Christian Humanism CH 10-11

Unit 10

The Natural Meaning of Sexual Intercourse:

The act of sexual intercourse between a man and woman is an act that is designed to express love. In this act (called the sexual act or marital act), the male and female persons go out of themselves to each other. They mutually give themselves to one another and simultaneously receive the gift of the other. The two of them, with their sexually incomplete bodies, unite as one, forming a sexual whole.

The giving of themselves and receiving each other physically is meant to have a parallel giving and receiving on the spiritual and psychological level.

The Natural Meaning of Sexual Intercourse:

3 Components of Sexual Intercourse:

Physical

Psychic

Spiritual

Consider the fact that the bodily union of the sexual act is naturally one in which the two persons hold nothing back from each other. The interior spiritual union that is a necessary parallel to this bodily union, then, must involve a totality in the mutual giving of the two persons. Thus sexual intercourse requires that the two persons freely choose to give themselves only to this one person and to no one else.

The union must be exclusive and lifelong.

*Disordered Act: An act which is not directed towards its proper end.

Marital Act:

Conjugal act: from Latin conjugium (yoked, together); the love of a man and woman involved in a marital relationship.

Sexual intercourse between man and woman, is designed to express and to foster conjugal love. This sexual act is meant to express this total self-giving. In other words, the conjugal act (marital act) is the way the spouses say with their bodies what they said in their marriage vows. “I give myself totally to you, forever.”

The Marital Act (Sexual Act):

The sexual act has two purposes:

Unitive: For a man and woman to express a profound self-giving love such that the two persons become one, both bodily and spiritually.

Procreative:For this union to bear fruit in the conception of new life.

A genuine entrusting of oneself to another cannot be one-sided. It requires reciprocity. The two people engaging in the sexual act are speaking a language with their bodies which says, “ I’m willing to be a parent with you.” In other words, they must be willing to widen the sphere of their love to form a family.

Family: a fundamental social group in society typically consisting of a man and woman and their offspring.

Natural Law and the Sexual Act:

Natural law tells us, then, that sexual intercourse is a bodily act which has an inherent meaning that requires our respect. The act has an objective truth to which we must conform our behavior. Part of that inherent meaning is that it is to be an act expressing total self-giving love, an act of the most complete union possible between two human persons. We refer to this as the unitive meaning of the act.

The very act which unites the couple in mutual self-giving bears within itself the possibility of bearing fruit in the conception of a child. God is creating new life through the unitive act of the husband and the wife. We refer to this as the procreative meaning of the act.

Parents’ Act of Self-Giving Love:

The new human person who may be created in his parents’ act of total self-giving actually embodies the oneness that his parents become. The child is himself a gift, the fruit of their love for each other.

A parent of each sex is necessary to make the child, to raise the child, and to teach the child. Why two genders? For a young man it is important to have a father to show him the model for a good husband and father. His mother provides the proper model for what he needs in a spouse. Our maleness and femaleness are not mere accidental elements of a marriage. They are essential component parts of the relationship.

Father and Mother/Male and Female:

Only a man and a woman can unite in this beautiful act of self-giving, which is at the same time physical and spiritual (unitive); and only the sexual union of a man and a woman is capable of bearing fruit in new life (procreative).

Natural Law teaches us that the marital oneness is to be:

Permanent

Exclusive

Life-giving

Faithful

Naturally Speaking: The Profound Good of Marriage:

Marriage comes into existence when a man and a woman pledge their word to one another that they will live every day what the sexual act symbolizes. They vow to give themselves to each other totally, forever! In other words they agree to share their whole lives together in a type of relationship that expresses itself in the sexual act.

What distinguishes a husband-wife relationship from any other male-female relationship is precisely the sexual element.

That is not to say that married couples must engage in the sexual act. It is possible for them to have a serious reason to forgo expressing their love in this way, for example, health issues, necessary absence for an extended time, or spiritual needs. They must, however, have the ability to engage in sexual intercourse with each other in order to get married.

Marriage: Good for Society

The word “matrimony”, in fact actually comes from the Latin word matrimonium which means “to lead into motherhood”. Every human person who has the capacity to engage in sexual intercourse has the natural right to marry a person of the opposite sex so that he or she can be sexually complete. Notice that the right does not ultimately come from civil society or its laws. It comes from the natural law and thus from the Author of that law.

Marriage: Good for Society

Marriage is a profound good for human beings and for society in general. It serves three important public purposes:

Marriage safeguards the needs of children, particularly ensuring that they have the love and support of their father and mother.

Marriage provides direction, order, and stability to adult sexual unions

Marriage especially calls males to greater maturity, deepening within them a sense of purpose that orients their lives toward virtue.

Marriage is the beginning of family life, and healthy family life is the basic cell of a vibrant society. States have universally recognized and encouraged marriage in both their laws and in their public policies.

