Husband At Bachelor Party

[Nihil Obstat]

[quote name='Raphael' date='06 June 2010 - 01:39 PM' timestamp='1275849565' post='2124657']
The substance (i.e., something "substantial") of adultery is lust. Any person who lusts commits adultery. That's our Lord's whole point on the matter. When your girlfriend goes to watch strippers, she desires them as a means to an end. They are eye-candy for her amusement and sexual arousal. They are there to put sexual thoughts in her head and desires in her heart. Now sexual desires are not evil and can be oriented toward love, but love is self-giving. I'm willing to bet that if that stripper approached your girlfriend and asked her to give herself to him in the sexual way she had been made to desire, you'd be offended. I'd imagine you would be quite upset also if he asked her to marry him. I imagine you'd want her to say no, but here's the thing: God made our sexual desires as one of the things to lead us toward love. To enjoy sexual desire, arousal, and fantasy, all while saying no the the marriage love demands, that is to misuse love. It it to take the substance love and turn it into the substance lust. A desire which is supposed to be self-giving then becomes selfish. "No," your girlfriend might say, "I don't want you. I have no interest in you as a person. I certainly don't want a relationship with you. A relationship with a stripper? Come now, why would I want you? All I wanted was the pleasure of seeing you naked and imagining the possibilities. Take your little outfit and leave me. I have no further use for you. I just wanted yup as a means to an end." now you might say that your girlfriend is more courteous than that. Perhaps she wouldn't be so rude, but I can assure you that any thanks she gives would be shallow. The only proper response to a person is love, not use. The only proper response to a welcomed sexual unveiling is to respond out of a loving response. God intended only married couples, who belong to one another wholly, to see each other nude, because they have the proper relationship in which the may respond to nakedness with an outpouring of love. Anything that falls short of that response is not worthy of the person. Anything else causes shame, which is the only thing that will make a person allow themselves to be so abused by others as to become a stripper. So don't pretend she isn't doing something substantial, she's lusting, committing adultery, saying yes to sexual desire but no to its fulfillment, building up a thirst of lust, desire for more to fill her need for sexual excitement while keeping her free of the responsibility of reciprocating love or treating others like persons, she's inhibiting her ability to love others by saying mo to love and yes to lust, she's avulsing another human being's dignity, choosing to fantasize about another man instead of you, laying the groundwork for a self-destructive marriage, and worst of all, imperiling her immortal soul, which it will be your duty as her someday husband to protect. Aside from all that, know that men and women both suffer ill-effects from lust; in a woman, it introduces coldness, infidelity, dominance, cruelty, and envy. Ready to marry into that?
[/quote]
This is one of the best posts I've read in months.

[Marie-Therese]

[quote name='Nihil Obstat' date='06 June 2010 - 02:43 PM' timestamp='1275849793' post='2124659']
This is one of the best posts I've read in months.
[/quote]

I concur. Raphael hit this one out of the park.

[rwri10]

[quote name='HisChildForever' date='06 June 2010 - 01:35 PM' timestamp='1275849325' post='2124656']
Since I am a heterosexual female and would not be at all tempted by putting it into Google, I just did - and apparently the "Boobs and Tubes" title refers to the shape or design of a beer bong.
[/quote]

They are floating the river, which is a fun thing to do where i live. hence in floating tubes...but to clarify, after i clicked on the event, there was a picture of a stripper.

[rwri10]

