Hell and Non-procreative Sex

[fbl9]

There is a very big difference here.

The sterilized person and the remarried person are in different circumstances. Let’s break this down.

STERILIZATION: The act of sterilization is a moral evil. Once the act is committed, it is over. When the person receives absolution, he or she is being forgiven for something that is over. The person is not being sterilized on an on-going basis. The act was done and it is now finished. Therefore, the Church, through the Sacrament of Reconciliation has the authority and the power to forigve it and forget about it.

REMARRIED PERSON: The act of adultery is ongoing until the parties separate. If one of the two persons is validly married, divorced and remarried, the couple is living in adultery. The act of adultery is not over. It is ongoing. Therefore, the Church does not have the power or the authority to forgive such a person until that couple stops living as husband and wife. Only when they stop living as husband and wife will the adulterous act be over. Then the Church can forgive and forget.

The Church DOES NOT SAY THAT A PERSON SHOULD REVERSE A STERILIZATION. There is no moral obligation to do so. The person must repent for having done it, confess it and receive absolution. From the moment that the person receives absolution, the Chuirch and Christ forget that the action ever happened. Even though the couple cannot have children in the future, they still have a moral obligation to share the marriage bed. The Church does not have the authority to command a married couple to stop having sex. Sex is part of being married. The husband and wife have a right to share marriage bed and to have sexual intercourse, even when they cannot procreate. That right is given to them by God and the Church cannot take it away, because they committed a sin that is over and done with.

Br. JR, OSF

Although i have read of memebers of the clergy even bishops saying they should, but not necessary. Should have bookmarked that site. The discussion bogged down on the forgiveness aspect.
Thankyou JR for helping understand better.

Wanner your posts didn’t help that much.

Annabelle your posts were entirely useless in helping understand were my error was.
Why did you even bother to ask the question in the first place as you seemed to already have the answer?

 

[fbl9]

Thankyou JR for helping understand better.

JR
By repenting the sterilized person “unwills” the sterlilization so to speak.
Thus removing the condition that causes marital relations to be sinful for him.
In the case of the remarried person they can not “unwill” the first marriage which is the cause of the sin in the second marriage.

 

[Annabelle_Marie]

Annabelle your posts were entirely useless in helping understand were my error was.
Why did you even bother to ask the question in the first place as you seemed to already have the answer?

Thanks for calling me useless…I appreciate that

Peace to you anyway…

 

[Annabelle_Marie]

Annabelle your posts were entirely useless in helping understand were my error was.
Why did you even bother to ask the question in the first place as you seemed to already have the answer?

BTW…I asked the question because someone posted "The church teaching is that sex without the possibility of procreation is grave matter. If you know it is grave matter and do it anyway (most are in this category), then it is mortal sin. "

Which naturally lead me to ask them my question…I didn’t say I didn’t know the answer…I said I would be curious to hear the responses…

 

[fbl9]

Thanks for calling me useless…I appreciate that

Peace to you anyway…

This is precisely why your posts were useless in helping find out my error. Making another false charge does not make your posts any more helpful.

 

[Annabelle_Marie]

This is precisely why your posts were useless in helping find out my error. Making another false charge does not make your posts any more helpful.

You are not being charitable. Basically you are telling us that our posts are a waste of time… Regardless…I thought my posts and Wanner’s posts were clear. Sorry that you did not. I am not a professor nor I am a teacher skilled in pointing stuff out like JREducation. Yes…he does a great job…I always learn a lot from his posts. But did you ever consider that you didn’t learn anything from ours because you were too defensive about it? If it makes you feel better…I didn’t learn anything from yours either:shrug:

Now…can you drop it?

 

[Robert_Burns]

Would I go to hell if I engaged in non-procreative sex with my spouse?

In other words, is marital, non-procreative sex a venial or mortal sin?

The only one who can send you to Hell is The Lord Jesus so only he can answer the first part of your question.

As to the second part of your question , All relations must be open to life and procreation and without being graphic - open to life means what it says. Will every act result in procreation? Once again , thats for GOD to decide.

