Sinful to use a vibrator?

[Prodigal_Son]

For starters,sex isn’t meant to be pleasurable.Really? I can’t imagine why anyone would bother if it weren’t meant to be enjoyed. Considering sex is designed to be an expression of love between a husband and wife.Procration is a natural consequence of the experience.They aren’t mutually exclusive.

My fault, Jeanne. I said, “they helped Catholic culture to forget the real meaning of sex, which has nothing to do with pleasure”.

The sentence is ambiguous between (1) the real meaning of sex is not related to pleasure, and (2) sex has nothing to do with pleasure.

I meant #1, not #2. My bad.

 

[Prodigal_Son]

Thank goodness that the vast majority of Catholics believe that it is an awesome thing in (almost) 2015 that sex is now more about and less about being pregnant every 18 months. IMHO, if vibrators and other sexual aides designed primarily for women are not acceptable, then that little blue pill, Viagra, and the hysterical double bathtub pill, Cialis (Sp), should also be banned. We all KNOW, that situation will never happen!. LOL!

I’m happy with banning those pills, for the record.

A question, kozlo: What is happening, in an ultimate sense, when two people have sex? What is the *significance *of this thing that happens?

 

[ToeInTheWater]

Prodigal Son, thank you for clarifying your comments, I think what you’re sounding makes more sense now.

The moral question, though, doesn’t have to do with whether I think less of a person for doing something. It has to do with whether doing that thing will make their lives more bountifully blessed and rich with virtue and wonder.

However, if doing something does NOT lead to the above, does that automatically mean it is sinful? One could use this argument to state, for example, that NFP is sinful because being providentialist will “make their lives more bountifully blessed”.

As emotional intimacy grew in my marriage, and as my wife felt safer and safer with me, she suddenly began to experience very powerful orgasms in the course of our lovemaking. If we had looked for “outside help”, in the form of vibrators and whatnot, I don’t think we would have ever gotten to the point we’re at now.

While I’m happy for you and your wife, I think it is a bit rash to jump to the conclusion that this is the case for ALL married couples. I can think of some medical conditions, for example, that would not lead to complete impotence, for example some cases of paraplegia where a man are still capable of having sex and fathering children, but would still be too disabled to take any “active” role in sex and make it very difficult for him to bring pleasure to his wife. That’s the kind of situation where I think use of a vibrator might be licit.

Now, could this result in the wife lusting, sure, but if we are supposed to refrain from all sexual acts that could result in lust, then it seems many wives who unfortunately have husbands who have sex with them merely out of lust would be licit in REFUSING sex, however I have never seen anyone claim the Church teaches this. Indeed, the Church teaches that even if one spouse is using contraception, the “innocent” spouse still has a duty to have sex and is not sinning themselves. (Unless you think that a wife who requests a husband use a vibrator is sinning, but the husband himself is not.)

Your comment about my imagination may be apt. And please note that I never said that women need to peak from intercourse alone. I said that vibrators shouldn’t be involved; that’s all.

Again, thanks for the clarification; from your apparent stance on the other topic that oral stimulation is not licit at all, much less to bring anyone to orgasm, plus the comments about vibrators, I had indeed gotten the impression that you thought the only licit way to procure orgasm was male-female intercourse.

Now, I agree that the use of a vibrator would be sinful if it leads to lust on part of the wife, or I suppose in part of the husband if he wants to see his wife orgasm not out of love, but out of lust because the sight would pleasure him. But this is a big IF. I’m sure this would be the case for many, perhaps most, couples. But I just don’t think your own experiences give you authority to say “this act is 100% sinful in every circumstance” the way you could say that about using pornography.

All this being said, I do think that some Christians and Catholics go too far in the opposite direction and think “the marriage bed is undefiled” means that “anything goes in the marriage bed”. Some people seem to think “it’s impossible to lust after one’s spouse” and I’ve seen some claim “God has ordained that marriage is the only licit source of sexual pleasure” (usually as a way to guilt spouses with a lower libido into having sex with the partner with the higher libido) and really do seem to think that having sex merely for pleasure is just fine as long as it takes place within marriage. I think this is wrong-headed as well.

