Week 8
Purity of Heart: Tackling Tough Issues
“This is my command: Love one another as I love you.” John 15:12
“It should cause no surprise that the church, and less than her Divine Founder, is destined to be a ‘sign of contradiction.’” (Luke 2:34) Humane Vitae
1. What is a sacrament? It is a physical sign that points to a spiritual reality. It can also convey God’s grace
2. There are 2 parts: the US to GOD and the GOD to US
4. Sexual union, the two becoming “one flesh” makes visible the invisible mystery of God’s Love…this is huge!
5. God created sex to point to who He is: a communion of persons. God created sex to image His love with us (showing us that His plan is to be united to us forever…) and to give us grace
6. God says His love is FREE, TOTAL, FAITHFUL, FRUITFUL and he showed us by dying on the cross. Where do we also see this definition of love?
7. What is the main reason for abstaining from sex until marriage? Sex is meant to say the wedding vows with the body. Every time a married couple has sex, they are renewing their wedding vows! Our bodies speak a spiritual language and not only can they tell the truth, but they can also lie…This is why sex out of marriage is lying with our bodies
8. What is the purpose of dating?
9. How are dating and courtship different?
Tackling the Tough Issues
1. Tonight we will be talking about the “tough issues” when it comes to dating and relationships. My purpose is to present the truth and, knowing what I do from TOB, I will be held accountable by our Lord if I leave out the tough stuff just to be liked.
2. The great thing is that this is not what I am saying – this is what the Church says. I have not been and will not be presenting my own ideologies, even though I give examples from my own life.
3. I will say, however, that through TOB I have seen people who disagree with the Church on a lot of issues around sexuality be transformed and set free by what She teaches.
4. Just as we’ve mentioned before, the Church doesn’t have rules just to have them. It’s because She possesses the truth, and I think we’ve all seen that over these past 7 weeks
5. If the Church has spoken so openly and beautifully about sex and it’s purpose (and we’ve seen a lot of hurt in this world in people who do the opposite), then She will also be open about the issues that cause so much division and even confusion around sex
At the root of it all…
1. There is one piece of reason at the root of…
2. We have talked about the reasons why sex and relationships were created and now it’s time to talk about the purpose of sex
3. There are two purposes of sex…but before we get into those let’s use a little analogy to understand them better
4. There are two purposes for eating – pleasure and nutrition. If you take away one of the purposes of eating, you end up with an eating disorder.
5. There are two purposes for sex – union and procreation. Similarly, if you take away one of the purposes of sex, it becomes “disordered”
6. Let’s look at some of the ways sex has become disordered…
Abortion
1. Revelation 12:6 --> Satan is waiting to "devour the child..."
2. We’ve looked at the analogy between the Trinity and the union between a man and a woman. We’ve seen how the Holy Spirit is the Love produced by the Father and the Son and how children represent the love produced by a man and a woman
3. Satan hates children, he hates life! For every child that dies in abortion, it is one less person to worry about influencing the world for the good
4. Abortion removes the procreation purpose from sex
5. This is only a brief overview of the effects of abortion. In October we had an awesome speaker here talk even more in depth
6. Abortion is one of the most common surgical procedures in the world, but the average person knows almost nothing of its gruesome reality
7. Every 20 seconds a child is murdered by abortion, in our country alone
8. It quietly destroys over 4,000 innocent human beings a day in the U.S. and 130,000 a day worldwide. It is a silent holocaust...
9. We can talk about all the statistics we want, but let’s get to the reasons why people have and say there should be legal abortion
10. Reasons women have abortion: 3/4 say that having a baby would interfere with work, school or other responsibilities; about 3/4 say they cannot afford a child; and 1/2 say they do not want to be a single parent or are having problems with their husband or partner
11. I though abortion was made legal for privacy and health reasons only???
12. Some argue that women should be able to have abortions because of endangerment to heath in pregnancy, rape, and incest.
13. Women who have been abused in incest are often forced to have an abortion to cover up the sexual abuse. Women who’ve been raped think an abortion will bring them closure, but it often increases the pain. And let’s look at a new Saint who gave her life in childbirth for her unborn daughter…
14. Late-term and Partial Birth abortions are extremely gruesome and if people actually knew what happened, many hearts would be changed
15. We must get educated, we must NOT be silent, we must be a support to pregnant women who feel like they have no choice, we must act in whatever way God calls us because being silent about abortion is worst thing we could do…
16. Just to think about: if murder is illegal and we can show it on TV, why can’t we show an abortion, which is legal? What is it that they don’t want us to know?
17. Finally, we MUST be a support to women who are pregnant and also to spread the Good News about Sex in order that people don't get themselves in situations that go against God's plan and purpose for sex.
Homosexuality
1. First I will argue this topic without using God or Faith to show you that the reason God gave us is enough to understand this tough issue. And since there has been much contention over Same-Sex "marriage" these days, let's start there.
2. Definitions:
·Marriage: 1)the state of being united to a person of the opposite sex as husband or wife in a consensual and contractual relationship recognized by law
2) an intimate or close union
·Union: an act or instance of uniting or joining two or m ore things into one
·*This is important for understanding why homosexuals cannot enter into marriage or civil unions.
