What Ever Happened to the Opposite Sex? Part III: The Sex Life of the Celibate

Can a day pass in which we are not faced with yet another Clerical scandal? Yet each of us knows a good and holy priest who continues to fight the battle; priests often with few allies in either the priesthood or the pews—many certainly with no friend at the helm of the diocese. What is it that sustains these faithful few?

This is the third installment of a discussion about the complementarity of the sexes and how that complementary plays a role in the dynamics of the world around us. This segment is dedicated specifically to the role this complementarity plays in the lives of the few remaining celibates among us.

In Part 1: Trinitarian Complementarity, we have discussed how the complementarity found in the sexes provides us with a window, however tiny, into the workings of the Trinity; how existence is essentially Trinitarian: a woman being the humble reflection of the Father, love personified; man, the dim reflection of the Word incarnate, truth personified; with the holy complementarity that couples share being yet another dim reflection of the personified complementarity of truth and love: the Holy Spirit. See  Part II: Gender Is a Social Construct?

But what about the sex life of celibates? After all, they are sexed beings, and they are alive; surely their sexuality plays a role in how they commune with the world. In the Biblical tradition of the Church, the priest stands in the place of Christ, the Word—Truth personified—and serves Christ’s bride, the Church, the visible sign of God’s love on earth.

The priest’s task is to proclaim the truth of Christ to his bride and to proclaim the beauty of His faithful bride to the world, for she is truly beautiful. Yes, she is scarred, and often needs to be washed and her wounds healed, but unlike Gomer, the harlot wife of Hosea who symbolized the old Jerusalem, the New Jerusalem has never completely strayed from the Truth, and the abundant grace of the cross will not allow her to do so.

And, of course, this same analogy applies to anyone in consecrated life: all are called to bear truth to the bride and to proclaim her beauty to the world; to honor her nest and to provide for her offspring. All are called to fly the flag, sound the bugle, and circle the wagons. For centuries, consecrated religious have often taken names that were not gender appropriate; this for the sole reason of expressing their total commitment to celibacy and to their spiritual calling—distancing themselves from the cares of the world that are incumbent upon the married.

When I remember the wonderful sisters of St. Francis who taught me as a child, I smile at the memory of Sr. Joseph (affectionately referred to by us students as José), a strict little curmudgeon with a heart of pure gold, and it seems clear now that, not only was her name masculine but that there is a certain masculinity about all of consecrated life, the call to exemplify and proclaim the Word Incarnate to his bride.

Conversely, all clerics are also members of the Church and enjoy the security of the nest; not the physical security of the world, but something so much grander: the spiritual security of truth. Of course, the sister Josephs of the world would certainly not self-identify as masculine, for they lived every day as the brides of Christ. And if woman does indeed require emotional experiences to be fulfilled, these were, no doubt, sufficiently supplied by their contemplation of the Eternal Groom.

And therein lies the key for the rest of us. The complementarity of the sexes is a beautiful thing, but it is not enough to completely fulfill us; it will always fall short, sometimes pathetically short. It is a natural thing, a supernaturally-inspired natural thing, but it cannot bring fulfillment without our contemplation of that of which it is but a dim reflection. Still, creation demands our admiration, and we would be remiss not to pause and admire this reflection of the Almighty.

Every faithful Catholic is called to live a life of chastity, whatever our chosen state in life. None of us are born married, and many of us will experience the pain of being unable to find a suitable spouse, the burden of a sickly spouse, or the death, or worse, the betrayal of a spouse.

Some of us will have sufficiently serious (for example, health) reasons to restrict the size of our families, and if we are to be true to the Church’s teaching concerning openness to life and to avoid the degradation that contraception and self-pleasuring wreak on both soul and relationship, we will be required to practice abstinence from time to time (e.g. a fertility awareness method that has come to be known as natural family planning).

Those who have used abstinence in this way can attest to the challenge it brings. It is worthy of note that, among the faithful who have had the need to avail themselves of this method, divorce is practically non-existent. Every one of us is, therefore, called to a life of celibacy as the situation demands.

Personal growth from self-denial will invariably reap more benefits in both this world and the next than living a life of self-gratification. Like the consecrated religious among us, we will not find the strength for that without leaning on the Cross and contemplating the wonder of the perfect and immutable complementarity of that most perfect of communities: The Holy Trinity.