Homosexuality and Natural Law -- A Concern

[Prodigal_Son]

The standard natural law argument against homosexual activity runs something like this:

1. The purpose of the sexual organs is procreation.
2. It is wrong to use an organ in a way that thwarts its purpose.
3. Homosexual acts use the sexual organs in ways that thwart procreation.
4. Therefore, homosexual acts are wrong.

I hope I have clearly and fairly expressed the argument, and I’m open to revisions.

The problem with this argument, as I see it, is that Premise 3 is false. Sodomy could be used to thwart procreation, but it could be used in other ways too. For example, it’s conceivable to participate in homosexual acts, but only ejaculate with one’s opposite sex spouse. It is hard to understand how this would be thwarting procreation – however otherwise objectionable the course of action is!

Now, despite the flaw in this particular argument, I believe its conclusion is true – both because of the my own instinctive moral sense, and because of the revelation of Scripture and Tradition.

There is another natural law argument against homosexual acts, one that I’m not sure I’ve heard anyone but myself give. It heralds back to the first dawn of natural law theory, with Aristotle. Here it is:

1. Human beings have a distinctive telos, or purpose.
2. Any type of action that tends toward the thwarting of one’s telos (or other people’s telos) is wrong.
3. The telos of a human being is happiness.
4. Homosexual actions tend to lead to unhappiness in oneself or others.
5. Therefore, homosexual actions are wrong.

Now, let me right off the bat respond to a few objections:

Objection 1: Premise #4 is false, or questionable.

I have sympathy with this objection. The jury’s still out on whether homosexual actions tend to lead to unhappiness. But if you read through histories about this stuff, even in pre-Christian cultures, authors generally connect homosexual activity (at least among men) with hedonism, and the modern link between homosexual activity and promiscuity suggests a similar connection.

Now, you might say “different people have different ideas of happiness”. But what does that matter? Happiness is a real thing. It is possible to thrive as a human being. And quite honestly, if I saw all the sexually active gay people I know thriving, I wouldn’t oppose homosexual activity at all. But I don’t see them thriving.

Objection 2: This argument is utilitarian.

It’s not, though. The argument does not evaluate individual actions on the basis of their actual or expected results. The argument evaluates action types on the basis of one result: happiness. The argument is consequentialist, in some broad sense, but not utilitarian. I follow Aristotle and Aquinas in believing that good actions tend to have good consequences, and bad actions tend to have bad consequences. (Thus, I reject Kant entirely).

An advantage to my argument: It compares very favorably to Romans 1, the Bible’s only extended treatment of homosexuality. In Romans 1, we see people exchanging true happiness for a shadow of that happiness: idolatry and lust. In order for this to happen, their “hearts” had to be “darkened” – they had to lose sight of what real happiness was. Romans 1 says that their passions were “unnatural”, but it does not say this with respect to their genitals, but with respect to their intellect. They were like drug users who didn’t understand that the costs of drug use outweigh the pleasures of drug use.

I’d love some constructive criticism. **Please **don’t use this thread as a place to denigrate gay people.

 

[Hopey]

1. Homosexual acts use the sexual organs in ways that thwart procreation

3 is true with no flaws because they could never complete the acts in a way that respect this. S/s couples could never have something sexual between themselves that would respect procreation. It is physically impossible. It is true no matter what other couples do in foreplay, etc.​

 

[Hopey]

1. The telos of a human being is happiness.

False because when judging something, feelings - happiness or sadness - do not determine the good. That is also how a truth remains a truth no matter my feelings and a wrong remains a wrong no matter my feelings.

 

[Prodigal_Son]

1. Homosexual acts use the sexual organs in ways that thwart procreation

3 is true with no flaws because they could never complete the acts in a way that respect this. S/s couples could never have something sexual between themselves that would respect procreation. It is physically impossible. It is true no matter what other couples do in foreplay, etc.​

But why is there something wrong with using an organ in an incomplete way? That would have to involve another premise – and I don’t think the additional premise would be true. Moreover, your talk of “respecting procreation” would require another premise. The first argument doesn’t mention internal mental states like respect, only external states.

