Thoughts on Same Sex Attraction, Diabetes and Rejecting the Physician

Preliminary Note

All Analogies limp if you take them further than they are intended to go. It’s easy to look at them overly critically instead of evaluate the point they are trying to make. I ask you to keep that in mind, and avoid trying to read more into my own analogy than I intend to be there.

Introduction

One of the first things we need to understand is that, in the eyes of the Church, having an inclination is not the same thing as an act. The fact that a person has an inclination that attracts them to behavior that is called sinful is not their fault, and the Church does not condemn a person for having an inclination. However, what a person chooses to do with that inclination can be assessed as doing good or evil. In other words, it is not the attraction that is sinful, but how one chooses to act in response to that attraction.

Comparisons and Those Offended By Them

Trying to create an example to illustrate how this works can be different. Whenever someone tries to use an example of an attraction that everyone recognizes as wrong, someone will invariably make the wrong connection and think this example is being used to say that “same sex attraction is just as bad as X.” But that’s to miss the point of such analogies. The point isn’t to fix same sex attraction on a chart to say it is the moral equivalent of something. The point is to demonstrate that just because someone has an inclination to certain behavior, doesn’t mean it is allowable to act on that inclination.

It’s a crucial point, but it is usually misunderstood. The real point to be understood is this: When a person has an inclination towards a behavior that has been condemned by God as being against His will, the obligation of the person with this inclination is to resist the inclination and avoid behaviors which put us in opposition to God. That’s not always an easy thing to do of course, and it is possible for a person with a compulsive behavior to lack the full free will to resist a sinful act, and thus not be totally responsible for the act they commit. That is something for the confessor to determine. However, even if a compulsion means that the individual who commits a sinful act is not fully in control of themselves (and therefore not guilty of a mortal sin), that does not mean that no wrong was done. The act is still wrong and still needs to be resisted.

That’s why we can say that the Catholic Church does not hate people with a same sex attraction. She is compassionate for them and wishes to help them live in a way compatible with what God calls us to be.

The Analogy of Diabetes

Think of it like a condition like diabetes. There are different types. Some are genetic (Type I), and some are brought on by living in ways that are not the best (Type II). Either way, you go to the doctor and ask him if it’s fatal. “No,” he replies. “But" (and you knew that was coming), “you will need to make some changes to your lifestyle and not give into the cravings you have for certain things.” (I’m sure some will get offended here, saying “OMG! He’s comparing same sex attraction to a disease!” But that is to miss the point of this comparison).

In such a case, it makes no sense to get angry with the doctor. Sure, you could storm out of his/her office and refuse to listen to his opinions—but the fact is, if you live in a way which meets your desires, the result is going to be harmful to you, and perhaps eventually fatal. So to live and stay healthy, we have to make some changes and avoid things that are harmful to us.

A disordered attraction is like that. People can’t gratify certain desires that come from this attraction because those desires are harmful for our spiritual health and can turn out to be fatal to our soul. Some people have said, “I didn’t ask to be gay.” I’m sure that’s true. And I didn’t ask to be diabetic. But since we have these things, we have to make changes to our lives that prevent us from doing some things that others can do—in my case, no super triple hot fudge sundaes (because of my body desires something harmful for me), in the case of a person with a same sex attraction, no sexual activity (because it involves acts with a person of the same gender—which is harmful for the moral life). Sure, we can choose to engage in behaviors which are harmful to us, but in my case, the result is going to be an elevated blood sugar level, and in the case of the person with same sex attraction, the result is going to be sin that alienates us from God.

Don’t Blame the Physician for the Diagnosis

In such cases, it is foolish to deny the problem and insist that things be changed for us. The government can coerce the FDA to declare that triple chocolate ice cream is OK for diabetics and the government can coerce businesses, and perhaps eventually churches, to say same sex “marriage” is a right. But in both cases, such government decrees would have no authority to change reality, and a person who believed them over the ones qualified to make the decision would wind up in bad shape very quickly.

Is it hard? Of course. And it’s much harder for the person with a same sex attraction (who knows they can never have a married life the way their inclination leads them to desire) than it is for me (who has to cut back on the carbs and the sugar). But this isn’t a violation of our “civil rights.” It’s a case of our having to live differently so we don’t do physical or moral harm to ourselves.

The doctor tells me “No.” The Church tells the person with the same sex attraction “No.” If we ignore these instructions, we will do ourselves harm—perhaps fatally.

So, it makes no sense to blame the Church for teaching that same sex genital activity is gravely disordered. All the Church does in any of her moral teachings is to be the physician, and try to let us know what is harmful. Just like the doctor who desires our physical health, the Church desires our spiritual and moral health, and the warnings are not out of hatred or personal opinion. They’re out of love for us and the desire for us to be spiritually well, spending our eternity with God..

