The Catholic Homegirl Blog is geared towards Catholic Homegirls, i.e. women who are trying to live out the teachings of the Catholic Church. The following letter is written with love for those who are trying to work out for themselves why the Church teaches that sex is reserved for sacramental marriage.
Dear Friend,
Did you know that the Catholic Church still teaches that sex is reserved for people who have first celebrated the Sacrament of Marriage?
I KNOW!
IN THIS DAY AND AGE!
SHE WON'T JUST LET IT GO!
WHATTHA???
But WHY won't she let it go? Why won't she just get with the times already? Well, in all my years of attempting to be a faithful Catholic, there are a few things I've come to learn regarding my beloved Church and her teachings:
1) The Church does not concern herself with keeping up with fads. That's precisely why you don't see the pope sporting skinny jeans when they are all the rage.
2) The Church is led by the Holy Spirit. Yes, the Church is imperfect. It is made up of knuckleheads like myself who sin and make mistakes, but it is led by the Holy Spirit who is Himself perfect. There is this cool verse in the bible where the Holy Spirit descends on the disciples who had locked themselves in a room. The disciples were hold up and scared because of the way Jesus had died. They knew they were next because they were His best friends. Once the Holy Spirit descended upon them they never looked back. They were empowered and were given the wisdom and courage needed to take the gospel to the ends of the earth. It is this same Holy Spirit which guides the Church today, over 2000 years later.
3) There is always an explanation behind what the Church teaches. I mean ALWAYS. The answer is never the one I give my kids when I am all out of explanations (Just cuz y'all)! If someone were to have beef with what the Church teaches on anything, they could go to a reliable source (TMZ not being one of them) and find out the WHY behind the WHAT that they disagree with. Many people choose not to do that. Often someone will hear something they think the Church teaches, decide we are a Church made up of a bunch of hateful, judgmental people and then banish us from their lives forever.
I can't set the record straight on all the misunderstood teachings of the Church--the baby is only napping for twenty more minutes and the laundry is calling my name in a bad way--BUT, I can certainly try to shed a little light on this whole, "no sex before marriage" thing.
The current popular teaching with regards to what the Church teaches about sex goes something like this:
"The Catholic Church, which is made up of a bunch of old geezers who hate women and people in general, has come up with the rule that sex is bad and therefore should not be had by anyone at anytime for any reason except to have fourteen billion kids. The end."
To which I respond: Um no.
The Church's teaching on saving sex for marriage is based on the idea that sex is good, holy and created by God Himself. God who is loving and wants what is good for us created it. So no, the Church does not teach that sex is bad. Quite the opposite actually.
The best way anyone has ever explained this misunderstood teaching to me was back when I was taking Confirmation classes. I didn't get confirmed until I was 22, so when I took the class, I was an adult. I found the entire class intriguing. My instructor was a total boss. He took such lofty ideas and made them easy to understand. One evening when someone asked why, even if you are in a committed relationship, the Church teaches that sex is reserved for sacramental marriage, we were all eager to learn his answer. He simply stated:
You are saying with your body what you have not yet said with your life.
You could have heard a pin drop. He went on to explain that sex says, I am yours--totally. It says, I give myself to you and hold nothing back. But if you have not also said this with your life, you degrade sex to merely a physical act and it is so much more. Sex is a sign of total union. God designed us with this unity in mind when He created our bodies to literally fit together and become one. In the Sacrament of Marriage you make a promise to each other and to God to stick with it through all the good and bad that comes your way. The sacrament is a sacred bond between the couple and God. In marriage, a man and woman commit to a total giving of themselves. That commitment says: even when I'm angry, even when this gets hard, even when I don't want to, I am here to stay. I am here to love you. And God is here to help us.
What you say with your mind and heart on the day you marry, you say with your body when you later give yourselves to each other.
People these days make commitment sound like it's a bad thing. But the commitment part of marriage is what makes people stick around, not the foofy love stuff. There are days when you stick around not because your heart flutters, but because you committed yourself to this person. There have been times in my own marriage where one of us is sick and tired of the trudge and would rather be doing anything other than working on staying together and working things out. But we signed up to see it through. To give each other all that we both have. And THAT is what sex signifies:
Sex says: Not only is my body yours, but my life is yours too. I have signed up for a total and constant giving of myself to you.
There are those who will say, "Whatever. Sex is fun and it means nothing and to make it a big deal is just a total bummer." That may be true for some people, but I'd argue that for most women, sex does mean something. We do want it to be special and would love to see it as a symbol of unity. The kind of unity that lasts. Many of us understand that sex is a special giving of ourselves. We know that we are trusting another person with all we are. The real bummer is that we live in a time where if we DO happen to think sex IS special, we are often looked at as if we are some sort of weirdo from another planet. If we feel something tugging at us not to give ourselves to just anyone, the thinking is that the guy we are currently dating has every right to make for the door because he deserves to be "kept happy." We aren't allowed to believe that sex is a big deal. Even if deep down we really and truly believe it is.
And if we do find someone we love who feels the same way we do about sex, and we both decide to wait, let's not even talk about how difficult the actual waiting part is. Because it is. No one is denying that fact. It takes heroic virtue, a ton of grace and a whole lot of strength. It takes a big ol' huge commitment from both people to make it to that coveted wedding night. But you know what? I think deciding to wait, and going through the effort and prayer that it takes to make it through that time is a perfect way to practice how to be married (not that there is no sex in marriage--no, a healthy marriage has plenty)! Why? Because marriage constantly and continually asks the spouses to sacrifice for the good of the other. It is putting the happiness and holiness of the other person before your own desires. It takes a ton of effort, but isn't anything of great value worth all the effort?
I know it is pretty annoying to hear all of this from an old woman with five kids who is already way into married life. But I want you to know it is possible. It's possible to claim the beauty of sex and make it mean something. Even if you haven't in the past. You can choose your new beginning. You and your boyfriend can. You and your fiance can. You can decide to wait.
Wait and say with your life first, what you will say with your whole self forever.
Love and prayers,
Alissa
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