“Sexual pleasure, which is a gift from God, is undermined by pornography: satisfaction without a relationship that can generate forms of addiction.” Thus Pope Francis in today's general audience underlined that “we must defend love”.
“Winning the battle against lust, against the “thingification” of the other, can be a lifelong undertaking,” he added in the catechesis. “In Christianity there is no condemnation of the sexual instinct,” the Pope continued, recalling that a book of the Bible, the Song of Songs, “is a stupendous love poem between two engaged couples. However, this beautiful dimension of our humanity is not free from dangers.”
“If it is not polluted by vice, falling in love – underlined Pope Francis in the catechesis dedicated to the vice of lust – is one of the purest feelings. A person in love becomes generous, enjoys giving gifts, writes letters and poems. She stops thinking about herself to be completely projected towards the other”. “This is beautiful!”, highlighted the Pontiff. “And if you ask a lover why he loves, he won't find an answer: in many ways her love is unconditional, without any reason”, the words of Pope Francis.
The vice of lust “devastates relationships between people – he then added -. Unfortunately, everyday news is sufficient to document such a reality. How many relationships that started in the best way have then changed into toxic relationships, of possession of the other, devoid of respect and a sense of limits? These are loves in which chastity is lacking: a virtue that should not be confused with sexual abstinence, but rather with the will to never possess the other. Loving means respecting the other, seeking their happiness, cultivating empathy for their feelings, placing ourselves in the knowledge of a body, a psychology and a soul that are not ours, and which must be contemplated for the beauty of which they are carriers.”
Vice, continued Pope Francis, “which mocks all this: it loots, robs, consumes hastily, does not want to listen to others but only to its own needs and pleasure; lust considers every courtship a bore, it does not seek that synthesis between reason, drive and feeling that would help us lead our existence wisely. The lustful person only seeks shortcuts: he does not understand that the path of love must be traveled slowly, and this patience, far from being synonymous with boredom, allows us to make our love relationships happy.”
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