Rule 5 Thursday
Because I figure it’s high time I at least pretend to be making an effort to drive a bit more traffic to the ol’ blog here.
Item 1: It’s nice to see that natural family planning is gaining some ground in secular circles, and that it’s being promoted as an alternative to the pill therein.
Item 2: This is anecdotal, but it kind of relates to natural family planning (and thus, the above item). Apparently, according to what my wife told me last night, schools are finally getting around to updating their sex education programs to not teach that ovulation happens on or about the 14th day of a woman’s cycle. Or, at least, not necessarily.
Which is a fact that many practitioners of NFP know, of course. Ovulation can happen pretty much any time — from right after menstruation to right before it (though I’m led to believe that there is a statistical average, which is probably where the “14th day” bollocks was derived from).
Which, in turn, got me thinking. We teach kids about birth control anyway…why not teach them about NFP in their sex ed classes as well? And no, I’m not saying this as the Catholic looking to impose his values on everyone…I’m musing on a practicality. I mean…we were teaching girls (and guys) about when ovulation happens anyhow, so why not teach girls something like the Billings Ovulation Method so that they can actually know and track when ovulation happens, if they are interested in so doing?
That’s the thing about NFP. Yeah, it’s “church approved birth control”…but it’s also more than that; it’s just a great way to track a particular natural cycle of the female body. If you’re trying to get pregnant or avoid becoming pregnant, it can be a highly useful tool to make use of…but it can also serve to indicate health problems.
If girls really want to understand their cycles, it is far and away the best tool out there for them to make use of, whether or not they also want to use it as a method of birth control. Using NFP, a girl can know exactly when she ovulates, or if she ovulates twice in one cycle (which can happen)…and she can develop a keen understanding of the rhythm of her cycle at the same time. And if that rhythm should suddenly change in some noticeable way, she can have advance warning of potential health problems as well.
So really: why aren’t we teaching this in schools, instead of this silly “14 days” nonsense?
You know, you gotta wonder (sometimes) if a part of the burgeoning teen pregnancy problem doesn’t have to do with exactly this sort of misinformation ending up as part of the curriculum? I honestly think that if something like the Billings method were taught in sex ed classes, instead of just tossing out a stupid and meaningless number, we’d see a sharp drop in the number of teen pregnancies.
Item 3: This is more of a theological gripe, but I really, really hate the scourge that is radical private interpretation of Scripture, especially as applied to sexual matters.
To wit:
I have been praying and looking through the bible. And all I can say is you are right! Masturbation is not a sin.
I have been using bible gateway for my searches and have looked through ALL the translations on the site! I couldn’t find one thing in the bible! NOT ONE THING!
Looking for the word “masturbation” in the Bible will get you nowhere; the term is nowhere to be found in Scripture’s pages. Which is not really a surprise; it’s a modern term for what was classically called “self abuse.” Which in turn was a rather obfuscating term, and not particularly helpfully so.
But really, if you want to play that game, Scripture is not plainspoken on the matter of abortion either, and yet we know that to be a grave sin. Scripture is not plainspoken on the matter of heterosexual anal sex, and yet we know that to be a sin as well. Scripture is not plainspoken on the matter of cybersex, but we know that to be a sin as well.
Or, at least, I hope we know such things, and can recognize them to be sinful.
But lest you think our erstwhile Protestant friend is done playing the part of the fool:
Plus I was talking to the same friend and he said, that looking at and making art of nude people or photos isn’t sinful, it is lusting after them! Or else what doctors, nurses, parents and so on, do would be sinful! Same with masturbation It isn’t the act it is the lustful thoughts that sometimes and can even usually come along with it.
Yes, but let’s connect the dots here. You look at a nude photo and masturbate while doing so…and yet are not lusting? Ditto, if one views a nude photo and then goes and masturbates thereafter, even if one does not bring said photo along for the occasion.
Methinks John Zmirak would have a field day with such a concept.
And even if we grant that masturbation is not itself a sin…shouldn’t masturbation be avoided because it, at minimum, constitutes an occasion of sin per the above speaker’s argument?
Sadly, he continues:
My parents agreed sorta, they said masturbation is NOT anything wrong or anything bad, it is like fire. It can be good and usefull, but it can also be dangerous, leading or usually experiencing lustful thoughts during it, especialy at a young age.
