ARTICLES

Clobber the Devil with His Own Stick

LOCAL PRIESTS GIVE ADVICE ON HOW TO BE CHASTE

By Greg Lay

Father Burt Boudoin, Our Lady of Grace, El Cajon

Greg Lay: What do you think are occasions of sin young people encounter today?

Fr. Boudoin: The first is television. Sins against chastity are aggravated by shows that are presenting imagery that is tempting. When I was growing up, they had censorship. As a result they didn't have those kind of images on TV.

Secondly the answer for people a little older, young adults, and especially men, would be availability of these different shops that they have.

The third thing is human nature which is the constant. The Council of Trent was addressing [these] issues in the sixteenth century, and biologically we have not changed since the sixteenth century and earlier.

Today we don't have the sense of the sacredness of our own body; we have strictly a utilitarian view. People absorb that through movies and television and other ways, and psychologists have been influential in spreading the message that whatever goes is fine in matters of human sexuality. Few priests address that issue except when it is raised in counseling or in the confessional. You don't get much from the pulpit.

G: What kind of boundaries do you think they can set up against these occasions through habituation?

Fr. Boudoin: A person who's immature is going to have a difficult time with images thrown at him in movies and at the beach. And those people need to do something to protect themselves. By doing things which cause us to grow in our spiritual life, prayer, and good direction through reading and formation of one's mind, and then avoiding those things which are going to lead you into sin. I think everybody, if they are honest about themselves, can figure out what causes them to fall into sin.

You have to realize you can't 100 percent eliminate any sin. It's ridiculous to think that we could eliminate our human biology. We have that force within us. Accepting that fact helps a person to understand the dynamics. Then you have to put into play self-knowledge, spirituality, and if necessary, don't watch television other than what is educational or edifying. Don't go to movies accept those that are rated G, maybe PG, but that's it.

One of the things young people have to be taught is that it is worth leading a chaste life. If a person does espouse chastity in hope of marrying, they will bring a great virtue to married life, a virtue which will make married life richer.

They also have to find somebody who is trying to keep that virtue. How many situations in counseling do we encounter an individual who is taken advantage of because they allow emotions to overwhelm them. They move in with somebody, and before long they realize that this person is ugly on the inside and that this ugliness has come out and in some way hurts them.

You look at all of these cases in San Diego and elsewhere of relationships that have ended in violence. A good percentage of them are young people who are living together.

Be virtuous yourself, find a virtuous person, and you will discover that it's worth the wait. But going ahead beforehand is going to do one of several things. If you are studying for any career, or you're going to be successful in work, it's going to take your mind off that and affect how well you do. There's no guarantee that living together or having sex before marriage willmake your relationship better. As a matter of fact, it's the opposite. There is a high divorce rate among those who have sex before they get married.

It hurts the marriage because you don't become spiritual partners first. That's what you need to do to prepare for marriage, become good friends who are attracted to each other on the basis of personality and character and the things of the spirit.

Part of the problem is a good percentage of our Catholic families are people who are in second or third marriages who are not convinced. They haven't communicated that to their children, either by example or by teaching.

Young people are not being taught the value of virginity or chastity. You get it in fundamentalist schools, or with homeschoolers, but you're not getting it in Catholic schools and regular schools.

You know these two eighth-grade kids in Florida who killed themselves because they felt they were in love? What are eighth-graders, twelve or thirteen? You don't start a relationship that early in life. You don't know who you are, let alone how to figure out who the other person is.


Anonymous Priest, central San Diego

Father: I want to give you a quote from the Bible. It's from Matthew 5:27, "...I say to you that anyone who so much as looks with lust at a woman has already committed adultery with her in his heart." Now then, the Apocalypse 21:6, "...But as for the cowardly and the unbelieving and abominable and murderers and fornicators and sorcerers and idolaters and all liars, their portion shall be in the pool that burns with fire and brimstone which is the second death.'"

G: What is your advice to single Catholics who watch TV and channel surf and go to the beach?

Fr: These days we're probably more challenged than in any time in human history, because of scantily dressed women and TV. So when a person happens to see a scantily dressed woman, he must not take a second look. Look away, resist that temptation for any second look. Well and TV, of course, even the commercials are bad. And most of the programs are aimed at arousing the sexual desire. That's what sells their products. And that's what people want to see.

G: Would you advise single Catholics to not watch TV, or to just be careful, or is it possible to be careful at this point?

Fr: I don't know how it would even be possible to...Conceivably, some news programs might be okay. And sometimes channel 15, the PBS channel. I guess that's about the safest.

G: But it's probably best not to watch the other channels at all?

Fr: Well, it seems to me that that's the case, yes. And the difficulty with almost any program, say sports program you say, "Well watching a football game, gee, no problem there"; but, well, I think that's pretty safe because even though the commercials slip in lustful stuff, you can be careful at commercial time I think. At a commercial maybe shut it off.


Father Louis Solcia, Our Lady of the Rosary, Little Italy

Fr. Solcia: The usual thought is that we have to do some formal penance. Penance does not mean that we have to give up things, we have to give up ourselves. We have to practice custody of the eyes. Custody means not to look at things that will bother us that we can see but don't have to look at.

