Sterilization followed by confession?

[1ke]

Sweet. I was really looking at getting into bestiality at some point.

All of these things are immoral for the same reason.

To be used morally, our generative powers must be an act of marital intercourse ordered per se to both unity of the spouses and procreation. The elements cannot be separated or we are engaging in a disordered use of our generative powers.

It has been your argument that the Church is wrong and that these two elements can be separated. Therefore, you are arguing that all of the following are acceptable:

Fornication, adultery, contraception, masterbation, homosexual sex acts, polygamy, artificial conception (IVF, etc), prostitution, pornography, and other acts

 

[sw85]

What the heck is bestiality?

Fornication with animals.

Sweet. I was really looking at getting into bestiality at some point.

Your sarcasm is unwarranted. This is a grave matter; it ought not to be treated with vapid mockery.

As 1ke and I have pointed out, all of the Church’s teachings follow rationally from the same natural law basis. How do you rationalize rejecting that basis for one teaching and retaining it for the rest? You cannot – there is literally no way to do it. You reduce all of the Church’s teachings to a matter of personal taste and preference, whatever happens to coincide with whatever you’re feeling at the moment.

But our God is not a God of “feelings” or of vaguely-formed intuitions. He does not have feelings at all, which are simply states of physiological arousal, and He has no physiology to arouse. His love for us is a love of will, and of reason, because He is a rational God and we are made in His image in this respect. The law he has prescribed for us reflects the rationality of His nature.

Who is teaching others to sway to their way of thinking??

I still don’t understand how NFP is being open to life when the couple is DELIBERATELY not having relations during fertile times. That is not being open to life!!!

By that rationale, the elderly and infertile should never have sex. But that’s absurd and we all know it.

What matters is the objective procreative potential of the act. That is, objective – in principle – not with respect to various individual circumstances. And in principle (that is, as a general rule) procreation occurs because of ejaculation into the vagina.

Thus, each and every individual sex act must conform to the procreative nature of sex to be in accordance with natural law. This is where we derive our prohibition contraception, abortion, masturbation, withdrawal, etc.: they are contrary to and subversive of the procreation toward which the sexual act is ordered.

 

[1ke]

I still don’t understand how NFP is being open to life when the couple is DELIBERATELY not having relations during fertile times. That is not being open to life!!!

For the billionth time, that is not what the Church teaches.

 

[joclucsylv]

Sex with a beast. It follows from the paradigm that “God wouldn’t care if we ____” that God wouldn’t care if we have sex with a beast.

(Assuming that it’s with a consenting adult beast, I suppose. )

OMgosh!! That is gross lol!!

 

[vsedriver]

Who is teaching others to sway to their way of thinking??

I still don’t understand how NFP is being open to life when the couple is DELIBERATELY not having relations during fertile times. That is not being open to life!!!

because choosing ‘when’ you have relations has nothing to do with if the relations are moral. Having properly ordered sexual relations when infertile (such as after menopause or because of a physical or medical health caused infertility) is still moral. NFP puts no barrier between spouses and doesn’t alter fertility.

The couple is using God’s naturally created fertility cycle and since they are using God’s design, it still lets God have control over the creation of new life. The couple puts their trust in God and gives God control over their lives.

ABC says, man is in charge. It negates fertility or puts a barrier between the spouses. It is actively closed to life. ABC is telling God you don’t trust him and are going to take charge yourself. ABC breaks something that is not broken.

 

[KostyaJMJ]

Sex with a beast. It follows from the paradigm that “God wouldn’t care if we ____” that God wouldn’t care if we have sex with a beast.

(Assuming that it’s with a consenting adult beast, I suppose. )

Just to play devil’s advocate here. A beast is unable to give meaningful consent to any sexual activity. I know contraceptive sex and bestiality are both non-procreative but I’d like to believe there is a bit more than that separating us from sex with the family dog.

 

[sw85]

OMgosh!! That is gross lol!!

It is gross. But it’s gross because your intuition tells you it is (this is all disgust is – a visceral, if rational, reaction to perversion). And your intuition tells you it is because it is inherently contrary to the procreative purpose toward which the sexual act is ordered.

 

[Rence]

Who is teaching others to sway to their way of thinking??

I still don’t understand how NFP is being open to life when the couple is DELIBERATELY not having relations during fertile times. That is not being open to life!!!

The Church teaches that when a couple is using NFP to space out or avoid pregnancies, they are still open to life because they have done nothing to avoid the unitive property (by placing a chemical or physcial barrier to come between the couple). Also, being open to life means, if a “oops” happens, you welcome that pregnancy rather than end it unnaturally. Being open to life doesn’t mean you intend to get pregnant each and every time that you share the marital embrace, it means that if life comes of that embrace, you welcome it.

 

[joclucsylv]

All of these things are immoral for the same reason.

To be used morally, our generative powers must be an act of marital intercourse ordered per se to both unity of the spouses and procreation. The elements cannot be separated or we are engaging in a disordered use of our generative powers.

It has been your argument that the Church is wrong and that these two elements can be separated. Therefore, you are arguing that all of the following are acceptable:

Fornication, adultery, contraception, masterbation, homosexual sex acts, polygamy, artificial conception (IVF, etc), prostitution, pornography, and other acts

K…I always considered myself smart, but I don’t get that. So if I think ABC is ok then I think homosexuality is ok. This Catholic stuff gets more and more difficult to understand.

 

[sw85]

Just to play devil’s advocate here. A beast is unable to give meaningful consent to any sexual activity. I know contraceptive sex and bestiality are both non-procreative but I’d like to believe there is a bit more than that separating us from sex with the family dog.

One’s mother is capable of giving consent, though – can one have sex with her morally (provided she consents)?

