August 2006 – Page 7

Identical Twins & Souls

A reader writes:

I’ve been discussing the issue of ensoulment and personhood with some people
and a person brought up an interesting question: When it comes to identical
twins, which come from the same fertilized egg, when do the two souls and
thus the two persons come into existence?

I was under the impression that
the Church held that God creates each soul at the moment of conception, but
the splitting off of twins suggests that in this case, he might create the
souls later at the point of division.

Or is it possible that he creates two
souls to share the zygote until they split?

Anyway, I figured you might be
a good person to ask this question.

I thought I’d answered this on the blog before, but Googling my archives didn’t turn it up, so here goes . . .

The soul is the substantial form of the living human body, and so any time you have a new living human body, you have a new soul (the resurrection doesn’t count, since that’s not a new body; it’s a resurrected old one).

It is very difficult to see how a single living human body could have two substantial forms. Indeed, classical metaphysics would say that this is impossible by definition, so I’m not inclined to go that route in explaining what happens in twinning.

Normally a new living human body comes into existence at conception, so that’s normally when the soul comes into existence as well, but the phenomenon of identical twinning indicates that the situation is more complex than that.

It would seem that there are two possibilities. Either

1) Twinning occurs in such a fashion that Embryo A fissions off a new embryo, Embryo B, without losing its identity as Embryo A. (This is analogous to the way in which a Adult A could have a clone of himself made from a skin cell without losing his identity as Adult A.)

2) Embryo A fissions in such a way that neither resulting embryo can be said to be the same entity as Embryo A, so there are two new entities, Embryo B and Embryo C. (Imagine taking Adult A, splitting him down the middle, and regrowing the missing part of the body on each resulting half so that neither resulting individual has a greater claim than the other to being Adult A.)

In case (1), it would seem that Embryo A received his soul at the time of conception and Embryo B received his soul at the time he fissioned off from Embryo A since that was when Embryo B’s body came into existence.

In case (2), it would seem that Embryo A received his soul at conception and that Embryo A was a short-lived individual who died when he fissioned into Embryo B and Embryo C, both of whom received their souls at the point of fissioning.

Now, just for the sake of completeness, let’s talk about the opposite of twins: chimeras.

As before, there are two scenarios:

3) Chimerism occurs in such a fashion that Embryo A is so large that it absorbs Embryo B without becoming a fundamentally different entity. (This is analogous to Adult A having a heart or kidney transplant from another adult; the minor addition of cells from the other adult does not turn Adult A into a fundamentally different person.)

4) Chimerism occurs when Embryo A and Embryo B merge in such a way that the resulting entity is neither one of them but is a fundamentally new entity, Embryo C. (This is kinda like the Tuvix episode of Star Trek: Voyager, only on the cellular rather than the DNA level.)

In the case of (3), Embryo A received his soul at conception and continued in existence. Embryo B also received a soul at conception but then died when he was absorbed by Embryo A.

In the case of (4), Embryo A and Embryo B both received their souls at conception and both died when they fused into Embryo C, who received a soul at the point of fusion.

If you want to be extra complete, you can posit the case of identical twins who then fuse to become a (genetically undetectable) chimera, and you can run the combinations on that one yourself, them being a combination of scenario (1) or (2) with scenario (3) or (4).

You could also think about what would happen if a chimera then twinned. Or if twins chimerized and then twinned again, etc. It’ll all just be combinations of (1)-(4), though.

Because of difficulties in determining when a new individual has come into existence, it could be hard or impossible to distinguish between scenario (1) and (2) or between scenario (3) and (4) in practice, but these would seem to be what is happening, even if we cannot make the determination in a particular case due to the limits of present doctrinal development on the subject of individual identity.

I’ve Been Book Memed

Georgette of Chronicle of a Meandering Traveller has hit me with a book meme, so here goes:

1. One book that changed your life:

THE NEW TESTAMENT DOCUMENTS: ARE THEY RELIABLE? by F. F. Bruce This book helped me, as a very young and liberal Christian, learn to take the New Testament seriously and thus turned me toward Christian orthodoxy.

2. One book that you’ve read more than once:

THE
CASE OF CHARLES DEXTER WARD by H. P. Lovecaft

3. One book you’d want on a desert island:

THE
WORST-CASE SCENARIO SURVIVAL HANDBOOK by Joshua Piven and David Borgenicht

4. One book that made you laugh:

THE
HITCHHIKER’S GUIDETO THE GALAXY by Douglas Adams

5. One book that made you cry:

Sorry. That’s private.

6. One book that you wish had been written:

ST. PAUL ANSWERS MY QUESTIONS: AN INTERVIEW ACROSS TIME by Jimmy Akin

7. One book that you wish had never been written:

THE QUR’AN by Muhammad.

8. One book you’re currently reading:

THE
ANUBIS GATES by Tim Powers

9. One book you’ve been meaning to read:

CHRIST
THE LORD: OUT OF EGYPT by Anne Rice

10. One book that you bought but haven’t read:

THE
SEMANTICS OF BIBLICAL LANGUAGE by James Barr

Per my usual meme-mutation policy, I hereby meme anybody who wants to be memed.

READ GEORGETTE’S ANSWERS TO THE MEME.

ED PETERS ALSO GIVES HIS.

