User:Jmklug16/sandbox

The Catholic Church offers a very coherent definition on homosexuality in its Catechism of the Catholic Church. The Church writes,“homosexuality refers to relations between men or between women who experience an exclusive or predominant sexual attraction toward persons of the same sex.” (CCC 2357) Throughout time homosexuality has taken many forms and its psychological beginnings are still unexplainable, due to ever changing cultural trends. We know that it does not arise from faulty parenting, which is a stereotype attributed to Freud about some distant father, or smothering mother. Pope Benedict XVI speaks on homosexuality and natural law saying, “for many today natural moral law is almost incomprehensible due to a concept of nature that is no longer metaphysical, but only empirical.The fact that nature, being itself, is no longer a transparent moral message creates a sense of disorientation that renders the choices of daily life precarious and uncertain.” When we look at the vast plan of creation of animals both rational and non-rational, they have a metaphysical design to unite with that of the same species but of the opposite sex in order to reproduce. This is a precept of natural law known as self-preservation written by Thomas Aquinas. As Aquinas writes in The Summa Theologiae question ninety-four article two, “there are things which belong to natural law, which nature has taught to all animals, such as intercourse and education of offspring.” This being said, the natural reason for intercourse is for the sake of reproduction, and reproductive intercourse is not a possibility in that of homosexual concupiscence. Pope John Paul II affirms this in his book Love and Responsibility. He writes, "marriage works for the end of procreation, to sustain a future generation, family, and a continual maturing of a relationship between two people in all areas, the nuptial bond included. By this act of self gift does this allow one to love the other fully and not use them for their own end as an object." Male and female are complementary to each other, needing the opposite sex to continue to replenish itself through natural selection. This being said, those that are rational and choose, by a rational grasp of our nature, and not what is biologically determined, empirical inclinations to the same sex are not listening to the beauty in which their body speaks and reveals to them through their nature. Pope John Paul II tells us, that through our experiences of reality we can come to know that something exists with an existence that is real and objectively independent of the cognizing subject and the subject's cognitive act. This supports Benedict's remark, in that there is a metaphysical design for the human body. We are created in the image of God, as His sons and daughters, and to act in opposition to or to manipulate this reality is to reject the very basis of human existence. If this aspect of sexual desire cannot be harnessed, according to the Catholic Church, one should practice the virtue of chastity. "Chastity is the ability to transcend erotic reactions that develops in the attractions of each other. This helps one to view the other as more than an object to be used for their own pleasure, but as a person who deserves love." Chastity is a virtue that the Catholic Church advises all to practice in all stages of life. It should not be confused with celibacy, which is not only the fulfillment of chastity but the refraining from all sexual activity. Celibacy is only for those who are called to such an act. For those that are practicing this virtue of celibacy are an eschatological sign of what is to come, our true home in heaven.