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Hypocrisy or the Lowest Common Denominator? Dangers in Selectively Denying Moral Norms

The area of moral teaching in which Christians seem to be most hated is the area of sexuality.  Persons who act on certain inclinations become angry when told that those sexual acts are evil.  Christians are called hateful and judgmental people because they say that certain acts are always wrong.  Now, while there can be people who say they are wrong in a grossly inappropriate way (The Westboro Baptists come to mind), the badly expressed message does not take away from the fact that certain acts are wrong.

The anger and hostility directed against Christians is accompanied by some rather bad reasoning.  The argument that if people choose to live in a certain way, nobody should tell them otherwise.  In other words, we are not allowed to have moral judgments on these activities.

Then these individuals get furious when you employ a reductio ad absurdum and apply that argument to other moral issues which they do find offensive.

That anger is revealing though.  It shows that the individual does recognize that certain things are wrong.  That individual just refuses to accept that their own behaviors can be part of the group [Things that are morally wrong].  Basically, it means "Other people do evil things, not me."

The problem is, those "other people" can often use the same arguments to justify their own deplorable acts.  For example, the same arguments used to justify homosexual "marriage" can also be used to justify incestuous marriage and polygamy: free and mutual consent between people who profess some level of affection for each other.  That isn't hypothetical, by the way.  I've personally encountered proponents of "polyamory" relationships who get offended when people say it is immoral, using the same arguments the proponents of homosexual relationships – and the same demand not to be judged.  These proponents got extremely angry when I pointed out that the concept of "polyamorous marriage" is an oxymoron.

Yet the fact that advocates of homosexual "marriage" do get offended when a Catholic Bishop makes that comparison shows that these advocates do think these things are wrong.  So, essentially, that means they believe a moral line exists.  Otherwise, when the comparison with polyamory and consensual incestuous relationships came up, they'd probably just shrug and say, "So what?"  Their anger then just want to draw the line differently, including their own preference in the list of "acceptable behavior."  People don't normally get offended when their beliefs are compared to something which doesn't offend them after all.

But that leads to the question of who draws the line?  Either there is a line to be drawn, or else we have no choice but to accept the lowest common denominator.  Take Pedophilia for example.  NAMBLA argues that the modern age of consent laws are artificial and that consensual relationships can exist between adults and children.  Most people find the existence of this group as well as their proposals horrific, but they use the same arguments that are used to justify other sexual activities condemned by Christian moral teaching.  They merely add the condition that the age of consent should be lower than 18 and invoke the ancient Greeks and Romans to justify their views.

It also demands a justification for drawing a different line.  If people want to say absolutes exist, but want to include homosexual acts as morally acceptable, they need to show how their absolute is justified while other consensual relationships are not.  Otherwise they become guilty of what they accuse Christians of: forcing their own view of morality on others.  In other words, why draw the line HERE and not THERE?

Actually, when it comes to showing justification for an absolute, Christianity has the advantage – and not from saying "God says so," either.  The belief in marriage as a lifelong exclusive relationship between a man and a woman which is open to the possibility of having and raising children has the biological data (pregnancy comes from sex) and sociological data showing the family as the foundation of a society and that societies with strong family ties also tended to have strong societies.

Eliminating the elements of lifelong, exclusive and being open to the possibility of having and raising children makes stopping at "gay marriage" an arbitrary decision by who is in charge.  That's the irony of it all.  Those people who get offended at this reductio ad absurdum have contradicted themselves.  By drawing the line at "gay marriage" but going no further is to make an arbitrary imposition – which is what they have accused Christians of in the traditional view of marriage.

This is the problem with "selective morality."  If a person demands that the traditional understanding of marriage be set aside in the case of one preference, then it leads one to ask, "Who has the authority to determine where the law may be redrawn and where the new absolute lies?"  Why should it be drawn to only include "homosexual marriage" and not incestuous marriages or polyamorous relationships?  Why should the age of consent be 18 instead of 15 or even 11?  After all, we can point to a time in the past when such things were seen as acceptable?  Of course we can also point to times when slavery and torture and other things we condemn today were considered acceptable, so maybe it's not always such a good idea to point to the morals of the past indiscriminately… it opens up the doors to the reductio ad absurdum.

You can see the problem which those who would change morality tend to avoid.  People don't want to permit things they believe are wrong, but they want to justify their own wrong by making themselves the "victim," claiming that the people who say their own vice is wrong are "judgmental" and "hate-filled" people.  But then they can't explain why others can't take their same principles and demand to have them applied in a way that goes even further than they want to go.

It's quite clear.  Without a rational basis for why a limit should be drawn (a basis Christian moral teaching does possess), one is forced to choose between hypocrisy and the lowest common denominator.

