33. Refusing the marriage duty
In 1 Corinthians 7:3-5, we read, “The husband should fulfill his marital duty to his wife, and likewise the wife to her husband. The wife does not have authority over her own body but yields it to her husband. In the same way, the husband does not have authority over his own body but yields it to his wife. Do not deprive each other except perhaps by mutual consent and for a time, so that you may devote yourselves to prayer. Then come together again so that Satan will not tempt you because of your lack of self-control.”
The duty of a married couple is to participate in intercourse with one another whenever it is reasonably asked for. To refuse one’s spouse a reasonable request to participate in the act of sexual intercourse is to commit a mortal sin. Both spouses of the marriage have a right to intercourse. Such a right was received on the wedding day.
When a spouse is denied intercourse on an ongoing basis, such can give rise to other sins or severe temptations. Examples of such sins are adultery, masturbation, separation, divorce, anger and/or drunkenness. There are occasions when a spouse can refuse the marriage duty. Examples are when the person asking for intercourse is drunk, in the case of illness, when there is danger to an unborn child or similar valid reasons.
Both partners in a marriage should be considerate of the other one’s sexual needs. It is inappropriate for one spouse to always have to insist on his marital rights.
When one partner denies the other the right to intercourse, that person is no longer open to the procreation of children, such action being contrary to a sacramental marriage as instituted by God.
34. Same Sex marriage
Marriage, as instituted by God, is a faithful, exclusive, lifelong union of a man and a woman joined in an intimate community of life and love. They commit themselves completely to each other and to the wondrous responsibility of bringing children into the world and caring for them. The call to marriage is woven deeply into the human spirit. Man and woman are equal. However, as created, they are different from but made for each other. This complementarity, including sexual difference, draws them together in a mutually loving union that should be always open to the procreation of children (C.C.C. # 1602-1605).
Same-sex union contradicts the nature of marriage: It is not based on the natural complementarity of male and female; it cannot cooperate with God to create new life; and the natural purpose of sexual union cannot be achieved by a same-sex union. Persons in same-sex unions cannot enter into a true conjugal union. Therefore, it is wrong to equate their relationship to a marriage.
35. Separating and refusing the marriage debt
There are those who interchange the “Marriage Debt” with the “Conjugal Rights” as explained above under “Refusing the marriage duty.” Refusing the Marriage Debt has nothing to do with denying sex to one’s spouse.
Refusing the marriage debt is observed in two different situations, first during marriages, and then following the separation of the spouses. In the Sacrament of Marriage, the spouses have an obligation to financially manage the basic needs of each member of the family. To withhold earned money from one spouse, be it in retaliation for being denied sex, because of limited visitations after separation, as a refusal to pay for the mortgage of the home that houses the children, such actions are mortal sins. They oppose charitable christian behaviour.
36. Sex Change
In 2000, the Vatican pronounced that transsexualism “does not exist.” The document concluded that “sex-change” procedures do not change a person’s gender in the eyes of the church. If a person was naturally born a male, he remains a male; if a person was naturally born a female, she remains a female. Catholics who have undergone “sex-change” procedures are not eligible to marry. To undergo a sex change is viewed as sinful in marriage because it goes against the law of nature that calls the married couple to procreate.
37. Sodomy has its origin in the Book of Genesis of the Holy Bible where it is mentioned that Sodom and Gomorrah were destroyed because of the behaviour of homosexuality which was viewed as a “deviation.” Hence the English word “Sodomy” is used to describe laws associated with sexual “crime against nature”, namely anal sex, either homosexual or heterosexual.
Accordingly, it can be said that any sexual act that is not intended for the creation of new life is viewed in the Catholic Church as sodomy because of its perversion of the gift to bring life.
Referring to such unnatural acts, Saint Paul states in the Letter to the Romans, “Because of this, God gave them over to shameful lusts. Even their women exchanged natural relations for unnatural ones. In the same way the men also abandoned natural relations with women and were inflamed with lust for one another. Men committed indecent acts with other men, and received in themselves the due penalty for their perversion.” [Romans 1:26]
38. Sterilization
This involves any medical technique, applied by a male or female, that intentionally leaves a person unable to reproduce. In 1968, Pope Paul VI released the Encyclical Letter Humanae Vitae (Latin, “Human Life”), which reemphasized the Church’s constant teaching that it is always intrinsically wrong to use contraception to prevent new human beings from coming into existence.
Contraception is “any action which, either in anticipation of the conjugal act [sexual intercourse], or in its accomplishment, or in the development of its natural consequences, proposes, whether as an end or as a means, to render procreation impossible” (Humanae Vitae 14). This includes sterilization, condoms and other barrier methods, spermicides, coitus interruptus (withdrawal method), the Pill, and all other such methods.
Sterilization is condemned by the Catholic Church.
39. Suicide
“Everyone is responsible for his life before God who has given it to him. It is God who remains the sovereign Master of life. We are obliged to accept life gratefully and preserve it for his honor and the salvation of our souls. We are stewards, not owners, of the life God has entrusted to us. It is not ours to dispose of.” [C.C.C. # 2280]
“Suicide contradicts the natural inclination of the human being to preserve and perpetuate his life. It is gravely contrary to the just love of self. It likewise offends love of neighbor because it unjustly breaks the ties of solidarity with family, nation, and other human societies to which we continue to have obligations. Suicide is contrary to love for the living God.” [C.C.C. # 2281]
40. “Therapeutic” Abortion
On July 10, 2009, the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith issued a statement confirming that so called “therapeutic” abortion “has not been and can never be” accepted as Catholic teaching. Numbers 2270 to 2273 of the Catechism of the Catholic Church reinforces this teaching.
The Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith explains that two “very different circumstances” can be involved in some medical treatments aimed at preserving the health of the mother. “On the one hand, an intervention that directly provokes the death of a fetus, sometimes inadequately called ‘therapeutic’ abortion, which can never be licit since it is the direct murder of an innocent human being; and on the other hand an intervention not abortive in itself which can have, as collateral consequence, the death of the child.”
The condemnation of therapeutic abortion is a condemnation of those who promote that rape is a reason to justify an abortion.
41. Tubal Ligation
This is a surgical procedure for sterilization in which a woman’s fallopian tubes are clamped and blocked, or severed and sealed, either method of which prevents eggs from reaching the uterus for fertilization. Tubal ligation is considered a permanent method of sterilization and birth control.
Page 1 2 3 4 5 6 7
Page 1 2 3 4 5 6 7
No comments:
Post a Comment