Catholic teaching on human sexuality is clear as crystal. God created two sexes – male and female. To enable the human race to flourish, God gave man (males) half of the equipment needed for reproduction and He gave woman (females) the other half.
Only in the marriage of a man and a woman do the two halves come together as one, as God intended. So sexual relations are only licit and moral between a man and woman who are man and wife, and only when they are not using any form of artificial birth control.
As Pope St. John Paul II wrote in Familiaris Consortio (11):
“Consequently, sexuality, by means of which man and woman give themselves to one another through the acts which are proper and exclusive to spouses, is by no means something purely biological, but concerns the innermost being of the human person as such. It is realized in a truly human way only if it is an integral part of the love by which a man and a woman commit themselves totally to one another until death.
“This totality which is required by conjugal love also corresponds to the demands of responsible fertility. This fertility is directed to the generation of a human being, and so by its nature it surpasses the purely biological order and involves a whole series of personal values.”
Procreation not Recreation
Today, however, many people seem to think Church teaching on sexual morality is archaic and badly in need of ‘updating.’ They think that ‘the marital act’ is not just for marriage anymore. They think sexual relations outside of marriage is a recreational activity. And since sex is now a recreational activity, sexual acts between two men or two women are also perfectly acceptable.
On top of all this, we are now being told that an individual’s sex is not biological – that ‘gender’ is a state of mind. But since sex and gender are one in the same (even though progressives and LGBTQ activists are determined to redefine the two words) such thinking is completely irrational.
A few years ago an article ran at Salon entitled, “Sex for “mere pleasure”? Shame on you! — 15 sexual hang-ups we can blame on the Catholic Church.” The article, written by a psychologist name Valerie Tarico, pretty much said everything the Church teaches about sexuality is wrong. The majority of the scholarly sources Tarico linked to in her 3,000 word article were Wikipedia and . . . Valerie Tarico! Now that’s chutzpah!
Of course the Catholic Church is not “obsessed with sex” as Tarico claims. It is mankind that is obsessed with sex. And the sin of lust is being glorified almost everywhere these days.
God Knows More than Us
But St. Paul is very clear that sex outside of marriage and sexual acts between two men or two women are immoral – sinful – acts (read 1 Corinthians 6:9; 1 Timothy 1:8-11; Romans 1:25-28, for instance). And such teaching cannot be ‘updated.’ It is God’s teaching.
As Jesus told the 72 in Luke 10:16, “Whoever listens to you listens to me. Whoever rejects you rejects me. And whoever rejects me rejects the one who sent me.”
Some try to argue, however, that thanks to science we know more about human sexuality than they did in Jesus’ time. Such arguments, however, fail to take into account that God is omniscient and He created us. God knows everything about human beings and human sexuality.
One commenter here at CS even wrote recently, “This idea that genitalia makes you male or female is really short-sighted. There are plenty of things that make one male or female. Is a person with XY chromosomes and a vagina a male or a female? People can be born with both male characteristics and female characteristics. Pretending these people don’t exist makes us Christians look pretty stupid.”
Of course, saying “Pretending that these people don’t exist makes us Christians look pretty stupid,” is a somewhat flippant remark. Many, if not most Christians, and the Catholic Church specifically, are fully aware of the existence of “intersexed” individuals.
Intersexed Individuals
Fr. Ted Pacholczyk, director of the National Catholic Bioethics Center’s certification program in health care ethics, addressed the issue of “intersexed” individuals in an article entitled “Making Sense of Bioethics: Column 132: Seeing through the Intersex Confusion.”
In short, Fr. Pacholczyk says despite any abnormalities, such people are indeed male or female.
“[I]ntersex situations represent cases in which a person is either male or female, but has confounding physiological factors that make them appear or feel as if they were of the opposite sex, or maybe even both sexes. In other words, the underlying sex remains, even though the psychology or gender they experience may be discordant.”