Hypocrisy or the Lowest Common Denominator? Dangers in Selectively Denying Moral Norms

The area of moral teaching in which Christians seem to be most hated is the area of sexuality.  Persons who act on certain inclinations become angry when told that those sexual acts are evil.  Christians are called hateful and judgmental people because they say that certain acts are always wrong.  Now, while there can be people who say they are wrong in a grossly inappropriate way (The Westboro Baptists come to mind), the badly expressed message does not take away from the fact that certain acts are wrong.

The anger and hostility directed against Christians is accompanied by some rather bad reasoning.  The argument that if people choose to live in a certain way, nobody should tell them otherwise.  In other words, we are not allowed to have moral judgments on these activities.

Then these individuals get furious when you employ a reductio ad absurdum and apply that argument to other moral issues which they do find offensive.

That anger is revealing though.  It shows that the individual does recognize that certain things are wrong.  That individual just refuses to accept that their own behaviors can be part of the group [Things that are morally wrong].  Basically, it means "Other people do evil things, not me."

The problem is, those "other people" can often use the same arguments to justify their own deplorable acts.  For example, the same arguments used to justify homosexual "marriage" can also be used to justify incestuous marriage and polygamy: free and mutual consent between people who profess some level of affection for each other.  That isn't hypothetical, by the way.  I've personally encountered proponents of "polyamory" relationships who get offended when people say it is immoral, using the same arguments the proponents of homosexual relationships – and the same demand not to be judged.  These proponents got extremely angry when I pointed out that the concept of "polyamorous marriage" is an oxymoron.

Yet the fact that advocates of homosexual "marriage" do get offended when a Catholic Bishop makes that comparison shows that these advocates do think these things are wrong.  So, essentially, that means they believe a moral line exists.  Otherwise, when the comparison with polyamory and consensual incestuous relationships came up, they'd probably just shrug and say, "So what?"  Their anger then just want to draw the line differently, including their own preference in the list of "acceptable behavior."  People don't normally get offended when their beliefs are compared to something which doesn't offend them after all.

But that leads to the question of who draws the line?  Either there is a line to be drawn, or else we have no choice but to accept the lowest common denominator.  Take Pedophilia for example.  NAMBLA argues that the modern age of consent laws are artificial and that consensual relationships can exist between adults and children.  Most people find the existence of this group as well as their proposals horrific, but they use the same arguments that are used to justify other sexual activities condemned by Christian moral teaching.  They merely add the condition that the age of consent should be lower than 18 and invoke the ancient Greeks and Romans to justify their views.

It also demands a justification for drawing a different line.  If people want to say absolutes exist, but want to include homosexual acts as morally acceptable, they need to show how their absolute is justified while other consensual relationships are not.  Otherwise they become guilty of what they accuse Christians of: forcing their own view of morality on others.  In other words, why draw the line HERE and not THERE?

Actually, when it comes to showing justification for an absolute, Christianity has the advantage – and not from saying "God says so," either.  The belief in marriage as a lifelong exclusive relationship between a man and a woman which is open to the possibility of having and raising children has the biological data (pregnancy comes from sex) and sociological data showing the family as the foundation of a society and that societies with strong family ties also tended to have strong societies.

Eliminating the elements of lifelong, exclusive and being open to the possibility of having and raising children makes stopping at "gay marriage" an arbitrary decision by who is in charge.  That's the irony of it all.  Those people who get offended at this reductio ad absurdum have contradicted themselves.  By drawing the line at "gay marriage" but going no further is to make an arbitrary imposition – which is what they have accused Christians of in the traditional view of marriage.

This is the problem with "selective morality."  If a person demands that the traditional understanding of marriage be set aside in the case of one preference, then it leads one to ask, "Who has the authority to determine where the law may be redrawn and where the new absolute lies?"  Why should it be drawn to only include "homosexual marriage" and not incestuous marriages or polyamorous relationships?  Why should the age of consent be 18 instead of 15 or even 11?  After all, we can point to a time in the past when such things were seen as acceptable?  Of course we can also point to times when slavery and torture and other things we condemn today were considered acceptable, so maybe it's not always such a good idea to point to the morals of the past indiscriminately… it opens up the doors to the reductio ad absurdum.

You can see the problem which those who would change morality tend to avoid.  People don't want to permit things they believe are wrong, but they want to justify their own wrong by making themselves the "victim," claiming that the people who say their own vice is wrong are "judgmental" and "hate-filled" people.  But then they can't explain why others can't take their same principles and demand to have them applied in a way that goes even further than they want to go.

It's quite clear.  Without a rational basis for why a limit should be drawn (a basis Christian moral teaching does possess), one is forced to choose between hypocrisy and the lowest common denominator.