Deviations from the Natural Model of Marriage:

Monogamy: Having only one wife at a time

Polyandry: Having more than one husband at a time.

Polygamy: Having more than one wife at a time.

Polyamorous: The practice or desire for, intimate relationships with more than one partner, with the consent of all partners involved.

Unit 11

Intro:

Human love involves a true gift of self, and an openness to the gift of the other person.

This self-giving is personally fulfilling to the man and woman who give themselves to one another sexually, and is capable of bearing fruit in new life. We have also seen, however, that this self-giving is much more than sexual.

Only sexual acts which are ordered to the truth can express a love that is worthy of the human person.

Adultery:

Definition: Sexual intercourse between two persons, one of whom is married to someone else.

Adultery is a disordered act.

The act which is supposed to express total self-giving becomes a lie. The person who is married cannot in truth make a total gift of self to anyone other than to his or her spouse. In the act of adultery, a person is taking what does not belong to him (or to her) and giving it to another. Such an act violates the unitive meaning of marriage.

The procreative meaning of the sexual act is also violated. The sexual act which is intended to be a beautiful expression of self-giving within marriage is doubly distorted. Ultimately, only unhappiness can be the result.

Divorce and Remarriage:

Marriage is not an arrangement they make merely for a time. The conjugal act is the physical expression of the couple’s marriage vow. To divorce and remarry when the marriage is valid and lawful is to be unfaithful to the marital vow.

It is important to note, however, that divorce itself is not necessarily ethically wrong. There may be situations of physical or psychological abuse or repeated unfaithfulness that requires the married couple to live apart from one another either from a time or indefinitely.

When a marriage is valid and lawful, re-marriage after a civil divorce violates not only the “one-flesh union” of the married couple. It also harms the children who have come into existence from their union.

Annulment:

An annulment is not the same thing as a divorce! Some of the factors that can lead to the judgment that an apparent marital bond was nonexistent or null would be any of the following.

● Impediments such as insufficient legal age or an existing marital bond. ● One of the persons refused to be open to having children or to being faithful until death. ● One purposefully deceived the other about some quality important to marriage, such as the fact that he or she is sterile. ● One lacked the psychological ability to give free consent to marriage vows.

If a marriage is annulled, then both persons are free to marry. Because there had been a valid civil marriage contract, the spouses were considered legally married.

Fornification:

Definition: The sexual act between two persons who are not married.

Fornication violates the Natural Law in (4) ways:

1. Fornication is a sexual lie. Their bodies are saying something which is not true. “I give myself totally to you”. Their minds are saying “not really”.

2. In fornication, a person belittles himself because he is giving himself to another without adequate assurance that the other is worthy of such a trust.

3. In fornicating, a person belittles the other person by receiving him/her without making the necessary commitment to safeguard his/her good.

4. In fornicating, a person disregards the rights of the child that can be conceived in the act.

Bad effects of disordered acts:

1. Out-of-wedlock births. 2. Over 55 million abortions in the US since 1973. 45% of all abortions occur in women who have never married and are not cohabitating. 3. An explosion of sexually transmitted diseases (STD). Prior to 1960- (2) and today over 25! 4. Destructive psychological consequences of temporary sexual relationships. 5. Flashbacks/comparisons/lack of trust in future marriages. Velcro analogy. 6. Greater chance of divorce in marriage.

Contraception:

“Contraception contradicts the truth of conjugal love.” St. John Paul II 9/17/83 When the couple chooses to contracept their act of sexual intercourse, they are doing something that makes the natural message of sex untrue. Their bodies engage in the act that means total self-giving, yet they have done something precisely so that they cannot give themselves totally. Instead of accepting each other totally, the contracepting spouses reject a part of each other. They reject each other’s fertility.

Natural Family Planning:

There may be circumstances related to financial problems, the poor health of one of the spouses, or other serious conditions that may arise, which legitimately require the couple to limit the size of their family. In that case Natural Family Planning is an option. It requires periodic abstinence from sexual intercourse during that time within the wife’s cycle when she is able to conceive a child. The difference between contraception and NFP lies in the nature of the act.

Forms of contraception:

1. Vasectomy 2. Tubal ligation 3. Intra-uterine devices 4. Abortifacient 5. Spermicides 6. The Pill

Human sexuality:

Sexuality and sexual attraction is one of the most complex aspects of the human experience. The societal projections on the % of same-sex attracted individuals is grossly inflated to enhance the argument that it is a “natural” option equal to male-female attraction. This phenomenon began with the publication of the Kinsey report in 1948 and 1953. Using skewed research data, Kinsey established a baseline # of same-sex attracted individuals in society at an overinflated rate. Same-sex attraction is one of the most important topics in the Church’s ongoing ministerial outreach.

