Chastity & Marriage

Even within marriage, there needs to be a place for periodic abstinence. Sexual relations in marriage, according to St. Thomas Aquinas, are a couple's due and any selfish refraining from this special act of unity is a violation of justice. However, sometimes charity and prudence will mandate abstinence because the time is not right for a child or because of the health of a spouse. If couples find self-control impossible prior to marriage, what kind of discipline and adult responsibility can they hope to achieve afterwards? Those who do not readily understand this do not appreciate Christian love and marriage. There is a place for chastity in marriage. This great virtue can be exhibited both in their abstinence and in their sexual expression. Lust would destroy this and all the other charisms proper to married love. Lust is a juvenile passion run amuck. It reaches no further into another person than the flesh. It is the lord of masturbation, pornography, rape, and sexual permissiveness. Lust is that opponent to which the apostle would write, "Would you join the body of Christ to a prostitute?" It has no place in marriage. If it is allowed any niche within the unity of man and woman where it can grow, it will dehumanize the beloved, destroying his or her image in the eyes of the lover like a cancer. The roving eye of lust breaks all promises and seeks infidelity. Rather than a mate, lust only wants its meat!