Sexual concessions to married couples and homosexuality

[Prodigal_Son]

You won’t find what you are saying in the teaching of the Church. The Church has never spoken against oral stimulation, nor defined it as unnatural. To say it is unnatural is merely your opinion.

The hands, mouth, genitals, etc all have many different functions. Who are you to say what is a “natural” function and what is unnatural and thus prohibited? If the Church wants to do so, I will obey. But she does not.

You are espousing ecclesiastical voluntarism: the idea that the Church makes things right or wrong, not on the basis of reason, but on some other (arbitrary) basis. This is absolutely the wrong way to look at things.

The Church once clearly said oral and anal sex was always wrong. Now the Church seems to – but things are not clear – be changing its mind.

It is VERY important that individual Catholics think about these things deeply. The Catholic culture is where the next bishops and popes will come from. If we don’t think clearly about these things, they won’t either.

The fact that there is no current dogma on a subject is not reason to reject all moral claims regarding the subject. It’s actually quite the opposite: it’s reason to discern the truth for ourselves, under the watchful protection of the Holy Spirit. That was a good enough strategy for Thomas Aquinas, and it’s a good enough strategy for me.

 

[underacloud]

You are espousing ecclesiastical voluntarism: the idea that the Church makes things right or wrong, not on the basis of reason, but on some other (arbitrary) basis. This is absolutely the wrong way to look at things.

No. I’m submitting to the authority of the Church to teach in matters of faith and morals. These teachings may have many foundations, in natural law, revealed law, reason, etc. I humbly submit to all of the Church’s teachings. I merely note that she does not have one on this specific topic.

The Church once clearly said oral and anal sex was always wrong. Now the Church seems to – but things are not clear – be changing its mind.

Well, you are the one making this claim. You should provide the relevant Church documents that you think show this.

PS This challenge has been issued before. The answer is - there are no such documents. The Church has never spoken on the matter or oral stimulation/foreplay. The prohibition on oral sex or anal sex to completion between married couples is also not doctrinally addressed (again, correct me if I’m wrong), but nonetheless is clearly prohibited on the basis of not being open to precreation.

 

[Charlemagne_III]

Many typical faithful Catholic married couples would find such sexual activity to be entirely natural.

And, pray tell, who are you to say that it’s natural just because it gives pleasure?

So do gluttony and drunkenness.

 

[Charlemagne_III]

PS This challenge has been issued before. The answer is - there are no such documents. The Church has never spoken on the matter or oral stimulation/foreplay. The prohibition on oral sex or anal sex to completion between married couples is also not doctrinally addressed (again, correct me if I’m wrong), but nonetheless is clearly prohibited on the basis of not being open to precreation.

Perhaps in the next edition of the Catholic Catechism they will get around to commenting on something you should have seen as fairly obvious … anal and oral sex are unnatural and against the natural law between anyone!

Whew! :coolinoff:

 

[Prodigal_Son]

PS This challenge has been issued before. The answer is - there are no such documents. The Church has never spoken on the matter or oral stimulation/foreplay. The prohibition on oral sex or anal sex to completion between married couples is also not doctrinally addressed (again, correct me if I’m wrong), but nonetheless is clearly prohibited on the basis of not being open to precreation.

Two things:

(1) Sodomy is a word, which has meant, for thousands of years, oral and anal sex.

(2) Sodomy is universally condemned by saints and theologians, throughout the centuries.

So I could give you tons of documents condemning sodomy. But sure, they wouldn’t talk about the details of sodomy, because these were intentionally taboo.

 

[underacloud]

And, pray tell, who are you to say that it’s natural just because it gives pleasure?

So does gluttony and drunkenness.

Gluttony and drunkeness are defined as sins by the Church. Oral stimulation is not.

Pleasure in sex is a God given gift to married couples. The pleasure of husband and wife, together, is part of the unitive aspect of sex. This is natural and intended by God. Oral stimulation can play a part in this. My conscience is completely clear on this matter. If your’s is not, then by all means do not commit an act that you fear is sinful.

That’s ultimately why it matters that I think it’s natural. Because the Church has not ruled one way or the other, I must follow my own conscience in this matter. I find it to be natural, to contribute to the unitive function of sex, to not deprive it of its procreative function, and that it does not contravene any other moral prohibitions. In short, I find there to be no sin whatsoever in it, between two loving spouses.