Finally , Everything we do is seen by Almighty GOD and there will be no secrets on Judgement day. Doing GOD’s will is relatively simple. Being willing to do GOD’s Will is the hard part. We are Human. The reason for the act is procreation and conjugal love. Sex isnt recreation.

Hope this helps.

pax

 

[PilgrimToChrist]

Please refrain from being too explicit on a public forum.

Thank You

Apologies. I was just trying to be clear. If too many circumlocutions are used, people can get confused about what the Church actually teaches. St. Alphonsus wrote about these things very explicitly in Theologia Moralis (although in Latin).

 

[PilgrimToChrist]

The only one who can send you to Hell is The Lord Jesus so only he can answer the first part of your question.

Yes, but it is dogma that everyone who dies with a mortal sin on their soul will descend immediately to Hell. Some people may remain impenitent until two seconds before their death, when God gives them an extraordinary grace, but we cannot presume that this happens in very many cases (contrary to von Balthasar’s assertion).

As to the second part of your question , All relations must be open to life and procreation and without being graphic - open to life means what it says. Will every act result in procreation? Once again , thats for GOD to decide.

No one says that you have to conceive every time you have sex, that’s not up to us and most times you won’t, of course (since we have a fallen nature, if Adam and Eve had conjugal relations before the Fall, Eve would have gotten pregnant every time she was fertile, but most Fathers say they were only in the Garden for a week at most). If it’s on the side of Nature, it’s not our fault. It’s the difference between someone dying of a disease and dying because we put a knife in their chest – one is on the side of nature, the other is a choice that we made and is therefore a sin (in most cases).

Every volitional emission of semen must be done in such a way that procreation could follow. If a woman or man is sterile for whatever reason, either permanently or just because it’s that time of the month, that’s not their fault, it’s on the side of Nature. Therefore it is no sin to have marital relations knowing that procreation is highly unlikely (although there are always the counter-examples of St. Elizabeth and Hannah). It is more complicated of a moral question if you choose to only engage in marital relations while procreation is unlikely and to specifically avoid engaging it in while procreation is more likely (commonly called “Natural Family Planning” or “NFP”). But insofar as that is not the case, it is not a sin (due mode being observed, of course).

So we are only talking about acts which by their very nature cannot lead to procreation, such as heterosexual and homosexual sodomy.

Finally , Everything we do is seen by Almighty GOD and there will be no secrets on Judgement day. Doing GOD’s will is relatively simple. Being willing to do GOD’s Will is the hard part. We are Human. The reason for the act is procreation and conjugal love. Sex isnt recreation.

Sex isn’t only recreation, it should not be engaged in only for pleasure, but pleasure itself is not evil – God gave that to us so that we would reproduce (otherwise, I’m sure there would be much fewer babies!).

I would like to note that it is a common, but mistaken, saying that the reason for the marital act is “conjugal love”. It is not, it is “the strengthening of the marital bond”. There is a difference. You may not feel like you are “in love” with your husband or wife anymore or you may be in a culture that has arranged marriages (think of “Fiddler on the Roof”). Love is obviously very good and husbands are commanded to “love their wives as Christ loves the Church and delivered Himself up for it” (Eph. 5:25; cf. Col 3:19) but it is actually aside the point.

The natural purpose of marriage is procreation – that is, the production and rearing of children. Children are best raised in a home with a mother and a father (although again, sometimes things happen on the side of Nature, like one parent dying) and so that marital union is important for raising the children, so that the children see the parents as a united force (and so they don’t play one off the other, as they love to do – to Mom: “Can I have ice cream?” Mom: “No, it’s almost dinner”, [so the child runs to Dad], “Dad, can I have ice cream”, Dad: “Sure, whatever.” [two minutes later] Mom: “Why are you eating ice cream when I specifically told you not to?” Child: “But Dad said I could!” – this happens all the way through high school…) Love is a good thing, but it is a side-product and not an actual end of the conjugal act. The remote end of the conjugal act is the production of children, the proximate end is the strengthening of the marital bond in order to raise any such children better.