[quote name='Raphael' date='06 June 2010 - 01:39 PM' timestamp='1275849565' post='2124657']
The substance (i.e., something "substantial") of adultery is lust. Any person who lusts commits adultery. That's our Lord's whole point on the matter. When your girlfriend goes to watch strippers, she desires them as a means to an end. They are eye-candy for her amusement and sexual arousal. They are there to put sexual thoughts in her head and desires in her heart. Now sexual desires are not evil and can be oriented toward love, but love is self-giving. I'm willing to bet that if that stripper approached your girlfriend and asked her to give herself to him in the sexual way she had been made to desire, you'd be offended. I'd imagine you would be quite upset also if he asked her to marry him. I imagine you'd want her to say no, but here's the thing: God made our sexual desires as one of the things to lead us toward love. To enjoy sexual desire, arousal, and fantasy, all while saying no the the marriage love demands, that is to misuse love. It it to take the substance love and turn it into the substance lust. A desire which is supposed to be self-giving then becomes selfish. "No," your girlfriend might say, "I don't want you. I have no interest in you as a person. I certainly don't want a relationship with you. A relationship with a stripper? Come now, why would I want you? All I wanted was the pleasure of seeing you naked and imagining the possibilities. Take your little outfit and leave me. I have no further use for you. I just wanted yup as a means to an end." Now you might say that your girlfriend is more courteous than that. Perhaps she wouldn't be so rude, but I can assure you that any thanks she gives would be shallow. The only proper response to a person is love, not use. The only proper response to a welcomed sexual unveiling is to respond out of a loving act of self-giving. God intended only married couples, who belong to one another wholly, to see each other nude, because they have the proper relationship in which they may respond to nakedness with an outpouring of love. Anything that falls short of that response is not worthy of the person. Anything else causes shame, which is the only thing that will make a person allow themselves to be so abused by others as to become a stripper. So don't pretend she isn't doing something substantial, she's lusting, committing adultery, saying yes to sexual desire but no to its fulfillment, building up a thirst of lust, desire for more to fill her need for sexual excitement while keeping her free of the responsibility of reciprocating love or treating others like persons, she's inhibiting her ability to love others by saying mo to love and yes to lust, she's avulsing another human being's dignity, choosing to fantasize about another man instead of you, laying the groundwork for a self-destructive marriage, and worst of all, imperiling her immortal soul, which it will be your duty as her someday husband to protect. Aside from all that, know that men and women both suffer ill-effects from lust; in a woman, it introduces coldness, infidelity, dominance, cruelty, and envy. Ready to marry into that?
[/quote]

Wow. Great post Raphael. I have heard about phatmass through several sources. This is my first post, as I really needed some Catholic insight into this matter. I am so thankful for the overwhelming responses. I feel I know what to say and do now in the mean time until we can seek help together.

[Semper Catholic]

[quote name='Raphael' date='06 June 2010 - 01:39 PM' timestamp='1275849565' post='2124657']
The substance (i.e., something "substantial") of adultery is lust. Any person who lusts commits adultery. That's our Lord's whole point on the matter. When your girlfriend goes to watch strippers, she desires them as a means to an end. They are eye-candy for her amusement and sexual arousal. They are there to put sexual thoughts in her head and desires in her heart. Now sexual desires are not evil and can be oriented toward love, but love is self-giving. I'm willing to bet that if that stripper approached your girlfriend and asked her to give herself to him in the sexual way she had been made to desire, you'd be offended. I'd imagine you would be quite upset also if he asked her to marry him. I imagine you'd want her to say no, but here's the thing: God made our sexual desires as one of the things to lead us toward love. To enjoy sexual desire, arousal, and fantasy, all while saying no the the marriage love demands, that is to misuse love. It it to take the substance love and turn it into the substance lust. A desire which is supposed to be self-giving then becomes selfish. "No," your girlfriend might say, "I don't want you. I have no interest in you as a person. I certainly don't want a relationship with you. A relationship with a stripper? Come now, why would I want you? All I wanted was the pleasure of seeing you naked and imagining the possibilities. Take your little outfit and leave me. I have no further use for you. I just wanted yup as a means to an end." Now you might say that your girlfriend is more courteous than that. Perhaps she wouldn't be so rude, but I can assure you that any thanks she gives would be shallow. The only proper response to a person is love, not use. The only proper response to a welcomed sexual unveiling is to respond out of a loving act of self-giving. God intended only married couples, who belong to one another wholly, to see each other nude, because they have the proper relationship in which they may respond to nakedness with an outpouring of love. Anything that falls short of that response is not worthy of the person. Anything else causes shame, which is the only thing that will make a person allow themselves to be so abused by others as to become a stripper. So don't pretend she isn't doing something substantial, she's lusting, committing adultery, saying yes to sexual desire but no to its fulfillment, building up a thirst of lust, desire for more to fill her need for sexual excitement while keeping her free of the responsibility of reciprocating love or treating others like persons, she's inhibiting her ability to love others by saying mo to love and yes to lust, she's avulsing another human being's dignity, choosing to fantasize about another man instead of you, laying the groundwork for a self-destructive marriage, and worst of all, imperiling her immortal soul, which it will be your duty as her someday husband to protect. Aside from all that, know that men and women both suffer ill-effects from lust; in a woman, it introduces coldness, infidelity, dominance, cruelty, and envy. Ready to marry into that?
[/quote]

She makes me smiley pancakes in the morning and does my laundry. If that's not love I don't know what is. She can commit adultery with her eyeballs as much as she wants. Heck I know I've done my fair share, and I have the bruises on my arm to prove it, but she still comes home and hugs me when I open the door, and that's good enough for me. I reckon it'd be good enough for Jesus too.

