Would
you say that sex exists primarily for procreation and family not any kind
of self-fulfillment? The pleasure aspect of sex being an accidental part
of procreation used primarily for ego-building?
 ot exactly. First of all, it should
be understood that Holy Matrimony is an act of
service to God, not a form of
romantic fulfillment. Sexual union can be an
important element in the context of that service. The real issue is whether
sexual activity is used to join the man and woman
together in their mutual love for God or as a
perversion [1]
in which they use sensory satisfaction in an attempt to fill up their emotional
emptiness.
So how do you tell the
difference?
Well, consider for a moment the
case of alcohol. Alcohol can be used socially, in a non-defensive way, with
proper boundaries (never drink alone, never drink to intoxication, etc.).
It can also be used as a perversion. Imagine the man, for example, who drinks
heavily yet denies that he is an alcoholic and
asserts that he can control his drinking if he wants. How do you tell whether
he is an alcoholic? Just tell him to stop drinking completely for a month.
If he refuses, or if he fails, then you know that he uses alcohol
defensively, because the proof is in his
unwillingness to do without it.
In a similar way, sexual activity
can be used in Holy Matrimony as an expression of love, but it can just as
well be a perversion. How do you test this? Just see what happens when
procreation becomes an issue. If a couple wants to have sexual contact but
doesn’t want the risk of pregnancy, then tell them to refrain from sexual
activity when the woman is fertile. If they refuse, but instead insist on
some form of artificial birth control, then you know the sexual activity
is a perversion and a denial of family. But
if they agree, then you know that for the sake of
love they can do without sexual contact as easily
as they can do with it for the sake of love.
___________
1. For the present purposes, a perversion
can be defined as that which leads you away from the true depths of your
emotional pain—and from the psychological healing that could happen
if you were to work therapeutically with that pain—by distracting you
with something apparently pleasurable.
What the
Catechism of the Catholic Church says:
2360 Sexuality
is ordered to the conjugal love of man and woman. In marriage the physical
intimacy of the spouses becomes a sign and pledge of spiritual communion.
Marriage bonds between baptized persons are sanctified by the sacrament.
2361 Sexuality,
by means of which man and woman give themselves to one another through the
acts which are proper and exclusive to spouses, is not something simply
biological, but concerns the innermost being of the human person as such.
It is realized in a truly human way only if it is an integral part of the
love by which a man and woman commit themselves totally to one another until
death.
2363 The
spouses’ union achieves the twofold end of marriage: the good of the
spouses themselves and the transmission of life. These two meanings or values
of marriage cannot be separated without altering the couple’s spiritual
life and compromising the goods of marriage and the future of the family.
The conjugal love of man and woman thus stands under the twofold obligation
of fidelity and fecundity.
  
DID MY WORK help you? Have you found
insight into your behavior? Have you found information unlike anywhere else?
Then why not make a Quick & Easy donation to this freewill website
to express your gratitude for my labor in creating something substantial,
something that can change your life for the better?
|
|
|
Huh? Donations? Freewill
website?