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what degree of fantasy should be labeled “lust”. I tried to look it up in wikipedia which only says sex desires. are fantasies of sitting side by side or hugging or kissing one’s girl/boyfriend lust? or must sex intercourse be present in fantasy to be qualified as “lust”?
all sins are committed by people in differing degrees. there is such a thing as a little lust in compasion to a lot of lust. while questions of degree interest our minds, they are not very healthy for the heart.
so be careful. you might want to keep it in perspective by rephrasing the question as “how much can I lust, before Jesus doesn’t really wanna talk to me anymore?” looking for the line, getting close to it, but not crossing it, probably wouldn’t make the Lord too happy. it’s like a kid playing with matches that has not actually burned down the house yet. you probably know all that, but i thought i’d still include the reminder.
while the Church teaches some specific things about this sin, there are also general definitions. “lust” covers more than just sex when it comes to describing man’s disorientation to God. in 1 John 2:16, St. John defines three types of lust, which John Paul II refers as the “three-fold lust” in his teaching. capitalizing on his teaching, lust is ‘the misappropiation of the other.’ it is inconsequential if the other person would agree with, or participate in, what you are imagining. it also doesn’t matter if there are worse, more demeaning things you could be imagining. the quality and degree of the sin is understood by the interior disposition of the person’s heart. Hence, Christ calls us to look within our own hearts in relation to this sin. (cf. Mt. 5:28)
this misappropriation occurs when one person makes use of the other, in any manner, as an object. God created the person, and the person’s body, as a valuable subject. to make use of the person for your own purpose violates the dignity of that person. if you merely reflect on your own internal observation that it would be nice to hold hands in order to communicate your mutual affection, you are not using the person. you are simply agreeing with some hypothetical proposition. but when the subject becomes “i” and there is no mutual exchange of gift which clarifies and upholds the dignity of the person as God intends, then it becomes an abuse of that person. so even something as seemingly benign as a fanasty of holding hands and kissing can desecrate the pure heart. you must keep in mind that the quality and degree of the sin of lust is determined not by how much the other is abused as an* object*, but how it affects the heart of
subject.
the seriousness is also determined in the subject. if these fanasties, under the guise of mildness, further distort the person’s regard for the dignity of the other, it is serious. the pure heart doesn’t tend to, or become accustomed to, seeing other people as objects.
of course, when things ‘just pop into our heads’, that’s different from entertaining the idea. lust, and other interior sins, need to have the quality of willfulness. if a person experiences some passing thought of lust, pride, etc. and rejects it by moving on to something else, or combats its persistence, then it would be hard to say that its presence is willful. only the person and God can really determine that.
i hope that answers your question. the teachings that i referred to by John Paul II are from his general audiences that make up the “theology of the body”. this is dealt with in the second cycle. i highly recommend reading them to everyone.