[HisChildForever]

[quote name='Semper Catholic' date='06 June 2010 - 03:41 PM' timestamp='1275853268' post='2124696']
She makes me smiley pancakes in the morning and does my laundry. If that's not love I don't know what is. She can commit adultery with her eyeballs as much as she wants. Heck I know I've done my fair share, and I have the bruises on my arm to prove it, but she still comes home and hugs me when I open the door, and that's good enough for me. [b]I reckon it'd be good enough for Jesus too.[/b]
[/quote]

No, Jesus said that whoever looks at another lustfully has committed adultery in his heart. That is breaking the sixth commandment.

[Marie-Therese]

[quote name='Semper Catholic' date='06 June 2010 - 03:41 PM' timestamp='1275853268' post='2124696']
She makes me smiley pancakes in the morning and does my laundry. If that's not love I don't know what is. She can commit adultery with her eyeballs as much as she wants. Heck I know I've done my fair share, and I have the bruises on my arm to prove it, but she still comes home and hugs me when I open the door, and that's good enough for me. I reckon it'd be good enough for Jesus too.
[/quote]

Lots of people make the same mistake you make. Love is not about feelings, or laundry or pancakes. Love is about the conscious choice to do everything possible for the betterment of the other person. As a Catholic man, that means also contributing to the spiritual betterment of your spouse, which means doing everything in your power to get your spouse to Heaven. I understand that you take a very lackadasical view of such things, but I encourage you, in all charity, to seriously reconsider.

The divorce rates in this country are 50% percent of first marriages, 67% of second and 74% of third marriages. This is because there are a lot more smiley pancake marriages than there are spiritual betterment ones.

[Thy Geekdom Come]

[quote name='HisChildForever' date='06 June 2010 - 03:46 PM' timestamp='1275853596' post='2124702']
No, Jesus said that whoever looks at another lustfully has committed adultery in his heart. That is breaking the sixth commandment.
[/quote]
Semper, since you're new here, let me just tell you...you don't want to get HCF here talking about how born hurts women...or about how anything hurts women...or about women's issues.

Also, please note that although it's hard to see it through all the digital stuff on your screen, we're writing you about this and pushing the issue because we're concerned about you. I've experienced first hand the damage that pornography can do to relationships. I know how it can destroy families. A good friend of mine from college has a father who is addicted to porn. My high school girlfriend was a rape/incest victim as a child because of porn. I teach high schoolers, some of whom I know have difficult relationships because they hold their girlfriends up to porn standards of sexual attractiveness. I was a youth minister to a girl whose boyfriend used porn, cheated on her, and came back to her, convinced her to have sex with him, then dumped her. Where porn goes, misery, destruction, and anger follow. Lives are ruined in its wake. Lust, pornography, fornication, masturbation, and so many other things are a rejection of the greatness God has planned for us, because true greatness isn't measured in my strength or my attractiveness or how many women I've had, true greatness is being able to give up all the power, strength, money, and sexual passion we have, to lay it down for another. Christ showed us this. God's greatest strength is not His ability to create or destroy the cosmos in an instant, it His his ability to lay down all His power and forgive, love, embrace. True power, true worth, can only be found in the cross. The fruit of the cross lasts for eternity, but these conquests and powers we enjoy now will wither and fade with time. Only love can last. Only self-sacrificing love can make you a real man.

[Hassan]

[quote name='Raphael' date='06 June 2010 - 02:39 PM' timestamp='1275849565' post='2124657']
Aside from all that, know that men and women both suffer ill-effects from lust; in a woman, it introduces coldness, infidelity,[size="7"][b] dominance[/b][/size], cruelty, and envy. Ready to marry into that?
[/quote]


That was an interesting negative quality to include. If women lust they may induce 'dominance'. What exactly does that mean?

[Catholic Fox]

[quote name='HisChildForever' date='06 June 2010 - 02:46 PM' timestamp='1275853596' post='2124702']
No, Jesus said that whoever looks at another lustfully has committed adultery in his heart. That is breaking the sixth commandment.
[/quote]

Action failed: You have reached your quota of positive votes for the day.

[MithLuin]

Just FYI, male strippers strongly encourage women to touch them. Men can be quite turned on by looks, but women generally react more to touch. So, that's part of how that job works.

[b]SC[/b], I'm glad you and your girlfriend trust one another. Trust is a very important part of any relationship. That's why it's important that the OP confront her husband so that he can clarify this misunderstanding. After all, it's a lot more common to joke about strippers at bachelor parties than to actually get them (though of course that happens, too). If he did nothing wrong, he should certainly be able to explain himself and she won't have to worry about him doing stuff behind her back.

[b]Hassan[/b], no relationship should be a struggle for dominance. When marriage turns into a fight over who is in charge, it is really hurtful to both parties. One can include 'dominance' on a list of negatives without suggesting that women ought to be doormats.