Perhaps you could revise the first argument, and we could look at the revision?

1. The telos of a human being is happiness.

False because when judging something, feelings - happiness or sadness - do not determine the good. That is also how a truth remains a truth no matter my feelings and a wrong remains a wrong no matter my feelings.

On natural law theory, happiness is not merely a feeling. Aquinas, for example, essentially defines happiness as “that which satisfies all our well-ordered desires”. It’s clear that God wants to satisfy our (good) desires, because He gave us these desires.

At any rate, thanks for the feedback!

 

[Hopey]

“Man’s ultimate happiness consists in the contemplation of truth, for this operation is specific to man and is shared with no other animals. Also it is not directed to any other end since the contemplation of truth is sought for its own sake. In addition, in this operation man is united to higher beings (substances) since this is the only human operation that is carried out both by God and by the separate substances (angels). (Summa Contra Gentiles, book 3, chapter 37)”

If man’s ultimate happiness is in the contemplation of truth, the s/s behavior can not be one of them because it does not contain truth - respecting the end of what reproductive organs are supposed to do - reproduce.

It is also interesting that he notes one can not achieve this - ultimate happiness here on Earth. That is so true.

 

[Hopey]

Also, there is a distinction between enjoyment and happiness. Enjoyment is physical and earthly pleasure. Happiness is absolute perfection which we know is only in heaven but our goal is to get there. There will always be an imperfect happiness.

 

[cjforJesus]

Also, there is a distinction between enjoyment and happiness. Enjoyment is physical and earthly pleasure. Happiness is absolute perfection which we know is only in heaven but our goal is to get there. There will always be an imperfect happiness.

 

[KindredSoul]

The standard natural law argument against homosexual activity runs something like this:

1. The purpose of the sexual organs is procreation.
2. It is wrong to use an organ in a way that thwarts its purpose.
3. Homosexual acts use the sexual organs in ways that thwart procreation.
4. Therefore, homosexual acts are wrong.

I hope I have clearly and fairly expressed the argument, and I’m open to revisions.

The problem with this argument, as I see it, is that Premise 3 is false. Sodomy could be used to thwart procreation, but it could be used in other ways too. For example, it’s conceivable to participate in homosexual acts, but only ejaculate with one’s opposite sex spouse. It is hard to understand how this would be thwarting procreation – however otherwise objectionable the course of action is!

Now, despite the flaw in this particular argument, I believe its conclusion is true – both because of the my own instinctive moral sense, and because of the revelation of Scripture and Tradition.

I would say that the flaw in this argument is due to the fact that premise 1, as you have it here, is lacking a vital element in the actual argument, as I understand it. It would actually go:

“1. The purpose of sexual organs is procreation and unity.”

The sexual organs’ purpose cannot be reasoned by looking at those organs alone, for there is wider evidence than just “part A fits part B and causes pregnancy” to show what those organs are for. Specifically, studies have found that human beings typically have hormones and chemicals released, during sexual activity, that cause bonding with the other person. Women have this reaction more strongly than men, but men have it too. In both genders, there is evidence that this union is ordered toward total self-giving, not merely partial, because promiscuity has a negative effect due to “spreading” the effects of these hormones and chemicals, in a sense “spreading” this gift of self too thin. This is true even for men, as evidenced by the fact that the grand majority of adulterous men, whether in longstanding affairs or in meaningless hookups, end up growing cold on their wives or less interested in them. They are “damaging” the uniting effect of sex by spreading it too thin. So there is a basis to believe that the sex act is meant not only to be procreative, but an act of exclusive self-giving.

Now, the way that this applies to homosexuality is this: If a man has homosexual experiences, then he is going to end up undermining one purpose or the other of sexual acts. If he allows himself to be totally self-giving, thus not thwarting the unitive aspect of sex, then he must give himself totally to the other man, which obviously thwarts the procreative aspect because he can’t have a wife. Yet if he has a wife yet is also engaged in homosexual activity, then he is thwarting the full course of the unitive aspect because he is not being fully self-giving to any of the people with whom he engages in sexual activity.

