When Purity Culture Hurts Men, Too

[MIKolbe]

I find it interesting that 'we' can visit the confessional on a weekly basis; pray the rosary everyday, abstain on Fridays outside of lent; discern our vocations, pray without ceasing; go to Mass multiple times a week; have the willingness to listen, discuss, and sometimes debate with eachother what our Bishops and Holy Father say; debate the finer points of homoiousios vs. homoousios; watch glorious videos of eastern liturgies; listen to catholic hip hop; talk about, defend, and teach NFP; and actively go on Muslim (and christian) websites to bring and defend the revealed truth that IS the Catholic Church...

 

 

but a lady wearing heels a little too high (because we all "know" what that does to her "backside" wink wink)...... and we are ONLY broken, weak, feeble men.

 

 

I mean, granted, a lady spilling out of a shirt 18 times too small is one thing.  And with that, can we not look our wives/gfs in the eyes at that time and tell them we love them more than anything in the world?...or, if we are alone, be strong enough to divert?   or.. if we have to talk to little-miss-cups-o-plenty, look her flipping squarely in the eyes?  So squarely she gets a little creeped out by us?  Wouldn't that be nice?  She would have to think, "golly gee, why is this fine catholic gentleman looking at me so intently in the eyes as we speak? Most other guys look at my...ohhhhhhhh that's why".  Maybe that would be a nice witness for her?

 

I am sick of "chastity" being only neo-gnosticism.  yeah, i made that word up.  And I am quite impressed with my proper use of semi colons in the first paragraph, though I always overdo the ellipses.......

[MissyP89]

I love you, Jason.

[Nihil Obstat]

More scattered thoughts:

 

Unless a man is a woman's confessor, husband, or father, he has no business whatsoever telling her that she is not dressed modestly. That would be an absolutely appalling breach of etiquette.

The excessive focus of certain strains of the 'modesty debate' on women's clothing seems rather misdirected to me, and possibly linked to an unhealthy desire to control women. This is wrong. Such tendencies do exist, both in secular culture and in young Catholic culture. Such men ought to be told to mind their own damn business.

I am sure there is a valid discussion to be had on what particular pieces of clothing a man or woman should or should not wear, but that discussion must happen in its proper context.

At the same time, many young people, men and women, are not really capable of receiving such a discussion, even in its proper context, without feeling personally attacked. Whether that is due to miscommunication or immaturity or anything else, I cannot say. But it complicates things because then we have to be extremely careful to first find the proper context for such discussions, then somehow present it in such a way that nobody feels attacked. Simply saying "we should never talk about immodest clothing" would be wrong, I think. There is a time and a place for it. 

It is true that sexual sin is nearly ubiquitous among Catholics right now, especially young Catholics. According to my priest, lust, wrath, and gluttony comprise about 90% of what he hears in the confessional. I would be willing to bet that lust makes up a good 75% on its own. So why is it such a problem right now, and what do we do to combat it? Is it more of a problem now than it was in the past? What obligation does one have to his or her companions to help them in their shared struggle against sexual sin? 

[ImageTrinity]

I think it's also worth noting that this guys isn't Catholic. Catholic modesty/purity discussions are tammeeee compared to the way they go in some Protestant circles.

 

It is true that sexual sin is nearly ubiquitous among Catholics right
now, especially young Catholics. According to my priest, lust, wrath,
and gluttony comprise about 90% of what he hears in the confessional. I
would be willing to bet that lust makes up a good 75% on its own. So why
is it such a problem right now, and what do we do to combat it? Is it
more of a problem now than it was in the past? What obligation does one
have to his or her companions to help them in their shared struggle
against sexual sin?

I had a priest tell me once that he wished he heard people confess to sins against charity at least half as much as they confess to sins against chastity.

[sixpence]

You'd think that the hip God who was secretly super cool with sex he just wants us to have the right sex which is really the BEST SEX EVER would have explained to Israeli society that a woman's virginity should be treated as a commodity but I guess that was a tall order for the God who sent a column of fire from the sky to buy Moses and the Jews time to escape the Egyptian army and then drowned said army in the Red Sea.

 

a tall order for his kiddos, not him!

[Basilisa Marie]

One of the problems I've experienced growing up will all sorts of chastity speakers is that the message never seemed to develop, it was always the same. 

 

Like, okay, the first time I ever heard a chastity speaker was in late middle school when my mom took me to hear the Everts (before they were married).  I LOVED it, I understood it as a fantastic counter-cultural message about human dignity. But the chastity message you give a 14 year old shouldn't be the same thing you tell a 24 year old or even an 18 year old. It should become more nuanced as you get older. For young women, the message almost always was to "dress modestly" and "guard your heart" (I'm not even going to begin to get into my frustrations with the idea of "emotional chastity"). It never went anywhere from there, never talked about experiencing lust, anything like that.  So I'd say that clothes and good relationships might be an okay place to start for ladies, but it has to grow to incorporate deal with lust, too.  Maybe the opposite would be true for men, starting with lust and then moving toward relationships.