Wait, so if someone lost their “equipment” due to some accident they would not be allowed to marry? I thought they would since infertile people are. As for this specific case. They both “posses” it and feel what’s going on down there.
If a person is incapable of the conjugal act then this is an impediment to marriage. By itself, infertility for either sex isn’t an impediment.
That’s the usual misunderstanding. The issue isn’t “can you have children?”, it’s “can you have marital relations?”. It’s the latter that make the marriage, not the former.
I think I might suggest that both participate in having the equipment, but neither possesses it himself, so to speak, and therefore, the impediment might attach.
And that’s just on CAF…there’s more threads on several other Catholic forums.
Apparently the moderators have permitted this topic at least 4 times in the past, so I guess 5 times is the charm.
Agreed that one should avoid such a topic if one finds it titillating.
Actually, discussions such as these — even though I find the subject personally distasteful — are the logical by-product of the Catholic mind, and of a Catholic worldview. Those of the world, and those who, while professing Christ, do so outside the visible unity of the Church and outside her magisterium, would think in terms of “whatever issues there may be, this is one time you’d want to make an exception to the rules, to allow these people to get married, and to have relations in some fashion — howsoever things might have to be “improvised” or “reimagined” — rather than leaving them involuntarily celibate for life”. We do not do that. We realize that involuntary celibacy for life is not the worst thing that can happen to a person, committing mortal sin, and dying in that state, is the worst thing.redcatholic:
Agreed that one should avoid such a topic if one finds it titillating.
From my memory of philosophy classes though this is exactly the kind of fringe case that helps bear the ‘fruit’ of a clearer understanding of given moral principles. We were certainly required to talk about more extreme sexual examples in classes I took.
For example, upthread it’s already started to improve the OP’s understanding of Church teaching on a more common impediment to marriage (accident/injury foreclosing ability to have marital relations, this not being the same as mere infertility). So that sharpened understanding strikes me as fruit already born.
Also, perhaps God plans to bring some conjoined twins home to His Church in future, and plans for them to see pre-existing concern for them and expectation-setting for their potential state in life within the Church. Who can say? :woman_shrugging:t2:
Personally my thinking is, if we can keep it respectful, philosophical, and ordered towards charity and increased understanding, it makes sense to discuss such a question.
My “Catholic worldview” sees this sort of topic, discussed publicly by uninvolved laypeople, as being somewhat insensitive and un-Christlike. I am not sure why any layperson who wasn’t either conjoined, the immediate family of a conjoined person, or wanting to marry a conjoined person would need to discuss or know about this. Furthermore, it seems like the Church might reach different conclusions on different sets of facts. It’s not like we can flip to page 1254 of the Catholic Manual and find an answer.
Indeed, there might be different answers based on different situations. My point, which might have been better made, was that some people in an unfortunate situation like this — and aside from having a single venial sin on one’s soul, it’s harder to imagine anything more “unfortunate” than sharing the bottom half of one’s body with another person — may just have to remain single and celibate, even though they want to get married and behave, to the extent possible, as married people normally do.HomeschoolDad:
My “Catholic worldview” sees this sort of topic, discussed publicly by uninvolved laypeople, as being somewhat insensitive and un-Christlike. I am not sure why any layperson who wasn’t either conjoined, the immediate family of a conjoined person, or wanting to marry a conjoined person would need to discuss or know about this. Furthermore, it seems like the Church might reach different conclusions on different sets of facts. It’s not like we can flip to page 1254 of the Catholic Manual and find an answer.
It seems to me that this has more to do with our culture’s perspective that sex is more important that just about any other consideration.
At the heart of it, I would say that it helps clarify the Catholic position sex, personhood, and marriage. As such, as odd as the question is, it would seem to have value.
Obviously Catholic Answers thinks it has value since they have allowed 5 threads on the topic to persist on the forum.