Nicene Guys Feed: Happiness and Holes

Speaking of the Nicene Guys, here is my latest post on that site:

"Great art Thou, O Lord, and greatly to be praised; great is Thy power, and Thy wisdom infinite. And Thee would man praise; man, but a particle of Thy creation; man, that bears about him his mortality, the witness of his sin…Thou awakest us to delight in Thy praise; for Thou madest for Thyself, and our heart is restless, until it repose in Thee."

Thus begins Saint Augustines’ Confessions, and these lines are among the most well-known ever written. I came returned to them after reflecting a bit on Mrs Jennifer Fulwiler’s discussion of Catholic misconceptions about atheists. Specifically, she notes that few if any atheists feel that they are “missing something” in their lives, and that few recognize the “God-shaped hole” in their hearts. Most atheists I’ve known, including those who are among my friends, would concur with this analysis, given that they reject the existence of said holes in their hearts. For her part, Mrs Fulwiler states that she only recognized that she was missing something after she had found it.

Indeed, if atheists recognized en masse that they were “missing something,” I suspect that a fair number of them would cease to be atheists. This is certainly true for those who pride themselves for their intellectual honesty, for going wherever the evidence leads. While it is true that a few see the evidence and yet refuse to accept it—eventual converts Mortimer J Adler and Alexis Carroll spring immediately to mind—many is the atheist who simply does not see the “God shaped hole” in his own heart.

Read the rest on the Nicene Guys site.

-----
If you enjoyed this post, here are some related ones:

Happiness and Contentment
Contentment: The Virtuous Vice 
Homogeneity in Heaven and Hell
Saint Thomas Aquinas and a Foretaste of the Beatific Vision
Human Imperfectability
Does Hell Matter?
_____ 
Or return to Equus Nom Veritas Home. 

The Nicene Guys Update

I've had the occasional email or other message pertaining to my other blog. For those who are wondering whatever happened to The Nicene Guys, it's been on temporary hiatus for a few months while Andrew and I have been trying to work out a few bugs. This kind of slowed done a bit, since he was busy moving (among other things)--Andrew's the Drupal-savvy webmaster, so he does most if not all of the maintenance on the site. Now that he's settled in a bit more, he's had some time to fix some of the bugs. We're hoping to give the site a sort of "re-launch" soon, likely by this summer; of course, I'd love to be ready on May 2 for the feast of Saint Athanasius.

By then, we hope to have a few more writers--we have a few specific people in mind. If things go according to plan, the site will have a small handful of writers (half a dozen-ish) who can contribute one or two posts a week each (on average)--mostly of the "longer" format often used on that site in our early posts. We'll probably continue to write about the same general topics which have been on the site before--theology, philosophy, culture, science, apologetics, book reviews, etc--and the intent is to continue presenting short essays on these topics through the lens of the Catholic Faith as each of us understands and lives (or tries to live) it. We will also be adding some new features--Andrew had an idea about book notes, and I wanted to add a sort of separate page to which I could post links "facebook" style at the press of a button (among other things).

I'm not planning to close down this blog when we get the Nicene Guys really up and running. I've always tried to put some of my more well-thought-out posts over there--or at least the ones which I've spent the most time working on--the ones which I take a weekend to write; as a tongue-in-cheek explanation, a part of ensuring that my best goes to that site is to ensure that everything else comes here. This blog will probably continue to be my regular "publish whatever" blog (it has, after all, had a long history of existence as far as blogs go), and a lot of what I write here might be written at greater length or with more thought over there. Hopefully the thirty minute musings, short reflections, and the occasional longer posts and whatnot will continue:  the more writing and and thinking I do, the more ideas I get to write about. It's also possible that I will close this blog down eventually, and just post everything over there, but we'll see. It's going to depend a bit on how busy I am with grad school--every semester brings a new level of busy to my life, and I'd like to finish my degree in the next two years or so.

As for the Nicene Guys, we will probably post a few articles here and there between now and our "re-launch" date to test out features and functionality. I suppose in that sense, it's already been re-launched. Until then, Andrew and I continue to appreciate your prayers and kind words of support.

TMM: The Rapture, End Times, and Whatnot

I was recently asked about Rapture Theory:  what does the Church teach, and what do I think about it. The short answer is that that the Church does not believe in the rapture as an event which will occur before the Second Coming, but that she does believe that those of her members who are still living when Christ returns at the end of the world will be gathered together to live with Him in His kingdom forever. I can point to three articles which give a good presentation of Catholic teaching regarding the Rapture: the first is by Catholic Answers, the second by Mr Marcel Lejeune, and the third is by Mr Carl Olson, who has also written a book on the subject.

As for what I think about it: I usually don't. As far as I know, the teaching of the Church is that those who are still alive when Christ returns at the end of time will of course be separated into the saved and the damned (see Matthew 25:31-46). Those among the saved will enter into Heaven (with possibly a stop in purgatory), and the rest shall depart for hell. This will happen only after Christ's return, not before--so this is not some sort of "get out of tribulations free card."

I accept the Church's teachings as best I understand them, including as regards the second coming. This means that I simply don't spend that much time thinking about things like millienialism, pre-millienialism, and post-millienialism as opposed to amillienialism. The way I see it, I will either meet Christ as my judge at the time of my death or at the end of time (or both), and it's probably not going to matter the particular order in which this happens. And while I don't frown on speculation--I engage in it myself sometimes--I don't see any particular use as to speculating when the end of time will be.

Rather, it is best to live as if each day may be my last (see Luke 12:16-21, and Matthew Chapters 24 and 25). While I'm at it, I prefer to live as if the world itself will survive a very long time without me, because I know it can and suspect that it will. In any case, if my spiritual affairs are in order, then I will hear (as I hope to hear) "Well done, good and faithful servant" (Matthew 25:21); in the meantime, I would prefer to work to hand on a better world to future generations, in whatever form I can (see Proverbs 13:22).

Will I be surprised if Christ returns in glory before the end of my life? Yes. Will I be unprepared? I hope not, but I cannot presume to say. Christ's return tomorrow morning would be little more surprising to me than my death in a car crash on the way home tonight. If anything, it is far less likely, since billions have lived and died during the Christian era without the world's having ended.  Basically, I view the question as to whether or not Christ will return in glory to usher in the end of the world before I die as interesting for speculation and useless for my spiritual life. I view it as being on a par with questions as to whether or not hell is eternal:  my goal either way is to not go there. Similarly, as concerns whether Christ's coming is for me Eschatological before or after it is Parousian, my goal--and my hope--either way is to be ready when it happens. In the meantime, when this will happen or how is not worth worrying over too much.