So the final argument would go:

1. The purpose of sexual organs is procreation and unity (total self-giving).
2. It is wrong to use an organ in a way that thwarts its purpose.
3. Homosexual acts use the sexual organs in ways that thwart either procreation OR unity (total self-giving).
4. Therefore, homosexual acts are wrong.

Blessings in Christ,
KindredSoul

 

[simpleas]

What I don’t understand is, people that are “ordered” correctly to one another, man and woman, can enjoy the pleasure/emotions of sexual union with each other, which will produce another human, not always of course.
People who are not “ordered” towards opposite sexes, are not to engage in sexual activity because they can not produce children. But they can still experience the pleasure/emotion of the sexual union.

And why do people who are ssa and in relationships have to be unhappy? Many people in “ordered” relationships are very unhappy people.

I just think we are all the same, some have a different way of love and union, and God knows all this.

 

[Peter_Plato]

On natural law theory, happiness is not merely a feeling. Aquinas, for example, essentially defines happiness as “that which satisfies all our well-ordered desires”. It’s clear that God wants to satisfy our (good) desires, because He gave us these desires.

At any rate, thanks for the feedback!

Also, there is a distinction between enjoyment and happiness. Enjoyment is physical and earthly pleasure. Happiness is absolute perfection which we know is only in heaven but our goal is to get there. There will always be an imperfect happiness.

For Aristotle, happiness, εὐδαιμονία (eu̯dai̯monía,) was in the completion of the telos for which a thing or being exists. Thus, εὐδαιμονία is, in a sense, the state of completeness.

If human beings are made in the image of a Trinitarian God where three persons share one nature, then the human state of completeness is normatively to be found where persons share one nature. Marriage is where “two become one flesh.” Two persons share one human nature because of the unitive (physically, physiologically, psychologically, socially, intellectually, emotionally, personally) nature of marriage.

It seems to be the unitive aspect of marriage that is prior to but not separate from the procreative aspect. Both are necessary and neither are sufficient.

Marriage is a face to face encounter with the beloved on all levels. A seeing eye to eye, not merely looking in the same direction.

Sodomy is not face to face.

All forms of homosexual encounters can never be procreative. This is important because the unity of marriage is fundamentally creative. A new human being comes about because of the unitive nature of marriage and cannot be separated from it.

Marriage is symbolic of the Trinitarian nature of God - the Holy Spirit proceeds from the Father and Son, just as a child proceeds from the unity of the mother and father. Without procreation, love is incomplete because there is no tangible result from the unity. Married love becomes embodied in a new being.

It is both the unitive and procreative aspects of marriage that define it as the unique completed state of the telos of biological human existence.

 

[TheSurvivor]

Please watch the entirety great video by Jimmy Akin.

m.youtube.com/watch?v=eBTpsVFhPPw

May God grant you Truth revealed by His Church

 

[Prodigal_Son]

I would say that the flaw in this argument is due to the fact that premise 1, as you have it here, is lacking a vital element in the actual argument, as I understand it. It would actually go:

“1. The purpose of sexual organs is procreation and unity.”

I think this correction has potential. It would be a good argument within a Catholic framework, probably.

But there is a dialectical difficulty here. You see, I find that people who support the permissibility of homosexual activity are MUCH more willing to admit that the biological purpose of the genitals is procreation than they are to admit that the social/anthropological/theological purpose of the genitals is unity. Indeed, they might claim that unity (in the ordinary sense) can be achieved through various homosexual acts.

