Augustine And The Proper End Of Sex

[Cure of Ars]

My questions;

Did St. Augustine teach that there was only one end in marriage, procreation?

Or did St. Augustine teach that there were two ends in marriage, union and procreation?

It would also be good to have the answer for St Thomas Aquinas as well.


This statement is what I want to make sure is true.

[quote]Now sex, with no intention of procreation, but for pleasure with the ultimate end being union in Marriage is not a sin and I would say that this is what Augustine was referring to in the passage that I gave.  Sex has two proper ends procreation and union in marriage.  [/quote]


This is the quote from a Augustine that I gave him to read,

[quote]"Since, however, the cohabitation for the purpose of procreating children, which must be admitted to be the proper end of marriage, is not sinful, what is it which the apostle allows to be permissible, but that married persons, when they have not the gift of continence, may require one from the other the due of the flesh-- and that not from a wish for procreation, but for the pleasure of concupiscence? [b]This gratification incurs not the imputation of guilt on account of marriage, but receives permission on account of marriage. This, therefore, must be reckoned among the praises of matrimony; that, on its own account, it makes pardonable that which does not essentially appertain to itself.[/b] For the nuptial embrace, which subserves the demands of concupiscence, is so effected as not to impede the child-bearing, which is the end and aim of marriage." (Book I, Chapter 16. Emphasis mine.)[/quote]


We are discussing this statement he made in an article which I do not feel is totally correct because of the above quote. Here is his statement that I am questioning;

“that sexual activity between married spouses, [for Augustine] if done for its own pleasurable sake and not for procreation, is a sin, but forgivable”

I think it needs to say “procreation and union in marriage”

Any help would be appreciated.


His first responce;

[quote]the key word is "pardonable," in your version,
which is somewhat like "forgivable." what Aug
means is that sex only for the sake of pleasure
in marriage is (only) a venial sin. that's abundantly
clear from his entire corpus. not even Epistle
6*, the most "lenient" of his writings on sex
in marriage, renounces that view.

thanks for the feedback.[/quote]

His second e-mail;

[quote]no guilt in sex in marriage if the act is done for procreation.
yes guilt, venial, if done for the pleasure. there are a zillion
passages in augustine that claim this. don't push to make augustine
more reasonable than he is. aquinas takes this notion over from
augustine and develops it at greater length. they both think that
a husband's pursuing sex with his wife solely for the pleasure
of it is to degrade the woman (aquinas's language is more
euphemistic than augustine's, who talks about the husband's
treating the wife as if she were a whore).

austin cartwright wrote:
>
> "not the imputation of guilt on account of marriage"[/quote]

I don't have my responses to him but it's not to hard to get what I said. This is what I'm wanting to say;

[quote]I concede, Augustine taught that sex done with the ultimate end being pleasure is a sin.

I would say that both Augustine and Aquinas are very reasonable.  They are just logically following Natural Law. 

“no guilt in sex in marriage if the act is done for procreation”

I agree the proper end of sex is procreation.

“venial, if done for the pleasure”

I agree pleasure is not the proper end of sex.  Pleasure is a means not an end.

Now sex, with no intention of procreation, bur for pleasure with the ultimate end being union in Marriage is not a sin and I would say that this is what Augustine was referring to in the passage that I gave.  Sex has two proper ends procreation and union in marriage. 

God bless[/quote]

Just want to make sure that I am right.

Edited July 26, 2004 by Cure of Ars

[BurkeFan]

I'm not sure that Thomas covered that topic. Marriage is only found in the supplement to the Summa, which Aquinas DID NOT write. I'm still not yet well read enough to know if he wrote on the topic elsewhere.

[Guest JeffCR07]

Well, a couple things. First: Sex which is done for the sole purpose of pleasure is a mortal sin, whether in or out of marriage.

It is assumed, however, when speaking of the issue, that sex in marriage is always done with union (and the re-consummation of the marriage) in mind.

Because of this assumption, sex within marriage that is [i]open to life[/i] though done primely out of its unitive aspect, is not a sin at all.

Not to be too explicit (perhaps this thread should be in the NFP board...even though I still havn't bothered to get a password yet) but I believe that the writings of Augustine and Aquinas are chiefly referring to instances in which a husband has sex with his wife when she doesnt really want to. Such a thing would be a venial sin, due to the juxtaposition (I believe) of marital obligation (one should have good reason to refuse, whether husband or wife) with the calling to mutual service.

If, however, Augustine and Aquinas really mean that no sex that does not place procreation as its prime goal is a venial sin, then they would be wrong.

