Recognize, Resist & Remember: One Cross that all are Called to Carry is Chastity

Alexandra Clark | The Daily Knight |Mass Conversions Interview

MassConverions did a 3 Part Series Interview with Fr. Samuel Waters on the topic of Chasity, see videos below.

Part I: WHAT IS CHASTITY?

Chasity is the virtue that every Catholic has to live their entire life no matter what state they are in. There is one Cross that all are called to carry from the time we are born till the day we die and that cross is chastity.

“Blessed are the pure in heart, for they shall see God” (Matthew 5:8).

Chastity is the state of being chaste. Chaste comes from Latin castus, meaning “clean, pure.” The reality symbolized is cleanliness of mind. "O how beautiful is the chaste generation with glory." The virtue and its reward is the right of the whole generation, young men and maidens, old men and children, the married, the widows and the single. That is, the purity of heart which is the condition of the vision of God.

St. John Bosco says “Holy Purity, the queen of virtues, the angelic virtue, is a jewel so precious that those who possess it become like the angels of God in heaven, even though clothed in mortal flesh.”

Some understand that the virtues of Chasity and Purity are the same thing and they are related but we can think of Purity as the trunk of the tree and from that branches out other virtues that are regulated and related to Purity, such as Chasity, Temperance, Modesty etc.

St. Thomas in his Summa quotes St. Augustine who says: "We must give praise to purity, that he who has ears to hear, may put to none but a lawful use the organs intended for procreation." Now the use of these organs is the proper matter of chastity. Therefore purity belongs properly to chastity.

St. Thomas further states that Chastity is a virtue to reign in the passions, because “chastity takes its name from the fact that reason "chastises" concupiscence, which, like a child, needs curbing, as the Philosopher states (Ethic. iii, 12). Now the essence of human virtue consists in being something moderated by reason, as shown above. Therefore it is evident that chastity is a virtue. Chastity does indeed reside in the soul as its subject, though its matter is in the body. For it belongs to chastity that a man make moderate use of bodily members in accordance with the judgment of his reason and the choice of his will.”

Overview:

Ø WE ARE called to Be Chaste in thought, word & deed.

Ø CHASTITY IS THE RIGHT ordering of the Sexual appetite.

Ø SEXUAL ACT IS FOR ONE Purpose - for the creation of children.