Can an unmarried Catholic couple live together if

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Hoosier_Daddy said:
I think I understand where you are coming from. The problem is I don’t ever want to visit that place…

You can package it all you like. It is still watered down nicey nicey “don’t offend” Theology.

Blech!

It just does not sit right with me. The OP wants to ad an “if” at the end as if it were changing the morality of chastity or scandal.
It is an exercise in futility because it is not a feasible situation. In a war torn persecuted country where all civil government is chaos and families are spread apart in some sort of apocalyptic hunger game situation then sure the OP can house a female. For as little time as possible. But come on. What does encouraging the loophole finders really accomplish. Are you adding to the OPs Holiness? Are you encouraging Him to get to heaven? Are you helping him with a tough moral question? Or are you cherry picking to find the easiest way out. Theologically with EVERYTHING there is room for God to work outside the Church and His sacraments. But in my opinion, just answering the way you have is the equivalent of telling someone not to worry about baptism because God is love and can work outside of the sacraments.

Can you give a definitive statement encouraging the OP to choose the high path or elaborate on why this situation meets extreme measures?

Immorality that is what. And I don’t wish to be judged at the end of my life and have to answer to God why I always gave the “happy” advice instead of the “hard” advice.

OP:

No, in your scenario you cannot do this. Period. No ifs.

Gee everyone thinks their situation has never been contemplated by the Church in 2000 years…

How vain.
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God Bless, Memaw
 
DarkLight said:
It’s a hard balance to strike. I know for my part it’s hard because growing up it seemed everything was scandal. Buying beer at the grocery store? Someone might conclude that Christians encourage drunkenness! Short hair? Someone might think you’re a lesbian and be encouraged to sin! Have a public meeting with a married man? Someone might think you were having an affair!

It’s kind of like the modesty debates in that regard. With clothing, we don’t want to be immodest but neither do we wish to be restricted to muumuus because some man might be tempted by the realization that you have breasts. With scandal, we want to avoid leading others into sin, but we also don’t want to be held hostage because “someone” might get the wrong idea. Especially with the difference between causing scandal and causing someone to be scandalized.
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It’s really not hard to strike a balance, I’ve done it for 77 years. Society today just tries to wipe out that balance and convince us that “anything goes.” Going to extremes either way isn’t helping. Strong faith, good judgement( gift of the Holy Spirit), common sense and a well formed conscience according to the guidelines of the Catholic Church, are needed. God Bless, Memaw
 
Memaw said:
It’s really not hard to strike a balance, I’ve done it for 77 years. Society today just tries to wipe out that balance and convince us that “anything goes.” Going to extremes either way isn’t helping. Strong faith, good judgement( gift of the Holy Spirit), common sense and a well formed conscience according to the guidelines of the Catholic Church, are needed. God Bless, Memaw
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Women ought to keep their calves and biceps covered. This is what faith tells us. It’s society that tries to tout “balance” when really wearing knee-length skirts is just an excuse to adopt the worldly anything goes attitude.
 
DarkLight said:
It’s a hard balance to strike. I know for my part it’s hard because growing up it seemed everything was scandal. Buying beer at the grocery store? Someone might conclude that Christians encourage drunkenness! Short hair? Someone might think you’re a lesbian and be encouraged to sin! Have a public meeting with a married man? Someone might think you were having an affair!
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Yep. My own father went to lunch once with a young, very pretty and very pregnant woman. By the time he got back to the office, tongues were wagging. He was told that someone was planning on telling my mother about the little tete a tete.

My father, very, callously, told them that he hoped they got pictures.

See, the young lady was my sister, his eldest daughter. It actually took a while to everyone to hear the true story. Why? Because so many people couldn’t help themselves when it came to such juicy gossip. Oh, what a scandal.
It’s kind of like the modesty debates in that regard. With clothing, we don’t want to be immodest but neither do we wish to be restricted to muumuus because some man might be tempted by the realization that you have breasts. With scandal, we want to avoid leading others into sin, but we also don’t want to be held hostage because “someone” might get the wrong idea. Especially with the difference between causing scandal and causing someone to be scandalized.
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Scandal is caused when someone acts as though a sinful act is not, and by that sinful act, encourages others to sin.

If you are living with someone, because of a flood, and they say to you, “I see you are now living with your SIL.” You can simply answer, “Yes, she was kind enough to allow me to sleep on her sofa, after my house flooded. Isn’t she kind?” No scandal. No sin.
 
maryjk said:
Yep. My own father went to lunch once with a young, very pretty and very pregnant woman. By the time he got back to the office, tongues were wagging. He was told that someone was planning on telling my mother about the little tete a tete.

My father, very, callously, told them that he hoped they got pictures.

See, the young lady was my sister, his eldest daughter. It actually took a while to everyone to hear the true story. Why? Because so many people couldn’t help themselves when it came to such juicy gossip. Oh, what a scandal.
Scandal is caused when someone acts as though a sinful act is not, and by that sinful act, encourages others to sin.