 

[Prodigal_Son]

To be clear, folks, the purpose of this thread is not to drag up old hobby horses about how oral/anal sex is/isn’t licit among married folks.

The purpose is to ask whether those who claim that these acts are permissible for married couples undermine our Catholic witness to the evil of homosexual activity (and sodomy in general). I, for one, would appreciate more discussion on *that *point.

 

[davidv]

Oral sex (covered under “sodomy”) is referred to as the “homosexual act”? That’s hardly plausible.

Why not?

 

[Charlemagne_III]

In short, I find there to be no sin whatsoever in it, between two loving spouses.

This is a typically Protestant approach to morality. You decide. Not God. Not nature.

YOU!

If the next edition of the Catholic Catechism condemns anal sex between married partners, will you submit? I guess not. You “find there to be no sin whatsoever in it.”

 

[davidv]

Let’s look at that reference (with my bolding):

That reference is clearly, as bolded by me, refering to relations between men or between women. It is not at all related to husbands and wives. By its very defitition, a husband and wife cannot even engage in a homosexual activity, and thus cannot be condemned for it.

Seems to me this misses the point. The CCC defines certain actions as intrinsically disordered. As disordered acts, it matter not who performs them. They can never be a moral act.

 

[underacloud]

Two things:

(1) Sodomy is a word, which has meant, for thousands of years, oral and anal sex.

(2) Sodomy is universally condemned by saints and theologians, throughout the centuries.

So I could give you tons of documents condemning sodomy. But sure, they wouldn’t talk about the details of sodomy, because these were intentionally taboo.

Sodomy is not that simple. It is a word that has been used to mean various things throughout history (legally and morally) and it remains unclear in many historical documents exactly what it does mean. Debate continues as to what the sins of the Sodomites were exactly. Some have used the terms to refer broadly to any sexual activity that is not procreative. In that sense, acts of foreplay are not what is being addressed; rather, any sex acts, between husband and wife, of unmarried people, or people of the same sex, that are closed to the possibility of procreation.

Regardless, you are the one contending that the teachings have changed, so you should provide the teachings that you think have changes so we can discuss them.

 

[underacloud]

This is a typically Protestant approach to morality. You decide. Not God. Not nature.

YOU!

No!

I’m happy to obey God. But His Church has not prohibited this.

I’m happy to follow the natural law, but quite simply I do not find this to contradict the natural law.

If the next edition of the Catholic Catechism condemns anal sex between married partners, will you submit? I guess not. You “find there to be no sin whatsoever in it.”

What a rude tone.

But to be clear - yes, I submit to all clear teachings of mother Church. I do not submit to the mere opinions of internet strangers.

 

[Prodigal_Son]

No, they’re guilty of sex outside marriage and against the order of nature.

I guess you can bite the bullet on that one, but I would have thought that those who use each other and then masturbate would have been just as guilty of sodomy as those who use each other to completion.

I’d like to see an authoritative reference for the bolded statement, including a definition of what the source document means by sodomy.

I don’t have time to find one. But it puzzles me how you could think it would be false. Read Shakespeare, or Dante, or Milton, or Aquinas, or whoever you like. They all have the same description of the Catholic church’s teaching on this. It was not unclear.

Moreover, “oral sex” is a confusing term. “Foreplay involving oral stimulation of the male / female genitals”, though clunky (at least verbally ) is perhaps more accurate. “Sodomy” in this context would be oral sex involving the male organ (“fellatio” if you will) to the point of ejaculation / climax. Note that oral sex involving the female genitalia has sort of slipped under the radar.

Well, the clerics weren’t as familiar – and if they were familiar, they sure as hell weren’t going to admit it!

“Concerning the sins of spouses in regard to the conjugal duty, ordinarily speaking, the confessor is not bound nor is it proper for him to interrogate, unless the wives bring it up, and then he may treat it in the most modest way possible…Regarding other matters, let him keep silent unless he has been asked.” (St. Alphonsus Liguori, quoted in the Response of the Sacred Penitentiary, June 8, 1842.) Source: Denzinger 2760.

Sounds vague to me. Isn’t the “conjugal duty” the duty to have sex a reasonable amount of the time?

I don’t think that if St. Liguori had a couple who admitted to regularly having full-on oral sex as foreplay, he would have “kept silent.”