 

[clem456]

Thank goodness that the vast majority of Catholics believe that it is an awesome thing in (almost) 2015 that sex is now more about ������ and less about being pregnant every 18 months. IMHO, if vibrators and other sexual aides designed primarily for women are not acceptable, then that little blue pill, Viagra, and the hysterical double bathtub pill, Cialis (Sp), should also be banned. We all KNOW, that situation will never happen!. LOL!

You set up straw men. For what???

Romance, pleasure, and the teaching of the Catholic Church are never at odds.

 

[Joie_de_Vivre]

And it’s fun for the man!

<moment of total embarrassment>

Seriously, lots of men just completely lack control, and lack the ability to please a woman. That was me, frankly, when I got married. I learned how to control *because *I loved my wife. Love comes first.

I have a feeling that guys wouldn’t view you as weird for enjoying touching breasts.

 

[Lost_Wanderer]

For point of comparison, scratching is extremely pleasurable, but I think it is bad for a person to scratch (though not, in every case, a matter of sin). Scratching makes a person want to scratch more. Seeking pleasure makes a person want pleasure more. Wanting pleasure more is a bad thing.

Whoa, whoa, whoa! First of all, your scratching example. I can’t say that’s entirely true. I’ve scratched my cheeks and parts of my nose dozens of times. There’s a certainly a threshold when the itch goes away.

Secondly, are you taking purely about pleasure here or just sexual pleasure? Because if yours is the Catholic position, I’d be in serious trouble even with my moderate gaming habits!

I mean, my sexual sins are bad enough in the eyes of the devout but I now my desire to spend hours playing trading cards and spending money on said cards just added to the pile? Really!?

 

[pnewton]

You will find nothing in Catholic doctrine that prohibits passion between the married.

The true answer to this question as with many applications of moral theology, since it is not forbidden by moral doctrine, then it remains the prerogative of the conscience. How this translates in the individual couple is of no one’s concern except that couple. In this sense, the priest did give the correct and only answer, even if it felt insufficient.

Likewise, there are posters here that will give ten different answers. What you will not find is documentation of an answer from Catholic teaching. Oh, there may be quotes on related topics that are pieced together to try and support an answer. Remember that it is the poster that pieces together that quilt, not the Church. If you find the reasoning compelling, then accept that. If not, follow your own conscience. That is what it is there for.

 

[Prodigal_Son]

Whoa, whoa, whoa! First of all, your scratching example. I can’t say that’s entirely true. I’ve scratched my cheeks and parts of my nose dozens of times. There’s a certainly a threshold when the itch goes away.

I’m glad you mentioned that. I didn’t mean to include those little scratches, where one can easily make the itch go away by scratching. I’m talking about chronic itch or eczema situations (which are quite common), where scratching just makes a thing itch more, sometimes much more.

Secondly, are you taking purely about pleasure here or just sexual pleasure? Because if yours is the Catholic position, I’d be in serious trouble even with my moderate gaming habits!

LostWanderer, for me to answer, I need to first step outside the Catholic Answers world where calling something a “sin” has some awful aura to it. For me, the question isn’t whether something is awful, but whether it is virtuous.

Does gaming make you a better person? Does it foster in you patience, love, peace, joy, courage, and temperance? If so, that’s wonderful. If not, ditch it.

Perhaps the pleasure of gaming plays a role in fostering such virtues – the pleasure in playing Pinochle or bowling helps me to grow in virtue. But if the *only *reason I play a game is pleasure, that’s a bad motivation – and it is proven bad because, if I *don’t *experience pleasure, I get emotionally frustrated.

For me, as a recovering porn addict, I often play Settlers of Catan online; it’s basically a rebound addiction. Do I do it for pleasure? A lot of the time, yes. Is that good? I don’t think so. Luckily, it can serve the purpose of helping me staying away from flirting with other pleasures. But then, what happens when the game is unavailable, or when the game frustrates me? Crutches can be good, but healing is the goal.

I mean, my sexual sins are bad enough in the eyes of the devout but I now my desire to spend hours playing trading cards and spending money on said cards just added to the pile? Really!?

