Posted on 10/08/2014 10:29:54 AM PDT by Morgana
There’s a necessary humility in acknowledging our utter inability to live chastely outside the grace of God. The first step, it seems to me, is to acknowledge our complete need for God in winning the battle. Thomas Merton wrote that “real self-conquest is the conquest of the self by the Holy Spirit.” This is most true in the battle for chastity.
St. John Cassian teaches that human effort alone will never make someone chaste:
If we really desire to enter into this spiritual combat on the same terms as the spostle (2 Tim. 4:7), let us concentrate our every effort at dominating this unclean spirit by placing our confidence not in our own forces but on the help of God. Human effort will never be able to win through here. For the soul will be attacked by this vice as long as it does not recognize that it is in a war beyond its powers and that it cannot obtain victory by its own effort unless it is shored up by the help and protection of the Lord (5)
God’s grace is necessary for all virtue, he continues, but a “special gift” is necessary for chastity:
In a certain sense, to escape the flesh is to remain in the body while surpassing nature: to remain surrounded by fragile carnality but not to feel the stings of the flesh. Thus it is impossible, as we have said, for us to fly to such an exalted and heavenly reward on our own wings, unless the grace of God lift us up from the slime of the earth by the gift of chastity. There is no virtue which renders the lives of carnal men more similar to that of the angelic spirits than the attainment and the gift of chastity. As the Apostle says, while still living on earth they have their homeland in heaven (Phil 3:20). They already possess in their fragile flesh here in this life that which the saints are promised to possess in the future when they have left their carnal corruptibility behind (6).
“Carnal corruptibility” sounds a little stuffy and theological. But we all know the truth of our hearts: like St. Paul says, so often we do that which we don’t want to do, and don’t do that which we desire to do. That’s our carnal corruptibility, and we all have it. (I seem to have it in spades!)
Acknowledging our utter need for the grace and special aid from God to win the virtue of chastity, however, does not mean that we just sit by and let him win the victory. No—we need to strive for the virtue, in the way an athlete readies himself for a contest:
Hear what the apostle says: “Everyone who enters a contest abstains from all things” (1 Cor. 9:25). Let us inquire what are “these things” that he mentions so as to acquire instruction for spiritual combat comparable to the carnal combat. For those who desire to struggle according to the rules in this visible contest do not have the freedom to use just any foods that appetite might suggest, but only those laid down as the training regime for those battles. Not only must they abstain from forbidden foods and all drunkenness and tippling, but also from inertia, idleness and ennui [listlessness] so as to increase their strength by daily exercise and assiduous concentration (7.1).
If we’re going to achieve chastity, we have to exercise, and build patterns in our lives that replace the patterns of the past. We have to forego certain things we find desirable, fixing our eyes on a goal for the higher good. We need spiritual disciplines, like frequent attendance at Mass, frequent use of the Sacrament of Reconciliation, reading of Scripture, prayer, reading the Divine Office, etc.
If we sometimes despair at our failures, or the seeming impossibility of living a chaste and continent life, these words from St. Leo the Great can bring us comfort:
And lest we should be led by despair into sheer inaction, he promises that the divine power shall make those things possible which are to man impossible from his own lack of power… In him therefore we find our model of patience, in whom we have our hope of life eternal; for if we suffer with him, we shall also reign with him (2 Tim. 2:12), since, as the apostle says, he that says he abides in Christ ought himself also to walk as he walked (1 John 2:6). Otherwise we make a vain presence and show, if we follow not his steps… and assuredly they would not be irksome to us, but would free us from all dangers, if we loved nothing but what he commanded us to love.
The challenge for me is to trust that God makes the impossible possible. I long to see chastity integrated into my life like it was integrated into the lives of Mary, the Mother of God, and her chaste spouse, St. Joseph, as well as in all of the other great saints of the Church who have gone before us. I thank God for the example of someone like David: even though he committed adultery with Bathsheba and arranged to have her husband killed in order to marry her, God still forgave him. It has always comforted me to know that David, such a passionate man who clearly had strong sexual urges was still called “a man after God’s own heart.” It has always helped me to realize that God’s forgiveness and redemption are so powerful that, after our mistakes, the rewriting of the story makes the story that much better. Christ the Redeemer came from the line of the union of David and Bathsheba, giving flesh to the words of St. Paul when he tells us, “where sin is, grace abounds.”
I also find inspiring the example of St. Augustine, who battled so much with unchastity. His words in the Confessions echo how often I have felt in my life, when he said, “Give me chastity…but just not yet!”
St. Augustine ran the race though, even if reluctantly at first—something I find myself sometimes doing too. Thank God we have saints like Augustine to pray for us, saints who also knew the delights of sexual pleasure, and how enticingly such pleasure can lure us away from that which we truly desire. And from he who will truly fulfill us.
St. Augustine, pray for us.
Mary, Mother Most Chaste, pray for us.
