Chapter 10: Integrating Oneself: The Virtue of Chastity

1. Integrating Oneself:
The Virtue of Chastity

2. What is Human Sexuality?
o Essential dimension of the whole
person
o Sexuality is a natural and
healthy part of life.
o Is everything about being a male
or female.
o It touches every aspect of our
being human (CFC 1061)

3. Human Sexuality
As we mature, we grow in awareness of our sexuality.
The following are some differences between male and
female:
Biological or Physical
Psycho-emotional and spiritual
Others arise from how Filipinos in general
understand the roles of men and women in society

4. Learning about Sex
o Many of us consider sex as a very interesting topic.
o This curiosity about sex is part of growing up.
 Because we experience physical,
psycho-emotional, and spiritual
changes as we mature

5. Learning about Sex
o At this point in our lives, we begin to ask our
parents and friends important questions about
relationships:
 “How do I know if another person
likes me?”
 “How does it feel to be in love?”

6. Learning about Sex
Because we all experience the changes that accompany sexual
maturity, our natural interest in sex should not be seen as something
shameful or scandalous.
“Parents are the first and most important educators of their own
children, and they also possess a fundamental competence in
this area: they are educators because they are parents.
- Letter to Families 16-

7. The Gift of Human Sexuality
Sexuality
- refers to everything about our being human that makes us either
male or female.
- the fundamental part of our being human and one of God’s many
gifts to us.
Through our sexuality, we nurture loving relationships with our parents as
young men or women.
The word sex does not simply refer to a specific act, or our doing, but also
to our very dignity as persons, our being.

8. Sexuality refers to your total self
Ethical self
Emotional self
Social self
Mental self
Physical self
The way you value your relationships
The way you feel about yourself and others
The way you interact with others
The way you think as a man or woman
The way you look as a man or woman

9. The Virtue of Chastity
o Chastity – is equated with celibacy, the choice to refrain
from engaging in the sexual act.
o It puts order to our sexual drives and energies, directing our
thoughts and actions toward attitudes and behaviors
appropriate to our state in life. (CFC 1096)

10. The Virtue of Chastity
Young and single adults
 Being chaste means abstaining from sexual
union, which finds meaning only in the context
of a loving marriage.
Married couples
 Living in chaste means genuinely loving one’s
spouse with exclusive and permanent
faithfulness.

11. Old Testament Significance
• Commandment #6 “You shall not commit adultery”
It protects not just the sanctity of marriage but also
the integrity of the family, the basic unit of society
(CFC 1066)
• Commandment #9 “You shall not covet your neighbor’s wife”
It reminds us that the source of our sinful acts is our
disordered desires and appetites.

12. New Testament Significance
• Sixth Beatitude “Blessed are the clean of heart, for they will see God”
Jesus taught us that those who strive to live in chaste lives – to
be clean of heart – will experience the great reward of
personally seeing God in perfect joy and freedom
Jesus affirms and intensifies the ninth commandment by
focusing on the source of all self-centered sexual acts- the
disordered desire of the heart

13. Obstacles to Grow in Chastity
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14. Masturbation
Why is it an obstacle to grow in chastity?
 reinforces the wrong notion that sex is merely for one’s
pleasure.
one’s sexuality is reduced to an object for personal
gratification
The act of arousing oneself by touching
one’s sexual organs
CFC 111 “it is the result of deficient [psycho-emotional] growth
and/or a symptom of much deeper personal problems”

15. Premarital Sex
• Also called as fornication
• entering into sexual union outside marriage
• can refer to a single act or even long-term
exclusive relationship outside of marriage (living in)
Catholic Church teaches that...
Sexual act is God’s gift and sexual union finds its fullest meaning
only in the service of conjugal love and the transmission of life

16. Two Reasons
1. to express conjugal love (the unitive purpose) and
2. to generate offspring (the procreative purpose)
Why is it an obstacle to grow in chastity?
1) it is an intimate act of self-giving between husband and wife
2) God created us to be capable of entering into sexual union in order,
to “multiply and fill the earth”

17. Use of Artificial Contraception
• Refers to artificial methods and technniques that prevent
pregnancy (literally “contra” – against + conception)
Family planning – refers to the notion of
spacing the births within a family

18. Reasons for the Church’s firm
stand against it
1) the sexual union of a married couple a) must always be an expression of
conjugal love and b) must be open to the possible transmission of life
2) some form of contraception do not prevent contraception but act as
abortifacients – (does not prevent conception but prevents the implantation
of the already developing child in the mother’s uterus
3) a mindset that depicts children as obstacles to one’s advancement and
goals; self-centered, pleasure-oriented, and consequence- free view of sex

19. Pornography and Prostitution
Pornography
refers to any material (pictures, periodicals, films, and
websites) that violates the private and intimate nature of
the human sexual act by exposing it to other persons.
Prostitution
 engaging in the sexual act for money

20. Why is it an obstacle to grow
in chastity?
1) their acts abuses God’s gift of sexuality, debase
their self-worth, and lead others to the false notion
that sexuality is about pleasure, not loving and lasting
relationships
2) they are often exploited and treated as objects for
sexual gratification rather than as persons with
intrinsic worth and dignity.

21. Homosexual Acts
Homosexual orientation
• refers to the sexual attraction of a person toward members of the
same sex
Homosexual act
• refers to having sexual relations with another person of the same sex
What is the difference between homosexual act and homosexual orientation?

22. Factors that contribute to a
Homosexual Orientation
1. biological problems
2. parental abuse
3. false education
4. other psycho- emotional factors - These are often
beyond a person’s conscious and complete control
 these implies that for many homosexual, perhaps, their
orientation was not something they freely or consciously chose

23. What does the Catholic
Church teaches us?
 Christian faith reminds us that we must accept persons
who have a homosexual orientation with genuine respect,
compassion, and sensitivity.
 CCC 2358 “Like all persons, Jesus invites them to
deepen their faith and grow in holiness by uniting their
difficulties with Christ’s own sacrifice on the Cross”.

24. Activity 2 – MY Jigsaw Self
• Divide a sheet of bond paper into ten or twelve sections
• Reflect on your strengths as a person (attitudes, habits, traits, values), and
write down one strength in each puzzle piece.
If it is nurtured by your relationship with your father or any male
figure in the family color these puzzle pieces YELLOW
If it is nurtured by your relationship with your mother or any
female figure in the family color these puzzle pieces BLUE
If it is nurtured by both parents color these puzzle pieces GREEN

25. Criteria
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