I just spent several days explaining why. Natural law, applied so sinuously is to undermine it as a system of judgment.
Depends which encyclicals (i.e. from whom). I recognise all seven Ecumenical Councils
Except it causes you more problems when you state it as a system of absolute judgment, and then make heaps of illogical exceptions.
No, I’ve pointed out when you say something is bad, and then make exceptions, it seems to undermine belief in ‘natural law’.
No. I don’t care about ‘purpose’. I care about God saying it’s wrong. Where you come unstuck is talking about ‘purpose’ as a rule, and then making exceptions for infertile couples (those unable to through impairment OR choice) and those who choose not even to form unions (such as priests).
I don’t judge it to be arbitrary. God’s making the rule.
I disagree with the ‘pleasure’ argument too, because it’s one one can find holes in. For instance a man might find pleasure being with an animal. An animal, not having any say in it, it’s own ‘pleasure’ or not would therefore be irrelevant. Simply then that he could find pleasure, doesn’t make it right.
That’s the problem with your system, and her system. They’re both applying human reasonings and they come up short. God says it. It’s enough.
What you have spent several days doing is repeatedly asserting the same flawed objections to what you imagine Natural Law to be. You have repeatedly stated that infertile couples and those who choose celibacy objectively violate the Natural Law and have obstinately refused to acknowledge all reasoning to the contrary. You maintain that your final authority is God and that your position on all morality comes directly from Him. Whether or not you accept any intermediate authority is a fairly open question. You maintain that sexuality is intrinsically without purpose and that any rules that govern it amount to nothing more that God’s arbitrary standard.
You do not seem to recognize what Natural Law is meant to be. Natural Law is the language that God has written all of creation in. You can’t reasonably deny that there are larger purposes behind God’s moral code based on the manner in which creation has been constructed. If you did, you would also, ultimately, have to deny that man is made in the image and likeness of his creator. Once you do
that, it follows that there are certain things that man was created to be able to do and certain things that he
was not created to do by virtue of his being created in a specific fashion.
That Natural Law is written into the very fabric of our being is not hard to see. Plato and Aristotle, who had no knowledge of God, were able to articulate lucid reasons against homosexual behavior. The ancient Chinese, the Hindus and the Buddhists were able to do this as well. That these individuals and cultures did not require God to tell them directly what was right and wrong regarding homosexual behavior implies that God has created an objective reference accessible by the use of reason entirely apart from knowledge of His existence.
The Church, having the requisite authority vested in her by God, therefore is able to use reason to determine what the fundamental purposes behind Natural Law are. She notices that God has given to man the gift of sexuality that will allow him to participate, with God, in creation. She reasons that there is no moral obligation to use this faculty. She further reasons that if this faculty is to be used, that it must be used in the proper way. Given the sacred nature of the sexual gift, it becomes eminently important that it never be misused.
In this way, the Church arrives at the conclusion that sexuality has a dual purpose in both procreation and the union of the couple. Since this purpose is one you have repeatedly misrepresented in this thread, I feel I must repeat this: sexuality has a
dual purpose in
both procreation
and the union of the couple. Neither purpose can be deliberately frustrated if one intends to use the sexual faculty. Notice, here, that there is absolutely no requirement that the sexual faculty must be used, simply that it must be used *properly *if chosen to be used.
The proper use of sexuality is one that does not deliberately frustrate
either the procreative
or the unitive purpose of sexuality. It is this word “deliberate” that seems to give you problems. It is meant to illustrate an act of willfully choosing to frustrate the purpose of the sexual act in order to achieve one’s own end.
(continued below . . .)
I was pretty sure that the Catholic Church did not endorse such regardless of who was involved, but I was unsure as to whether it would consider such to be grounds to determine that that marriage was therefore no longer valid in the eyes of the church or simply grounds for assigning acts of penance and a promise not to do so again (I am presuming the confessional is the only way the church would ever find out anyway, as long as the situation was consensual).
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