What would Ann
Landers say?
“Masturbation
is an intrinsically and gravely disordered action. The deliberate use of the
sexual faculty, for whatever reason, outside of marriage is essentially
contrary to its purpose.” Catechism, 2352
“The
traditional Catholic doctrine that masturbation constitutes a grave moral
disorder is often called into doubt or expressly denied today. It is said that
psychology and sociology show that it is a normal phenomenon of sexual development,
especially among the young. It is stated that there is real and serious fault
only in the measure that the subject deliberately indulges in solitary pleasure
closed in on self (‘ipsation’), because in this case the act would be radically
opposed to the loving communion between persons of different sex which some
hold is what is principally sought in the use of sexual faculty.
"This
opinion is contradictory to the teaching and pastoral practice of the Catholic
Church. Whatever the force or certain arguments of a biological and
philosophical nature, which have sometimes been used by theologians, in fact
both the Magisterium of the Church—in the course of a constant tradition—and
the moral sense of the faithful have declared without hesitation that masturbation
is and intrinsically and seriously disordered act.
The
main reason is that, whatever the motive for acting in this way, the deliberate
use of the sexual faculty outside normal conjugal relations essentially
contradicts the finality of the faculty. For it lacks the sexual relationship
called for by the moral order, namely the relationship which realizes ‘the full
sense of mutual self-giving and human procreation in the context of true love.’
All deliberate exercise of sexuality must be reserved to this regular
relationship.
Even if it cannot be
proved that Scripture condemns this sin by name, the tradition of the Church has rightly
understood it to be condemned in the New Testament when the latter speaks of
‘impurity,’ ‘unchasteness’ and other vices contrary to chastity and
continence.
"In
the pastoral ministry, in order to form an adequate judgment in concrete cases,
the habitual behavior of people will be considered in its totality, not only
with regard to the individual’s practice of charity and of justice but also
with regard to the individual’s care in observing the particular precepts of
chastity. In particular, one will have to examine whether the individual is
using the necessary means, both natural and supernatural, which Christian
asceticism from its long experience recommends for overcoming the passions and
progressing in virtue.” Sacred Congregation for the Doctrine of the
Faith, Declaration on Sexual Ethics (1976), 9-10.
