Marital Act Question

  • Thread starter Thread starter TotusTuusForever
  • Start date Start date
Status
Not open for further replies.
T

TotusTuusForever

Guest
Hi Everyone,
This is an awkward question, but I feel uncomfortable asking a Priest.
So here it goes, whenever I make love to my husband, I can’t help feeling like sex is too animalistic. Im not sure if I am just over thinking the whole think but, I feel like it is suppose to be a deeply spiritual act and it just doesn’t feel that way. Is it just me or what?! I can’t help feeling like a bad Catholic for not feeling spiritual during the act. I try to focus on the deep love I have for my husband, but I still feel like it is mostly passion. Am I missing something?

Just for background I spent years discerning a vocation before I met and married my husband. Maybe this is why Im focusing on the spiritual aspect so much? 😳
 
I don’t have any idea how to be “spiritual” during sex. By giving yourself wholly to the other-emotions and all-that is what God intends.
 
TotusTuusForever said:
if I am just over thinking
Click to expand...
This. Yes you are overthinking it.

it’s not a spiritual act. It is a physical act of intimacy between spouses. It is a loving act, but it is not spiritual act per se. Passion is what you are supposed to feel.
 
TotusTuusForever said:
I can’t help feeling like a bad Catholic for not feeling spiritual during the act.
Click to expand...
Your post reminds me of the way Church documents talk about sex between married people. Is that where maybe the expectation came from. Did you have an expectation from the way those documents describe sex between a married couple? Because I agree with Xanthippe_Voorhees and 1ke.
 
Last edited:
It’s not supposed to be “spiritual” in the same way you would be when praying a rosary or attending mass. It’s good and holy in and of itself. The way to be spiritual in this area is not to concentrate on that, but to actually give yourself to your husband and allow him to do the same. Bear in mind that the sexual act was designed by God, along with all the desires and emotions that go with it.
As someone said, it is a physical act and you are supposed to feel passion.

How long are you married out of curiosity?
 
Last edited:
I agree with the others that you’re overthinking it - but you are onto something. The act of love between husband and wife is indeed a holy act. Perhaps you and your husband could consider offering a very short prayer of thanksgiving and consecration of yourselves to God before making love, and/or a prayer afterwards.
 
I’ve actually done this in the silence of my heart, but I think my husband might not be able to do both at once. It might weird him out too much. 😅
 
Okay, I guess I am just over thinking it. Any ideas one how I can overcome this feeling?
 
So you love your husband deeply, find him physically attractive, and feel heat and passion in bed?

Sounds like exactly what is supposed to happen. Let yourself go and enjoy.
 
Yes! But I also forgot to add that we’ve been dealing with infertility. We haven’t tried to avoid pregnancy really at all in our marriage (because the times we said we would in the beginning we didn’t), but nevertheless no baby. Maybe, I’m just feeling discouraged.
 
TotusTuusForever said:
Yes! But I also forgot to add that we’ve been dealing with infertility. We haven’t tried to avoid pregnancy really at all in our marriage (because the times we said we would in the beginning we didn’t), but nevertheless no baby. Maybe, I’m just feeling discouraged.
Click to expand...
Are you aware of how NFP can work for you? DH and I, with good NFP, took over a year.

I apologize in advance if you already know this but I’d recommend a few things. The first would be tracking your basal body temperature this can be achieved with a cheap, $10 BBT thermometer. There are cheap ovulation strips on amazon/eBay. In conjunction with an app/website like Fertility Friend you get really good data.
 
You are overthinking it a little, but as dshix says you are onto something also.
Further, the advice of other posters re passion is not quite correct from a Catholic perspective either.
Its a fine line here between Jansenism and pagan attitudes that has always dogged even the greatest of Catholic minds talking of sexuality (eg Augustine).

Basically the problem, as you have experienced, is how far we may unleash irrational passion. We all know passion in anything is good but it is not an absolute good. Passion also interfere’s with reason and it has always been held that reason and free will are our highest powers and we cannot please God if we intentionally deny them in ordering all our acts, feelings and thoughts to Gods plan.

The ancients recognised that in all human activities sex is the most problematic in this regard because reason and even free will for most people is suspended during this activity.

Augustine was extremely perplexed by this conundrum. Some saw marriage as a necessary evil because God commanded us to procreate which held even after the Fall when we lost the ability to completely control our bodies (hence the shame and fig leaves). So these viewed sex even in marriage as venially sinful at best.