But it’s not a sin or anything, remember! Cripes.
Praying of course revealed no revelation about it being sinful either, just made me realize I to readily switched my opinion based off of some things other people sayed and things I thought!
So the end result is you are right, masturbation isn’t sinful. It isn’t sexual so it isn’t sexual imoral…
Direct, deliberate stimulation of the sexual organs, in a manner intended to replicate the motion experienced during sexual intercourse, in order to produce orgasm (the pleasurable sensation chiefly associated with Sex)…isn’t sexual?
…it doesn’t degrade the quality of sex but studies show that it increases the quality…
Because we all know that the quality of the experience is the principal moral determinant. A bad buzz off a run of cheap Cocaine is a sin, but a sweet, sweet high off of some high-grade Columbian blow is just a-ok!
…and you can think pure thoughts during masturbating or when choosing to do so.
Yeah…but who does?
The bible doesn’t say anything against it so it isn’t sinful and the fact that it is pleasurable and increases pleasure at the same time, makes masturbation a pretty good thing.
I really, really hope this post was intended as satire, but I really, really get the feeling that it wasn’t written as such.
It’s worth noting the Church’s position on the matter:
2351 Lust is disordered desire for or inordinate enjoyment of sexual pleasure. Sexual pleasure is morally disordered when sought for itself, isolated from its procreative and unitive purposes.
2352 By masturbation is to be understood the deliberate stimulation of the genital organs in order to derive sexual pleasure. “Both the Magisterium of the Church, in the course of a constant tradition, and the moral sense of the faithful have been in no doubt and have firmly maintained that masturbation is an intrinsically and gravely disordered action.” “The deliberate use of the sexual faculty, for whatever reason, outside of marriage is essentially contrary to its purpose.” For here sexual pleasure is sought outside of “the sexual relationship which is demanded by the moral order and in which the total meaning of mutual self-giving and human procreation in the context of true love is achieved.”
To form an equitable judgment about the subjects’ moral responsibility and to guide pastoral action, one must take into account the affective immaturity, force of acquired habit, conditions of anxiety or other psychological or social factors that lessen, if not even reduce to a minimum, moral culpability.
I think the important point to stress here is the text which I have bolded: the sexual faculty of the human person is ordered, by its very design, toward the conjugal and fecund love between husband and wife; any use of this faculty above, beyond, or outside this context goes against its intrinsic purpose, and so constitutes a disordered use. Which is to say: a sin.
Item 4: Mark Shea’s recent article at Catholic Exchange concerning the First Commandment isn’t really about sex, per se…but the opening anecdote seems quite worthy of mention here, both because it’s Rule 5 Thursday and given the idiocy of Item 3:
The other day, one of my readers sent me a hilarious note:
Hey, Mark, you may get terrific questions as a Catholic author/speaker, but as a Catholic high school teacher, I get terrific answers. My current favorite:
Q: Name the seven capital/deadly sins.
A. (among the others): Sluttony
I have to say I enjoy this brilliant accidental portmanteau word as a sort of idiot savant moral insight into our culture. It exactly describes countless millions of square miles of what now constitute “Western values” (i.e., those values being proposed to us by the Manufacturers of Culture as a counter-narrative to the gospel and Christian virtues). But though the accidental insight is wonderful, it remains nonetheless accidental. We may be happy when a bad tennis player flails and accidentally wallops one over the net, but we don’t thereby confuse him with a good tennis player. Similarly this student’s poor familiarity with elementary Catholic moral teaching, while luckily insightful, is still the equivalent of throwing her racquet at the ball and accidentally scoring a point.
I hope what I’m trying to say, by quoting as much, needs no further explanation?
Item 5: The Archbishop of Sacramento, Jaime Soto, has called for tomorrow — January 22nd — to be a day of Penance for the “sinful scourge” of abortion.
Item 6: This one isn’t about sex, per se, but about the sexes, and in particular about how men and women co-exist in a modern home. And most specifically, it is about what has declined — almost to the point of non-existence — in the modern home: male “space”.