This quote shows that:

• this debate is far older than Stonewall and Vatican II
• it was an issue of natural law and Divine prohibition, not “sodomy” on its own.

I’m puzzled. Surely things that are against natural law would be wrong even if they were not forbidden by God?

See above. Again, I’m not a moral theologian, and I don’t have all the answers (just a Denzinger ), so I’d welcome (name removed by moderator)uts from those who know better!

I’m a step down from you. I’m a secular philosopher!

 

[underacloud]

The CCC defines certain actions as intrinsically disordered. As disordered acts, it matter not who performs them. They can never be a moral act.

It merely refers to “homosexual acts” as being intrinsically disordered, which as addressed, are acts between homosexual persons.

 

[Amandil]

What point? This one:

If that’s your point, you should try to understand that you are begging the question here.

You can’t accuse me of trying to rationalise a sin that hasn’t first been demonstrated to be a sin.

I am all for avoiding sin. But I don’t go around avoiding every acticity that someone else chooses to label a sin, when the Church has not.

Not at all.

The fact that what you are doing is sinful comes from your attempts to rationalize it.

The fact that you’re committing semantics and pedantic is proof that you’re rationalizing it.

Sin does not cease to be sin just because it’s committed in the marriage bed.

Secondly, you’re arguing from silence.

Thirdly, the Catechism specifically states that fecundity is the end of marriage.

It has also taught that lust-sexual pleasure sought for itself, isolated from it’s unitive AND procreative purposes-and masturbation is in fact sinful.

We are called to the obedience of faith.

Instead you’re saying that we should act like a teenager who says, “my parents told me not to go to my friends house, but they didn’t say that I couldn’t go to the movies.”

 

[Prodigal_Son]

" Does the fact that Catholic married couples are now permitted to engage in various activities – including activities that were once considered sodomy, like oral stimulation – make it more difficult for us to provide a consistent witness to the sinfulness of homosexual acts?"

First, the Church itself has not put forth any canonical laws on what constitutes acceptable acts in a marriage, other than the man must finish inside of the woman. We have been given the guidance that sex is:

1. Within sacramental marriage
2. Must be unitave and open to life and
3. **Not objectifying the other person for self gratification. **

Item 3 relies on the consent of the heterosexual couple under item 1 and is none of my business.

Item 2 in regards to homosexual sexual relations is nor possible.

What happens in a sacramental marriage cannot be compared to homosexual acts of lust that are not procreative.

Don’t you think that some actions are intrinsically objectifying? I mean, suppose I were to use your elbow to paint a picture I wanted to paint. Even if you consented, wouldn’t that be using you as a mere object?

Indeed, our moral theology relies heavily on the idea that the creation of pornography is intrinsically objectifying, whether a person consents or not.

I myself ask, “Why would God have made homosexual actions incapable of being consistent with a marriage?” And I immediately think: because these actions are intrinsically objectifying. But if they are intrinsically objectifying for gay people, they must be objectifying for straight people too.

Maybe there’s some other answer, but I haven’t found it.

 

[davidv]

It merely refers to “homosexual acts” as being intrinsically disordered, which as addressed, are acts between homosexual persons.

Why do you think that is what it means?

What are the specific acts that are performed?

It can be easily deduced from the principles expressed in the theology of the body that it is not the nature of the actors that are the source of the disorder. It is the inherent nature of the acts.

 

[Prodigal_Son]

Why not?

Because most of the people who have oral sex are heterosexuals.

 

[davidv]

Because most of the people who have oral sex are heterosexuals.

So?

What does the sexual attraction of the actors have to do with whether the acts are disordered or not?

 

[Prodigal_Son]

Sodomy is not that simple. It is a word that has been used to mean various things throughout history (legally and morally) and it remains unclear in many historical documents exactly what it does mean. Debate continues as to what the sins of the Sodomites were exactly. Some have used the terms to refer broadly to any sexual activity that is not procreative. In that sense, acts of foreplay are not what is being addressed; rather, any sex acts, between husband and wife, of unmarried people, or people of the same sex, that are closed to the possibility of procreation.

Regardless, you are the one contending that the teachings have changed, so you should provide the teachings that you think have changes so we can discuss them.

Start with Dante’s Inferno. Go from there. It is historically insane to think that anal sex was ever thought by the Catholic Church to be morally licit for married couples before the Enlightenment.