The Church eventually rejected this view on sex, though it did take a long time. It still keeps popping back up though in some forms of Irish and French Catholicism most recently.

Aquinas probably sums up the best in the current teaching which all modern teaching uses as its base.

That is, sex does suspend reason and give inordinate control to passion. This is something we have little or no freedom to control since the Fall (concupiscence) However this reality/condition, while an unfortunate result of sin, within the constraints of marriage, is perfectly acceptable. It is still reason-able even though reason may often be unable to operate fully in the act itself. That of course assumes the act itself is not unnatural in any way.

At a moral level it is perhaps like choosing to get drunk now and then to relieve stress and relax and enjoy good company…it is acceptable if we rightly reason beforehand that we are in safe company, we have a sober driver, we dont get violent or stupid. Nothing wrong with that.

So enjoy your passion in the moment and you may even choose to increase it but dont in the longer term let passion control you or be the primary reason for your intimacy. That is a judgement call you have to make as you get to know yourself and your husband.

If you do have the rare ability to find the explicit presence of God in such times lucky you, of course be sensitive to that but if it is at the expense of being in the moment with your husband then you really should be concentrating on your husband I humbly suggest. Prayer whether private or jointly in the afterglow is of course entirely commendable.
 
Last edited:
My wife and I have been struggling with infertility as well. Started leaving it to chance in 2011, actively trying since 2013. We’re considering adoption. It’s expensive, though, and finances have been tight.

However, the infertility in my marriage does not undermine my marriage as an image of God’s love for His Church, and it doesn’t mean that God has not blessed my spouse and me in many other ways.

It’s a struggle I feel, and it’s one I’ve had to be there for my wife during. I understand the feelings of inadequacy or feelings of having done something wrong personally to be in such straights. But infertility isn’t a punishment. It’s just a cross to shoulder. And my marriage is still good and holy, as is yours. And my wife and I will drink the cup God gives us, and will pray that His will be done.

I pray that you’ll have children, if that’s what you and your spouse desire. Please pray for me, too.
 
Last edited:
TotusTuusForever said:
Yes! But I also forgot to add that we’ve been dealing with infertility. We haven’t tried to avoid pregnancy really at all in our marriage (because the times we said we would in the beginning we didn’t), but nevertheless no baby. Maybe, I’m just feeling discouraged.
Click to expand...
Are you sure you’re dealing with infertility or have you just not conceived yet? It can often take much longer than a year to conceive.
 
Blue_Horizon said:
At a moral level it is perhaps like choosing to get drunk now and then to relieve stress and relax and enjoy good company…it is acceptable if we rightly reason beforehand that we are in safe company, we have a sober driver, we dont get violent or stupid. Nothing wrong with that.
Click to expand...
Getting drunk is always a mortal sin though. I don’t think having sex suspends your reason at all. In fact, I’ve found that I become much more mindful of my wife’s needs at these times. I think this is a simple case of the OP overthinking. Not many people really approach sex in the same manner as one would approach to receive the blessed sacrament. Yes, a couple should approach each other with love and respect, and even wonder and awe, but there are appropriate attitudes in different circumstances. In Mass, one must be outwardly reverent to show respect. In sex, the couple are free to admire and enjoy the other.
 
AdamPeter said:
Getting drunk is always a mortal sin though.
Click to expand...
Not as far as I am aware.
All the Catechism says is:
“2290 The virtue of temperance disposes us to avoid every kind of excess: the abuse of food, alcohol, tobacco, or medicine. Those incur grave guilt who, by drunkenness or a love of speed, endanger their own and others’ safety on the road, at sea, or in the air.”

Obviously I am not talking on the floor chucking drunk. Perhaps inebriated is a better word.
The point is to the point of losing some control but knowing that there is no danger to others in doing so.
AdamPeter said:
I don’t think having sex suspends your reason at all.
Click to expand...
Concupiscence is different for everybody. Concupiscence of the flesh is only one of three.
Even Kinsey’s research back in the 1960s appeared to show that 6% of a population has no libido.
However it is not so for most of us.
 
Last edited:
Blue_Horizon said:
Concupiscence is different for everybody. Concupiscence of the flesh is only one of three.

Even Kinsey’s research back in the 1960s appeared to show that 6% of a population has no libido.

However it is not so for most of us.
Click to expand...
So you’re saying that having sex, for most people, constitutes a loss of reason similar to that of being drunk? Forgive me if I think that’s nonsense.
 
Status
Not open for further replies.
Back
Top