"Seek ye therefore first the kingdom of God, and his justice, and all these things shall be added unto you. Be not therefore solicitous for tomorrow; for the morrow will be solicitous for itself. Sufficient for the day is the evil thereof" (Matthew 6:33-34).

_____
If you enjoyed this post, here are some other related posts:
What Happens to Non-Christians When They Die: A Speculative Reflection
Christ's Return: the Parousian Sense
Christ's Return: the Eschatological Sense
Christ's Return: the Veiled Presence Sense
Of Infants and Salvation (Nicene Guys)
Pascal's Wager and Invincible Ignorance: Irreconcilable? (Nicene Guys)

CAT: Three Senses of Christ's Second Coming

For those who are interested, I've revised (slightly) and reposted a series of three of my "thirty minute musings" about Christ's Second Coming on the Catholic America Today blogs:

"And then the sign of the Son of man will appear in heaven; then, too, all the peoples of the earth will beat their breasts; and they will see the Son of man coming on the clouds of heaven with power and great glory. And he will send his angels with a loud trumpet to gather his elect from the four winds, from one end of heaven to the other. 'Take the fig tree as a parable: as soon as its twigs grow supple and its leaves come out, you know that summer is near. So with you when you see all these things: know that he is near, right at the gates. In truth I tell you, before this generation has passed away, all these things will have taken place. Sky and earth will pass away, but my words will never pass away. But as for that day and hour, nobody knows it, neither the angels of heaven, nor the Son, no one but the Father alone" (Matthew 24:30-36).

What does one make of these words? Christ appears to be claiming that He will return "before this generation passes away." An overly literalistic reading of these lines has caused a number of people to question His divinity--even though he notes that "the Father alone" knows the "day and the hour." So much for a literal interpretation, though Jesus rarely gave a literal answer, and certainly not a direct one (by modern standards). There are, as best I can understand, at least three senses in which this passage might be properly interpreted. These I will call the Parousian sense, the individual Eschatological sense, and the Veiled Presence sense. Today I will discuss briefly the Parousian sense.

Continue reading...

A Tale of Two Columns

I read two new columns today which referenced the CDC's report that pre-marital sex young adults and among teens has recently seen a significant decline. One is in the National Catholic Register, the nation's best Catholic weekly. I essentially agree with this one, which also discusses Mr Ross Douthat's recent column and blog post about the same CDC report:  namely, that Douthat's analysis is good, but that it doesn't go far enough:

In Douthat’s judgment, when radical feminists dump on abstinence-only sex-ed programs or tolerate pornography, their puzzling behavior is actually an attempt to shore up gender equality. From their perspective, the two radical social movements that converged in the ’60s — sexual liberation and women’s liberation — can never be separated without weakening women’s advances in society and the workplace....Douthat suggests that we should be content with a slight uptick in delayed premarital sex. But can’t we aspire to something greater? And how do you really know whether a non-marital sexual relationship is altar-bound without the benefit of hindsight?

If there’s one thing we’ve learned since the onset of the sexual revolution, it’s that wishful thinking fueled by sexual passion often obscures the brutal truth of human intention. How many women have viewed cohabitation as a form of “courtship,” only to discover that it was just a “way station” before graduate school or a better job in another city?

Before the sexual revolution, Americans understood that marriage vows secured and celebrated fundamental truths about human dignity, true love and personal fulfillment. To thrive and grow, the love between a man and a woman required permanence, fidelity and openness to children....Ross Douthat shatters some feminist taboos, but that’s only the beginning. The growing disconnect between feminist ideology and the actual experience of young women in 21st-century America provides fertile ground for the New Evangelization.

At the other end of the spectrum is one of the Daily Sexan Texan's opinion writers, Mr Jonathan Rienstra, who essentially falls into that very mistake of assuming that sexual liberation and women's rights are inextricably intertwined, albeit indirectly:

Instead of assuming that any girl in a miniskirt is a skank, it’s important to note that clothing does not dictate action. Sometimes I like to rock the mank (man tank top) because I want to show off my guns. That’s for me. It’s certainly not an invitation for girls to talk to me, and believe me, they don’t.

But women and teenage girls should be able to wear the clothes they want without assuming that anything more is going to come from it. Sexiness is about empowering the individual — it’s not an invitation. 

No, the clothes we wear do not predetermine all of our actions or interactions with others. They do, however, influence the way in which those others interact with us. Whether or not the girl who dresses immodestly means to tell those around her that she is "available", this is the message which is sent. When she then says, "No, I'm not," a good many guys get mixed messages. The same might be said about a guy who (for example) dresses like a slob but contends that he is in fact very well-organized. For better-or-for worse, we do judge tings by their appearances, and that appearance is generally the first impression we make of a person.

Left out of the analysis altogether, because it would lead to a different conclusion than the one which Mr Rienstra wants his reader to make. Whatever may be the intentions of a young lady who dresses immodestly, one result is that she will, if physically attractive, excite the lusts and passions of an untold number of young (and dirty old) men who cross paths with her. Her "empowerment" may be his suffering, and it is at least morally cruel, if not physically or emotionally.

-----
If you enjoyed this post, here are some other related posts:
Modesty and the Culture Wars (Catholic America Today)
Thoughts About "SlutWalk"
Much Ado About Pants
Wright Is Right
Love and Responsibility (Book Review)
_____ 

Three Sunsets

"Orange, red, and deep violet hues--
Split across the sky once blue,
There be dragons behind the western clouds,
Each sleek and powerful and ferrociously proud.
Their breath is filled with heat and flames,
Each will to the skies stake his own claim.
Their soundless cries fill the early nights,
Noiselessly hearkening the dying of the light."
With that the old pagan ended his tale,
And the materialist began his own description.
"It's beautiful to behold without your mythologies,
These legends are silly and false as astrology,
'Tis not but simple photon scatters,
Not magical but simply interactions of matter,
Long since Lord Rayleigh's theory explains,
That the reason for these colors is too plain:
They result from light absorption by molecules,
Not a war between dragons most cruel."
As he finished, the materialist sat back smugly,
And regarded his companions with some derision.
"The charm and wonder your descriptions each confide,
I find that I cannot in justice deride,
Both contain certain sublime truths,
One efficient, one more fantastic in sooth,
But nature's very law to us shows
A deeper truth which the laws foreshadow:
A battle once fought and again at the end of all things,
Captured by our pagan friends mythic imagining."
So spoke the kindly mystic in his turn,
Though he too was dismissed with deprecation.

