Second Conference

Relationship between Chastity and Charity

I. In speaking of Poverty and Hope – we said that Hope is a special gift that enables us to rely on those resources that from the human point of view are totally incapable of giving us a sense of security and morale. Hope enables us to be truly poor, and gives us super-human power. We will try to speak of Chastity and Charity in the same way, namely, that we need a power that is beyond our human power in order to be chaste, and that power is given to us by Chastity, a gift of God. – some other aspects of Chastity – chastity draws down God’s gifts.

II. One thing to note, first of all, is that it shouldn’t be necessary to make a promise of Chastity. We now promise to live by the spirit of poverty because it is so essential to our life of grace and pursuit of holiness. We ordinarily make promises because we want to bind ourselves where we were not bound before. And yet we are already bound to live chaste lives in virtue of the sixth and ninth commandments. What is the reason behind the promise? Does it add anything beyond and above what the commandments imply?

III. As the beginning of an answer to that – and I am not sure that one answer would not satisfy everyone – we note that in the case of those promising chastity in religious life, it means not only being chaste as an unmarried person, but also always remaining in the unmarried state. It means foregoing a good that I have a right to choose, the married state, in order to adhere wholeheartedly to the Lord Jesus Christ, and to make Him the spouse of my soul. Therefore, the promise of chastity made by anyone in the married state must also mean foregoing something we ordinarily could have, but willingly forego it in order to adhere more whole-heartedly to Our Lord Jesus as our one supreme love.

IV. But first of all, we must insist that what a married person willingly denies or foregoes is something that is personal to the one making the promise. One does not and cannot deny one’s spouse some good thing that he or she has a right to, greatest among them being the good of spousal intimacy, spousal affection and companionship. And secondly, what is envisioned by the promise is to enable one or encourage one to cling more whole-heartedly to the love of Our Lord Jesus, which will result in a more generous unselfish love of one’s spouse.

V. When a young man or young woman promises chastity in the religious life, it is in order to take Jesus as the Spouse of one’s soul. What that means is that the one making the promises makes the interests and the cause of Jesus one’s personal and most dear interests and causes. It amounts to telling Jesus that I am all for you, you can rely on me. When you want me to go somewhere far from where I am to do something that needs to be done for the good of souls and for the good of the church, there are no bonds or ties to hold me back. All other ties are severed by my promise of chastity as a religious. And even if I do not have to go far from where I am to do your work and to help souls and the Church, I will not let existing ties of relationship or friendship stand in the way.

VI. Now although it is true that Jesus said whoever loves father or mother, spouse, brother or sister more than Me is not worthy of Me, we can still say that that does not require someone in the married state to deny his or her spouse the rights to spousal affection, companionship and intimacy. As a matter of fact, it seems to me the promise of chastity would oblige a spouse to be more willing and more cheerful in tending to all the needs of one’s spouse, because the spouse will always be a kind of “surrogate” Jesus. Just as it is by doing for the least of His brothers that we do for Jesus, so also, in ordinary circumstances, it is by “being for” one’s spouse that one is “being for” Jesus. The intimacy of the spousal relationship is such that ordinarily one’s spouse is the littlest, weakest and poorest of Jesus’ brothers and sisters because a spouse is so vulnerable. The spouses are one and the commitment so total that the potential for wounding, hurting, inflicting injury is greater, and the vulnerability and helplessness is greater.

VII. Thus it seems to me that what a married person promises by the promise of chastity is to forego anything that would injure the spousal relationship. Thus, chastity in the married state does not mean only observing the 6^th and 9^th commandments, in thought, word and deed, it also means avoiding and giving up all those selfish interests and pursuits that deny one’s spouse his or her right to companionship, intimacy, tenderness, concern, and affection. By the promise of Chastity, a spouse says “I will do my best to be totally for Jesus by being totally for my spouse”.

VIII. One might object: But what about me? I need space! I need a certain amount of privacy to attend to my unique human and spiritual needs. Every once in awhile I need to be free from being “on call” every minute of the day for my own mental health. Well, not only do you have the obligation “to be for” your spouse, she or he has the obligation “to be for you”. And part of your spouse’s being “for you” means recognizing that you have those special needs of privacy and space and he/she will most gladly respect that. Your spouse, if she or he is as serious about being “for you” as you are about “being for” him or her, then he/she will not be making demands on you that overtax and burden you, and will above all scrupulously avoid exploiting you, saying, he/she is “for me”, now I can start treating him or her as a “thing” a “chattel”.

IX. This last statement, about being a thing or a chattel is extremely important because as you know, pornography has had devastating effects upon human relationships in our day and age. The way sex is portrayed in movies, on T.V., in books, wherever; there is no sacredness to the human person. Human beings are portrayed as objects, as sex objects, therefore my personal, selfish gratification. This is totally opposed to what Jesus has revealed about the sacredness of sex and the dignity of marriage that the promise of chastity involves very careful avoidance of anything on T.V. or in the movies or in books and periodicals that could defile one’s respect and reverence for the opposite sex, especially the tremendous respect and reverence due to women, who are more vulnerable and suffer far far more than men when the sacredness of their body and their psyche is violated.

X. Well, when am I going to talk about charity? Well, I suppose I can say that I have been talking from the perspective of charity all this time. I say from the perspective of charity because the infinite love of God for every one of His human creatures requires us to take this view of chastity within the married state. That is, the more that one loves God and grows in supernatural charity, the more chastity as I have described it, becomes a normal, natural attribute of a married person’s life. I think it is evident that to live chastity to the degree implied by the promise requires super-human power, and that power comes directly from charity – from the love of God poured forth in our hearts by the Holy Spirit Who has been given to us.

XI. But what do I say to those lay Carmelites who are called to the state of single blessedness? Does this promise oblige them to forego the married state? Of course not, but in the meantime just as those in the married state are obliged by the 6^th and 9^th commandment to avoid any and all exploitation – and it doesn’t have to mean sexually – so also they are obliged. And just as those who are spouses must be “for Jesus” by “being for their spouses”, so they must be “for Jesus” by “being for” their brothers and sisters in the faith and those most in need according to their ability and resources. But remember, you who are single, that just as there are marvelous compensations and joys that sustains spouses in their chaste lives of “being for” one another, there are sublime spiritual joys and compensations that Jesus bestows upon those who choose no other spouse for themselves but Him alone.

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