Rome wasn’t built in a day. We start by getting the worst toxins out of our systems, and then we move to the lesser ones. God can use our desire for pleasure for good purposes. But a truly holy person – so far as I can tell – does not ever act for the sole purpose of experiencing pleasure.

I’m open to being proven wrong about this, but I have thought this out.

 

[Lost_Wanderer]

Perhaps the pleasure of gaming plays a role in fostering such virtues – the pleasure in playing Pinochle or bowling helps me to grow in virtue. But if the *only *reason I play a game is pleasure, that’s a bad motivation – and it is proven bad because, if I *don’t *experience pleasure, I get emotionally frustrated.

Okay here’s a little food for thought. How would you know pleasure if you didn’t experience the opposite (mainly boredom as well as frustration)? It’s the same, vice-versa. I can’t really see where there’s a middle-ground in that. Ultimately, you either enjoy something or you don’t.

And furthermore, this contrast between pleasure and displeasure can be what marks pleasure as an instrument of healing. For example, after a long tiring day from work, I set to a gaming schedule. One some days I play Hearthstone. Other times I play Monster Hunter. It might frustrate me when I lose or do something really stupid (brain, I said move my character right, not forward to the massive tailclub of pain). However, it makes it all the more pleasurable when I finally start making progress and pull off something awesome.

Obviously, you gotta have a strategy so you don’t bite off more than you can chew. But my main point is sometimes pain and frustration can amplify the satisfaction one gets from finally coming out victorious.

 

[Prodigal_Son]

Okay here’s a little food for thought. How would you know pleasure if you didn’t experience the opposite (mainly boredom as well as frustration)? It’s the same, vice-versa. I can’t really see where there’s a middle-ground in that. Ultimately, you either enjoy something or you don’t.

And furthermore, this contrast between pleasure and displeasure can be what marks pleasure as an instrument of healing. For example, after a long tiring day from work, I set to a gaming schedule. One some days I play Hearthstone. Other times I play Monster Hunter. It might frustrate me when I lose or do something really stupid (brain, I said move my character right, not forward to the massive tailclub of pain). However, it makes it all the more pleasurable when I finally start making progress and pull off something awesome.

Obviously, you gotta have a strategy so you don’t bite off more than you can chew. But my main point is sometimes pain and frustration can amplify the satisfaction one gets from finally coming out victorious.

Doesn’t the pain/frustration simply create a longing, which you then fulfill with pleasure? Is there a sort of pleasure that doesn’t require pain in order to obtain it?

I highly recommend you read Plato’s Gorgias, or Dostoevsky’s The Brothers Karamazov. You have the RIGHT idea when you talk about the joy of overcoming pain. But this joy should be experienced in genuinely accomplishing something of use in the world. Sometimes that something could be simply relaxation. But if you find yourself “relaxing” in this way for hours every day, you can rest assured that God is calling you to more.

 

[Prodigal_Son]

However, if doing something does NOT lead to the above, does that automatically mean it is sinful? One could use this argument to state, for example, that NFP is sinful because being providentialist will “make their lives more bountifully blessed”.

This is why I don’t find talking about “sin” particularly illuminating, in many cases. (Me and the Orthodox Church!) I find it more helpful to talk about three categories of things: (1) things that help me grow in virtue, and (2) things that make me less virtuous, and (3) things that are neutral.

Does refusing to use NFP make some people grow in virtue? Perhaps. In my case, using NFP has helped me grow in virtue. One has to evaluate these things honestly, in prayerful discernment. There aren’t many magic bullets to help discernment. Obviously, though, the notion of “mortal sin” is one such magic bullet, when correctly applied.

While I’m happy for you and your wife, I think it is a bit rash to jump to the conclusion that this is the case for ALL married couples. I can think of some medical conditions, for example, that would not lead to complete impotence, for example some cases of paraplegia where a man are still capable of having sex and fathering children, but would still be too disabled to take any “active” role in sex and make it very difficult for him to bring pleasure to his wife. That’s the kind of situation where I think use of a vibrator might be licit.

The tone of this question reminds me of a situation where a man was married to a famous chef, who would make amazing dinners every night. Then she had an accident, and is unable to cook anymore. Is he morally entitled to buy extremely expensive eat-in food from other cooks?