3. Every person, whether heterosexual or homosexual, is subject to legal restrictions as to whom they may marry.
·While every individual person is free to get married, no person, whether heterosexual or homosexual, has ever had a legal right to marry simply any willing partner.
·The fundamental "right to marry" is a right that rests with individuals, not with couples. Homosexual individuals already have exactly the same "right" to marry as anyone else. Marriage license applications do not inquire as to a person's "sexual orientation."
4. Marriage is not a way of simply recognizing people who love each other and want to spend their lives together.
a. If love and companionship were sufficient to define marriage, then there would be no reason to deny “marriage” to unions of a child and an adult, to roommates who have no sexual relations, or to groups rather than couples.
b. Love and companionship are usually considered integral to marriage in our culture but they are not sufficient to define them as an institution
5. Even adding a sexual relationship to love and companionship does not constitute it as “marriage.”
c. The Supreme Court, in Lawrence vs. Texas, ruled that sodomy laws are unconstitutional. Ironically, the Court’s ruling that sex need not be (legally) confined to marriage undermine any argument that sex alone is a defining characteristic of marriage. There must be something more.
6. So, what IS marriage?
d. Homosexual relationships cannot be reasoned as “marriage” by fact of natural law. That is, they do not fit the minimum necessary condition for a marriage to exist – namely, a physical union
e. Indeed, the facts that a child cannot reproduce, that close relatives cannot reproduce without risk, and that it only takes one man and one woman to reproduce, are among the reasons why people are barred from marrying a child, a close blood relative, or a person who is already married. Concerns about reproduction are central to those restrictions on one's choice of marriage partner--just as they are central to the restriction against "marrying" a person of the same sex.
7. Homosexuality removes both the unitive and procreative purposes of sex
8. Now for the reasoning by FAITH:
*The three persons of the Trinity make ONE God
*This is why God made men and women: to image the Trinity
*Men and Women can come together, in their bodies, to image God
*Two men and Two women cannot be physically united and cannot image God with their “acts” (What they “do” is not sex. Sex is a union.)
*God’s love is Free, Total, Faithful and Fruitful, and our love is called to be the same
*We profess these “vows” (to be Free, Total, Faithful and Fruitful) in the marriage rite; Homosexual acts can be “argued” they are “free and faithful”, but they are not fruitful or total. They cannot bear children through the natural sexual act and they are not giving of themselves totally. (Studies also will show that a majority homosexual relationships are not faithful)
9. What should we do if we know someone who is homosexual or we feel these tendencies ourselves?
10. First of all, distinctions must be made:
Homosexual Desire: the “desire” to be with someone of the same gender: not a sin
Homosexual Act: acting out the desire: is considered a sin
11. Second, know that we all have crosses to bear and there are always people to help us
12. COURAGE: a group of homosexual Catholics who support each other in the sincere effort to be chaste and live faithfully to the Church, and tries to conform human lives to the teaching of Christ’s Church
- The main argument for homosexuality is that people are "born" with same-sex attraction.
- In all actuality, people are no more born with same-sex attractions as they are born alcoholic or are born depressed
- Homosexuality is ultimately a choice
- Using alcoholism as an example, people don't necessarily "choose" to become alcoholic. However, there is usually a trigger that sets off the alcoholism in a person: abuse, bad relationships, the wrong situations, etc.
- Ultimately the alcoholic does have a choice: to continue drinking because it feels good or to turn from his disordered habits and choose what it true, good, and beautiful
- The same is for those with homosexual tendencies. There are triggers that set off same-sex attractions. People don't choose to be homosexual out of the blue.
- Once same-sex attractions are realized, it is KEY that the person look back on his or her life to identify the triggers to see how this has manifested in their life
- The Catholic Church is not oppressive when it comes to the Truth that homosexuality is "disordered" (Disorder is not of the right order, going against Natural Law)
- In fact, following what Romans 12:6 has to say, She wants us to live the most happy and fulfilling life as possible, with Christ as our center!
- People with same-sex attractions are called to live a chaste life. This may sound oppressive, however, it is actually one of the most freeing ways to live
- Here is what COURAGE has to say:
This antagonism is heard so often that many Church people half believe it and think the Church condemns and excludes people with homosexual feelings. Young people especially begin to think their Church is cruel, which is tragic because they start to distrust the Church on other matters. First of all, no one is condemned or excluded by Catholic teaching or policy for homosexuality. And secondly, the Church is not singling out any one type of sexual sin. The Church says adultery, polygamy, and any other form of sexual activity outside the marriage of a man and a woman are all harmful and wrong. And that’s the Church’s job, to be a lighthouse and guide us away from dangerous waters. The Church’s sole mission is to lead people to salvation. In fact, by guiding all people to chastity, the Church saves countless lives which would otherwise be lost to AIDS. The failure rate for condoms in preventing HIV infection for "gay" (and "straight") sex is extremely high. Seeing those harms and many others, the Church must speak. Love demands it.
Please visit COURAGE for more information.
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