I am particularly pleased with this essay:—

I







“How horrid,” the comment on my post began, “to read a very upsetting and homophobic response to this link. Not something I wanted to find on Facebook.” Another comment, addressed to another objector, wrote: “Quite frankly Stuart, you come across as homophobic as does the catholic adoption agency. It is difficult to see how anyone who is not homophobic can object to a gay couple’s right to adopt.”



Now I wish to discuss this word “homophobic,” and its cognate substantive, “homophobia.” In these days in which we live, wherein the habitual use of the human intelligence has sunk to its lowest, it is considered a triumph in argument to demonstrate that one’s opponent is homophobic or intolerant. “Homophobic” is taken to mean, by those who have forgotten how to think, or never learned, “intolerant of homosexual people”—as my comments were called. The notion that one can be tolerant of homosexual people and intolerant of homosexual acts, which are evil—and I shall explain why they are evil in a moment—eludes the nincompoops, who (since they have forgotten how to think) cannot distinguish between an action and its agent. I have written elsewhere of how the maxim that we should “hate the sin and love the sinner” has transmuted into “love the sin and hate the sinner.” For to hate a sin is to love its agent, and to prevent him from harming himself; and to love a sin is to hate its agent. Those who have scars along the length of their arms from the times they have harmed themselves in a more visible fashion will perhaps understand what I mean.



The first distinction to be made is between an action and its agent. It is true that an action can only be done by an agent, and it is from this, I think, that the confusion arises. Nevertheless they are separate.



There are so many first principles that need to be explained that I am not entirely sure where to begin. But it is necessary for our opponents to understand why we believe what we believe, and for them to understand that our objections are not the result of mere prejudice. Personally I think many of them do think our objections are but the fruit of prejudice; and if that were true, they would be right to object to our objections. But this arises from a misunderstanding.



It does not help when we try to explain our morality in such a way as not to offend our secular opponents. It means we miss out at least half of the reasoning necessary to defend our arguments, and consequently we fail. For example, to oppose euthanasia without mentioning the simple fact that it cannot be more charitable to put a man in hell than to allow him to endure temporal suffering—this can only arise from fear of offending others.



Every one of us is guilty of evil, myself (I think) of more evil than most. But the fact that we are all guilty of evil does not justify the evil we have done, or that we shall do. We are free to resist evil, and God will give us the grace necessary thereto if we pray for it. In order for an act to be subject to the laws of morality, it must be what theologians call “a human act,” and (in this life) it must be free. A human act, my manual of moral theology tells me, is one that proceeds from knowledge and free will, such as writing. A human act, or actus humanus, is to be distinguished from an act of man, or actus hominis—so that writing is a human act, while breathing is an act of man.



The requisite knowledge entails that of (1) the action, (2) the object of the action, and (3) the possibility of not acting or of acting otherwise. Knowledge of the action entails that the man must be aware of what he is doing, saying, or thinking. Let me explain the meaning of the phrase “the object of the action.” To be clear I should say what my manual of moral theology says: “The object of the action with all its proximate circumstances.” So for instance if a man shoots at another man, believing him to be a bear, and having no thought that it might not be a bear, then the man is not guilty of homicide. Indeed he is not guilty of anything, for it is no sin to shoot a bear.



This will be a good point, I think, at which to explain the difference between material and formal sin. Now let us suppose that our first man shot at the second, believing the second man to be a bear. He was guilty of nothing, but there was what is called a material sin of homicide. I repeat the man was not guilty of homicide, but the matter of homicide—i.e. the killing of a man—was there. In a second scenario, our first man shoots the other, knowing him to be a man. Here there is a formal sin of homicide—our first man incurs the guilt of murder. It is only formal sin that is, strictly speaking, sin; by material sin we mean that which would be a sin if it were known and willed. I hope I express myself clearly. Material sin is not culpable, at all: but it has the same consequences, broadly (and somewhat inaccurately) speaking, as formal sin does.



My third numbered point was the possibility of acting otherwise or not at all—for “Only when this possibility is recognized can there be free consent of the will, without which neither good nor evil deeds are imputable.”







The second requisite is free consent of the will. The only subdivision I shall mention here is that of perfectly and imperfectly voluntary—for an act to be perfectly voluntary there must be full knowledge and full consent; if either of these or both is to some degree lacking, the act will be imperfectly voluntary. If both are absent, the act is not voluntary at all.















Next—the imputability of human acts. “The imputability of a human act consists in this that one may be declared the free author of an action and its consequences and may be held responsible for the same.”



An act may be directly or indirectly voluntary. Indirectly voluntary means that it follows as a consequence of another act which is directly voluntary.



Directly voluntary acts are always imputed to the agent; indirectly voluntary are only attributed to the agent when there is question of an evil effect, and then only in certain circumstances, which do not concern our present purpose.







Obstacles to human acts include ignorance, which is often culpable, violence, fear, concupiscence, and habit, among others.











It should be clear from all of this that an act may in itself be evil and yet not attributable to the agent as evil—the agent may act in perfect innocence, but his act may, considered in the abstract, be wrong; it may even be very evil. For instance, none of my readers, I hope, will deny that homicide is very evil, and that if someone were alerted to the fact that our first man above was about to kill another man, however inadvertently, this third person would be bound to do what he could to prevent it—even though the first man were in all morals quite innocent.