If you are living with someone, because of a flood, and they say to you, “I see you are now living with your SIL.” You can simply answer, “Yes, she was kind enough to allow me to sleep on her sofa, after my house flooded. Isn’t she kind?” No scandal. No sin.
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Innocent situations do not give excuses for wrong situations.
Why is it when one is trying to make a sincere point that others have to go to extremes to make theirs acceptable, even when it shouldn’t be. People in dire situations are an entirely different situation and that still should only be done in a last resort, temporarily." Partners" not included!! God Bless, Memaw
 
Memaw said:
Innocent situations do not give excuses for wrong situations.
Why is it when one is trying to make a sincere point that others have to go to extremes to make theirs acceptable, even when it shouldn’t be. People in dire situations are an entirely different situation and that still should only be done in a last resort, temporarily." Partners" not included!! God Bless, Memaw
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Respectfully, in your very first post in this thread you used the example of a brother-in-law staying at his sister’s in law home after a flood. You used that as an example of scandal because people were gossiping.

It wasn’t an example of scandal. It was an example of gossip.
 
Mary_Gail_36 said:
Respectfully, in your very first post in this thread you used the example of a brother-in-law staying at his sister’s in law home after a flood. You used that as an example of scandal because people were gossiping.

It wasn’t an example of scandal. It was an example of gossip.
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No it was an example of scandal. I DO know what I meant. Why keep bringing this up as tho you can justify unmarried people living together. He had a good job, he could have rented a place until he got his home repaired but didn’t. Being ’ homeless’ doesn’t always mean being destitute. Sometimes we bring these things on ourselves. Instead of taking responsibility for our own actions, why must we try to blame others for our bad example. God Bless, Memaw
 
Mary_Gail_36 said:
Respectfully, in your very first post in this thread you used the example of a brother-in-law staying at his sister’s in law home after a flood. You used that as an example of scandal because people were gossiping.

It wasn’t an example of scandal. It was an example of gossip.
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It wasn’t a scandal because people were gossiping. People were gossiping because IT WAS a scandal!!! God Bless, Memaw
 
Memaw said:
No it was an example of scandal. I DO know what I meant. You keep bringing this up as tho you can justify unmarried people living together. He had a good job, he could have rented a place until he got his home repaired but didn’t. Sometimes we bring these things on ourselves. Instead of taking responsibility for our own actions, why must we try to blame others for our bad example. God Bless, Memaw
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This is my third post to the thread, so no, I an not constantly mentioning it.

Idle gossip does not equal scandal.

Your example was not an example of scandal. It was an example of people jumping to the wrong conclusion and gossiping about it.

Again, if i were dead and my sister needed shelter, my husband would offer shelter out of respect for family, as a gentlemanly and chivalrous action and out of respect for me, his dead wife.
 
Mary_Gail_36 said:
This is my third post to the thread, so no, I an not constantly mentioning it.

Idle gossip does not equal scandal.

Your example was not an example of scandal. It was an example of people jumping to the wrong conclusion and gossiping about it.

Again, if i were dead and my sister needed shelter, my husband would offer shelter out of respect for family, as a gentlemanly and chivalrous action and out of respect for me, his dead wife.
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Again, I KNOW what I meant, you evidently DON"T !! There would have been NO reason to ‘jump’ to the wrong conclusion if the scandal hadn’t already been there!! Think what you want, there seems to be no reasoning with you anyway, God Bless, Memaw
 
Memaw said:
Again, I KNOW what I meant, you evidently DON"T !! There would have been NO reason to ‘jump’ to the wrong conclusion if the scandal hadn’t already been there!! Think what you want, there seems to be no reasoning with you anyway, God Bless, Memaw
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Actually, the only person who can’t be reasoned with here is seems to be you. You keep changing the subject, throwing out opinions as though they’re cannon law without any documentation, and capitalizing words as though shouting makes you right. Even HD, who holds a similar opinion to yours has been far more reasonable.

Just because people could find something to gossip about does not make the situation scandalous. I hope you don’t live your completely based on what others think.
 
BlueEyedLady said:
Actually, the only person who can’t be reasoned with here is seems to be you. You keep changing the subject, throwing out opinions as though they’re cannon law without any documentation, and capitalizing words as though shouting makes you right. Even HD, who holds a similar opinion to yours has been far more reasonable.

Just because people could find something to gossip about does not make the situation scandalous. I hope you don’t live your completely based on what others think.
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Pretty much this.

Without sources, “canon law”, “church teaching”, etc., are just your opinion. After all I could stand here and claim it’s church teaching that you shouldn’t drink, or whatever I wanted. And “common sense” is just a claim unless you can back it with arguments.
 
I subscribed to this thread on day one and I came back today to see what had happened.

Memaw (and I can reason with you 100%), JamalChristophr, Gertabelle and if I can add Hoosier Daddy: after reading all your contributions, I will say this thread should really have been very short.

👍
 
Mary_Gail_36 said:
Respectfully, in your very first post in this thread you used the example of a brother-in-law staying at his sister’s in law home after a flood. You used that as an example of scandal because people were gossiping.