QotD: T.H. White on Spoiled Beauty

"At the gralloch, the three remaining huntsmen were in trouble. They had begun to slit the skin of the belly, but they did not know how to do it properly and so had perforated the intestines. Everything had begun to be horrible, and the once beautiful animal was spoiled and repulsive. All three of them loved the unicorn in their various ways, Agravaine in the most twisted one, and, in proportion as they became responsible for spoiling its beauty, so each began to hate it for their guilt. Gawaine particularly began to hate the body. He hated it for being dead, for having been beautiful, for making him feel a beast. He had loved it and helped to trap it, so there was nothing to be done except to vent his shame and hatred of himself upon the corpse. He hacked and cut and felt like crying too."
T.H. White, The Once and Future King

This passage is found early in The Queen of Air and Darkness, which is the second part of T.H. White's classic, The Once and Future King. Four brothers, members of the Orkney clan which is waging war against the newly-crowned King Arthur, have set off with a kitchen maid to hunt the mythical unicorn. The maiden catches the unicorn, which they had agreed to lead back to the castle if it be tame, but then the second brother, Agravaine, charges the unicorn with his boar spear and mercilessly slaughters it. The young maid runs back to the castle, with the youngest brother (Gareth) in pursuit, leaving the three other brothers (Gawaine, Agravaine, and Gaheris) to bring the unicorn back to the castle.

Now, the unicorn is described as a creature of exceeding beauty:

When the unicorn came, things were different from expected. He was such a noble animal, to begin with, that he carried a beauty with him. It held all spellbound who were within site.

The unicorn was white, with hooves of silver and a graceful horn of pearl. He stepped daintily over the heather, scarcely seeming to press it with his airy trot, and the wind made waves in his long mane, which had been freshly combed. The glorious thing about him was his eyes. There was a faint bluish furrow down each side of his nose, and this lead up to the eye-sockets, and surrounded them in a pensive shade. The eyes, circled by this sad and beautiful darkness, were so sorrowful, lonely, gentle and nobly tragic, that they killed all other emotion except love.

All of which makes the ruined carcass that much more difficult to bear. And though Mr White may not have meant it this way--since he was not religious but rather was agnostic--there is a moral allegory to been seen in this: disordered love ruins a thing, despoiling its beauty. Worse, the more beautiful a thing before, the more horrifying will it stand in contrast when ruined. Moreover, the more good a thing, the more evil it may become upon corruption, if corrupted fully. The greater a truth, the more greatly it can be twisted into a worse lie.

In some ways, this is foreshadowing of hell, or of the despair which in this life is its foreshadowing. The highest good is rejected for some other good. The unicorn's beauty lasted while he was alive and free, but the boys refused to accept beauty on these terms. They would have it on their terms: imprisoned (as Gawaine wanted) or as a stuffed trophy (Agravaine).

Since these terms are illicit, they now have a ruined unicorn, one which is not only dead but also no longer beautiful. Its beauty is spoiled as a direct result of their actions, to be enjoyed by neither them nor anyone else. They have their unicorn, but it's nothing like they'd expected, a stinking carcass. They also have guilty knowledge--know that they've chosen evil--and this guilty knowledge makes the carcass even more odious to them.

I think this is what we get in hell, too. The reason for hell is sin, and sin is the rejection of God, be it directly or indirectly--that is, the rejection of His will, His love, His commandments, etc. (all of which are related to each other). But why reject God? Well, often this is done for some other good or perceived good which is placed higher than God, be it temporarily or permanently. We look for happiness in something else, even in something else which is good. Often we're allowed to have that something else, but it just doesn't bring the happiness which it is supposed to have given us. In fact, the pleasure or joy which we find in a thing is often there because God made it good or pleasant. We find enjoyment in good food or with good company, in holding good possessions or in doing good things.

It is possible that in hell, we are allowed to eat the same foods, or have the company of the same kinds of people (if not the same people themselves), to have and own anything we want, to do anything of the activities which we once enjoyed. The one thing we cannot have in Hell is God--for Hell is the absence of God. Without Him, there can be no goodness, and so these things we once enjoyed we will find dull and bland at best, and quite possibly downright torturous for the memories of how much we once enjoyed them. Beauty becomes spoiled, and we will see it as so many painful reminders of what we once thought we enjoyed, but now have lost forever. For the damned, every possession might be theirs, but they no longer want any of it. Things which once brought joy can now bring naught but sorrow, and even beauty, if it be permitted to enter Hell, will be marred and spoiled, and will act as so many painful reminders of the beauty the damned once had known on earth, let alone of the beauty they never would know in heaven.

Like the brothers hacking and mutilating the corpse of the unicorn, the condemned cannot stand beauty marred, and so shall ruin it further until it no longer retains even a hint of its old self. They shall, moreover, feel a growing misery and shame as they do it:  for this is perhaps one of the torments of Hell, and a self-inflicted one at that. Next to this kind of suffering, the physical pains of a lake of fire might seem a gift of mercy. "A wicked heart shall be laden with sorrows, and the sinner will add sin to sin" (Eccliasticus 3:29).

Saint Patrick's Seasons

(This is a re-post of an old poem, originally posted on the Nicene Guys site. Happy Saint Patrick's Day!)

Winter's cold and frosty hand,
Long hast lingered on the land--
Ere a prophet comes at long last,
A prisoner was he to men, alas!
A prisoner to set them free
To follow the man upon a tree.

Soon would come the thaw of spring,
The land once bleak with cold's sting,
Would bloom and blossom and awake,
And old night would be slip away!
From sin's stain the land would be clean,
As colors changed from gray to green.

In the summer's heat and longer days,
Saint Patrick's teaching spreads and stays,
The Church's banner soon would stand,
Where pagan Roman feet never did land!
Even sin would for a time seem to flee
From that land so free of heresy.

Until at last came the fall to witness,
A new scene of frightful distress:
Saint Patrick is now long gone away,
And the faithful are lead horribly astray!
The leaves' colors began their slow change
From vibrant green to faded orange.

Now soon will winter's cold night return,
The faithful witnesses will begin to yearn
For the days of Ireland's first saint,
He whose memories seem lost and feint!
Saint Patrick in a tomb sleeping lies,
And portents spell of the Faith's demise.

Yet under the weary winter snow and gloom,
Hides the planted germ of next spring's bloom--
For though Patrick's spirit slowly dies,
Like the sun of spring it will again arise.
Hence the Faithful must not lose heart:
For God's grace will not forever depart.