But what has all this to do with homophobia?



















II







I do not deny—I do not know if many, or any, will deny—that many people who engage in homosexual activity are perfectly innocent of all wrongdoing. It is important, very important, to grasp the principle that if you do not know that something is wrong, and it does not occur to you that it may be wrong, you do nothing wrong. But if a real doubt (rather than a scruple) comes into your mind, you are bound to refrain from action, until you have settled the matter. For to act when to act may or may not be evil is to be willing to do something evil—and such a conscience is malicious.



While the matter is not as serious as that of an inadvertent homicide, it is nonetheless grave. We hold that there are certain acts, besides adultery, forbidden by the sixth commandment of God. The acts that I can immediately recall forbidden by this commandment are fornication, adultery, rape, criminal assault, incest, sacrilege, masturbation, sodomy, and bestiality. It also forbids all impurity in thought and word, and it even forbids, under pain of mortal sin, any directly voluntary consent whatsoever to the irregular motions of the flesh. (Here it is important to distinguish directly from indirectly voluntary.) Now with the majority of these sins the non-Catholic world has not yet gone so far in its descent to the abyss of amorality as to have denied the evil of most of these: it is true that fornication and masturbation seem to have been virtually struck off the list, and sodomy appears to be the next one to go.







Now discussion of these matters is not a pleasant subject. But I should make some attempt to explain why we believe these things are wrong. They all come under the one commandment. There is not a separate commandment forbidding adultery and sodomy. They are forbidden, we hold, by the one commandment: it is sins against chastity that are forbidden.



Sins of lust are forbidden because they do harm to those who indulge in them. They are forbidden on pain of mortal sin because they do great harm to those who indulge in them. Those who have been enslaved to these sins for any length of time, and examine themselves honestly, seeing themselves as they are, as God sees them, cannot possibly deny the harm that these sins do. They harm one’s health, physical and mental; they destroy families; they wreck people’s lives—and they wreck nobody’s life more than that of the sinner himself. They are addictive; it is easier to break an addiction to heroin than to break an addiction to sins against chastity. They lead to misery in this life and in the next. They make a man resemble a demon. They form the most abundant matter for sacramental confession by far; they are an express ticket to hell. As sins, they are greater than theft and than detraction. They are the curse of the proud.



I wish to expand on that phrase, “the curse of the proud.” Proud people are unchaste; humble people are chaste. The proud are intent upon their own will: that is what pride is. The humble sacrifice their own will. God abandons the proud to their own destruction. The humble he exalts. Proud people will fall into sins against chastity: God allows this in order for them to recognize their own pride, and their need of Him. Shame is necessary sometimes to conquer pride.



The consequences of sins against chastity, as enumerated by St Gregory, are these. Memorize this list. Love of self; hatred of God; love of the present life; horror of the future life; rashness; inconstancy; inconsiderateness; spiritual blindness. Memorize the list, and examine your conscience.







It should be borne in mind throughout all of this that I am discussing not homosexuality alone, but all sins against chastity. Those of us who have been the slaves of mortal sin know what it is: it is the greatest of all evils, and we do not desire anyone else to suffer it.











III







THE REMEDY







I write “the remedy;” I suspect nothing else will lay me more open to the infamous charge of “homophobia” than the use of this word. But I am referring to the means that should be taken by all those who have, or have ever had, the evil habit of impurity in any form.



The means to be undertaken in order to be freed from vices opposed to chastity are, first, prayer, humble, trusting, persevering, without which nothing can be accomplished—both vocal and mental prayer—; secondly, the Sacraments, if one is a Catholic, should be frequented. One should pray assiduously, and not neglect always to pray in temptation—as soon as one is conscious of the temptation, and until it goes away, one should, at least mentally, call upon the names of Jesus and Mary. Nor should one be discouraged after a fall, but endeavour to pick oneself up again immediately. Failing the Sacraments—if one cannot make use of sacramental confession: one should find someone, good, wise, and holy, to whom one will allow oneself to be accountable. There can be no chastity without humility; and I do not see a great deal of humility in those who use the word “homophobe” like the mallet of the March Hare.



Remember that Mary is the refuge of sinners, and there is no-one who, if he does but turn to her, will not be assisted by her with graces beyond his dreaming.







IV







A few words on the initial comments I quoted at the beginning. First, the word homophobic is used derogatorily. If we used it, we should use it to mean someone who was intolerant of homosexual people (as my comments were called). Our opponents use it, however, to mean someone who is intolerant of homosexual acts.



In these matters there seems usually to be a struggle with conscience, expressed outwardly in violent terms. “Methinks the lady doth protest too much.” It is this much protesting that should perhaps concern us most deeply.



If the word homophobic does indeed mean somebody who is opposed to homosexual acts, and not someone who is “intolerant of homosexual people,” then yes, we are homophobic.







There is a certain irony, I think, in the calling of those who have same-sex attraction, and are striving to live chastely, “homophobic”—for these people are indeed intolerant of homosexual acts, and none, I think, more so than they. They will, of course, oppose such things as adoption by homosexual couples.



But no-one ever mentions these people.



I wonder why.











(26th August, 2010.)