[Thy Geekdom Come]

[quote name='Hassan' date='06 June 2010 - 06:55 PM' timestamp='1275864922' post='2124911']
That was an interesting negative quality to include. If women lust they may induce 'dominance'. What exactly does that mean?
[/quote]
Mithluin explained it best, but I was going for the sort of aggressive female dominance you might see in real life when women few men as objects. Be on the look out for the "yes, dear" attitude (when it's done in half-heartedness or sarcasm, that is). Also look for women who think their men are accessories or who talk about training their neandrathals. I'm thinking of the stereotypical wife in many a Shakespearean era play. Now, that kind of attitude can be achieved by other means as well, including husbands who don't take the leadership of their homes or man up to their responsibilities of treating their wives with dignity. Is it any surprise that such women would decide their husbands are irrelevant and need to be usurped?

[Hassan]

[quote name='MithLuin' date='06 June 2010 - 07:53 PM' timestamp='1275868435' post='2124946']


[b]Hassan[/b], no relationship should be a struggle for dominance. When marriage turns into a fight over who is in charge, it is really hurtful to both parties. One can include 'dominance' on a list of negatives without suggesting that women ought to be doormats.
[/quote]


The Abrahamic religions (I'm not saying this does not apply to other faiths besides Islam, Christianity, and Judaism I just don't know enough about them to say one way or another) all have an unfortunate streak in them that associate a woman's sexuality with her potential to gain undue and illicit influence over men and potentially dominate them. You see it in Jewish tradition, like with Lilith who refused to be sexually subservient to Adam and was therefore rebelling against the natural order of things. Aquinas associated Sodomy, in part, with a woman assuming a sexually dominate position in sex and we know the frequently skimmed over passages in St. Paul's letters that associated a woman's righteousness with subservience to men and being sexually receptive, being defined by her sexual capacities which are always defined in a utilitarian way rather than something over which she is sovereign. Shut up and have babies, seems to be an admittedly uncharitable characterization of Paul's advice. Ibn Taymiyyah took it to the extreme in Islam, a woman once married should remain in the home, except when she must leave to attend the funeral of her parents and a very few other exceptional circumstances. A woman's voice should not be heard either, least the public introduction of any feminine quality or hint of feminine sensuality tempt men to sin against the law's of Allah.

I can't speak for Judaism, but in the case of Christianity and Islam, the founders had, relative to the time and context, progressive opinions on women and their place in society, however all too often, in the hands of their followers, that world view becomes one in which women are some insidious temptation to be checked. And somehow their sexuality is constantly linked to their potential to lead men away from righteousness and be a socially corrosive force.

They talk a good game

There is neither Jew nor Greek, slave nor free, male nor female, for you are all one in Christ Jesus
Galatians 3:28

So their Lord accepted their prayer, for I do not waste the efforts of any (righteous) worker, male or female; you are all one among yourselves; so those who migrated and were driven out from their homes and were harassed in My cause, and fought, and were slain - I will certainly wipe out all their sins and will certainly admit them into Gardens beneath which rivers flow; a reward from Allah; and only with Allah is the best reward.
Qur'an 3:195

Yet somehow that equality always seems to be cast in very Orwellian terms. Women are equal to men just different (never mind that, logically speaking, stating that something is equal but different is incoherent (x)(y)[x=y-->(P)(Px<-->Py)] ). It's just for female different equality they must be subservient while for male different equality they are fated to be dominate. Somehow, the whole things smacks of all the barnyard animals being equal, but some just so happen to be more equal than others. And somehow, this need for men to be extra equal to women always seems to trace back to a woman's sexuality. Something seems fishy about this picture.

Edited June 7, 2010 by Hassan

[Hassan]

[quote name='Raphael' date='06 June 2010 - 08:11 PM' timestamp='1275869496' post='2124952']
Mithluin explained it best, but I was going for the sort of aggressive female dominance you might see in real life when women few men as objects. Be on the look out for the "yes, dear" attitude (when it's done in half-heartedness or sarcasm, that is). Also look for women who think their men are accessories or who talk about training their neandrathals. I'm thinking of the stereotypical wife in many a Shakespearean era play. Now, that kind of attitude can be achieved by other means as well, including husbands who don't take the leadership of their homes or man up to their responsibilities of treating their wives with dignity. [b]Is it any surprise that such women would decide their husbands are irrelevant and need to be usurped[/b]?
[/quote]


Usurp is a word usually used for an authority being overthrown his subjects. Perhaps a woman can object to being fit into a relationship of one partner being dominate over the other and not be overly bitter or lusty.