Jennifer Fulwiler on Common Catholic Misconception about Atheists

I must say that Jennifer Fulwiler is an excellent addition to the National Catholic Register's blog staff. I rather hope she is able to join our lay Dominican group, as I've heard that she's been considering this. Her latest post on the Register outlines five misconceptions that Catholics might have about atheists. Since I am not--and never have been--and atheist, I cannot comment on this from the same kind of personal experience which she has as a convert.

However, I have witnessed all five misconceptions in action. Also worth noting is that not all five misconceptions concerned the same atheist (I've never really tried to dig deeply enough to find out). For example, they usually do not have a good grasp of Catholic doctrine, though I know a handful who do and are not convinced by this. It goes hand-in-hand with the point that winning arguments does not bring about conversions (since conversion is in both the intellect and the will), though of course explaining the doctrines isn't exactly the same as having (let alone winning) an argument. On the other hand, few are the atheists who find the Bible to be particularly convincing--they'd be Christians or at least practicing Jews otherwise!--though occasionally I'm surprised to find one or another who--while believing the Book to be uninspired--will admit to finding something of value in it, and not merely in the historical sense. This is one misconception which she's overlooked, which is that there are atheists who nonetheless try to live a moral life; they're not all Nietzchean nihilists or hedonistic moral relativists!

Categorically, I've found that there are essentially two kinds of atheist: those who are truly atheistic--"without God or gods"--and those who are anti-theistic. An example of the former would be perhaps the majority of the people in my research lab, in particular the Chinese who occasionally ask me about points of Catholicism from sheer curiosity, but who regard Christianity as a strange sort of hobby, like butterfly collecting. This seems to be the reaction I get from a great many atheists (or agnostics), provided that they don't perceive any overt attempts at evangelization (or prosylitization) on my part. This generally results in exasperation or at least annoyance, or in the case of "soft" evangelization such as this blog, it results in posts which they love to hate (as one atheist friend said).

As for the latter type of atheist--the anti-theist--these are fewer and further between. These are the militantly anti-Christian folks, who want to antevangelize their religious, and who heap abuses on what few non-religious friends they have; to be fair, we Christians have some of these of our own, though they are often bound by such commandments as "love thy neighbor as thyself" (if in a distorted way) unlike the atheist variety. These are the Dawkins and Hitchens and Weinbergs of the world, and the slightest hint of religion sets them off, whether it is meant to evangelize or no. Merely mentioning "I'm Catholic" (or Christian") in their presence can unleash a tirade.

In both cases, I find two pieces of advice in Mrs Fulwiler's column which are generally true. The first is that "we should always focus more on showing Christ to our atheist friends rather than just offering data about him." I sometimes try and often fail to do this, and not just to be the sort of "armchair apologist" who sits back and posts away on my blog. However, in my departments there aren't many windows into the Catholic Faith, so every little success counts. The second is that prayer works wonders, and (for the more timid at heart) can be done in secret.

Controlling Nature and Controlling Self

I've been working on a fairly long (~ hour) talk for the AP physics class at one of the local Catholic high schools which is supposed to touch on what I believe is to be the relationship between science and religion. The original type manuscript for the talk came to 22 pages (single-spaced), so I'm doing a bit of trimming down. This is one of the things which I am probably going to cull from the talk itself, because it really doesn't fit with the rest of the talk. Since it's probably not going to be used for the talk, I've made no attempt to edit it to a level which is suitable for high school students, beyond the semblance of doing that which was present in my initial brainstorming. Enjoy!
-----
I would be remiss in a discussion about the relationship of religion and science if I did not at some point mention the philosophy of scientism*. Scientism, briefly defined, is the epistemological attitude that only the knowledge gained through scientific or otherwise empirical methods is trustworthy; and that, moreover, knowledge is little more than a means to an end, specifically, to the end of controlling nature. Knowledge is only valuable if it is useful, and it's only useful if it can aide me in controlling my environment, increasing my comfort, or improving my health.

Is his short though prophetic work, The Abolition of Man, C.S. Lewis discusses one of the major problems of this will-to-power over nature:

In what sense is Man the possessor of increasing power over Nature?

Let us consider three examples: the aeroplane, the wireless, and the contraceptive…What we call Man’s power is, in reality, a power possessed by some men which they may, or may not, allow other men to profit by. Again, as regards the powers of the aeroplane or the wireless, Man is as much the patient or the subject as the possessor, since he is the target for bombs and for propaganda. And as regards contraceptives, there is a paradoxical, negative sense in which all future generations are the patients or subjects of a power wielded by those already alive. By contraception simply, they are denied existence; by contraception used as a means of selective breeding, they are, without their concurring voice, made to be what one generation, for its own reasons, may choose or prefer. From this point of view, what we call Man’s power over Nature turns out to be a power exercised by some men over other men with Nature as its instrument.

The initial stated goals of "improving health" or "making people more comfortable" are worthy ends. Unfortunately, they eventually become a sort of "bait" by which men are convinced of the error of scientism: we see that science gives us technology, and technology can make our lives easier, longer, and more comfortable.

What science does not do, and cannot do, is give ultimate meaning to life. A corollary to this is that it cannot tell us how to use that technology, what is the proper way by which men are benefited from having these technological advances. About such things, science is incompetent. Thus, for example, technology gives us improved efficiency in the workplace, but it cannot tell us how to spend the time which we supposedly "save." Computers may allow us to make more mistakes more quickly, but they also enable us to get more work done. This should give us more time for leisure and family and God--what Fr James Schall calls the important things in life in his On the Unseriousness of Human Affairs--but what we actually see is that the expectations of productivity are often increased instead. The need to toil from dawn until dusk to provide all the necessities of life--food, shelter, clothing, etc--is gone from life in the West, yet the father who works long overtime or the mother who is scarcely home from her job has become the norm again.

There are, meanwhile, new moral problems created by our advanced technology which cannot be answered by appeals to science alone. Embryonic stem cell research, cloning, new forms of artificial birth control, artificial insemination or implantation:  in each these things, one group of men (though now living) exercise unchecked power over another group (those not yet living). That control is somewhat varied:  from denying existence (contraception) or denying the right to life (embryonic stem cell research, abortion) of those not yet born, to forcing into existence people whose physical or genetic traits we have pre-determined (cloning, genetic engineering).

