I had the pleasure of interviewing Dr. Chelsea today about pelvic floor 101 (dropping in January!) and during our conversation she said something that resonated:
“I wish purity culture was called puritan culture. Because purity is a gift of the Holy Spirit and it’s good.”
And, I agree with her! I’m in a Theology of the Body 2-year study program right now and something one of the leaders said is that we often think of “the pure of heart shall see God” as those who have died and can see the face of Jesus. While this is true, she wondered the following: the pure of heart may also be those who can truly see the body-soul combination of the person in front of them and they are able to see God in that person. St. JPII calls it the “interior gaze” of Adam & Eve pre-original sin in which we were able to look at each other with such love and we saw the ENTIRETY of the person: the goodness of their body and soul. There was no lust, only love. There was admiration and awe at the goodness of the human person.
Purity means a “freedom from anything that debases, contaminates, pollutes”. To be pure means to be free of the lies of sin and the lies that the body is bad, disgusting, etc.
The body is made GOOD and the body – including the sexual act – represents the love of Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. That’s why it’s so powerful and why God in His goodness asks of us to reserve this gift for marriage because of its power and what it represents!
So, why not call it puritan culture?
The puritan religion was a belief that only the few could be saved and many lived in a state of constant spiritual anxiety. They held themselves to laws and rigorous practices. There was no love, no freedom. The body was bad and everything related to it was bad. The body was a shell in which to exist and the soul was what mattered.
I’m scratching the surface on a complex issue. There is so much more to be said and I’ll continue to talk about it because purity is not what we’re angered by. Puritanical beliefs about the body and sex can fire us up with righteous anger because they perpetuate the belief that the body and everything related to it is bad.
What does the Catholic Church teach?
The Catholic Church DOES NOT teach this. JPII explored this in his audiences about the theology of the body: our bodies tell God’s story. We believe the body is good, including sex (as a verb & a noun). There are parameters to this teaching to protect and help us enter into deeper freedom with God and live out the goodness of our bodies and to reflect the Trinitarian love of Father, Son, and Holy Spirit (i.e. no premarital sex, no masturbation, no self-mutilation, no contraception, no homosexual acts).
The Catechism of the Catholic Church #2345 says that “Chastity is a moral virtue. It is also a gift from God, a grace, a fruit of spiritual effort. The Holy Spirit enables one whom the water of Baptism has regenerated to imitate the purity of Christ.”
The answer isn’t to throw out purity. Purity is a good.
We can throw out puritanical beliefs that the body is bad, how we are made is bad, that the sexual act is bad. These are NOT bad. If God made them, they can’t be bad.
How do we integrate our bodies?
We, as human beings capable of error due to original sin, can twist the truth or take these acts and distort them, but they are not inherently bad. We can have premarital sex, but that doesn’t mean sex is bad. The choice was bad because it hurts us – body and soul – because of the deep spousal meaning of sex and the reflection of the love of the Trinity is not reflected with multiple partners, but rather in a marital relationship. That is how the the love of the Trinity is lived out: in sex in marriage. This is both mysterious and miraculous. And, it is something that needs to be explored and talked about with much greater frequency than it currently is in the Catholic Church.
The fears that we have in talking about sex, in scandalizing someone by using anatomically correct parts, in causing more “damage” are preposterous. If not us, then who? As of now, Theology of the Body is a best kept secret of the Catholic Church and it is one of the greatest teachings on understanding the body and human sexuality in a culture that is so hurt and broken by the sexual revolution. It was no accident John Paul II shared Theology of the Body when he did. The Holy Spirit is abundantly present in his works and in his response to some of the greatest needs of the human person right now.
Are we willing to show up? Are we willing to go deep, to heal wounds, to allow Christ to pay the price for our sins? God desires our healing more than we desire it. He desires deep freedom for you from the sins of your body and the shame of your past. The healing may hurt and it may hit at places of your heart that deeply ache, but Christ WILL meet you there. He waits for you. He desires you more than anything or anyone else.
Are you willing to let him in and heal the wounds of puritanical beliefs that keep you from deep joy in & of your body?
