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Rau
Guest
Zoltan, as far as I can tell, that document (from the CDF) does not contradict that statement from the earlier Catechism. If I’ve missed something, please point out the relevant text.
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Rau
Guest
And that page provides no “brief” at all beyond what you asserted Zoltan - that the statement is in conflict with Catholic Teaching. So we really have to find that teaching, or stop making that assertion! My suggestion is that the Church realises it does not know anything of the cause (“ethology”) of the inclination - and does not want to suggest otherwise. Instead, it makes a statement it is competent to make - that the inclination is “objectively disordered”, ie. directed to an intrinsically disordered object (same sex sexual acts).
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Joie_de_Vivre
Guest
Incorrect
Catechism 1st Edition said:
Catechism 2nd Edition said:
Would you claim the phrase “who has the right to know the truth” is in conflict with Catholic teaching? It is not in error, it was removed because it was more confusing than helpful.
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Rau
Guest
It is not the teaching of the Catholic Church that persons of homosexual inclination choose to experience that inclination. They certainly choose to follow it, or indulge it - and that is not disputed.
We all experience various forms of concupiscence. It is a choice to indulge them, or refuse them, but their presence is not of our choice. Please explain why you think otherwise in the case of same sex attraction? The Church asserts no such thing. In fact it says of concupiscence (CCC2515):
It unsettles man’s moral faculties and, without being in itself an offense, inclines man to commit sins
and
2520 Baptism confers on its recipient the grace of purification from all sins. But the baptized must continue to struggle against concupiscence of the flesh and disordered desires.
One does not choose to experience (to be challenged or tempted by) our disordered desires. We choose to repel them or to embrace them.
That the homosexual inclination is “objectively disordered” is not to condemn it any more than we condemn other forms of concupiscence. It is simply to describe it - disordered by virtue of the object (same sex sexual acts) to which it is directed.
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LongingSoul
Guest
They are discernibly different ‘inclinations’. In the Church eyes anyway, inclination toward homosexual acts is called a ‘deep seated tendency’. That suggests more than an addiction or lustful desire that can be part of any sexual impulse. A deep seated tendency is regarded by the Church as something that can preclude ordination to Priesthood regardless of whether the man has ever engaged in the activity of sex or not. On the other hand an man can struggle with inclinations towards heterosexual sex but not necessarily be precluded on that basis.
Heterosexual sex is not disordered per se. It can be immoral but it still conforms to nature in an ordered way from what I understand.
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Rau
Guest
Which to me suggests:
- not easily eliminated;
- potentially difficult to overcome.
Nor is “thinking” disordered.
Fornication, Adultery, Lust, Lying, Calumny and many more acts listed in the Catechism and Veritatis Splendor are also “intrinsically disordered”.
It is worth thinking through why the Church excludes those experiencing SSA from the priesthood. It is not to condemn them, or to blame them. It is not a judgement of their moral calibre. It is a different kind of judgement about their suitability for that particular role.
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LongingSoul
Guest
Does it refer to those as intrinsically ‘disordered’ or intrinsically ‘evil’? They are different things. I know that masturbation is classed intrinsically ‘disordered’ along with homosexual sex because no change of conditions or circumstances could make the act ordered towards procreation.
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JimG
Guest
As an activity ordered to the proper function of the reproductive system, one can say that heterosexuality is not disordered. Yet, fornication, contraception, cohabitation are not correctly ordered sexual activities in the moral order. Indeed, cohabitation and hookups are rampant and in the past would have been considered highly disordered.
The fact is, as soon as “heterosexuality” was invented as an ‘orientation’, homosexuality was soon to follow. The sexual revolution, beginning with contraception, broke the connection between sex and procreation, reinventing sex as recreation, “sex without moral or generative limits, relationships without cultural or familial constraints”, to quote the article.
As soon as “heterosexuals” accepted the tenets of the sexual revolution, they embraced all that was to follow, including same sex relationships. Heterosexuals want sex without moral or generative limits? Well, so do homosexuals. I’m not arguing in favor of same sex “marriage.” Far from it. I’m arguing for a return to sexual reality. There have always been men and women. Only recently have we instead decided to identify people by sexual preferences.
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Joie_de_Vivre
Guest
Intrinsically disordered and intrinsically evil mean the same thing.