Sure he is. But that’s because food isn’t something that is *marital *in nature.

In my view, though, when a person orgasms because of a vibrator, the person who gives her pleasure is the designer of the vibrator. But **he **(or she) doesn’t belong in my marriage bed!

Now, could this result in the wife lusting, sure, but if we are supposed to refrain from all sexual acts that could result in lust, then it seems many wives who unfortunately have husbands who have sex with them merely out of lust would be licit in REFUSING sex, however I have never seen anyone claim the Church teaches this.

You need to distinguish between things that merely COULD result in lust, and things whose INTENT is to produce or satiate lust. Looking at a cute girl on the beach could result in lust, but it isn’t intrinsically wrong, because lust is not the reason the cute girl exists. Looking at pornography IS intrinsically wrong, because pornography’s purpose is to excite and satisfy lust. I think vibrators are like porn, in that way.

Again, thanks for the clarification; from your apparent stance on the other topic that oral stimulation is not licit at all, much less to bring anyone to orgasm, plus the comments about vibrators, I had indeed gotten the impression that you thought the only licit way to procure orgasm was male-female intercourse.

I never said that oral stimulation is not licit. I said that oral SEX is not licit. If you’re innocent enough not to know the difference, God bless you! But I know the difference, and the difference is very real. Could such acceptable stimulation licitly end in orgasm? I don’t think so. But it could certainly be part of a set of loving acts in the midst of lovemaking.

(I can’t be more specific without being overly graphic. Sorry.)

All this being said, I do think that some Christians and Catholics go too far in the opposite direction and think “the marriage bed is undefiled” means that “anything goes in the marriage bed”. Some people seem to think “it’s impossible to lust after one’s spouse” and I’ve seen some claim “God has ordained that marriage is the only licit source of sexual pleasure” (usually as a way to guilt spouses with a lower libido into having sex with the partner with the higher libido) and really do seem to think that having sex merely for pleasure is just fine as long as it takes place within marriage. I think this is wrong-headed as well.

I couldn’t agree more with this paragraph.

 

[Lost_Wanderer]

Doesn’t the pain/frustration simply create a longing, which you then fulfill with pleasure? Is there a sort of pleasure that doesn’t require pain in order to obtain it?

I highly recommend you read Plato’s Gorgias, or Dostoevsky’s The Brothers Karamazov. You have the RIGHT idea when you talk about the joy of overcoming pain. But this joy should be experienced in genuinely accomplishing something of use in the world. Sometimes that something could be simply relaxation. But if you find yourself “relaxing” in this way for hours every day, you can rest assured that God is calling you to more.

I had a pretty good response to this but had a hard time finding time so I know this is a little overdue.

What I’m simply saying is that the joy of overcoming trial has a lot more potency. You’re right, it’s not just limited to ‘simple pleasure’ but you’ve got to really define what goes beyond that.

And like I said, it’s also good to have a strategy where you don’t bite off more than you can chew. Besides, can’t you construe the same argument against struggling with lust? When you manage to finally overcome a vice that you think harms you, then you’ve accomplished what you’ve described: Pleasure of triumph geared towards a higher purpose.

However, that’s not just limited to overcoming vice. Learning is another example. If, say, I lose a couple times because my playstyle seems to be missing something, I wouldn’t know if I always succeeded. But once I’ve tasted failure, I now enjoy the feeling of success. There’s no point asking about learning about pleasure without pain. Because really, it’s hard to think there is a way. There’s really just more pleasure in putting the Rubik’s cube to rights than just seeing a block that’s mono-colored on each side from the very beginning.

 

[Prodigal_Son]

And like I said, it’s also good to have a strategy where you don’t bite off more than you can chew. Besides, can’t you construe the same argument against struggling with lust? When you manage to finally overcome a vice that you think harms you, then you’ve accomplished what you’ve described: Pleasure of triumph geared towards a higher purpose.

But if that’s the case, then shouldn’t I keep succumbing to lust, in order to obtain the pleasure of once again conquering it?

But once I’ve tasted failure, I now enjoy the feeling of success.