Consent is immaterial. It is a necessary but insufficient precondition to the morality of the sexual act. What constitutes a moral sexual act is the extent to which it is ordered toward procreation.

At any rate, we use animals for all kinds of purposes. We don’t ask them to sign a release agreement any time we shear their wool or slaughter them for their meat or keep them as household pets for companionship and amusement.

 

[sw85]

K…I always considered myself smart, but I don’t get that. So if I think ABC is ok then I think homosexuality is ok. This Catholic stuff gets more and more difficult to understand.

They are equivalent in their disorder: both are contrary to the procreative nature of the sexual act.

 

[joclucsylv]

For the billionth time, that is not what the Church teaches.

LOL 1ke!! It’s what people on this board say. The church wants us to be open to life.

 

[Fran65]

What the heck is bestiality?

Believe me. You do not want to know.

 

[Rence]

Just to play devil’s advocate here. A beast is unable to give meaningful consent to any sexual activity. I know contraceptive sex and bestiality are both non-procreative but I’d like to believe there is a bit more than that separating us from sex with the family dog.

Uhm, yeah, good point Kostya

 

[1ke]

So if I think ABC is ok then I think homosexuality is ok.

Yes, that’s what I am saying. On what grounds do you say is it not OK?

The proper use of our generative faculties is a marital act that is ordered to unity and procreation. From that flows the disordered nature of homosexual sex acts.

But, since you reject this teaching of the Church, on what basis do you say homosexual sex acts are wrong?

 

[1ke]

LOL 1ke!! It’s what people on this board say. The church wants us to be open to life.

It may be what people say, but it isn’t what the Church teaches, and I’ve stated that at least 4 times on this thread alone.

“Open to life” is likely their own understanding of, or shorthand for, the teaching that to be used morally our generative powers must be an act of marital intercourse ordered per se to both unity of the spouses and procreation.

But that sort of statement is woefully imprecise and leads to exactly the type of confusion you have at present.

 

[1ke]

. What constitutes a moral sexual act is the extent to which it is ordered toward procreation.

And unity. Neither element can be separated.

Which is why rape transgresses the moral order as well.

 

[crazzeto]

I think this gets into what St Paul talked about with works of the law not being able to save you. The law of Jesus Christ (if you will) is essentially a law of love, it always has been from the start actually. The sacraments we do now, and the old rituals fundamentally are designed to reflect this law of love. Because of this, the sacraments have to be approched in truth, not as a mere work that must be done.

I think that on this basis, give n the description you provide the sacrament of reconciliation would have no effect. For it to have effect, the penetant needs to actually be penetant, you need to feel sorry for what you did.

So while by all appearances they may be canonically good, I don’t know that necessarly means they would actually be good with God. So I think ultimatly if this hypothedical person wanted to truely be in a good place with God, they would need to perform more introspection and seek out more help.

I know this last part is the part we’re not really debating or commenting on, and I"m not trying to start the debate. I’m just saying, that’s what it comes down to. This person has an incorrect view on this matter, and they should seek to understand why it is God (not the Catholic Church) teaches this is wrong.

 

[Bookcat]

The church wants us to be open to life.

Yes we are to be open to life…such is the Church teaching (which Ike accepts of course…I think there is a misunderstanding somewhere)…but what does that mean?

Does not exclude the moral practice of periodic continence (NFP)? No of course not…for NFP is open to life…

The Compendium of the Catechism which was issued not long ago by Pope Benedict XVI:

Here is what the Catholic Church teaches (in part)…Note each word.

1. What are the goods of conjugal love to which sexuality is ordered?

2360-2361
2397-2398

The goods of conjugal love, which for those who are baptized is sanctified by the sacrament of Matrimony, are unity, fidelity, indissolubility, and an openness to the procreation of life.

1. What is the meaning of the conjugal act?

2362-2367

The conjugal act has a twofold meaning: unitive (the mutual self-giving of the spouses) and procreative (an openness to the transmission of life). No one may break the inseparable connection which God has established between these two meanings of the conjugal act by excluding one or the other of them.

1. When is it moral to regulate births?

2368-2369
2399

The regulation of births, which is an aspect of responsible fatherhood and motherhood, is objectively morally acceptable when it is pursued by the spouses without external pressure; when it is practiced not out of selfishness but for serious reasons; and with methods that conform to the objective criteria of morality, that is, periodic continence and use of the infertile periods.

1. What are immoral means of birth control?

2370-2372

Every action - for example, direct sterilization or contraception - is intrinsically immoral which (either in anticipation of the conjugal act, in its accomplishment or in the development of its natural consequences) proposes, as an end or as a means, to hinder procreation.

vatican.va/archive/compendium_ccc/documents/archive_2005_compendium-ccc_en.html

 

[KostyaJMJ]

I think that on this basis, give n the description you provide the sacrament of reconciliation would have no effect. For it to have effect, the penetant needs to actually be penetant, you need to feel sorry for what you did.

We keep on going back and forth between “you need to have this feeling” to “repentance isn’t a feeling but an act of the will.”

It is about as clear as mud for me.

I can understand deciding, “I’ve decided the Church is right and I am wrong and I am going to arrange my life as if I wish I had never been sterilized.”

I can’t understand deciding, “I feel really bad about getting sterilized and I really feel my life would be better if I hadn’t”

I can understand a person who is sterilized feeling relief that they don’t have to worry about a pregnancy and being happy they can still have sex with their spouse. I’d hope that feeling doesn’t have to go away before they can receive reconciliation.

I think the one thing that attracts Catholics to sterilization above other methods of contraception is that it is a one and then done kind of deal. You can get a vasectomy confess the very same day, and then be done with it. Other methods require living with a guilty conscience.