I have not the same amount of free time that I had a week ago, so I must be quick, to-the-point, and blunt. Sorry about the blunt. I don’t like being blunt. I’d much rather wrap up my words in lots of qualifications and charitable concessions. But time waits for no man, you know?
This used to be standard, and there’s absolutely no reason why this should have changed.
Yes, listen to Aquinas. The nature of deep kissing is to excite the passions (aka “lustful” if you’re not married)
I think you mean “the direct object of the act,” because a final cause cannot be part of a nature or essence. Moreover, simply
asserting that the object of deep kissing is excitation or arousal is not an
argument. Moreover, the claim is clearly false.
The direct object of the act of “deep kissing” or “passionate kissing” or “prolonged kissing” or “tongue kissing” is not the excitation of arousal. The direct object of the act is the same as the direct object of the simple cheek-peck: a demonstration of affection. Arousal is a possible consquence, but it is neither necessary nor necessarily intended.
I’m listening to Aquinas. Closely. You, however, are superimposing your own prejudices (there is no better word) over the actual words of the Doctor’s text. If a kiss or touch, passionate or simple or prolonged or brief or tongued or cheeked, is lustful, it is a sin. If it is not lustful,
it is no sin.
You
insist, on the authority of your own “common sense” and “the perennial teaching of the Church” (a “teaching” for which you cite no documents, no statements, and, as yet, nothing at all beyond
bookcat’s 19th-century confession guides), that it is
impossible for a deep kiss, particularly a “tongue-kiss,” to be executed without the effect, or even the intent, of generating sexual arousal. If you are correct about this, then you are correct overall. However, you soon veer away from making arguments. Instead you finish up your post with a slough of insinuations and sarcasms. For instance:
If you want to show affection, do something affectionate instead of trying to turn her and yourself on. Maybe we should all play “let’s see how much we can get away with before we think we’re sinning”.
This is delightful. A hundred-odd years ago, church folks used the
exact same argument to say that unmarried couples shouldn’t kiss, shouldn’t touch, shouldn’t look at one another.
They were at least consistent on the subject: no physical signs of affection. Period. 'cause only filthy people show physical affection before marriage. (Plainly not true – but definitely consistent.)
But once you allow that it is possible to have
any sort of touching or kissing without exciting arousal, or that touching or kissing can ever be used to express affection rather than sexual desire, you have given up the argument, because any further rules you put in place (“Kissing is okay, but only for five seconds or less!”; “Your teeth can touch, but not your tongues!”) is entirely arbitrary.
You may not
believe,
Abenadar, based on your own experience, that tongue-kissing is possible without exciting arousal. Fine. Own that judgment. Advise people who ask according to your judgement. That’s how prudential judgement works. But to go around, solely on the basis of your own experience, accusing everyone else with a
contrary experience of trying to “explain away their own sins” because of a lack of “common sense” is totally uncharitable. (Not to mention false, as I hold on the authority of my own prudential judgement, based in reading experience.)
Even if you manage to show deep affection without lust, what’s to say she feels the same way?
If you are a couple that is at the stage where this would be legitimate, then you are both firm and serious Catholics in a state of open and honest communication with each other. So, who’s to say she feels the same way?
She is! Women have lips
primarily for reasons
other than smoochin’! Do not disparage those other functions by supposing that women are incapable of communicating critical information about their spiritual lives to the men they dearly love.
But that’s what it’s for! It is meant to arouse, which is fine for the married, and not fine for the unmarried (even if they are, as you say, “seriously committed”).
If it were true that heavy-duty kissing is, in and of itself, “meant to arouse,” you would have a strong argument on your hands.
This has been the perennial practice of the church.
Citation needed.
Bedroom activities are a private thing between a married couple…and the unmarried shouldn’t be practicing bedroom activities (they shouldn’t be in each other’s bedrooms at all, esp. not alone!).
This is obvious, but irrelevant, since heavy-duty kissing is not a “bedroom activity.” Indeed, your feint here begs the question.
I’m curious to know in what “proper context” two unmarried people would be tongue kissing.
In the same context that they would be lip-kissing. Only moreso. Kinda like tongue-kissing is lip-kissing – only moreso. And an engaged couple is a dating couple – only moreso.
Like I said, this has nothing to do with doctrine, and everything to do with unmarried people performing aspects of the marital act, which include passionate kissing.
Here’s a very simple way to determine whether something is “an aspect of the marital act” or not:
(1) Does anyone touch the genitals?
(2) See question one.
Everything else is only accidentally a part of the marital act. In your words,
Abenadar, “stick to Aquinas.”
Sorry for the blunt.