Fr. Pacholczyk has degrees in philosophy, biochemistry, molecular cell biology, and chemistry, as well as a PhD in neuroscience from Yale University, so it’s a good bet that he knows what he is talking about.
But it’s likely that Jesus addressed such instances as well in Mathew 19:12 when His disciples suggested that maybe it’s better for no one to marry. Jesus replied to them:
“Some are incapable of marriage because they were born so; some, because they were made so by others; some, because they have renounced marriage for the sake of the kingdom of heaven” [Emphasis added].
Then and Now
Biblical scholars say that “born so” and “made so” refers to eunuchs. But “born so” could apply to intersexed individuals as well.
There’s no question that intersexed individuals have a cross to carry. But God will give them the graces they need to carry their crosses just as He gives all of us the graces we need to carry our crosses. We have only to ask for them.
At the same time, “made so” could apply to those who are afflicted with same-sex attraction.
Science cannot find a genetic cause of homosexuality and it should be pretty evident by now to everyone that God did not make men or women with same-sex attraction. As The Catholic Medical Association stated in a pamphlet on Same Sex Attraction, “Same-sex attractions and behaviors appear to be the consequence of a convergence of developmental, emotional, psychological, and social factors.”
Let us not forget that God is omniscient. It is foolhardy to think that 2,000 years ago God had no idea that scientific research would discover chromosomes, genomes, gametes, DNA, and Sexual Development Disorders.
It’s also foolish to think that God would deliberately inflict his children with a sinful sexual disorder. It’s also foolish to think that He would not know that homosexual behavior, which has always been immoral, would become a big problem in the late 1900s. And it’s also foolish to think He would not know that divorce, fornication, abortion, and transgenderism would be problems as well.
Permanent but Not Permanent?
The moral laws God gave to His Chosen People in the Old Testament did not change with Jesus sacrifice for us, and they cannot be changed now. Jesus tells us so in Mathew 5:17-18:
“Do not think that I have come to abolish the law or the prophets. I have come not to abolish but to fulfill. “Amen, I say to you, until heaven and earth pass away, not the smallest letter or the smallest part of a letter will pass from the law, until all things have taken place” [Emphasis added].
But even that once august body the American Medical Association (AMA) seems to be confused about sexuality these days. The Medical Student Section of AMA House of Delegates recently drafted a resolution calling for “Removing Sex Designation from the Public Portion of the Birth Certificate.”
We like to think that doctors are rationale people but this resolution is anything but rationale. First it says that the sex designation is not permanent. But then it says it is and that sex designation should only be visible for medical and statistical use. So it’s not permanent but it is?
Wisdom or Folly?
We’ve already seen what happens when society ignores or tries to insist that God’s Moral Laws are wrong. The divorce rate shoots up to 50 percent. All of a sudden it’s okay to murder a baby that’s still in its mother’s womb. Suddenly sodomy is perfectly acceptable. Then the Sacrament of Marriage, instituted by God, gets redefined by man.
Now we are being told that sexuality is not biological, it is a state of mind.
But if this is so, a woman who thinks she’s a man should be able to produce sperm. And a man who thinks he’s a woman should be able to produce oocytes. This is, however, a biological impossibility. Unless you are a certain species of fish.
As Tom Collingwood wrote recently, “The emphasis on accepting transgenders as they identify themselves and the fear of offending feelings and sensibilities masks the ultimate consequence of accommodating to the [transgender] movement, which is to deny reality. We are being forced to accept and go along with a false narrative.”
So all those who think they are right and Catholic Teaching on sexuality is wrong might want to re-think their positions. Disagreeing with God is not showing a lot of wisdom. It is a Tower of Babel kind off hubris.
All of this is nothing less than man letting the evil one deceive him into thinking he is smarter than God.
Final Note
So why are there intersexed people in the world? For that matter, why are people born with various other birth defects? Does God will this or does he allow such suffering so as to bring good out it?
Many theologians argue that God allows suffering so as to bring good out of it. But this does not explain how birth defects came about in the first place.