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Rau
Guest
I believe there is no distinction. The term(s) mean “always wrong to choose”, no matter Intentions or Circumstances.
Here the terms are used in close proximity:
…At the same time the Congregation took note of the distinction commonly drawn between the homosexual condition or tendency and individual homosexual actions. These were described as deprived of their essential and indispensable finality, as being* “intrinsically disordered”**, and able in no case to be approved of (cf. n. 8, $4).
…Although the particular inclination of the homosexual person is not a sin, it is a more or less strong tendency ordered toward an intrinsic moral evil; and thus the inclination itself must be seen as an objective disorder.*
Source: LETTER TO THE BISHOPS OF THE CATHOLIC CHURCH
ON THE PASTORAL CARE OF HOMOSEXUAL PERSONS
The same thing (the sexual actions) are described as “Intrinsically disordered” in the first para, and an “intrinsic moral evil” in the 2nd.
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LongingSoul
Guest
I’ll look into it further before I can accept that they mean the same thing as I’ve always thought that intrinsically disordered referred to their inability by their nature to be ordered to procreation. ie homosexual acts and masturbation. They are both intrinsically disordered and intrinsically evil. Both morally and naturally offensive.
Intrinsically evil acts can actually still be ordered to nature but are always morally wrong. But I will do a bit more researching on the subject.
Intrinsically evil acts can actually still be ordered to nature but are always morally wrong. But I will do a bit more researching on the subject.
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Rau
Guest
I’ve never encountered that interpretation before.
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Rau
Guest
Contraception would thus also be “intrinsically disordered” by your understanding above.
Pope Pius used the expression “intrinsically against nature” - he was speaking of contraception.
I can’t find any record of where these terms - intrinsically disordered or intrinsically evil - are distinguished. And if a distinction such as you propose were to exist, I can’t see that it would contribute anything of moral significance.
Note also that the natural law is not bounded by things which are against our physical nature. Fornication also offends the natural law.
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LongingSoul
Guest
It seems I’ve probably made a skewed leap from the CCC statement on homosexuality… that the ‘inclination is objectively disordered’ meaning that although not evil in itself, is not ordered to nature… to assuming that the statement that homosexual acts are ‘intrinsically disordered’ means primarily that the acts don’t conform to nature and by that fact are made evil.
I know that Pope Francis wants to addresse the language aspect of the Catholic teaching on homosexuality as part of the upcoming Synod.
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Rau
Guest
I understand it this way…
Same sex acts are “intrinsically disordered” (ie. always wrong to choose).
Same sex attraction is an inclination to same sex acts. Thus, such sexual attraction is ordered toward an intrinsic moral evil – and it is the “object” of the inclination (those acts) which makes the inclination disordered. Thus, the inclination is described as “objectively disordered”.
This situation differs from the sexual attraction experienced by most of us. Sexual attraction is not, per se, a disordered inclination. Further, a man’s inclination to sexual relations with a woman can be (and is naturally) ordered toward what is good (sexual complementarity, procreation…) as in Marriage.
But the inclination of a man to sexual relations with a man is a disordered inclination, because it cannot be ordered to the good. What dooms an inclination to sexual relations with the same sex is not “sexual relations”, it is doomed by virtue of the very object of the inclination – no change in situation can remedy that while the object remains the same.
One can trawl through the CCC looking at the use of the term disorder. It (disorder/disorders/disordered) some 31 times in a wide range of topic areas. “Nature” per se is not particularly central to its use.
Z
Zoltan_Cobalt
Guest
Then why was it removed? Tell me… and Rau would be happy to know also.
I maintain that the Church has never accepted or taught that homosexuality was innate. Therefore the phrase “They do not choose their homosexual condition.”** is in conflict with Catholic teaching**
Where did you find the reason that phrase was removed? Rau and I would like to know.
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Rau
Guest
The Church neither accepts nor denies anything about the etiology of homosexuality. Science does not have an explanation for the etiology of homosexual inclinations either.
We don’t say a statement is in conflict with a teaching when the teaching does not address the matter of that statement, unless we’re just having a little game with someone.
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Rau
Guest
One gets tangled in the meaning of words. If the person experiences no attraction to the opposite sex, and is sexually, attracted to the same sex, that is an unusual situation. Their sexual orientation would be labelled homosexual.
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