The sexual organs’ purpose cannot be reasoned by looking at those organs alone, for there is wider evidence than just “part A fits part B and causes pregnancy” to show what those organs are for. Specifically, studies have found that human beings typically have hormones and chemicals released, during sexual activity, that cause bonding with the other person. Women have this reaction more strongly than men, but men have it too. In both genders, there is evidence that this union is ordered toward total self-giving, not merely partial, because promiscuity has a negative effect due to “spreading” the effects of these hormones and chemicals, in a sense “spreading” this gift of self too thin. This is true even for men, as evidenced by the fact that the grand majority of adulterous men, whether in longstanding affairs or in meaningless hookups, end up growing cold on their wives or less interested in them. They are “damaging” the uniting effect of sex by spreading it too thin. So there is a basis to believe that the sex act is meant not only to be procreative, but an act of exclusive self-giving.

I like all of this; I think it’s a very perceptive take on human nature. There is something interesting in the case of men. I think that men become cold and unfeeling as a result of giving into lust, whereas women are more likely to give into lust after they become (for other reasons) cold and unfeeling. The devil seems to tell men that the “ultimate” unity (or rather, experience of unity) we crave is always around the corner, when the next corner only holds another dead end.

Now, the way that this applies to homosexuality is this: If a man has homosexual experiences, then he is going to end up undermining one purpose or the other of sexual acts. If he allows himself to be totally self-giving, thus not thwarting the unitive aspect of sex, then he must give himself totally to the other man, which obviously thwarts the procreative aspect because he can’t have a wife. Yet if he has a wife yet is also engaged in homosexual activity, then he is thwarting the full course of the unitive aspect because he is not being fully self-giving to any of the people with whom he engages in sexual activity.

I’m not sure this excludes homosexual activity *before *(straight) marriage.

So the final argument would go:

1. The purpose of sexual organs is procreation and unity (total self-giving).
2. It is wrong to use an organ in a way that thwarts its purpose.
3. Homosexual acts use the sexual organs in ways that thwart either procreation OR unity (total self-giving).
4. Therefore, homosexual acts are wrong.

The argument is formally valid, which I like (constructing formally valid arguments is a gift that few people have). As I said above, I have doubts about the dialectical strength of Premises #1 and #3. I think they are true, but true in ways that seem to presuppose Catholicism (or something like it).

A presupposition of mine, by the way, is that homosexual acts can be shown to be wrong without any appeal to religion. This was the view of Plato, Aristotle, Aquinas, and pretty much every Western theologian who wrote upon the subject prior to 1950.

Now one might say that my argument contains dialectically problematic premises – teleology, for example. But teleology has strong secular roots, and it is held (in some form) by all consequentialists and virtue ethicists. Thus, pretty much everybody in the modern philosophical/moral-theological “scene” accepts something like teleology, even though they hate the term “teleology”.

Thanks for your response!

 

[Prodigal_Son]

For Aristotle, happiness, εὐδαιμονία (eu̯dai̯monía,) was in the completion of the telos for which a thing or being exists. Thus, εὐδαιμονία is, in a sense, the state of completeness.

Good – this was pretty much precisely how I was going to respond to Hopey, myself.

If human beings are made in the image of a Trinitarian God where three persons share one nature, then the human state of completeness is normatively to be found where persons share one nature. Marriage is where “two become one flesh.” Two persons share one human nature because of the unitive (physically, physiologically, psychologically, socially, intellectually, emotionally, personally) nature of marriage.

It seems to be the unitive aspect of marriage that is prior to but not separate from the procreative aspect. Both are necessary and neither are sufficient.

Marriage is a face to face encounter with the beloved on all levels. A seeing eye to eye, not merely looking in the same direction.

Sodomy is not face to face.

All forms of homosexual encounters can never be procreative. This is important because the unity of marriage is fundamentally creative. A new human being comes about because of the unitive nature of marriage and cannot be separated from it.

Marriage is symbolic of the Trinitarian nature of God - the Holy Spirit proceeds from the Father and Son, just as a child proceeds from the unity of the mother and father. Without procreation, love is incomplete because there is no tangible result from the unity. Married love becomes embodied in a new being.

It is both the unitive and procreative aspects of marriage that define it as the unique completed state of the telos of biological human existence.

See my reply to KindredSoul above. I take it for granted that gay sex can be shown to be wrong without recourse to any religious premises. Thus, I am in the tradition of Aquinas and Robert George, for example, both of whom make secular arguments on this subject.

