From the Editor Emeritus / John F. Fink

Basic Catholicism: Sexual morality

(Fortieth in a series)

Sex is good. God created it good. He created men and women physically different so that they could unite in sexual activity and become two in one flesh.

Furthermore, he created us with extremely strong desires for sex to make sure that we would want to unite with one another. That is the method he planned for us to co-create the human race.

However, he made us different from the animals, who also engage in sexual intercourse in order to reproduce.

For humans, sexual intercourse is meant to be an act of love, an act of self-giving and receiving, an act that can be engaged in even when the woman is not fertile, an act that is licit only in a marriage between a man and a woman.

Modern society has rejected that idea. It began with the so-called “sexual revolution” in the 1960s, powered by the invention of the birth-control pill that made it possible for women to have sex with less fear of becoming pregnant.

What happened to morality when all this was going on? When did it suddenly become all right for non-married men and women to have sex? Today our society takes it for granted that sexual activity is part of dating. Our television situation comedies revolve around men and women having sex outside of marriage.

The Catholic Church, however, still teaches the virtue of chastity. It is a virtue that must be practiced by everyone, single and married. For the single person, it means no sexual activity of any kind—which, admittedly, is very difficult. For the married person, it means sexual activity only with your spouse.

Sexuality is more than just a physical act. Rather, it affects the whole person because of the unity of body and soul. We achieve chastity only through self-discipline, which can be a lifetime struggle because the sexual drive is powerful indeed.

It’s true that the Sixth Commandment says only, “You shall not commit adultery.”

Young single people have said to me, “I’m not committing adultery when I have sex with another single person.”

We believe, though, that this commandment forbids all sexual misbehavior. It is worded as it is to emphasize that sexual activity belongs in marriage and not outside it. Among the sins forbidden by this commandment are masturbation, fornication, pornography and homosexual acts.

Contrary to those TV situation comedies, sexual activity between unmarried persons is sinful. It is called fornication, which might seem an old-fashioned word, but it is an action that is meant for those in the committed bond of marriage.

Homosexuality is not wrong in itself and people with homosexual inclinations are not immoral. They must not be discriminated against.

However, homosexual acts are immoral. The Church calls them “intrinsically disordered” because “they close the sexual act to the gift of life. They do not proceed from a genuine affective and sexual complementarity” (Catechism of the Catholic Church, #2357). †