Worse still for those of us who are living is that although science itself lacks the competence or the authority to give the answer to the meaning of life, scientism is nonetheless happy to abrogate to itself that authority, often on strictly utilitarian grounds. Some men--perhaps a governmental agency, or a "bioethics council"--will decide for all what is to be the meaning of life, and what is a life worth living. Some will decide what, exactly, constitutes "more comforts and better health, and a higher quality of life."

Technology, in-as-much-as it is the control of Nature (and at times the control of others through Nature) can therefore also be opposed to another type of control:  self-control. This is sometimes knows as substituting a technical solution for a moral problem; in more blunt terms, it is a means of committing a bad act without having to face the consequences, of trying to get something for nothing. The problem--as Professor Budziszewski (among others) has noted--is that a morally illicit "bad" act always come with consequences, and then consequences must be paid; if not with the moral currency of repentance, then with whatever coin is close at hand. Perhaps technology will progress to the point where artificial birth control is 100% effective, so that fornication will not result in unwanted pregnancies or STIs, as it does for a still-growing fraction of the population; nevertheless, fornication will ultimately result in a loss of intimacy for those involved.

We may alleviate some of the physical consequences, but never the moral ones, and rarely the emotional ones, either. There is a reason why, for example, the depression rate in the US is doubling every 20 years (the treatment for this is often drugs: another technical solution). Instead or exercising  self-control before acting--or humility after sinning--we too often rely on our technical knowledge to bail us out. Fornication becomes sinful only if the proper methods of birth control aren't used. We quiet the voice of conscience with this substitution, and then we begin to wonder why there are so many single (or divorced) men an women in their thirties. We look to control nature as a substitute for controlling ourselves, and slowly replace religion with "science."

Unfortunately, we ultimately replace the sacrifices of religion with a different kind of sacrifices, and trade the true salvation offered by God for the false salvation offered by technology. All the while, we can pretend that nothing is wrong, because, after all, God and morals are outside the realm of science: hence, we have a philosophy which argues these away. But neither God nor morals are mere arguments, let alone fantasies:  they don't go away just because we want them to, nor can they be argued out of existence.Instead, by embracing a philosophy which rejects both, we only lose the ability to embrace God's grace and His revelation. Using technology to defy God and His moral law will not allow us to escape the consequences of sin, nor the demands of our human nature. We may start with attempting to abolish morals, but we will only end by abolishing men.
-----
*Although I am probably culling this particular aspect from my talk, I actually will still have some discussion of scientism.

Comprehensive Sex Indoctrination: A Rant

A Catholic friend left the following comment (with my emphasis) regarding my recent article about Abstinence Only sex education:

I think you are being too hopeful that teaching abstinence only birth control has any significant effect on people actually practicing abstinance only birth control. It is wishful thinking that kids would do something just because an authority figure tells them. That may work for to some degree with the pre-teen crowd, but as they get into the rebellious teen phase using the 'because I said so' strategy is less effective. The danger in not explaining the existence of, or marginalizing the effectiveness of artificial contraception is that if someone has a lapse in judgement, or rebels, the consequences of their misdeeds will not compromise the rest of their lives. If you were to consider by life impact, is someone more likely to look back on their youth and say 'I wish I had used a condom' or 'I wish I hadn't used a condom'? I can imagine that it would take a very special set of life circumstances for someone to fall into the latter category.

I think the better approach is to teach abstinence, as well as contraception. Schools are for education after all, not indoctrination.

I can feel a rant coming on, though in this case much of it isn't necessarily directed my friend.

Um, no. I'm actually being very critical of abstinence-only education as it is currently taught, but for different reasons entirely than the ones that you or anyone else who opposes it have cited:

"Abstinence-only education, on the other hand, is ultimately an incomplete moral solution to a moral problem: perhaps better than the technical solution from a moral standpoint, though still a far cry from being the whole solution."

A far cry from the whole solution. This implies that not only do I think that it is an imperfect solution, but that I also think that it is not the best solution possible. I think that it is a far better solution than the proposed comprehensive sex-education programs--because I think that the ones I've seen and heard of are the worst form of indoctrination. I would not trust Planned Parenthood and their ilk to give good abstinence-based sex education at all:  and this, after hearing the president of NARAL (a related group) state in a public forum that she wants "abstinence-based" sex education. Leave it up to the "comprehensive sex-ed" folks, and the fornication rate will almost certainly increase, the pregnancy rate will almost certainly not decrease (though the birth rate might).

My criticism of it is that because of the way that marriages are practiced today, many parents actually undermine any hope's of abstinence-only working. I think that "abstinence-only" is bound to fail, because it is taking the moral action--abstinence--and separating it form the virtue which makes that action possible. This is legalism, and will be viewed as such by the teenagers in question. It may be viewed as hypocrisy to boot, and in some cases it would be. Abstinence only education does not work as well as it could, because most marriages aren't being lived in a chaste manner. As to what exactly should be taught in the school, I didn't write this to hammer out a detailed step-by-step instruction. I think it should be considerably less--and less graphic, and to a more mature audience--than what is being taught in many other states (or other countries which the US often emulates culturally). I think that the use of contraception is an utterly useless skill, because it is immoral, and I'm not afraid to state that. As a Catholic, YOU are obligated to accept that teaching, without undermining it.

As to how it should be implemented on a state level, there is perhaps some room for disagreement. Should we tell teens that there exists artificial birth control? Sure. And if we insist on having the secular schools teach this, fine, though I would suggest spending a bit more time on teaching NFP as well: it's ridiculous that so many people still believe that this consists in just the old rhythm method. On the other hand, it was nice to have some theology of the body mixed in with our NFP class when we took it, but I digress. Of course, it remains incumbent on the parents--an in particular, on Catholic parents--to explain that this is immoral, and why (and to live that explanation out). Most don't, or do so in a half-hearted manner. This is for much the same reason that I noted in the original article: a combination of sloth from well-meaning parents and dissent from others, not to mention that many of the parents are unwilling to make the sacrifices demanded of them for an abstinence-only approach to work, be it on a societal scale or within the smaller scale of the family.

Of course I don't believe that abstinence only will be 100% effective in even a more chaste society. There will always be some rebels, or some with little self-control (a virtue almost forgotten in our more hedonistic age). And I don't see our civilization turning itself around and becoming such a society, at least not any time soon. However, the kinds of comprehensive sex-education often advocated by opponents of abstinence only sex education is the kind which will promote the immoral behavior, thus undermining even the witness of those families which are living chastely, and which are trying to instill the virtues of chastity and self-control in their children. The parents are, at the end of the day, the first moral teachers of their children; if the education systems will not aide in this endeavor, then they can at least not hinder it.

