Are you claiming we have no free will? Are you claiming those with SSA cannot live a life of holiness if they refrain from those acts?
Simple abstinence is not the same as chastity. The decision of a homosexual not to engage in sexual activity, even if possible, simply does not have the same character as it would for a heterosexual. The heterosexual gives up the good of a family. The homosexual earns nothing in this supposed sacrifice and therefore stands before his Creator with empty hands. He is exactly as the hapless servant from Luke 19:20, who was condemned. Moreover, I will not second-guess the Savior who equated.
I am indeed claiming that a homosexual has lost his free will. As I pointed out in my response to goofyjim, simply refraining from the disordered sexual act is not enough. The root cause of this unatural desire is a willfull decision upon the part of the homosexual. By this, he has given up free will of his own accord.
That is illogical. Even if the inclination is a choice one still has a choice not to act on it, or he could choose not to be inlined the same way he chose to be inclined. Or, if one had some organic, or psychogenic, disturbence that so inclined one that would mitigate culpability.
The problem is that the Church has expressly not allowed for the diminishment of culpability in the context of homosexuality and it is certainly clear why. Ultimately, permitting the reduced culpability will turn Tradition and Church teaching on its head. The act, it will be argued, arising as it does from a disordered psychology, can only be engaged in to the degree that the individual cannot control himself. The homosexual sex act would therefore only be sinful in theory, never in practice.
You persist in attempting to paint the Church as damning those with SSA without any room for free will or God’s grace. Fortunately your agit prop is not true. It is not true in that the Church does not teach as you theorize and it is not true as an attempt to malign the magisterium.
The Church cannot undo the misguided decisions of the flock. I do not say that the Church has condemned anyone. I say that the homosexual has condemned himself. I say that he has allowed his own free will to die within him and that God’s grace, though it may be offered time and again, is consistently refused. These are the qualities necessary to produce a homosexual and this is why their salvation is lost and they will never see the face of God.
Free will does not die while we are still living.
On the contrary, according to the Catholic Encyclopedia:
If strengthened by exercise, then it atrophies through neglect. In one with a condition such as I have been describing, it is effectively dead.
I agree with the CE, but where does it say free will dies? It is not set forever until we die.
If, by his own free will, a man makes a decision that effectively renders him immune to the appeals of God’s grace and confirms within him a compulsive taste for the disordered that can only grow in strength over time and renders the free will an irrelevancy, what would you call his free will if not dead?
Please do not pass judgement. Remember that the first person saved in the Chrisitian dispensation was a thief at the hour of his death. Even mortal sins can be forgiven in the confessional. The church has never condemned anyone to hell through predestination. That is not her teaching either. I really wish you would stop doing this yourself.
The tale of the good thief involves a man who expressed regret for his deeds. This is something that the homosexual is completely unable to do. The condition prevents any sincere act of contrition, rendering even the confessional powerless over the homosexual’s own flagrant pride.
It means his conscience is dulled from sin, it does not mean free will no longer exists.
We are, however, talking about an act that is a psychotic compulsion for the individual. Certainly he can’t be said to have the same use of his free will in this matter as a normal man. Rather, looking at the psychological profile we can discern confidently that the homosexual has exchanged his own free will for the hedonism of the moment. In his arrogance, the homosexual has been given over to his sins and has rejected his own free will. As a result his salvation is lost and he will never see the face of God.
This would be a possible interpretation, except that we already know that where there is no free will (compulsion), there is no culpability; therefore, this cannot be what the Church is telling us. To recap:
Begging the question. You claim it is a compulsion; by no means have you provided sufficient justification for this claim.
Again, this remains mere opinion. You have not proved this. The research you cite does not prove what you claim it does, and the church teachings you quote to support your position actually deny it.
Heresy. As fix said, free will does not die until we do. The Church teaches that we cannot know who will go to Hell; even She will not say for certain that a particular person is damned, even after that person’s death. What you say is completely opposed to the Church’s teaching; you seem to be getting these ideas from protestant sources.
Care to provide an authoritative citation for your insistence that my interpretation conflicts with the Church’s teaching? I know I’ve produced citation after citation to demonstrate that it does not.
This is all baseless denial rather than argument. Again I ask if you can provide any authoritative citations for your arguments.
Anyone, until he dies, can turn from his sins. Even the sin of abortion can be forgiven in the confessional. I agree that the mistake of the homosexual is defining himself as such. But this is not a fixed state and therefore redemption is still possible. Let us not rule out the mercy of God. There is only one unforgivable sin that Jesus mentioned. I don’t think this one was it.