It wasn’t an example of scandal. It was an example of gossip.
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Mary_Gail_36 said:
This is my third post to the thread, so no, I an not constantly mentioning it.

Idle gossip does not equal scandal.

Your example was not an example of scandal. It was an example of people jumping to the wrong conclusion and gossiping about it.

Again, if i were dead and my sister needed shelter, my husband would offer shelter out of respect for family, as a gentlemanly and chivalrous action and out of respect for me, his dead wife.
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You can’t say that with any degree of certainity. She knows the situation better, so I don’t see why you are arguing the issue.

I get the impression that you still haven’t really understood what circumstance can be referred to as a scandal. See my next post for another attempt.
 
kelvinf said:
Some references to Church teachings on scandal are provided here: forums.catholic-questions.org/showthread.php?t=18880
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You’ll note the only thing there that’s actual church teaching is the definition of scandal. While I respect our apologists here, they are not representatives of official church teaching either. In that particular question, being of the age where pretty much everyone has roommates, I know the vast majority of the people I talk to would consider the assumption that opposite-sex roommates were necessarily having sex to be laughable.

I don’t think any of us disagree on the definition of scandal. What we disagree on is when it is actually likely to occur. Many of us think that in such situations the danger of scandal has been greatly exaggerated, and that most people are not going to conclude that sin is occurring, especially if the couple is clear as to what the situation is. Of course there are gossips and suspicious people in the world, but such people there is almost no helping their getting the wrong idea - having dealt with such merely talking with a man at length in public gets tongues wagging.
 
kelvinf said:
I subscribed to this thread on day one and I came back today to see what had happened.

Memaw (and I can reason with you 100%), JamalChristophr, Gertabelle and if I can add Hoosier Daddy: after reading all your contributions, I will say this thread should really have been very short.

👍
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Thank You and God Bless, Memaw
 
I understand what scandal is.

I under stand that a couple who is dating, engaged or otherwise romantically involved could cause scandal by cohabitating.

I don’t see familial relationships the same way at all. Brothers and sisters in law are family. They should be able to offer each other shelter without people feeling scandalized. 🤷
 
Gertabelle said:
Now, the OP has stated that this is hypothetical, and in the hypothetical set-up, of course one would have to provide shelter! In fact, the hypothetical was intentionally set up – there are NO OTHER OPTIONS – so there could be only one answer – so why even ask the question?! 🤷

But out here in the real world, there is floor space, and there are couches, and there’s even room for a tent in the yard (and yes, I do have a camp toilet I could provide)! Out here in the real world, I still believe that the poor have more generosity when it comes to sharing from their need than the rich do sharing from their overflowing excess. If I were suddenly homeless, my friends with the two bedrooms and six kids would probably be the first to offer me their couch, or a spot in their yard for my tent and camp toilet 😃

The flaw in your argument is with the idea that original hypothetical – no other options – cannot be challenged or changed. The original hypothetical is easily answered if it is taken at its face value with no room for other possibilities. The thread would have been very short – yes, give shelter to the homeless. One post in answer and we all move on.

But if the point of a hypothetical is to actually THINK about questions of morality in difficult situations, then there needs to be some leeway in how we interact with it.

The OP asked about romantic couples, and posters started going all over the place with whether or not non-romantic couples could cohabit. Others asked questions about whether there were really no other options, or whether someone with no other options should even be in a romantic relationship. These are good discussions, natural outgrowths of the initial question, and shouldn’t be shouted down with the argument “but the OP said…”

My request would be that, when posting, we would each be clear exactly which hypothetical situation we are addressing – Are the man and woman romantically involved or not? Are we assuming there really are no other options (post-apocalyptic hunger games [thanks, Hoosier Dad, for that one!]) or not? Are we talking about first world “no options” or refugees fleeing the Gaza Strip “no options”? As someone who came back after a couple days offline, it seems that many posters aren’t even discussing the same question.

If we must stay only to the original hypothetical with no ability to challenge or expand any of the details, then we might as well close the thread 🤷

God bless you!

Gertie the gotta-get-to-sleep-now-girl :yawn:
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Fair point. I’m sorry. I was out of line. 🙂
 
DarkLight said:
It’s a hard balance to strike. I know for my part it’s hard because growing up it seemed everything was scandal. Buying beer at the grocery store? Someone might conclude that Christians encourage drunkenness! Short hair? Someone might think you’re a lesbian and be encouraged to sin! Have a public meeting with a married man? Someone might think you were having an affair!

It’s kind of like the modesty debates in that regard. With clothing, we don’t want to be immodest but neither do we wish to be restricted to muumuus because some man might be tempted by the realization that you have breasts. With scandal, we want to avoid leading others into sin, but we also don’t want to be held hostage because “someone” might get the wrong idea. Especially with the difference between causing scandal and causing someone to be scandalized.
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Yup its a a difficult balance to strike, especially if you’ve been raised with an attitude too far in either direction. Both extremes are wrong, but if either extreme seems like it is really the middle ground then it is hard to find where the real mid-ground is.
 
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