes a pledge from Our Lady to jump in the foxhole with us and fight.  With close proximity to the heart, the habit will act as a protecting shield for those who wear it.