Edward Feser, Natural theology, natural science, and the philosophy of nature

James Chastek, Marriage and mortal sin

Brandon digs out a fantastic text from STA’s commentary on Corinthians:



…that the conjugal act is sometimes meritorious and without any mortal or venial sin, as when it is directed to the good of procreation and education of a child for the worship of God; for then it is an act of religion; or when it is performed for the sake of rendering the debt, it is an act of justice. But every virtuous act is meritorious, if it is performed with charity. But sometimes it is accompanied with venial sin, namely, when one is excited to the matrimonial act by concupiscence, which nevertheless stays within the limits of the marriage, namely, that he is content with his wife only. But sometimes it is performed with mortal sin, as when…

So guess: what is he going to say? Is sexual activity a mortal sin when “it is not open to procreation” (an answer that is at hand from what he says at the head of the quotation) or when “it is performed in an unnatural way”? Don’t we expect St. Thomas to mention some obvious perversion? Yet, in the casual way that he says all his revolutionary things, he says that sexual activity is a mortal sin when…
…the husband approaches the wife with the idea that he would just as gladly or more gladly approach another woman.

Aquinas has a "full" account of marriage, but some may criticze him for focusing only on the sexual act. One can start with the analysis of the external act and whether it is good or not, but one than moves "upward" and looks at the intention which may modify the act. In this case, one looks at the presence (or absence) of marital friendship/love or charity. The mistake of those who look solely at the intention is that they deny the sexual act is intrinsically moral. Elsewhere he touches upon the roles of husband and wife (citation?) - while the personalists are right to focus on the "context" of the sexual act in marriage and to talk about the married life, were they so bold as to claim that this aspect had been ignored by previous generations of Catholic theologians? Or were they blind to the limitations of their own historical situation? How many of them were reacting to atomism of mass society (or liberal society) and yet espousing some of the principles of such a social de[form]ity? While some personalists assumed a "traditional" understanding about the complementarity of the sexes and the differences in roles did others fall into the error of radical egalitarianism? Did others have a msitaken or exaggerated notion of marital friendship (borrowed from those who advocate "companionate marriage", one that failed to take into account sex differences (especially the role of the husband as leader)?

thenyssan said, raises a question about concupiscence. If one is motivated purely by carnal desire then the sexual act is a venial sin?

Mr. Chastek writes:

"[S]ense goods as sensed are peculiar to a subject as opposed to being common. But the very intensity of sexual desire is from the contact it has with the common good – we really do touch something of the divine (De Anima, 2:4). To enjoy this purely out of concupiscence is to cheat the good we touch and to act against its nature, since we want to enjoy common goods as mere particular goods. If this is right, then there is a certain mercy in saying it is only a venial sin! Shouldn’t we have a harsher judgment on someone who want to appropriate common goods to his own peculiar good?"

I don't know if I'd take this line of reasoning. I think I'd focus more on the psychological aspect behind concupiscence - how it diminishes the moral agency that should be present? Human beings are animals, but they should not be "too" carnal? Reason (and will) should operate in tandem with sense appetite? If appetite does not raise above the sense level, if it is not sublimated by reason...

Dominicans visiting Chevetogne several years ago: The Sacraments as Liturgy

Rorate Caeli: Saint Hildegard and Saint John of the Cross, Doctors

Chant Cafe: "To chant, to sing, engages one's whole being, really." - NPR

Choeur des Moines de Chevetogn - Pentecôte

Simonopetra Manastir!

Insight Scoop: The uniqueness of Saint Philip Neri, the "Apostle of Rome"

Byzantine, Texas: French documentary on Valaam to be subtitled in English


Related:
Valaam "Step to the Skies" part 1 of 7 (English Subtitles)



Parts 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7

Grand canon pascal, choeur des moines de Valaam


Archimandrite:

Rome Reports: President of the Vatican's Bank, Ettore Gotti Tedeschi, ousted by board



Is the bank in need of reform? Is it involved in usury in any way?