Nevertheless, I’m enjoying your comparison between marriage and the Trinity.

 

[Prodigal_Son]

And why do people who are ssa and in relationships have to be unhappy?

I certainly never said they did! There are lots of things about gay relationships that can be good and healthy and life-giving. I am only claiming that sex is not one of these life-giving things. You could test my hypothesis, I suppose, by comparing the happiness of sexually active gay couples with sexually abstinent gay couples. That would be a difficult study to do, and it’s difficult to measure happiness certainly, but it’s not a crazy idea.

 

[inocente]

Sodomy could be used to thwart procreation, but it could be used in other ways too.

Sodomy includes oral, so heterosexuals account for far more sodomy than the tiny percentage of homosexuals.

But there’s a lot more straights and we make the rules so quit complaining.

I have sympathy with this objection. The jury’s still out on whether homosexual actions tend to lead to unhappiness.

Aristotle’s argument is a self-fulfilling prophecy. If a group is discriminated against then of course they won’t be as happy. We can’t know until we have a society which does not discriminate.

Romans 1 says that their passions were “unnatural”, but it does not say this with respect to their genitals, but with respect to their intellect.

People look at verses out of context. If you carefully parse all of Romans sentence by sentence and think about what each sentence means, and how it relates to those around it then it’s hard to see how Paul can possibly be talking of homosexuals in general, if he is talking of homosexuals at all.

Certainly it’s bizarre to let the 15-year old lesbian girl in the pew next to you think for even one moment that Paul is telling her she is “filled with every kind of wickedness, evil, covetousness, malice. Full of envy, murder, strife, deceit, craftiness, they are gossips, slanderers, God-haters, insolent, haughty, boastful, inventors of evil, rebellious towards parents, foolish, faithless, heartless, ruthless”.

 

[Prodigal_Son]

“Man’s ultimate happiness consists in the contemplation of truth, for this operation is specific to man and is shared with no other animals. Also it is not directed to any other end since the contemplation of truth is sought for its own sake. In addition, in this operation man is united to higher beings (substances) since this is the only human operation that is carried out both by God and by the separate substances (angels). (Summa Contra Gentiles, book 3, chapter 37)”

By “ultimate”, Aquinas means “last”. Obviously, eating a cookie isn’t man’s ultimate happiness, but it’s morally licit to eat a cookie.

 

[Prodigal_Son]

Sodomy includes oral, so heterosexuals account for far more sodomy than the tiny percentage of homosexuals.

I certainly agree. Straight people who commit sodomy are no less guilty of “the homosexual sin” than gay people are.

But there’s a lot more straights and we make the rules so quit complaining.

Catholic rules apply equally to straight and gay people. I do acknowledge, however, that people in the Church often irrationally condemn gay people while ignoring the same sins among straight people.

Aristotle’s argument is a self-fulfilling prophecy. If a group is discriminated against then of course they won’t be as happy. We can’t know until we have a society which does not discriminate.

You seem to assume that all harms associated with homosexuality are caused by discrimination. Do you have evidence for this assumption?

People look at verses out of context. If you carefully parse all of Romans sentence by sentence and think about what each sentence means, and how it relates to those around it then it’s hard to see how Paul can possibly be talking of homosexuals in general, if he is talking of homosexuals at all.

It doesn’t matter if he’s talking about all gay people. He clearly indicates that the lust for homosexual activity is an undesirable trait – which would apply equally to all people.

Certainly it’s bizarre to let the 15-year old lesbian girl in the pew next to you think for even one moment that Paul is telling her she is “filled with every kind of wickedness, evil, covetousness, malice. Full of envy, murder, strife, deceit, craftiness, they are gossips, slanderers, God-haters, insolent, haughty, boastful, inventors of evil, rebellious towards parents, foolish, faithless, heartless, ruthless”.

I agree. Gay children are clearly not the sort of people Paul is talking about.

 

[KindredSoul]

I’m not sure this excludes homosexual activity *before *(straight) marriage.