God can give us success without us having to taste failure. To deny that is to deny that Jesus was truly a man – since Jesus never tasted moral failure, nor did he taste any failures of virtue. Yes surely he delighted in virtue and righteousness.

 

[VeritasLuxMea]

For me, as a recovering porn addict, I often play Settlers of Catan online; it’s basically a rebound addiction. Do I do it for pleasure? A lot of the time, yes. Is that good? I don’t think so.

I mean no offense, but I don’t get what you’re saying here. Why is it per se a problem to enjoy a thing? Why is it a problem that you enjoy Settlers of Catan, for example? It would be better if you didn’t enjoy it? Or if you did enjoy it, but chose not to play it?

You need to distinguish between things that merely COULD result in lust, and things whose INTENT is to produce or satiate lust. Looking at a cute girl on the beach could result in lust, but it isn’t intrinsically wrong, because lust is not the reason the cute girl exists. Looking at pornography IS intrinsically wrong, because pornography’s purpose is to excite and satisfy lust. I think vibrators are like porn, in that way.

I find the use of the word lust problematic at times. It seems to me that it’s often backhandedly conflated with any kind of sexual pleasure at all, or if the sexual pleasure is “too good,” even by people who know what the Church teaches on the subject.
,

 

[Prodigal_Son]

I mean no offense, but I don’t get what you’re saying here. Why is it per se a problem to enjoy a thing? Why is it a problem that you enjoy Settlers of Catan, for example? It would be better if you didn’t enjoy it? Or if you did enjoy it, but chose not to play it?

It’s GREAT to enjoy things. I have no objection to enjoying things. I do have a problem with doing things *merely *because you enjoy them – especially if these things are not social in any meaningful way. Such activities tend to make a person more reliant on pleasure as a sort of addiction.

A good guide is this: does X activity make me energized and excited about my mission and my responsibilities in life? If so, X is a recreation, and it is purely good. If not, then X is an escape into pleasure, and it is at the very least concerning.

I’ve used Settlers of Catan both ways. Sometimes, it is truly a recreation to me, but sometimes it is something that pulls me away from my family, my job, my responsibilities, and my God. In these latter cases, I need to hate it, so that it does not become my god.

I find the use of the word lust problematic at times. It seems to me that it’s often backhandedly conflated with any kind of sexual pleasure at all, or if the sexual pleasure is “too good,” even by people who know what the Church teaches on the subject.
,

In my experience, lust has very little to do with sexual pleasure. Lust is a disposition, and sexual pleasure is an experience. The experience of sexual pleasure is never wrong in itself, only wrong (sometimes) because of its context.

 

[Lost_Wanderer]

But if that’s the case, then shouldn’t I keep succumbing to lust, in order to obtain the pleasure of once again conquering it?

Not necessarily. But that’s the thing, you’re arguing for pleasure without the price of knowing pain. Put in another way, if you’ve never had lust to begin with, would you really know the joys of being chaste in the same way a former porn addict might?

God can give us success without us having to taste failure.

To say that man doesn’t get success without failure is really a set up for more disappointment (as I personally can attest). And again, you’re not answering the question. How would you even know? How would you know it’s success? How would you know that something tastes good without knowing what won’t taste good? It’s two-way, vice-versa reality.

We’re not Jesus. Heartbreaking that may sound to you but that’s just fact. Moral failure isn’t the only type of failure there is either. For all you know, He might’ve tried to make a chair but didn’t like the first draft. That by itself fits the basic definition of a failure. There are also the many times where He may have failed to teach His disciples clearly. Doesn’t sound like a moral offense but it does point out the role that mistakes have in education.

 

[Matt2540]

I don’t think you’ll find any specific Church teaching on this particular question. This is something that would be left to the prudential judgment of the couple - perhaps in consultation with their spiritual director / confessor. In my opinion, there would be no issue as long as, at the end of the act, the man climaxes within his wife. Pope St. John Paul, in his theology of the body, stipulated that a man can certainly aid his wife in achieving orgasm, even AFTER he has climaxed himself - I don’t see why using a tool would be intrinsically wrong.

Can you kindly provide a citation for this?