Medical research has identified various causes for birth defects. “For some birth defects, researchers know the cause. But for many birth defects, the exact cause is unknown.”
Yet still the question has been and will continue to be asked, “If God made us in His image, how come things like birth defects, genetic defects, and chromosomal problems exist?” But Catholics should know the answer to this question. Because of the sin of Adam and Eve, death and suffering came into the world. Sin changed everything.
As CCC 400 states:
“The harmony in which they [Adam and Eve] had found themselves, thanks to original justice, is now destroyed: the control of the soul’s spiritual faculties over the body is shattered; the union of man and woman becomes subject to tensions, their relations henceforth marked by lust and domination. Harmony with creation is broken: visible creation has become alien and hostile to man. Because of man, creation is now subject “to its bondage to decay.”
Compassion and Virtuosity, not Irrationality
We should certainly feel compassion for those suffering from same-sex attraction, sexuality development disorders, or Gender Dysphoria, just as we should for any individual suffering from a physical deformity, mental illness, or even an incurable disease. All are crosses people have to bear.
Today, however, instead of acknowledging our sins, repenting, and trying to live virtuous lives, society is trying to make sin perfectly acceptable. Society is even celebrating sinfulness today. And its generally helping the father of lies to spread confusion and pull us further away from God.
So, no, Catholic Teaching on human sexuality does not need to be updated. Society needs to stop being prideful, sinful and irrational. Society needs to find its way back to God, God’s truths, and His moral laws.
The question of Swyer syndrome can be further complicated depending on the actual presentation of the genitalia. You can have a XY Female with a female presenting vulva but no vagina (just a vaginal dimple or not even that ) or a very shallow vagina.
With XX Females this is corrected with a procedure like the Davydov procedure. I believe the condition is called vaginal disgenesis.
Once you’re doing this to an XY Female you’re now creating a vagina (to affirm femaleness) in a person who wasn’t created with one, and are not choosing to do the opposite of some kind of penile construction to affirm maleness.
When the same type of surgery is done to a XY Male transgender they call it Perineal Pull Through Vaginoplasty but the end result is the same, a person who is XY and was born without a vagina now has a vagina
However to support the performance of this type of vagina creation surgery on a XY Female, who can then be legally married and given the sacrament of marriage it is then a little harder to explain to say a male suffering from transgender autogynephilia that wants to become female and does these surgeries that they cannot also be a XY person with a surgically created vagina and get married in the church etc.
I’ve explained it as there is a difference between correcting or amelioration of a person born with a birth defect than a person born without that defect desiring the treatment for whatever reason and this seems logical and fair, however questions remain.
Why should Swyer syndrome XY Females be surgically altered to affirm femaleness vs surgically altered to affirm maleness?
Is there any legitimate reason to choose female affirmation surgery vs male affirmation surgery in such a situation?
Is the XY Female with a neo vagina now allowed to marry in the church?
The XY Females even those who still have a uterus or partial uterus have successfully undergone IVF and gestated to full term
It is conceivable that a transgender male might one day get a uterus transplant and carry a human life, which IVF is also sin, but the person could volunteer to save a frozen embryo etc and then the question would be should they be allowed to continue the pregnancy or should it be terminated?
I’ve also been told and have read that once a person goes through with a transgender transition the church doesn’t force the person to de-transition and the person can receive baptism, holy Communion etc even while presenting as the opposite gender, female clothes long hair etc still having whatever surgeries were done and on artificial hormones.
They would just need to remain celibate is what I am gathering?
This seems to mean that crossdressing isn’t necessarily based on chromosomal makeup either, or it would seem the church would indeed tell such persons to stop.
This needs to be clearly addressed by the church.
The fact that the Shakers never re-examined the question of whether they should start bearing children is the reason they are now defunct.
It’s about what you expect if dogma on sexual relations was formed by men only, and not only that, but men who have never seen a vagina, and men who have never had a sex life (or at least, not a happy one).