FSSP ordinations vid

(via Rorate Caeli)

What is Natural Law Like? by Jeremy Waldron (via MoJ)

Abstract:
“The State of Nature,” said John Locke, “has a Law of Nature to govern it, which obliges every one.” But what is “a law of nature”? How would we tell, in a state of nature, that there was a natural law as opposed to something else — like positive law, a set of customs, natural morality, natural ethics, a set of natural inclinations, the truth of certain prudential calculations, a widespread but perhaps false belief in some transcendent law, the voice of God, or just a natural disposition on the part of some pompous people to make sonorous objective-sounding pronouncements? What form should we expect natural law to take in our apprehension of it? This paper argues three things. (a) John Finnis’s work on natural law provides no answer to these questions; his “theory of natural law” is really just a theory of the necessary basis in ethics for evaluating positive law. (b) We need an answer to the question “What is natural law like” not just to evaluate the work of state-of-nature theorists like Locke, but also to explore the possibility that natural law might once have played the role now played by positive international law in regulating relations between sovereigns. And (c), an affirmative account of what natural law is like must pay attention to (1) its deontic character; (2) its enforceability; (3) the ancillary principles that have to be associated with its main normative requirements if it is to be operate as a system of law; (4) its separability form objective from ethics and morality, even from objective ethics and morality; and (5) the shared recognition on earth of its presence in the world. Some of these points — especially 3, 4, and 5 — sound like characteristics of positive law. But the paper argues that they are necessary nevertheless if it is going to be plausible to say that natural law has ever operated (or does still operate) as law in the world.

Vatican launches competition to promote the Social Doctrine of the Church



Centesimus Annus
Catholic Social Teaching in Action

For Greater Glory: The True Story of Cristeros

Fr. Michael Sherwin informs us that Fr. Bedouelle has passed away. May he rest in peace.

L'Inquisition, Dominique et les dominicains
fr. Guy Bedouelle, o.p.

Edward Feser, Oerter on universals and causality and Oerter contra the principle of causality and Review of Krauss

Rome Reports: Jesuits celebrate 500th anniversary of Diego Laínez, successor to St. Ignatius of Loyola

Gregory B. Sadler, Yves Simon on Moral Virtue (part 1 of 2)
Yves Simon on Moral Virtue (part 2 of 2)

Orthodox theologian to visit Stamford church

James Chastek, Lecture on Thomism and Molinism

The Province of St. Joseph: Preparing for Ordination

Augustine Di Noia, The Vision of Dominican Theological Education (I've posted this link to his page at the DHS Priory before, no?)

The Traditional Mass Is Not a Spectator Sport by Steve Skojec

What this does is create a sense of community – something that I have found to be lacking in many traditional parishes I’ve attended or visited. Often times, the Traditional Latin Mass is attended by people from every far corner of the geographic area, creating a loose federation of individuals that know each other by face or even by name, but have little in the way of a sense of real common bond. It’s a lovely thing to have coffee and donuts in a Church basement as a means of socializing with your fellow parishioners, but it’s a different thing entirely when a priest and his confrères make you feel as though you’re a part of something more cohesive and organic.

This communal aspect is almost familial, and is rooted first and foremost in the liturgical experience. The CRNJs believe in a participatio actuosa that is neither the frenetic, hand-holding around the altar experience of many post-Vatican II parishes, nor the austere, entirely interior participation of those more inclined to chapels of the Society of St. Pius X. It is a human, natural, anthropological form of worship, where one is engaged but not coddled, involved but never given the sense that it’s all about them.

I think the difference in impression is due more to the difference in the size of the congregation than anything objective (other than the members of the congregation living in closer proximity to one another than those attending the EF elsewhere). It is true that many traditionalists have a low Mass mentality, but one will not [usually] find it among the priests of the Institute of Christ the King or the Priestly Fraternity of St. Peter. I think the biggest weakness in the parish life for traditionalist Catholics is the geographical spread of the personal parishes. The faithful live so far apart that one cannot really say that they are living with one another.