St. Joseph, Chaste Guardian of the Virgin, pray for us.
King David, pray for us.
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Daniel Mattson is a writer and public speaker who focuses on sharing the good news of the Catholic Church's teaching on sexuality and chastity. The story of his conversion to the Church from a life of active homosexuality is one of the three stories featured in the Courage Apostolate's new documentary, Desire of the Everlasting Hills.
He entered into full communion with the Catholic Church in 2010, primarily because of the Catholic Church's teaching on homosexuality. His message is simple: the path to fulfillment and peace for the person who lives with same sex attractions can only be found in the teachings of the Catholic Church. He is a frequent speaker at events across the country, including at Catholic high schools, parishes, seminaries and Diocesan clergy gatherings and conferences. He often appears on Catholic Radio programs such as the Al Kresta Show, the Teresa Tomeo Show and Catholic Answers Live. He has been a guest on EWTN's, Life On The Rock, and will be appearing soon on the EWTN program Women of Grace. His writing has appeared in First Things, Crisis Magazine, Catholic Answers Magazine and other Catholic publications.
His personal blog is LettersToChristopher.wordpress.com, and his writing can also be found at JoyfulPilgrims.com. He can be contacted for speaking engagements at letterstochristopherblog@gmail.com. When not speaking or writing, Daniel enjoys his career as a professional orchestral musician.
Maybe one or two from a distance, like the disciples and others who were afraid and confused.
BTW, is there a reason you capitalized Crucifixion and not the word “his”? Just a typo? I make them all the time.
Mat 12:46
While He was still talking to the multitudes, behold, His mother and brothers stood outside, seeking to speak with Him.
So in their minds you are in error.
The Perpetual Virginity of Mary - Brothers and Sisters of Christ?
Virgin Birth—or Prophetic Slip?
The Perpetual Virginity of Blessed Mary
Aeiparthenos (An Anglo-Catholic Priest on Mary's Perpetual Virginity)
[Why I Am Catholic]: Because of the Protestant Reformers Beliefs On Mary
Catholic Biblical Apologetics: Mary: Virgin and Ever Virgin
Luther, Calvin, and Other Early Protestants on the Perpetual Virginity of Mary
Luther, Calvin, and Other Early Protestants on the Perpetual Virginity of Mary
The Protestant Reformers on the Virgin Mary
Zwingli’s’ Mariology: On Mary “Full of Grace”
There was no word for “cousin” back then.
It is flat-out amazing the difference it can make when a person is allowed to read and hear the Gospel for himself in a language he can understand, don’t you agree?
Oh wait their bother is being executed and they don’t give a... Just leave Mom to go? Yea right.
Precisely. Jesus had brothers and sisters mentioned in the Bible.
Some have trouble with this. I do not. Mary and Joseph were a happily married couple who followed God’s plan to be fruitful and multiply as He intended.
Physical intimacy between a husband and a wife is a gift from God which should be denied to no one. There is NOTHING in the Bible which requires mandatory celibacy among the clergy. To the contrary, priests were married men in the Bible. Compulsory clerical celibacy was instituted much later and for reasons which have nothing to do with anything that can be found in the Bible.
I’m Lutheran but she’s right that those references to brothers do not necessarily mean biological brothers.
See Genesis 14:14New King James Version (NKJV)
14 Now when Abram heard that his brother was taken captive, he armed his three hundred and eighteen trained servants who were born in his own house, and went in pursuit as far as Dan.
The “brother” it is talking about here is Lot. Lot is identified elsewhere as Abram’s nephew.
Well you see since my Church wrote the Bible, only my Church has the right to translate the Bible. All other denominations have been messing it up since Martin Luther, including throwing books of the Bible out for what ever reason.
So go on believe what you want. Believe in fluffy bunny rabbits for all I care. For I have spent too many years with uneducated, stuck up, down right mean Protestants to spend one more second of my life with the likes of you. People like you do nothing for me, other than bring me down. So please GO AWAY.
Good Rant! :)
Not necessarily, of course. Since it was so along ago, it cannot be confirmed 100% that Jesus’s brothers and sisters mentioned in the Bible, were actually His brothers and sisters. But I tend to treat the Bible much as I do the US Constitution. I don’t read into it. I read it as it is written and treat it as it is written. Since Mary and Joseph were a happily married couple, it is not unreasonable that other children followed Jesus’s birth.
Luk 1:36
And, behold, thy cousin Elisabeth, she hath also conceived a son in her old age: and this is the sixth month with her, who was called barren.
Put a lot of thought into this have you? Why is it so important to you? What are their names? How many were there? What ages were they? What other serious bible scholars have studied your line of rational? Are there other historical references to support your speculation?
Unless they all died before the crucifixion, then either (a) they weren’t Mary’s children; or (b) Jesus sinned by giving Mary into John’s care. (It’s a sin to absolve someone else of their obligations under Torah.)
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