While male space was chipped away at during the 18th century, there were some consolations. During the Victorian Era, upper and middle class homes were built with several gender specific rooms. These rooms were often divided evenly among men and women. Women had sewing, drawing, and tea rooms; men had billiards, smoking, and trophy rooms. One peculiar male room in Victorian homes was the growling room. That’s right-growling room. Apparently growling rooms were a place a man could go to be alone and “growl” when in a bad mood. (I just use the bathroom for that now. )
This period of gender balance in homes would be short lived, however, and male space would continue to shrink as women took more and more control over home life.
…
The rise of suburban culture with its emphasis on creating a domestic nest, usually meant sacrificing male space for the good of the family. Home designs in the 1950s exchanged the numerous, smaller rooms of the Victorian home for fewer, larger rooms. The goal was to create more open space where families could congregate together and bond while watching the Honeymooners on TV.
With no room to call their own, men were forced to build their male sanctuaries in the most uninhabitable parts of a home. Garages, attics, and basements quickly became the designated space for men, while the women and children had free reign over the rest of the house.
Men filled these rooms with the trappings of manliness — animal heads, discarded furniture, and pictures of sports figures (or women) would adorn the room. They would use their “man caves” as a place to retreat to when the demands of work and family life felt suffocating. Here they could play cards with their friends or tinker around, working on their car, reading the paper, or doing some woodworking.
But even these undesirable areas of the home would be taken away from men. Basements and attics became game or entertainment rooms to be used mainly by children. And even the least feminine of all places — the garage — would be cleaned up and domesticated.
Now, why exactly does this matter?
We often underestimate the effects our surroundings have on our psyche. Architects, interior designers, and feng shui experts understand this profound impact. Even famous feminist writer Virginia Woolf understood the importance that space can have on an individual.
In her 1928 essay A Room of One’s Own, Woolf passionately argued that the reason women hadn’t produced as many great literary works as men was because they were denied the same opportunities afforded their male counterparts. The central argument in her essay was that women needed a room of their own in a world that was predominantly male so they could be alone and connect with their true identity and creative impulses.
Eighty years later, it’s the men asking for a room of their own.
Just as male friends play an important role in giving men satisfaction and in shaping their manliness, so does male space. It’s important that men have a place where they can take off their social masks and revel in masculine energy. For many men, the bureaucracy of corporate culture can leave them feeling powerless and emasculated. Having a “man cave” at home, a place men can deocrate as they please and do what they want in can give them a much-needed sense of control, empowerment, and of course relaxation. And spending time in the company of other men at an all-male hang out can help a man reconnect with his manliness.
It’s shouldn’t have to be noted (since evidently, some people have expressed confusion on this point) that the above is not intended, in any way, to denigrate women, family, or anything related thereto. If anything, it’s a remark borne out of the inherent differences between men and women, and the differences in their needs. No man is an island, but every man needs a space to withdraw to and re-center himself. And it’s better if such a place is in the home, rather than…say…at a local bar.
Norm was a great character on Cheers, but shouldn’t be the model on which Western husbands operate in order to get that re-centering time.
Item 7: Oh yeah, I almost forgot.
Okay, here’s the thing. We have these big video billboards in town, at the overpass that carries Gateway Boulevard/Calgary Trail across Whitemud Freeway.
Kinda like one of these:
There’s one for each direction of traffic (north & south) along Gateway/Calgary Trail. And while the screens are usually running ads, every so often one gets treated to something else…like the Windows desktop or, occasionally, a blue screen of death.
And I’ve driven by those things a few times and thought: “if someone hacked into those and started broadcasting porn on ‘em, the traffic pile-up would be huge.”
Turns out that exactly that happened to Russian commuters a while back:
One of the first and most obvious truisms of advertising is that “sex sells.” When said sex is on a billboard, and extremely graphic, it also apparently stops traffic. According to Fox News, “traffic jerked to a standstill” in Moscow last night when hardcore pornographic footage was broadcast on two downtown billboard video screens.
The screens are professionally operated by ad firm Panno.ru, which said someone hacked into its computers and swapped a legitimate advertisement video with the pornographic material. The road-sign sex display congested traffic on the popular Garden Ring Road for an entire 20-minute period before company officials disabled the billboards. Panno.ru attributed the attack to either hooligan hackers or advertising competitors, but it probably shouldn’t be too worried about the consequences. Russian commuters obviously don’t seem to mind if they get stuck in the crossfire of a bawdy billboard ad war.
It’s probably only a matter of time before that sort of thing happens here.