Same-sex attraction:

Three aspects of same-sex attraction must be considered in the field of Ethics and Moral Theology:

1. The homosexual inclination 2. The homosexual act; and 3. The person who has a homosexual inclination The homosexual inclination refers to one’s conscious physical attraction toward persons of his or her own sex. Such an attraction, because it inclines a person to engage in acts which are not in harmony with human nature, is misdirected.

From the moment of conception, a person is physically male or female, and he or she develops physically until they reach maturity at puberty. Another development, however, must also take place. Every person must develop psychologically as a male or female. From approximately the age of two and throughout childhood, a person grows in his understanding of his own sexual identity and becomes secure in it. As the child becomes psychosexually secure, he or she is able to grow, mature, and develop confidence in relating appropriately to persons of the opposite sex. If, for some reason, the young child does not develop this healthy understanding of his or her sexual identity as male or female, then the same-sex attraction could arise. Psychosexual: of or relating to the mental, emotional, and behavioral aspects of sexual development.

The Homosexual Act: In the homosexual act there can be no true sexual union. The two persons do not have complementary male and female bodies enabling them to unite sexually with each other. It is a sterile act. Two persons of the same sex are simply not able to engage in the sexual act which will truly unite them sexually and bring forth new life. Neither the unitive nor the procreative purpose of the sexual act can be realized by persons of the same sex.

Most respected scientists agree that same-sex attraction is due to a combination of social, psychological, and biological factors. Because same-sex attraction is a disorder which a person does not ordinarily freely choose, it is not sinful in itself. It is an inclination, a condition from which the person suffers due to situations beyond his or her control. Same-sex attraction is an inclination, not an act.

The Person with Homosexual Inclination: In seeking to understand the truth about this complex issue, the most important consideration is always the person. Having a sexual attraction to someone of the same sex never means that the person has less value. All human persons have the same inherent dignity. Not using the terms “gay” or “homosexual” to specify who a person is, points to the value of the whole person, not merely his/her sexual attraction. Using these terms as nouns makes them into a sort of identity, as if the inclination or attraction defines the person. “Love is important, but not all love is intended to be sexual. Even for the heterosexual only the marital relationship is intended to be sexual.” Dr. Elizabeth Moberly

Modern Gender Theory:

To better understand the modern theories of gender and sex, it is important to provide a glossary of terms used by the theorists and what they mean by these terms:

Sex commonly refers to a person’s physical, biological and anatomic dimensions of being male or female. These facets include chromosomes, gonads, sexual anatomy and secondary sex characteristics.

Gender refers to the psychological, social and cultural aspects of being male/masculine or female/feminine.

Gender identity refers to how a person experiences him-or herself (or thinks of him-or herself) as a male or female, including how masculine or feminine a person feels.

Gender role refers to ways in which people adopt cultural expectations for maleness or femaleness.

Masturbation and Chastity:

Masturbation: The deliberate stimulation of the external sex organs without intercourse. Masturbation is a disorder, for it negates the message of self-giving love that the body is designed to express in the sexual act. Such behavior is potentially addictive, thus contributing to further isolation. Because of confused attitudes toward human sexuality in our society, many see masturbation as harmless, or at least as “better” than such practices as fornication. In reality, however, masturbation causes deep-seated harm to a person, leading to loneliness and islolation.

It is important to note that while masturbation is an objectively disordered act, gravely wrong in itself, still the subjective guilt within persons who engage in the act varies.

If the act has become compulsive, the person’s will is not actually free and personal responsibility is lessened. Immaturity can also play a part in lessening the degree of one’s personal responsibility.

Pornography:

Pornography is a visual representation of human sexuality in a way that removes it from the context that is proper to it.

“Pornography is a marked tendency to accentuate the sexual element when reproducing the human body or human love in a work of art, with the object of inducing the reader or viewer to believe that sexual values are the only real values of the person, and that love is nothing more than the experience, individual or shared, of those values alone.” Saint John Paul

Bad effects for the person himself:

● Pornography is addictive. The person easily loses the freedom not to view it.

● Pornography desensitizes a person to the distorted view of another human person, so that he then seeks even more perverse distortions.

● Pornography strongly inclines men who use it to view women as commodities, as mere objects for their sexual pleasure.

● Pornography inclines its regular viewers to have a higher tolerance for abnormal sexuality, sexual aggression, and sexual promiscuity.

Bad effects for the family:

● Distances husbands from their wives, both emotionally and sexually, a situation often leading to infidelity and divorce.

● Often perceived by the spouse as marital infidelity.

● Leads to a loss of interest in good family relations because the person’s interest lies elsewhere, in a fantasy life.

Bad effects for the society:

● Teenagers who view pornography are inclined to feel guilt, loss of self-confidence and sexual uncertainty.

● It leads to an increase in crime and a decrease in property values in the community that surrounds sexually oriented businesses.

● Harms the relationship between men and women

■ Use of pornography leads to the breakdown of marriage, sexual promiscuity, increase in out-of-wedlock births and sexually transmitted diseases.