I think St. Augustine (a Doctor of the Church) who was very promiscuous as a young man before his conversion, would disagree with you, as would the three women who are also Doctors of the Church.
Yes. That is the simple answer to question in the title.
And I appreciate the shoutout, and I also appreciate that Fr. Pacholczyk states what he believes should be the basis for sex – genetics. Genetics is a reasonable basis and I haven’t heard too many people in the Catholic world take a stance on it. That belief is his personal opinion rather than actual church teaching though, which probably explains why he didn’t go into the next logical offshoots – can people who are XY become priests even if they have a vagina? Can two people with penises get married as long as one is XY and one is XX? Or are these people banned from marriage or the priesthood as this article seems to favor? These are questions without an official answer, and that results in a wide range of different types of treatment within the global church.
Regardless of beliefs (my beliefs and opinions diverge greatly from the author and from Fr. Tad), the church needs to update its teachings to deal with these new scenarios that we are now aware of. Being silent or providing various priests’ or bishops’ opinions is not sufficient. Having one diocese handle these cases differently from another is not sufficient. I would like them to take an open approach acknowledging that there is still a lot we don’t know about sex, but any stance would be better than ignoring the issue completely on an official basis.
Kyle:
1) Despite your apparent confusion (still), Fr. Pacholczyk is very clear that science and Church teaching, are perfectly in line in regard to human sexuality. By the way Kyle, what are you credentials? Why should anyone listen to Kyle in these matters instead of Fr. Pacholczyk?
2) No, Kyle, females with XY chromosomes (Swyer syndrome) cannot become priests because they are females. Despite having the XY chromosomal makeup, females with Swyer syndrome look female and have functional female genitalia and structures including a vagina, uterus and fallopian tubes.
3) And no, Kyle, two people with penises cannot get married as long as one is XY and one is XX. This is because the presence of male genitalia on the individual with XY chromosomes clearly indicates the individual is a male, while the presence of a penis on the individual who is XX (known as “XX male syndrome”) means this individual is a male as well.
Woah! Did I finally get you to state that you believe sex should be based on genitalia? If so, we have something in common – we both disagree with Fr. Pacholczyk.
In Fr. Tad’s article that you linked to, he made the argument that genetics determine sex and that physiological differences can happen. So if someone is XX with a penis, they are still female and should strive to be female. Or if someone is XY but has a vagina and ovaries, they should strive to be male which is their “underlying” true sex. What you’ve stated here in the comments is the complete opposite – that you can be an XY “female” or an XX “male”.
So it seems safe to say that you have your own opinion and are listening to neither me nor Fr. Tad.
Kyle, I think you need to re-read my article, Fr. Pacholczyk’s article, and my reply to your comment again. Despite your confusion and preoccupation with genitalia people are either male or female despite any “confounding physiological factors that make them appear or feel as if they were of the opposite sex, or maybe even both sexes” as Fr. Pacholczyk states. He also does not state ‘genetics determines sex.’ He says “our genetic sex (XX female or XY male) serves as the best guide to the true sex of an individual” while acknowledging that the existence of Sexual Development Disorders can cause confusion for those with zero expertise in human sexuality, as is apparent in everything you are saying. FEMALES with XY chromosomes (Swyer syndrome) are still FEMALES. MALES with XX Male Syndrome are MALES.
I would say that I didn’t think you actually read Fr. Tad’s article, but you quoted it so I assume you did. You are mistaken in thinking that you’re in agreement with Fr. Tad.
From the article: “Human beings, along with most other members of the animal kingdom, are marked by an ineradicable sexual “dimorphism,” or “two-forms,” namely, male and female. When problems arise in the development of one of these forms, this does not make for a new “third form,” or worse, for an infinite spectrum of different sexual forms.