To return to the initial quote, the one thing which I really take issue with is the false-dichotomy presented:

If you were to consider by life impact, is someone more likely  to look back on their youth and say 'I wish I had used a condom' or 'I  wish I hadn't used a condom'? I can imagine that it would take a very  special set of life circumstances for someone to fall into the latter  category.

Why is this is a false dichotomy? Because the assumption from the beginning is that teens will all either have sex with or without a condom (or some other form of contraception). Alternatively, the assumption is that for at least the ones who do have sex, they can reflect back and only see these two choices:  fornication with a condom, or fornication without one. It ignores the very real possibility of not fornicating. Some people will deliberately overlook this possibility, but it's still there. The real reflection ought to be, on looking back*:  "I'm glad I waited" or "I wish I had waited." Because, as it turns out, there are quite a bit of us who can say we've experienced the joy f the former or the sorrow of the latter reflection as well. While there may be a few who look back and say simply "I wish I'd used a condom" (the implications of which are a topic for another day) it is doubtful that anybody looks back and says "I wish I hadn't used a condom." Rather, he might look back and reflect, "I wish I had waited for that someone special."
-----

*The other possibilities are "I'm glad I didn't use a condom," which is likely applicable to parents who had an unplanned pregnancy which they accepted with joy; or "I'm glad I didn't wait for anyone special," though such a person is rightly regarded as a sleazbag; or "I wish I hadn't waited for that special someone," though this last one is a bit of a stretch.

TMM: Another Couple of Sonogram-Related Thoughts

It's been a few days now, but after reading this article (and some of the comments) in the Daily Texan about the Sonogram Bill, something occurred to me about the rhetoric employed.

Another major line of opposition to this bill seems to be that it would inconvenience the woman further to have to view the sonogram. Since nobody *really* knows when the unborn child becomes a separate human being with full rights, this kind of inconvenience is unwarranted. The problem with this is, of course, that if we don't know whether or not the unborn child is human, the safe (and sane) thing is to treat him as if he is a human person. The legality of abortion rests on the assumption that the unborn child is definitively not human--this point was made clear in the Casey V Planned Parenthood decision, however poorly reasoned. On the other hand, supposedly no woman takes this decision lightly* since, after all, the supposed assumption is that she has done her best to determine that this child is not a separate human person, and that this therefore is the right decision for her to make.

I'm getting mixed signals on this one: no one takes this decision lightly, but yet viewing a sonogram is just an extra inconvenience to the woman? Sure, the whole transvanginal ultrasound was trotted out by one legislator as a sort of scare tactic:  look at what we'll be putting the woman through! Of course, this ignores the fact that a transabdominal ultrasound could be used after about 6 weeks of gestation, which is well before most abortions occur. Meanwhile, transvaginal ultrasounds are routinely used after abortions to "assess the outcome after medical abortion," so this bill really doesn't force any physical discomforts on women which they wouldn't experience in the course of an abortion anyway.

No, what this bill will do is provide more information to the woman, which she very likely would not get otherwise. Of course, this information is dismissed as "irrelevant"--though strangely enough it could also cause some women to change their minds and keep their baby. As one commenter put it:

"Relevant" information would help a woman make a better decision. Psychologists, social workers, etc. (who have spent significant numbers of years in universities for studies and research) in Planned Parenthood and Sex Education programs provide all that information.

In other words, 'Trust the experts who work for the abortion mills (and who profit financially from abortions) to provide you with unbiased information about abortions.' And they say that we are being manipulative?
----
*And on a related note about people taking this one seriously, I found this passage interesting:

Rep. Carol Alvarado, D-Houston, said she voted against the bill because the Republican majority is neglecting the pressing fiscal issues facing the state, including a multi-billion-dollar budget shortfall....“I am very disappointed in the outcome today,” Alvarado said. “I feel there are much more important items to focus on, like the budget.”

Even assuming that this matter is unimportant compared to the budget shortfall--a point which it seems that nobody on either side of the debate actually buys--this is not actually a good reason to vote against the bill. Since the bill will be moving forward either way, stalling it is really making the process take longer. The sooner this thing passes, the sooner everybody can turn their attention to the budget.

WI: Goodbye Public Unions

...and good riddance. I haven't given the matter much thought, but it seems to me that there is a relatively simple solution to this: fixing income and benefits for public employees some comparable level to their private-sector analogues. This retains the ability of public employees to make a fair living (and from what I've heard coming out of Wisconsin, the living they make is more than fair), without having to give extra power to Big Labor. Certain positions would be exempt, of course, since there aren't private police or firefighter crews (for example): but these two groups have actually retained their collective bargaining rights!

In a sense, there are already some systems which operate this way.  For example, the Diocesan schools (read: private, Catholic) in Austin set the salaries of their teachers with respect to the equivalent positions in the public schools. I think the current going rate is that a private school teacher working for a diocesan school makes 90% of what the equivalent position in the public schools would make. It's not perfect--for example, I would not pay more money to the public employees than their analogues in the private sector--but I think it's a better system than the one in place.

Abstinence Only Education and the Technical Solution

The Daily Sexan Texan, has been making a hard push (ahem) on all things pelvic of late. Most of this has focused on either the Sonogram Bill in the Texas Legislature or the move by the House of Representatives to defund Planned Parenthood.  Fingers crossed. Today's exhibit turns now to abstinence-only sex education--though they did manage to work in more teeth-gnashing over the state legislature's own move to defund Planned Parenthood.

There are two (and a half*) points which stand out to me form this particle editorial, each in its own way representative of the larger culture's attitude:

"We support the legislation and TFN’s efforts because abstinence-only sexual education is not based on science...HB 1624 could not come at a more pressing time. The U.S. House of Representatives recently passed a law banning federal funding for Planned Parenthood. While the organization is most widely known for providing abortions, it actually spends much of its efforts and resources educating young people about reproductive health and distributing various forms of birth control. If the organization loses federal funding and is significantly weakened, then the state must step in and fulfill that responsibility. Similarly, with the Texas Legislature bent on restricting women’s legal right to abortion, the state must at least effectively educate its youth on the subject" (emphases mine).

The first point is that abstinence-only education is not based on science. The second is that since Planned Parenthood can't give our children comprehensive sex-education, therefore the state should do it.