- Your Brother In Christ, Jeff

[phatcatholic]

exactly where do you two disagree? you seem to be in agreement

also, you seem to be accusing ur opponent of not believing in the unitive necessity of the sex act, but i dont see where he is denying this.

also, why is sex in marriage simply for pleasure only a venial sin? is he implying that sex for pleasure naturally carries w/ it a unitive purpose? if so, this is not true. i can have sex w/ my wife simply for pleasure w/o caring in the least bit about rather it draws us closer together--in which case my act would be mortally sinful. even sex that desires unity--but not procreation--is mortally sinful.

my impression of your opponent is that he believes in the unitive and procreative ends of intercourse, but he separates them. what he needs to know is that the couple must be open to achieving both ends at the same time in order for intercourse to be licit.

i hope that helps,
phatcatholic

Edited July 26, 2004 by phatcatholic

[St. Catherine]

It looks like I was wrong.

[Cure of Ars]

The above post belongs to me. My wife is never wrong.



Just joking honey.

[phatcatholic]

what were you wrong about?

[BurkeFan]

I think it was an inside marriage joke... just a guess though.

[Cure of Ars]

[quote name='phatcatholic' date='Jul 26 2004, 05:45 PM'] what were you wrong about? [/quote]
In thought wrongly that the ends of bonding and procreation in the conjugal act could be separated. I thought if you used NFP (with the intent of not having children) and had the end of the conjugal act be for bonding purposes that it was ok to separate the two like this. I have now learned that a “grave reason” is first needed. I guess with even the “grave reason” that you still cannot separate the two. I am still working on wrapping my head around this. It takes time. I have been married 4 years have two children have been using NFP for about three months. NFP has been great for my wife and I but it looks like I need to be doing some soul searching about adding to the clan .

As specifically toward Augustine he explicitly states (no pun intended) that procreation is the end of marriage in the quote I gave. I guess he could be implying that with marriage that bonding is also the end but I have not been able to find an explicit statement that says this. But even if he did state there were two ends for the conjugal act in marriage he would probably agree with the Church that the ends couldn’t be separated. In any case I was wrong.

[phatcatholic]

i do know that a belief in intercourse solely for the purpose of procreation is notoriously attributed to augustine, but i don't know with certainty if this is warranted or not.

[Guest JeffCR07]

I am somewhat confused about that last comment of phat's but I was under the assumption that sex is sinful if it precludes [i]either[/i] the unitive or procreative aspects. I thought it was:

a.) a mortal sin to have sex just for pleasure (without the intent of unitive or procreative)
b.) a mortal sin to have sex just for unitive purposes, without be open to life
c.) a mortal sin to have sex just for procreative purposes, without desiring the unifying bonds of love between man and wife

Am I mistaken?

[Madonna]

[quote]Did St. Augustine teach that there was only one end in marriage, procreation?

Or did St. Augustine teach that there were two ends in marriage, union and procreation? [/quote]

I believe it was the first one. Augustine leaned toward gnosticism. It makes sense, too. Augustine had a very promiscuous past. The root of much of his sins were sexual. He had a mistress for many years before he converted. In the things on Augustine that I have read, it was hard for him to see sex, even inside marriage, to be anything but lustful unless the sole intention was to create life.

[Guest JeffCR07]

Madonna, that makes perfect sense. I think it is important for us to remember that while individual Church Fathers are a wonderful source, we should probably look to more than one or two (even if they are Doctors of the Church) and we should definately look to the Magisterium's teachings on the subject.

[phatcatholic]

[quote name='JeffCR07' date='Jul 27 2004, 08:39 AM'] I am somewhat confused about that last comment of phat's but I was under the assumption that sex is sinful if it precludes [i]either[/i] the unitive or procreative aspects. I thought it was:

a.) a mortal sin to have sex just for pleasure (without the intent of unitive or procreative)
b.) a mortal sin to have sex just for unitive purposes, without be open to life
c.) a mortal sin to have sex just for procreative purposes, without desiring the unifying bonds of love between man and wife

Am I mistaken? [/quote]
that's how i've always understood it.

btw, what i meant by my last statement is that people often think Augustine believed only in the procreative necessity of intercourse and not in its unitive aspect or in the due privilage of pleasure if both of these necessities are met--but i am unsure if it is correct to think this about him

Edited July 27, 2004 by phatcatholic

[Guest JeffCR07]

ooooo, I gotcha now, sorry about that (I was a little slow this morning, lol). Yea I agree, I am a little hesitant to make a definitive stance on his teachings.