We have to use modesty. Abnormal sexuality is a very oppressive way to practice immodesty, you know, purposely doing it in order to find that gratification. Avoid the occasions of sin. You know occasions of sin are people, places, persons; they are leading us into sin. Avoid bad friends. People are surprised when I say, "You have bad friends." "Well, my friends are good friends." But they are not, because they use them.

We have to avoid bad movies and bad TV. But we have to realize the more we give to the flesh, the more the flesh wants. And that is very important to me.

The second idea is we have to learn to control our thoughts. If we control our thoughts we will be able to control our evil inclinations which have been the consequences of original sin. I always remember a piece in Life magazine. Somebody said, "I keep chastity by looking at our priests. If they can do it, I can do it."

I think we should practice positive aspects of chastity. First of all is prayer. Also the Bible reminds us to taste and see how good the Lord is. Taste means to realize the great feeling, how beautiful it is, how beautiful it is to pray to God, to spend time in the church, to spend time doing good.

The other idea is to join groups like the single Catholics or prayer groups. There we experience real love, real love of brethren.

One thing that impressed me when I came to this country was one of the anthems ["America the Beautiful'] which says to practice self-control. Self-control is very important.

The most important thing, as usual, is the old act of contrition which says we must avoid the near occasions of sins. But the majority of the people when I ask what are the near occasions of sin, they don't know it. And so we have to specify bad friends, bad places, things that we do to tantalize.

G: What would you say to a single Catholic going to a beach nowadays, especially with the way people immodestly dress?

Fr. Solcia: I can choose other beaches. I take a walk along quite a few beaches and see something pretty good, because there are children around and there are parents and so on, depending on what you want. If you go there purposely to entice, to fill your eyes with beautiful bodies, sure you will get bad thoughts, bad desires and so on. To see is not a sin; to look and to desire is a sin.


Father Stephanos Pedrano, O.S.B., Prince of Peace Abbey, Oceanside

G: What would be some general advice you have for single Catholics?

Fr. Stephanos: I often find in the confessional that good people, whether it's lust or anger, or any other strong feeling, often make a simple mistake I tend to call a pious lie, and that is they speak about these feelings as if "I'm not suppose to feel this." I always caution them that the truth is you feel it, but the question of sin or virtue comes from the choices you make in the face of those feelings. So in the case of chastity, often when people confess impure thoughts, or sexual temptations, if I find that they think that these things are not suppose to be there, that's when I caution them. They're just there by nature. We're responsible for the decisions and actions we make on the basis of those natural things.

However it has to be tempered; although these things are natural and they are part of the blessing of creation, there's also the reality of original sin, which has left nature in disorder. So chastity doesn't aim at getting rid of sexual attraction or sexual feelings. Chastity aims at living responsibly, living with natural--not only natural, but also what has been put in disorder by original sin. Concupiscence would be the more traditional expression -- we're responsible through chastity to put in order our freedom to love other persons, whether human persons or God. Although there is the negative side of avoiding sin, that's only half the story.

The other half of chastity is protecting love, protecting intimacy with God, freedom for God. So I began by talking about the confessional, but I often find that when it comes to strong feelings, no matter what they be, I often caution people not to panic, and especially good people.

G: Do they come up with anything on their own as far as how to handle those impressions, or is there a kind of general rule that you give them?

Fr. Stephanos: Sometimes there is a fine line to be drawn between recognizing something that is a mere inclination and when does it become "I'm dwelling on this actively." And although I can't and neither can they draw the definite border between the two, I tell them that the passage from the simple presence of the sexual urge to the deliberate feeding and promotion of it, [they] have to be careful about crossing that line.

Our culture does not support basic human dignity, the dignity of procreation or the dignity of relationships between man and woman. In our culture you just open any magazine, even the most naively innocent, and the perfume ads are based not simply on romanticism, but on sensuality, sometimes nearly to the point of pornographic.

There has to be a deliberate sense of modesty if someone is going to be serious about chastity. That's a challenge, perhaps, more today than at any other time. It's odd. Our culture, on the one hand, oversells sex. And as a response, to strike the healthy middle can be hard.

G: Is there any advice you have for discerning, or perhaps even playing it safe and avoiding, certain entertainment?

Fr. Stephanos: I'm in the monastery so I'm not too familiar with what's being shown in the theaters today, but when I read the paper or Catholic magazines that refer to mass media, I do recognize that there is a problem out there that people are faced with. I can't tell people to stay at home or enter a monastery.

G: What do you have to say about the school of thought that says that if you look at the temptation and dwell on it long enough that will make it harmless?

Fr. Stephanos: No, I think that's simply dishonest. Not just in the area of sexuality but in too many things are we told that if we desensitize to these things they go away. We are not machines and you can turn on this button and the other one stays off.


Monsignor Anthony Chylewski, Propagation of the Faith director, diocese of San Diego

G: How can single Catholics remain chaste?

Fr. Chylewski: I really think that a person has to get close to the Lord and have a relationship with Christ that will allow them to know that His love and His grace is available to them in moments when their chastity or their purity might be threatened. And the only way you can do that--and I can speak at my age, I found it hard to do that as a young priest--is by constantly approaching the Scriptures, constantly trying to learn the mind and the heart of Christ.

