Adolescent
Yesterday, I came across this piece by Jo McGowan when reading the President’s favorite blogger, Andrew Sullivan, and I think it hits the nail squarely on the head: that the views of certain vocal Catholic priests, and to a large extent all socially conservative Republicans who criticized the President during the Contraception debate earlier this year, are adolescent. In the quoted pieces below, McGowan was addressing the comments of Father Roger Landry, who thought the use of contraception amounted to the rejection of the “paternal and maternal leaning” that, for him, defines, or is the point of, sex:
He is wrong, though, to assume that using contraception automatically makes “pleasure the point of the act.” This is how adolescents think. Teenagers dream of constantly available sex, uninhibited by any possibility of pregnancy. That priests would talk the same way about sex between a husband and wife who have chosen to use contraception reflects inexperience and adolescent projection.
Adults understand that good sex, with or without contraception, goes deeper than pleasure. It is complex and demanding. And pleasure isn’t necessarily a part of it. Any human encounter requiring honesty and surrender has the potential for both revelation and pain. The communication, healing, and strengthening that good sex ensures is foundational to a marriage. Pure pleasure the point of the act? What is Fr. Landry talking about?
Here is Sullivan’s take:
The word “adolescent” is the key one here. That is where most priests’ sexual understanding began and ended. It may be why some find themselves attracted to adolescents. Until we have female and married priests, Catholic sexual teaching will remain as abstract as it is immature.
Indeed. I have long thought that some Catholic priests lacked a necessary background and experience to counsel and guide their respective flocks on matters of love, sex and marriage, since they cannot marry or have children. All they can do is quote scripture, which comes off as dry and unfeeling and non-understanding as one might think.
100% correct. The Catholic Church has the sexual maturity and understanding of a 12 year old – actually, many 12 year olds have more.
I do not agree. I am a cradle Catholic and my experience in the church regarding sex and sexuality is not at all reflective of the above comments. My experiences regarding sex, sexuality, sex education and Church teachings have have been positive, thoughtful and mature.
So you’re happy supporting an organization that has devoted itself to dodging civil law in covering up the rape of thousands of children and adolescents?
As far as the church’s teaching on sex goes, how would they know? They’ve supposedly never had it. I’m not going to take driving lessons from someone who has never driven. I’m not going to take university classes from a high-school dropout. And I’m not going to listen to a word these fuckwads have to say about the gonads and proper use of them by either gender.
I’m a “cradle Catholic,” too, but I was smart enough to recognize an authoritarian organization that stood in direct opposition to the teachings of Jesus of Nazareth by the time I was about 12. Free thinking — you ought to try it sometime.
This is an astute article. I’m a “cradle Catholic” too and individual priests or nuns with a grownup attitude to sex and the people who engage in it are few and far between. But then it is the institution that doesn’t understand that controlling other people’s sexuality is no longer path to controlling congregations. And as Geezer notes, their reaction to their own mismanagement of priests who sexually abused kids doesn’t make them credible council here.