To the first point, it is worth answering that abstinence-only sex education is in fact quite scientifically sound. It is a scientific fact that if you do not engage in sexual intercourse, you will neither conceive nor beget any children. If anything, the problem with abstinence-only sex education is that people often act in a way which is unscientific, in the sense that they know the possibility of an unwanted pregnancy is there, and they ignore that possibility. The science says, "If you have sex often enough, assuming that you are not sterile, then you will either get pregnant or impregnate someone else." This goes for couples who contracept as well, since no contraception is 100% "foolproof." That is why, for example, Planned Parenthood's Guttmacher Institute reports that the majority of women who come in for abortions were using contraceptions when they got pregnant. This is not especially surprising.

It is more accurate to say that abstinence-only sex education does not avail itself of the technology made possible by science. That is to say, it does not avail itself of the various forms of artificial birth control made available to us in this high-tech society. After all, natural fairly planning also relies on science--namely, the physiology of a woman's fertility cycle--to space children, but it does not rely on any technological advances. Rather, it relies on good old-fashioned self-control, in much the same way as does abstinence, as well as a bit of communication and discernment between the spouses.

Thus, the requests for comprehensive sex-education courses are an appeal to use our technical knowledge to solve what is ultimately a moral problem. Why practice self-control (which is a sort of moral virtue which requires some amount of sacrifice) when you can practice "safe-sex" instead. The technology attempts to circumvent the consequences which are sited as some reasons against teens' (or really anyone's) fornicating.

In a related note is the second point:  if Planned Parenthood** (or some other supposedly trustworthy organization) can't give our children sex-education, then clearly it must be the state's job to do it. This is another form of looking for a technical solution to a moral problem, albeit in a different form. The moral problem here is that some parents don't want to be bothered with raising their own children: this also takes time and sacrifice.The solution is to have somebody else step in and act as nanny: be it the state or some other entity. Anybody will do, so long as it's not the parents.

Of course, the "technology" employed here is a bit different than before, and the "science" is too: we rely on political and social sciences to create these entities to step in and raise our children. This way, there is no need for the parents to take responsibility in the matter. While we're at it, we can have the state policing everybody to make sure they take their birth control pills before turning them loose to "play." Rather than kicking the government out of the bedroom, we'll re-train it as our own certified birth-control inspector to ensure that Johnny put his condom on correctly and Susie took the right dosage of birth control pills before (or after) the two get together. What a brave new world this will make.

In the meantime, parents are dispensed from their responsibilities to educate their children--whether they want to be or not.  With that dispensation comes a similar dispensations of setting a good example for said children. After all, abstinence itself relies more-or-less on the virtue of chastity, which can be (and is) modeled to the children by their parents. If Johnny's mother and father can enjoy consequence-free sex with each other, then why is it different for Johnny and his girlfriend? Especially since Johnny will almost inevitably discover the artificial birth control methods at some point. Moreover, if Johnny's parents can get divorced--and then remarried to different partners soon thereafter--then what exactly was so special about that marriage which makes it o.k. to enjoy intercourse within the bounds of marriage, but not without those bounds? In a word, nothing.


The comprehensive sex-education is therefore also an attempt to find a technical solution to a moral problem. Abstinence-only education, on the other hand, is ultimately an incomplete moral solution to a moral problem: perhaps better than the technical solution from a moral standpoint, though still a far cry from being the whole solution. The proponents of the comprehensive sex education are therefore right to point out that abstinence only sex education is not the whole solution to the problem; unfortunately, their solution is not right, either, and if it is better from a purely technical or consequentialist point of view--which is debatable--then it is worse from a moral one. Ignoring the problem won't make it go away, whether that problem is the technical consequentialist problem of unwanted pregnancies and the spread of disease, or the moral problem presented by a culture which has rejected chastity in favor of fornication, adultery, contraception, and divorce.

-----

* The half-point is that Planned Parenthood is a great organization, if not because of the abortions, then at least despite them because of all of its other services. I won't waste any more time right now playing whack-a-mole with this particular (disingenuous) argument, other than to link to an old post and to the comments made there by my friend Mr Nathanael Blake.

**Of course, since Planned Parenthood distributes the least effective condoms available for use in birth control, why would anyone trust that they would do any better in their sex-education services?

-----
If you like this post and want to read more, here are some related posts:
Contraception and Discernment (Nicene Guys)
The Sanitary, Sterilized Life
Procreation and Commitment As Characteristics of Christian Marriage (Thirty Minute Musings)
My review of Three to Get Married (Nicene Guys)
What is the Purpose of Morality? Part 1: Right Living (Catholic America Today)
What is the Purpose of Morality? Part 2: Marriage, Chastity, and Sexual Morality (Catholic America Today)
Love or Power
Abstinence, Chastity, and Sexuality (Nicene Guys)
Quote of the Day: Archbishop Fulton J Sheen on Children 

Speaking of Marriage as a Witness

Mr Ross Douthat of the New York Times--to whom some congratulations are due--has a column and a blog post along similar lines to my post about marriage as a sign and witness to the culture. I agree with some--but not all--of his analysis on this one. For example, he's right in the concluding remarks to his column:

Obviously, social conservatives don’t like seeing their tax dollars flow to an organization that performs roughly 300,000 abortions every year. But they also see Planned Parenthood’s larger worldview — in which teen sexual activity is taken for granted, and the most important judgment to be made about a sexual encounter is whether it’s clinically “safe” — as the enemy of the kind of sexual idealism they’re trying to restore.

Liberals argue, not unreasonably, that Planned Parenthood’s approach is tailored to the gritty realities of teenage sexuality. But realism can blur into cynicism, and a jaded attitude can become a self-fulfilling prophecy. Social conservatives look at the contemporary sexual landscape and remember that it wasn’t always thus, and they look at current trends and hope that it doesn’t have to be this way forever.

The problem is that in the same article, he makes a distinction between "types" of pre-marital sex:

But there are different kinds of premarital sex. There’s sex that’s actually pre-marital, in the sense that it involves monogamous couples on a path that might lead to matrimony one day. Then there’s sex that’s casual and promiscuous, or just premature and ill considered.

This mars an otherwise good column which is being rather poorly treated by his readers:  though this should come as no surprise given who his readership is.

In any case, from a strictly cultural perspective, this distinction might make sense. It might be admissable that sex with somebody you love and care about (and are considering marriage to) is preferable to the casual sex of the hook-up culture. At the very least, it is "safer" in the consequentialist mindset which sees as the only adverse effects of premarital sex a higher risk of spreading STIs or out-of-wedlock births. On the other hand, cohabitation and premarital sex do increase the odds of divorce--which is obviously bad from the perspective of the social or cultural conservative who is saddened by such things even on the purely consequentialist grounds of the ill effects of divorce on the children.