You have to sense that chastity, that purity is what Christ is asking of you, and you have to be willing to do it for Him. There has to be that lofty motive because there's just nothing else that makes sense.

G: As far as practical things then, do you mean every day?

Fr. Chylewski: Today young people in the East, I mean the Far East, have really taken to meditation. You have thousands of young people who take time out of their day to pray in a reflective or meditative way. This does so much to give self-control. Look how much more self-control the young people of the Far East have as compared to us. The Muslims and the eastern sects today encourage their young people and their young people practice this and accept it because they see the good that comes from it. They seem to understand and to perceive that they gain as a result of taking this time to be spent in meditative prayer.

As a consequence, they not only seem to be in greater control of their lives and of their senses, but they seem to be more prayerful, to be more accepting of the things that happen in life, to be more understanding. And I think this comes about because they have been trained in meditative prayer.

Isn't there that group in France now that is just constantly growing because they are spending more of their time in prayer? They'll go away for two or three months of utter silence and meditative prayer just to build up their inner strength, their spiritual life.

G: Why is it difficult for us to do this?

Fr. Chylewski: We live in a society that's forever saying get as much done, squeeze as much out of the time you have as you can.

G: Do you have any practical advice you give in the confessional when someone's inclined to go to movies that do not have good scenes in it?

Fr. Chylewski: I think you have to appeal to the person's good judgment and to reason. You have to be logical. You have to have a major, a minor, and a conclusion. That requires giving the matter a lot of thought.

You've got to show them on a rational basis what their options are. Do you want the conflicts, or do you want to live in a way in which you've got some peace of mind and peace of heart?


Father Gene Dougherty, St. John of the Cross, Lemon Grove

G: What's good advice for single Catholics to help them to remain chaste?

Fr. Dougherty: You ask the question, "Who am I?" "Who do I belong to?" "To whom do I owe my life and my gifts and my abilities?" I owe everything that is good to God. "What kind of a contact do I have with God to express my gratitude to Him for my life and for my abilities?" One of the things they should do daily is to talk to God, to pray-- and that doesn't always mean the 'Our Father' or the 'Hail Mary'. It means those personal prayers: 'Lord, give me patience'; 'Lord, I love you'; 'Lord, help me to be chaste', etc.

And one of the other things that's very important to keep our relationship alive with the Lord is to keep holy the day that belongs to the Lord. And for us Catholics it means Sunday Mass.

We ought to do works besides; we could teach catechism to the younger kids, or even of our own age, and also to be active in the church community.

We should look at who are the friends we keep company with. Do we make sure that they pretty well go along the same lines that we do? Towards a good life? Do I really and truly realize that I am a creature of the Lord 24 hours a day, whether I'm dating, or whether I'm going to school, or I'm going to church, or wherever? And that brings us to whom do we date? Am I particular, or do I go with just anyone?

On dates do I do a lot of necking? Am I easily lead to the forbidden? No matter how close we are to God, we still cannot fool around with temptation. We really should kiss no one any different than we would our father, or mother in order to preserve us, to keep our purity and our chastity and to always help us to remember who we are:the people of God.

I don't know why, but some parents don't teach their girls and their boys about this business of dating.


Father Earl LaRiviere, Our Lady of Mt. Carmel, San Ysidro

G: What makes up chastity?

Fr. LaRiviere: Well you look at it this way. You can define sex as the sum total of characteristics that divide the human race into male and female. And that's God's doing. So what does that do? Right away it puts the whole idea of sex in God's backyard. It makes it holy right away.

Everything else follows from there. You handle sex as something where God is at the center of the whole thing. Then you can teach people virtue, you can teach self-control, you can teach avoiding the occasion of sin, and you can teach the idea that it's necessary to pray.

G: What are some of the practical things that follow from this?

Fr. LaRiviere: This theme gives us a reason for appreciating sex in itself and in one another. And besides, look. Women are beautiful. Where does that beauty come from? It comes from God. So right away, instead of having a temptation, you have a prayer. So if a man looks at a woman and begins to lust after her, then as our Lord said he has already committed adultery with her in his heart. But why not teach a kid when he is young when he sees a beautiful girl to thank God for that.

G: You almost take the devil's stick away he's clobbering you with and use it on him.

Fr. LaRiviere: Exactly. So when you start to think about all of this it all makes good sense. It's good asceticism too.

And when you come to the realization of getting married, why are you going to get married? What's the purpose of getting married? I ask people I'm preparing, "Why do you want to get married?" "Oh, we're in love." "That's the worst answer you can give me." When I say this then they are shocked. I tell them they marry someone so they can help each other get to heaven. That's the purpose of the sacrament of matrimony. It's to sanctify the union that's present here and to cooperate with God in the salvation of souls that you're going to help bring into existence. And you get to heaven by helping each other do this. That's your sanctification and the sanctification of your children. It's the Sacrament because you're under vow and you're under divine grace to do this. And in the center of this is sex. But who's the center of sex? God. He's the glue of marriage.