Catholic Online Forum

This is lifted from another thread where Moderator Dean thought we were drifting off topic.

That situation is much preferable to having the husband constantly lusting after the wife. Lust is a mortal sin.

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David L (CA)
"Outside of a dog, a book is man's best friend. Inside of a dog it's too dark to read.” - Groucho Marx

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David L (CA)
"Outside of a dog, a book is man's best friend. Inside of a dog it's too dark to read.” - Groucho Marx

Dean,

I don't understand how a low libido could be sinful?

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David L (CA)
"Outside of a dog, a book is man's best friend. Inside of a dog it's too dark to read.” - Groucho Marx

David,

Was libido what we were considering here? Is the libido we have a matter of choice? If low libido is not sinful, then neither is a high libido, since I would maintain that both are linked to biology.

What I was considering were the deliberate, free choices regarding marital relations. And unreasonably denying one's spouse marital relations is equally sinful to unreasonably demanding marital relations from one's spouse. Both are choices against love.

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Dean
Most people's sense of history goes back to breakfast time - Benjamin Netanyahu

Hmm... but the context was one in which the issue under consideration was the possibility of some sort of situation (mental or physical) that led to this impasse, wasn't it? If a person has an underlying mental or physical condition that predisposes him or her to marital relations, then there wouldn't be a situation that might be described as "unreasonably denying" (or "unreasonably demanding"), would there?

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Larry

When I found your words, I devoured them; they became my joy and the happiness of my heart, Because I bore your name, O LORD.

-- Jeremiah 15:16

No, if there were some underlying physical issue causing a low or high sex drive, then there would be less (or no) imputability. However, I don't know that the thread from which this thread was spawned established that a physical or psychological condition was the source of the lack of marital relations; there may be much we don't know about the situation. And it is beside the point. This thread is separate and can therefore explore any conditions, from involuntary low/high libido to reasonable/unreasonable use (or lack thereof) of the marital privilege. And the thread from which this came should no longer be referenced from here, since it is not good to speculate on a particular, real situation.

Finally, remember that lust is not the antithesis of low libido, which is the dichotomy that David setup.

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Dean
Most people's sense of history goes back to breakfast time - Benjamin Netanyahu

If the libido (meaning sexual appetite, a Freudian term, I believe) is extremely high, it is disordered and leads to lust, a mortal sin.

As a matter if fact, isn't lust defined by the Church as a disordered appetite or desire?

I don't see any analagous consequence from a low libido.

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David L (CA)
"Outside of a dog, a book is man's best friend. Inside of a dog it's too dark to read.” - Groucho Marx

High libido does not necessarily lead to lust. Lust is not determined by one's sexual appetite, but by one's intent. If one's sexual appetite for one's spouse is driven by a desire to use the spouse for one's own sexual pleasure, THAT is lust. If one's sexual appetite is driven by a desire to express one's love for the spouse, that is not lust. Furthermore, in order to be culpable of lust, you have to choose to lust, just as with any other grave sin, or there is no mortal sin.

Low sexual appetite for one's spouse, on the other hand, can result from such evil choices as viewing pornography (with its resulting actions) or adultery. Furthermore, a deliberate refusal to engage in the marital act with one's spouse (which could be blamed by the refusing spouse on low libido, but could be due to using sex as a way to get what he/she wants instead, as well as due to other reasons within the refusing spouse's control), is rather seriously sinful as well.

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Dean
Most people's sense of history goes back to breakfast time - Benjamin Netanyahu

And moreover, can we really say that a high libido is a disordered condition (from a moral perspective, in the way that the Church uses "disordered")?

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Larry

When I found your words, I devoured them; they became my joy and the happiness of my heart, Because I bore your name, O LORD.

-- Jeremiah 15:16

I think it can be said that an unbalanced (high or low) libido is disordered, just as the homosexual tendency is said by the Church to be disordered. But these disordered conditions are not sinful.

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Dean
Most people's sense of history goes back to breakfast time - Benjamin Netanyahu

I disagree, based on what the catechism says.

It asserts that lust is a disordered desire, and that "sexual pleasure is morally disordered when sought for itself, isolated from its procreative and unitive purposes". In other words, the ends for which sexual pleasure is sought are what dictates the morality here. If, as you assert, high libido doesn't necessarily lead to lust, then it follows that a high libido isn't necessarily morally disordered.