Going a step further, since Mr Douthat is a Catholic, he should know better than this, even if he is trying to write to a broader audience by appealing to cultural or socio-economic considerations only*. Pre-marital sex, formerly known as "fornication," is and always has been a serious sin according to Catholic moral teaching. From the viewpoint that marriage is a sacrament and thus a sign in our Church, even pre-marital sex (that is, sex in anticipation of marriage) is not to be celebrated, because it distorts the meaning of both sex and marriage. Sex is the consummation of love, but the pre-requisite to this to for the spouses to love each other completely.

But this completeness of love means having first made an unreserved (and unequivocal) commitment to each other--as in, "for richer or poorer," "in sickness and in health," and "until death do you part." The act of intercourse is meant to be a consummation of the marriage, a renewal of the vows; thus even pre-marital sex attempts to renew a thing which has not yet taken place, and is a sign between the would-be lovers of something which does not yet exist (namely, the bonds of marriage). Thus, pre-marital sex, even between a relatively "stable" and "loving" couple intent on marriage is the consummation of a lie; indeed, in some ways the lie is worse than that of casual sex, since the latter is at least willing to admit that if sex does not belong exclusively within the bounds of marriage, then it really doesn't belong only to couples who are "in a relationship," either. The pre-marital sex of the otherwise stable couple does more to thwart the witness of marriage than the casual hook-ups, because the latter do not attempt to blur the distinction between marriage and mere "relationships," however stable.
-----
*To be fair, this is perhaps the price he has to pay to be the "Apostle to the Cultured Despiser," as Mr Mark Shea so eloquently puts it.

-----
If you like this post and want to read more, here are some related posts:
What's in a Name:  Marriage or Holy Matrimony?
Love or Power
A Reflection Concerning "The Longing" (Nicene Guys)
Abstinence Only and the Technical Solution
Love and Lust:  How Porn Undermines a Marriage (Catholic America Today)
Procreation and Commitment As Characteristics of Christian Marriage (Thirty Minute Musings)
My review of Three to Get Married (Nicene Guys)
Love and Responsibility (Book Review)

TMM: Marriage As a Witness to the Culture

Marriage is one of the sacraments of the Church, meaning that it is (among other things) a sign pointing to a grace given by God to the spouses; it is also a vehicle for that grace. One of the functions it holds as sign is to be a witness: to the spouses, to their family and friends, to the Church, the community--and to the culture at large. As such, marriage points beyond itself--after all, a sign's end is to signify something--to a deeper reality: namely, to Christ's love for His Church (see Ephesians 5:21-32). Marriage therefore points to the covenant between God and His Church, and as such is a permanent institution between the spouses for so long as both live*.

However, our culture wants to treat marriage as anything except a sacrament--a sign--and a lifelong covenant.We want to have marriage on our own terms, and not on God's. Thus, for example, we have a culture which is slowly but surely looking to legitimize gay marriages, and perhaps polygamous or incestuous ones as well. On the other hand, the culture has long sense moved beyond merely "legitimizing" fornication, pornography, and adultery. These are not merely tolerated or even treated as "healthy alternatives" to abstinence or faithful and monogamous marriages, but are often trumpeted as superior to either of the traditional moral options.

Then there is divorce, which Erin Manning has recently called "Christian America's golden calf." Writes Mrs Manning:

In a nation that still likes to pretend to itself on convenient occasions that it adheres to the Christian principles on which it was founded, it's absolutely amazing to consider how cynical most Americans--even most Christian Americans--are about marriage. In the years since America's founding divorce has gone from a social liability to a necessary evil to a mere rite-of-passage for so many; remarriage after divorce has become so widely acceptable that only a handful of people are ever so churlish as to refuse to attend a second wedding or to join the new bride-to-be or husband-to-be in the new pre-wedding pastime known as "bashing the ex."

....Yet Christian America dances and makes false sacrifices in front of the idol of divorce. Denouncing all the other evils produced by the sexual revolution, such as abortion, casual attitudes about sex, and similar social ills, many Christians unquestioningly accept divorce as a kind of "insurance policy" that protects them against unhappy or unsatisfactory marriages. Although this really means, in the truest sense, that many Christians stand up at the altar and promise to love and honor each other--until they get bored or tired or meet someone else, certainly not until death parts them--few Christians understand the implied insult in a so-called promise or vow made in those terms.

If we Christians really want to reform our diseased culture, we will start by unhesitatingly rejecting the evil of divorce--an evil which hurts men and women, damages children, and tears away at the fabric of society.

The culture which rejects marriage as a life-long covenant will ultimately begin to accept this host of other "similar social ills." Ours has already made considerable "progress" in this department, and this includes the part of our culture which is supposedly Christian. Thus, it becomes difficult to show the contrast between Christian marriage and, for example, the radically Marxist or Feminist concept which sees it as little better than a power struggle between the spouse. Alternatively, it is viewed as that thing we do when we want to "settle down": after, of course, we are burned out on all the hedonistic pleasures and temptations which life has to offer. If marriage is to be treated (or even worse, celebrated) as a temporary arrangement rather than a permanent covenant, then there is little to say that fornication is wrong, or for that matter adultery. A marriage which can be dissolved on a whim from either partner is one which is not worth "waiting" for, nor is it really worth being faithful to.

With the divorce rate near 50%--and Christian marriages faring little better than secular ones--there is little reason for the culture to view marriage as anything particularly special or permanent. A good, strong, faithful, and loving and lifelong marriage is therefore a very strong witness against the culture which says that such things are impossible. Indeed, it is possibly the strongest witness that those of us who are married can give.

-----
*As an interesting bit of added symbolism, the marriage bond is ended when one of the spouses dies; in the meantime, a mortal sin severs the soul from God's sanctifying grace. Mortal sin is the death of the soul, though of course we are able to return to Go's grace through reconciliation, whereas we will have to wait until the afterlife to see our deceased loved ones again.

-----
If you like this post and want to read more, here are some related posts:
What's in a Name:  Marriage or Holy Matrimony?
Love and Lust:  How Porn Undermines a Marriage (Catholic America Today)
Procreation and Commitment As Characteristics of Christian Marriage (Thirty Minute Musings)
Contraception and Discernment (Nicene Guys)
A Reflection Concerning "The Longing" (Nicene Guys)
Abstinence only and the Technical Solution
Abstinence, Chastity, and Sexuality (Nicene Guys)

Worth a Thousand Words

I will summarize my thoughts about the abortion industry with a semi-cryptic allegorical picture:

His foreign policy is a very fitting analogy.