GOOD ARTICLE ON CHASTITY:CHASTITY AND FREEDOM

Chastity and Freedom

Posted By Robert Colquhoun On June 29, 2009

What does the word chastity mean? According to the Catechism, “Chastity means the successful integration of sexuality within the person and thus the inner unity of a human being in his or her bodily and spiritual being.” (2337). Chastity is the virtue of love in the area of sexuality. Chastity is not just the abstention from sexual sins, but is a positive gift of purity and passion.
A person who has acquired the virtue of chastity is a person who is totally free. This is because he has ordered his passions and is not unruly in his behaviour or controlled by his urges. The chaste man “maintains integrity of the powers of love and life.” (CCC 2337). The virtue of chastity is one that helps us to masters over our own self, which helps to give ourselves totally.
[1] A marriage needs to be based on freedom in order to be valid. Couples freely give themselves to each other in an authentic marriage. The Second Vatican Council said that man “cannot truly find himself except through a sincere gift of himself.” (Gaudium et Spes n. 24). It is not possible to truly give oneself if you are not free but enslaved by your own passions. You cannot properly give what you do not have. If we do not possess ourselves we are not able to give ourselves.
The best presents are ones that are given entirely gratuitously. The more isolated we are from our own selfishness and self gratification, the more we can give of our true selves. We are more true to ourselves when we have free choice with an informed conscience than when we act by our blind fancies or whims. In this respect a man either, “governs his passions and finds peace, or he lets himself be dominated by them and becomes unhappy.” (CCC 2339). To have an informed conscience means to have taken the time to properly inform one’s conscience.
Teachers of natural family planning (NFP) have seen that those that have premarital sex often find it hard to practice the periodic abstinence in marriage that NFP requires. Those that do not practice premarital chastity find it hard to practice marital chastity. Marriage preparation is something that begins at birth. Vices and weaknesses that are brought into a marriage are not mystically transformed on the wedding day. Those that are promiscuous before marriage will find it all the harder to practice the self restraint and sacrifice required during marriage. Those that use artificial contraception before and during marriage are especially susceptible to the temptation of infidelity.
We read further how chastity can blossom into different wonders in our own life: “Chastity leads him who practices it to become a witness to his neighbour of God’s fidelity and loving kindness. The virtue of chastity blossoms in friendship. It shows the disciple how to follow and imitate him who has chosen us as his friends, who has given himself totally to us and allows us to participate in his divine estate. Chastity is a promise of immortality.” (CCC 2346-7). Chastity is a form of charity, as charity is the essence of all the virtues and chastity can be the gift of a person.
The choice to save sex until marriage leads to a natural yearning for total self gift to one’s spouse. Cohabitation and sex before marriage open the gift before it is given. The best response is to wrap it up again. It is similar to opening your Christmas presents on Christmas eve. When the big day comes the novelty, excitement and surprise is worn off because the gift has now been superseded. This is perhaps why some couples decide to spend more time waterskiing during their honeymoon than consummating their marriage. To have intercourse outside the context of total commitment of spousal love is to reject the meaning and purpose of God’s gift of sex and marriage. This is an insult to the inherent and God given dignity that God gives us.
God teaches us that our sexuality is a gift from himself, as he invented it as something holy and sacred, beautiful and filled with profound meaning. Marital intercourse should be open to the gift of life. The call of love is the call to give oneself just as Jesus gave himself to us in entirety on the cross. St Thomas Aquinas teaches that, “The birth of the son from the father is the origin of every begetting of another.” (Commentary on De Trinitate of Boethius). In the second book of Maccabees we read of a mother who says to her seven sons, “I do not know how you came into existence in my womb; it was not I who gave you the breath of life, nor was it I who set in order the elements of which each of you is composed… It is the Creator of the universe who shapes each man’s beginning.” (2 Mc 7:22-3). The inner truth of marital intercourse is to be given in personal totality (CCC 2370).