Moreover, the allusion to homosexuality doesn't seem to be warranted: whereas homosexual acts are "intrinsically disordered" and in fact, homosexual tendencies/inclination are noted as objectively disordered, no such statement about lust being "objectively disordered" is in the CCC. Therefore, it follows that, based on the CCC, we cannot say that a high libido is disordered.

(CCC references: lust (#2351), homosexuality (#2357-58))

Might there be any other Church documents out there that address the question to shed greater light on the discussion?

Thanks!

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Larry

When I found your words, I devoured them; they became my joy and the happiness of my heart, Because I bore your name, O LORD.

-- Jeremiah 15:16

Larry,

http://www.vatican.va/roman_curia/congr ... ns_en.html

CONGREGATION FOR THE DOCTRINE OF THE FAITH

LETTER TO THE BISHOPS OF THE CATHOLIC CHURCH
ON THE PASTORAL CARE OF HOMOSEXUAL PERSONS

"Although the particular inclination of the homosexual person is not a sin, it is a more or less strong tendency ordered toward an intrinsic moral evil; and thus the inclination itself must be seen as an objective disorder."

Lust and high libido are not one in the same thing. Lust is sinful, high libido, or high sex drive is an inclination, not a sin. Something sinful (lust) is more than simply disordered - it is an evil. Something not sinful in and of itself, but which produces an inclination or a more or less strong tendency ordered toward an intrinsic moral evil, is objectively disordered. Yet, as Dean points out, a high libido does not necessarily tend toward lust, so it is not objectively disordered, like homosexual tendencies, yet it remains disordered.



Pax et bonum

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-Brian

"This is the horrendous and hidden poison of your error: that you claim to make the grace of Christ consist in his example and not in the gift of his Person." - St. Augustine correcting Pelagianism

I wanted to share with you what Archbishop Fulton Sheen had said:

The essence of married love is not sex, but consent; not animality,
but freedom; not a libido, but a choice. If marriage is a love of "the
opposite sex," it is selfishness disguised as love. If marriage is
love of a person, it is eternity in the garments of time.
.....................
From another point of view, sex seeks the part; love the totality.
Sex is biological and physiological and has its definite zones of
satisfaction. Love, on the contrary, includes all of these but is
directed to the totality of the person loved, i.e., as a creature
composed of body and soul and made to the image and likeness of
God. Love seeks the clock and its purpose; sex concentrates on the
mainspring and forgets its mission to keep time. Sex eliminates
from the person who is loved everything that cannot adapt itself to
its carnal libido. Those who give primacy to sex for that reason are
anti-religious. Love, however, does not concentrate on a function,
but on personality. An organ does not include the personality, but
the personality includes the organ, which is another way of
repeating the theme: love includes sex, but sex does not include
love.
THREE TO GET MARRIED
FULTON J. SHEEN
Nihil Obstat: Rt. Rev. John M. A. Fearns, S.T.D., Censor Librorum
Imprimatur: Francis Cardinal Spellman, Archbishop of New York

http://www.ewtn.com/library/MARRIAGE/3GETMARR.TXT

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In Christ
Kim, M



"....abstinence and chastity, dispose man very much to the perfection of intellectual operation.” St Thomas Aquinas

I would agree that a high libido does not necessarily lead to lust, but it tends to lead that way, just like an excessive appetite for food tends to lead towards gluttony. And we can probably all agree that a low libido does not.

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David L (CA)
"Outside of a dog, a book is man's best friend. Inside of a dog it's too dark to read.” - Groucho Marx

If I can offer a feminine perspective on the question...

It's more complicated than that. If, through whatever means, the experiences are disappointing, then the libido might be lowered even when lust is present. An increase of one does not necessarily lead to an increase of the other.

It may be that the disappointed person has unreal expectations developed through inappropriate exposure to various media, or it may be that there is a physiological issue.

I'm not sure anymore what the intent was of splitting this thread from the original, but perhaps we could consider what the purpose and implications of the act would help us to understand how to get back on track or what to check on when things are off track?

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Rose West
"May God help us not to spoil His work" (Bl. Mother Theresa)