Instead, intersex situations represent cases in which a person is either male or female, but has confounding physiological factors that make them appear or feel as if they were of the opposite sex, or maybe even both sexes. In other words, the underlying sex remains, even though the psychology or gender they experience may be discordant. Put another way, intersex individuals may be “drawn away” from their intrinsic male or female sexual constitution by various anatomical differences in their bodies, and by opposing interior physiological drives and forces.”
When he talks about “confounding physiological factors that make them appear” as if they were of the opposite sex, he is talking about their bodies including their genitalia. He is saying that a person with two X chromosomes and a penis would be a female with the confounding physiological factor of having a penis. This is in direct opposition to what you are stating. I really want to help you understand this because I think it is important. Your views here are at odds with the person you think you agree with.
Fr. Pacholczyk is not saying what you seem to think he is saying. As such, I can only conclude that 1) you have a reading comprehension problem, or 2) you take undue delight in trying to sow confusion by deliberately trying to twist words while ignoring other words to make them mean what you want them to mean, or 3) you are just another troll. This exchange is done.
Did you delete my comment because you realized you were wrong about Fr. Tad’s views? Because you couldn’t answer the question I posed while maintaining your own stance?
Kyle: Your questions, as are your arguments, are nonsensical.
Your argument (here and from your comments on the article “Gender Theory: A Destructive Anthropology [Parts I and II] article) is that (quoting you) “In reality, God created a gray area. There are plenty of people with both male characteristics and female characteristics. They might have the sex organs of one sex, but the genetic chromosomes of another. These people are all part of God’s creation, and denying their existence (or at a bare minimum their value/importance) like this article does will ultimately hurt the church.”
God did not create a “gray area.” He created males and females. Original sin resulted in misery, confusion, and death. This is what the Church teaches, yet you continue to insist that God created “people with “both male characteristics and female characteristics” and that the Church is somehow denying their existence.
You are wrong on both counts. God created only males and females and the Church does acknowledge that there are people with “both male characteristics and female characteristics.” As Fr. Fr. Pacholczyk has stated, and as I have stated in this article, this is due to sexuality development disorders. This is one of the many results of Original Sin – misery, confusion, and death.
The individuals who suffer from these sexuality development disorders are still either male or female despite any confounding characteristics. They are not a third or a fourth sex. There is no “gray area.”
And that is my final word on this. Don’t bother posting any more comments on this article because I will delete them.
As you have deleted mine.
The CS Comments Policy is clear on what is acceptable and what is not. If you posted a comment that was deleted, the comment undoubtedly violated the policy. Keep in mind, too, the Policy clearly states that “Editors may determine when a conversation has strayed too far from the original post.” In the instance above, the commenter was taking an “I’m right and you’re wrong” stance that was unjustly criticizing of and contrary to Catholic Doctrine with nothing more to go on than only his own personal opinion. He had his say and I ended the discussion.
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“Argument from authority is the weakest argument.” — Aquinas
“If you remain in my word, you will truly be my disciples, and you will know the truth, and the truth will set you free.” – Jesus Christ
Not when the Authority is God Himself. As Aquinas would surely agree.
Jesus called us back “to the beginning” and raised marriage to a sacrament. Open to life marital relations between a wife and her husband are an incredible gift and a sign of God’s own love for His people! By such, wives and husbands cooperate with God in His continuing work of creation! When we realize this, it becomes clear how wrong is any other use of our sexuality. Yet we also have this awesome God who stands always ready to forgive us when we are sorry.
“It was said that Christians are to be recognized by the fact that they love one another. I would add: Christians should also be recognized by the fact that they who have received the festival clothes in Baptism shun any superficial, mediocre approach to the great goods of creation, that they understand more profoundly than others `how admirable are they works, O God'” (Dietrich von Hildebrand, Man and Woman: Love & the Meaning of Intimacy). ”
It’s challenging to believe that it’s such a short time since St Pope JP II’s phenomenal Theology of the Body (1979-1984). Especially those of us greatly blessed by marriage need to shout this phenomenal news all the louder!.