Pope Francis: “Sexual pleasure is a gift from God but is threatened by pornography”
“Sexual pleasure, a gift from God, is undermined by pornography.” The Pope highlighted this at the general audience by dedicating the catechesis to the “demon”, that is to say to the vice of lust and its traps. Such as “satisfaction without relationship which can generate forms of dependence”. Hence the warning: “We must defend the love of the mind, the heart, the body to give themselves to each other. Winning the battle against lust, against the “thingification” of the other, can be a lifelong undertaking.” “However,” Bergoglio underlined, “the prize of this battle is the most important of all, because it is about preserving that beauty that God wrote in his creation when he imagined the love between man and woman. Which is not to use oneself but to love one another.”
Speaking about the vice of lust, Bergoglio observed: “Be careful: in Christianity there is no condemnation of the sexual instinct. A book of the Bible, the Song of Songs, is a wonderful love poem between two engaged couples. However, this beautiful dimension of our humanity is not free from dangers, so much so that Saint Paul already had to address the issue in the first Letter to the Corinthians. He writes like this: “Everywhere we hear talk of immorality among you, and such immorality that is not found even among the pagans.” The Apostle's rebuke concerns precisely an unhealthy management of sexuality by some Christians.”
Pope Francis: 'beware of toxic relationships, the daily news documents it'
'The warning, 'to love is to respect the other, seek their happiness' Beware of toxic relationships. The Pope warned this during the catechesis – at the general audience – dedicated to the vice of lust. Looking at the human experience, at the experience of falling in love, Bergoglio observed: “Why it is such a shocking experience in people's lives, none of us knows: it is one of the most surprising realities of existence. Most of the songs you hear on the radio are about this: loves that shine, loves that are always sought after and never achieved, loves that are full of joy, or that torment to the point of tears. If it is not polluted by vice, falling in love 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. 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.”
Francis warned: “This “garden” where wonders multiply is not, however, safe from evil. It is disfigured by the demon of lust, and this vice is particularly hateful. First of all because it devastates relationships between people. 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.”
“Lust, on the other hand – observed the Pontiff – mocks all of this: it preys, robs, consumes in a hurry, does not want to listen to the other 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.” But there is a second reason, Francis said, “why lust is a dangerous vice. Among all the pleasures of man, sexuality has a powerful voice. It involves all the senses; it dwells in both the body and the psyche; if not disciplined with patience, if not inscribed in a relationship and in a story where two individuals transform it into a loving dance, it turns into a chain that deprives man of freedom”.
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