I have read Fr Martin's book Building A Bridge: Q 1: why need for gay community?

  • Thread starter Thread starter Annie
  • Start date Start date
Status
Not open for further replies.
What the Church teaches is that the inclination is disordered, and by that they mean that it is not ordered, not that it is a mental disease. It is directed in the wrong direction. Any sexual attraction that is not towards one the nature of whom would allow procreation with is not ordered toward the end (goal, reason for) of sexual activity. A human attracted to fish would also be experiencing a disordered inclination.

The Church does not teach that homosexual inclinations are sinful, only acts which arise from them.

And the Church does not teach that the acts are sinful and therefore the inclination is disordered; the Church teaches that the act is sinful because it violates the purpose for sexual activity.
 
I asked “firstly the question of “disorder”; do you feel this relates to the sex act being non procreative or is there more to it?” I also know what disorder means in a catechism context. So that was a long winded yes.
 
Sorry, it seemed like you were saying something different in an earlier post.

Homosexual activity is sinful first, because it violates chastity. In addition, it is not ordered to the end of the sexual act, no matter what the general inclination of the person is.
 
No worries. I wanted to clarify if the primary conflict was based on the assumption that the goal of a sexual needed to be procreation, because I feel in many ways this is the heart of the matter.

The first assumption that the Church makes then is that sexes only, not even just primary, goal is procreation. This is an assumption the Church makes based on theology around chastity, as you mentioned. The moral objections as regards chastity are not objective, they’re a belief based only on a theological basis; which doesn’t mean it’s bad or even wrong, but it’s not objective.

Removing dogma from the equation we can see that there are multiple reasons for people to engage in sex that are not procreative. At this point I’d like to mention that I’m asexual, I literally don’t care about sex, so I don’t actually have a personal drive for it or bias towards indulging in it.

But reasons for sex include:
  • Pleasure
  • Pair bonding
  • Release of endorphins
  • Stress release
Apparently it can even lower blood pressure, lower the risk of heart disease and lessen pain among other things. These are valid reasons to indulge in an activity. If I found a food that one could eat to do this I would likely eat it to help improve my health and wellbeing.
 
Let me see, the Calix Society is a church group that is organized around drunkenness. Nobody is claiming they somehow celebrate keg stands.
 
Well spoken! We can never condone what is contrary to what God has decreed to us ! SIN IS Sin!
 
But the devil would have us believe otherwise. “Did God really say…?”
 
Last edited:
It seems like different people have different ideas about morality.

To me (ie, my interpretation of what I have learned, not straight out of the CCC), God communicated with us to prepare us to recognize and understand the coming of His Son, His Son’s death, and what this all signifies.

Christ taught us how to get to Heaven. The most important rule, as He said, is to love God with our entirety, and to love our neighbors as ourselves. This says to me that everything is about love.

We can chose to love God or not. If we love Him, we “will keep His commandments,” which are, in effect, rules for loving God. It’s like if you’re deeply in love with someone and want to please them, you’ll remember she loves getting flowers/he is not keen on PDA/etc.

The thing is, God wants us to do these things out of love, because we are drawn to Him Who is all good, all love. He accepts us when we come to Him only out of fear, but He doesn’t want us to stay there.

He also communicates to us by various means. A lot we know through “natural law,” what works for humans as they are constituted. Some we learn from science: don’t eat too much or bad things will happen to you (knee problems, diabetes, etc). Wow, that sounds like don’t be a glutton, doesn’t it? And we are finding that fasting one or two days a week is good for us–and the Church has recommended or required the practice all along.

So we see from the way things work how to use them. And this often relates to what the Church teaches through morality. We are finding out now all sorts of problems connected with sex outside of marriage. For those who engage in homosexual activities (even heterosexual couples), we find they are at increased risk for certain kinds of cancers and scientists think this is due to sperm’s characteristic of being able to enter cells. The “morally correct” way of sex works to protect the recipient from that “intrusion,” the other ways do not. Again, what God teaches us actually works.

