There is a lot of confusion about love and its relationship to sexuality today. Relationships between same-sex couples confuse things even further by creating what is surprisingly a non-existent distinction between heterosexual relationships and homosexual relationships.
Consider what is common to each and every person:
- The sexual urge.
- The need to choose how to respond to it.
The nature of attraction is not relevant. We really have no control over attraction. We are naturally attracted to the attributes of other persons: Their personalities, their appearance or looks, and even their sexual attributes.
Everyone is called to chastity and has the same struggles.
Remember, the opposite of love is use, i.e. using another person as a means to some end. We have a natural desire to be close to people we are attracted to, we like, or we love. But when we engage in sexual acts outside of marriage between a man and a woman, consider what the purpose of the acts are.
Are these sexual acts of love or acts of use? Do they create a habit of use, or a habit of love or virtue?
In reality acts of genital manipulation, by one's self or by using the body of another person, develop habits of use. The same is true with intercourse, which is an intimate act, has the wrong end. In addition, because of the potential for pregnancy, even with the use of contraceptives, the fundamental human right of the potential child to be conceived and brought up within marriage is jeopardized. Until a man and woman have first made themselves irreplaceable to each other in marriage, they have no right to procreate.
The objective of either kind of act outside of marriage can only be pleasure or the creation of the sense or illusion of intimacy for self. Why is this not real intimacy? This self-centered "intimacy" fades with time; real intimacy does not. Use of others actually interferes with the development of true intimacy and friendship, which requires love. Use is always contrary to love.
Can mutual use ever be an act of love? How can it be when it promotes habits that are contrary to love?
Chastity, then is an act of love. It promotes the habit of love and virtue in each person for the other.
If I love you, I will never, never use you.
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