I think that would still interfere with the total self-giving unity. Because, in order to not be thwarting the procreative aspect, a person engaging in such activity would have to know in advance that he was going to get married to the opposite gender one day. This means that, even as he gives himself to the other man involved (obviously this can be gender flipped for lesbians) he knows it’s not exclusive nor total, because even if he’s not having sex with other people at that moment in time, he knows that he’s going to leave that man one day in order to get married. If he doesn’t know that, then he’s committing an act that–according to his own intentions at least–would thwart the procreative aspect.

The argument is formally valid, which I like (constructing formally valid arguments is a gift that few people have). As I said above, I have doubts about the dialectical strength of Premises #1 and #3. I think they are true, but true in ways that seem to presuppose Catholicism (or something like it).

A presupposition of mine, by the way, is that homosexual acts can be shown to be wrong without any appeal to religion. This was the view of Plato, Aristotle, Aquinas, and pretty much every Western theologian who wrote upon the subject prior to 1950.

I believe so, too. I believe–although doubtless I have more work to do on it myself–that by further argument or exploration into Premise #1 and #3, it can be shown from a non-religious point of view that those premises are reasonable. I believe, for instance, that the appeal to the way the human body works in sex (such as I said in my first post), is just the tip of the ice berg in building a non-religious foundation for why exclusive, total self-giving is part of the purpose of the sexual act. It bears more digging, of course, but what we’ve already covered seems to at least point toward there being more than just the Church’s word indicating that the “exclusive total self-giving” aspect is inherent to the purpose of sex.

I agree, of course, that it may be difficult to get the secular world to agree with that, but I also believe that has a great deal to do with the secular world–in the current age–having biases of its own that are not, strictly speaking, inherent to a secular approach at large. In other words, I believe that my argument could stand without needing to appeal to Church teaching (or any religious teaching), but I admit that it may first require other arguments in order to cut through the existing biases in the secular world, so that they can see that one needn’t be Catholic in order to see the sense of the argument.

Thanks for your response!

Thank you for your thread!

Blessings in Christ,
KindredSoul

 

[davidv]

The standard natural law argument against homosexual activity runs something like this:

1. The purpose of the sexual organs is procreation.
   {snip}

I think this starting point makes this argument flawed. In my view, natural law applies to persons, not the individual parts of persons.

Also, it can be argued that procreation is not the sole purpose of the sexual organs. In fact it is the ordered use of the sexual organs in the marital embrace that is ordered toward the unity of the spouses.

This leaves the argument open to many red herrings related to the varies parts of the body and their appropriate use.

 

[arklawler]

The Church passes on that by which the witness of Scripture, Tradition, and the Magisterium (the Teaching Office of the Church) God has taught us He desires of His creatures for happiness in this life and in the next. Sexual acts, are equally both for unitive and procreative functions in the marriage of one man with one woman. For this reason the procreative function of sex can not be interfered with in marriage, and until the 1930’s all Christian denominations taught this. Masturbation, which is neither unitive nor procreative, is likewise morally wrong. Homosexual acts, are certainly always not open to the procreative function of sex in the Divine Order. A Chistian person who has homosexual desires, proper response, is to treat those desires as temptations, and fight them as such with the many spiritual tools God has given us in his Church. This is no different than an unmarried Christian who is tempted to fornication, a married one to adultery, or any Christian to masturbation. Sin is not a popular word today, but lust is an easy pit to fall into in today’s world. The secular world will never be convinced by purely philosophical arguments today any more than the Greek philosophers would listen to St. Paul. Such a path is fruitless. We have to say with St. Paul: 'I preach Christ, and Christ crucified." This is something our good Pope Francis has been stressing. We must be preaching by word and deed Jesus Christ and the Gospel. We (the Church) often talk too much about things such as abortion, homosexuality, contraception, and other hot topic issues, he has said, not because they are not important, but because people need the new eyes of transformation in faith to truly understand and embrace such truths. This is why the Church’s mission is to preach Jesus Christ and the Good News.