This is why I see Church teachings as a kind of owners manual. The Ford company made my car; Ford probably knows how often I should change my oil, no? And God made us, and He probably understands our parameters and specifications better than we do.
 
Disordered inclinations are not something made by God but could be a result of original sin and different circumstances. Promoting and celebrating such things are silly and scandalous.
 
You wrote, in defense of the uniqueness of homosexual groups, “It’s never been illegal to be vegetarian or have red hair. There’s never been a “red hair panic” as a legal defence against murdering gingers (look up “gay panic”). People aren’t regularly murdered for being vegetarian.”

Vegetarianism and redness of hair are , neither one, gravely disordered desires. The whole world was vegetarian until the Great Flood of Noah’s time (see Gen 9:1-4), when the freedom to be otherwise was given. Redness of hair similarly has ancient occurrences naturally, drawing forth no condemnations from God.

Same-sex desires are gravely disordered desires, contrary to the divine image and likeness in which man and woman were created. God, in His eternal being as Trinity, is in the divine essence fruitful in love. The Father eternally begets the Son, and from/in the love of Father and Son, the Holy Spirit eternal proceeds. This “dynamo” of divine generation - the Son eternally from the Father, and the Spirit eternally from the Father and the Son “as if as from one principle”, is eternally divine generation proceeding from love. This image, and this likeness, were build into mankind by way of the male- and the female-ness of human beings. Children can be generated and born into this world only by way of the union of the male and the female - same-sex attraction contradicts the divine image and likeness, and the command to be fruitful and multiply, as well as contradicting the witness to humanity, as Paul wrote, through marriage of the man and the woman, of the covenant of Christ and His Bride the Church.

Humanity was created man and woman specifically with the potency to be fruitful, and to be commanded to be fruitful, in that divine image and likeness. There is no sexuality in God, but there is fruitfulness in divine love: God is not sterile; His love is potent. In humanity, potency and fruitfulness (living the divine image and likeness in this attribute), was created by God by means of the two sexes, male and female.

Homosexual unions are intrinsically sterile. God is not. God created them man and woman “in the divine image and likeness” because He wants spiritual union with us - hence, He created us in His image to enable a certain “compatibility” within us to have true covenantal fellowship with Him and in Him and through Him. It is good to embrace the gift of being a man, or of being a woman, realizing the natural attraction of the one for the other is a sign of God’s design and intention for us: “Be fruitful” in the covenant of marital love, “and multiply.”

Same-sex desire is a temptation and a cross, when it arises, to be overcome - and it can be overcome. All are called to chastity in sexual expression: either through chaste, fruitful conjugal love in marriage (one man, one woman, until death do you part), or through spiritual fruitfulness in celibacy. Every cross that God permits, in every one of His beloved creatures, is meant for our sanctification: every temptation that comes to men, is permitted as a trial to be overcome - to be defeated in Christ - to help us grow stronger in holiness.
 
Last edited:
Fr. Martin seems to speak out of both sides of his mouth. He seems to want to be popular. He does not win my trust. I’ve seen this kind of ambiguity and pride fall very fast and reveal itself eventually.
There will always be types like Fr. Martin. For me it is not the solid spiritual food I want to live on. There are better choices.
 
Are you defending the murder of gay and trans* people…?

I also posted above regarding the “disorder” of homosexuality; I am yet to see any proof it is in fact disordered.
 
In what why did he seem to be defending the murder of gay and trans people?!?!?
 
OK, your criteria for defining something as disordered differs from that of the Church. The Church considers how something functions well and how it functions badly, and considers the former good and the latter sin.

You do not agree. On what basis do you judge whether or not an act is disordered?
 
The Church represents God, you represent yourself. Who should we follow? Pretty simple; God and His Infallible Church !
 
I would mention that homosexuality seems to function just fine. The goal of many sex acts is not procreation, and in that they achieve their other goals perfectly well.

I normally work off the dictionary definitions of words when possible.
 
Status
Not open for further replies.
Back
Top