More On Embryo Adoption

A reader writes:

I’m one of your blog readers, and I’ve got a dilemma/question. You recently
posted your thoughts regarding the issue of adopting frozen embryos. You
pointed out that the Church has not taken a formal stand on the issue as of
yet. A lively discussion ensued in the combox. My wife and I had one
lovely daughter using this method. Since the birth of our daughter, we have
converted from evangelicalism to Catholicism, and want to submit ourselves
to the teachings of the Church in this (and all) matters. We are
contemplating attempting the procedure again, and have reserved a set of
embryos in preparation.

My wife has raised a potential moral concern that I
have not seen addressed anywhere. Part of the transfer process involves
drugs that regulate a woman’s cycle for several months prior to the
transfer, in order to be able to transfer the embryos at the woman’s most
fertile time.

My wife argues that these drugs are technically a form of
birth control, since they prevent pregnancy until the time of transfer. She
thus believes that taking these drugs as part of the process would be
illicit.

I have countered however that even if the doctor would agree to an
unmedicated transfer (unlikely), this might reduce the chances that the
embryos would implant, leading to their demise. The good that could be done
(providing the best chance for the embryos to live) outweighs any potential
evil from the short period of "birth control".

Further, since we are
infertile anyway (unfortunately, I am sterile), the fact that she may
receive drugs that would act in a contraceptive manner is moot. I argue
that the intent of the Church’s ban on birth control is not a problem with
the chemicals themselves, but rather that the Church doesn’t want to inhibit
the potential of conception. Since we can’t have children anyway, that
isn’t an issue.

My wife counters that God could work a miracle by curing my
sterility, and we shouldn’t hinder that possibility by even a short period
of possible contraception. I then counter that she’s being too idealistic .
. . We are meeting with the doctor soon, and need to make a decision. Would
you care to comment on this issue?

I’ll be happy to provide what insight I can.

First, as you note, the Church has not made a determination of the moral status of frozen embryo adoption and there are orthodox Catholic moralists on both sides of the issue. Until there is an official determination, individuals may pursue their own conscience regarding the morality of the action provided they do not violate other, established principles in the process. This does not mean doing whatever you want, though. It means doing the best to inform your conscience on the matter even in the absence of a Church declaration (e.g., reading arguments for and against the relevant positions, doing a novena if the reading doesn’t convince you one way or the other, etc.)

What you’re asking here is whether there is another established principle–i.e., that contraception is immoral–that would be violated by doing the procedure in the proposed way.

While you are correct that saving the lives of the embryos is a very grave matter, one should not think in terms of this good outweighing the evil of contraception. Contraception is one of those things that is always and intrinsically wrong and is not permissible no matter what the circumstances. It cannot be done as an end in itself, nor can it be done as a means to a good end–even a very good one.

That said, there is the question of whether the use of hormones to regulate your wife’s fertility cycle would constitute contraception in this case.

In the Church’s official documents (starting with Humanae Vitae, though the passage is also quoted in the Catechism of the Catholic Church, number 2370), contraception is defined as:

every action which, whether in anticipation of the conjugal act, or in its accomplishment, or in the development of its natural consequences, proposes, whether as an end or as a means, to render procreation impossible

From this definition, it would appear that the use of hormones to regulate a woman’s cycle in order to facilitate implantation does not involve contraception.

It is true that, by regulating her cycle, there will be infertile periods, but these periods are not being created in order "to render procreation impossible," which is a sine qua non of contraception. If you’re not trying to render procreation impossible, what you are doing is not contraception. It’s something else.

Such non-contraceptive use of hormones can, however, have a contraceptive effect. This is the case with women who use hormones to treat a medical condition and the hormones simultaneously prevent them from getting pregnant. Such usage is permitted under the law of double-effect as long as the usual conditions for this law are satisfied (e.g., the contraceptive effect is not an end in itself, the contraceptive effect is not a means to the therapeutic end, the condition being treated is serious enough to endure the contraceptive side-effect, there is not a better treatment for the condition). Some debate whether couples should have intercourse during such treatment due to increased possibility of miscarriage, though this is something that the Church has not yet addressed one way or the other.

In your case, the use of hormones to regulate your wife’s cycle in order to achieve pregnancy would not be contraceptive. It would create infertile periods, but these are undesired and the fact that you are infertile renders the question moot. Catholic moral theology would not hold that it is necessary to withhold medical treatment in this area in hope of the miraculous happening any more than it would be necessary in any other area to withhold medical treatment in hope of the miraculous happening.

Some moralists might disagree with elements of the reasoning above but, since the Church has not yet addressed the matters at hand, we are left to try to figure out such matters for ourselves, informing our consciences as best we can by reading different perspectives on the matter, weighing the arguments they use, entrusting the matter to God in prayer, and then following our best determination.

Hope this helps!

Valid Scapular Enrollment?

A reader writes:

A friend of mine recently asked a question on a web message board. Because you are the master of all rules, laws and technicalities, I was hoping you might be able to answer this question

I decided to ask a priest to enroll me in the brown scapular. Here’s what happened:

If anyone is familiar with the enrollment prayer, the priest must bless the scapular itself once, and the person wearing it twice (at separate parts of the prayer). The priest jumped over blessing the second time:

V. By the power granted to me, I admit you to a share in all the spiritual works performed with the merciful help of Jesus Christ by the religious of Mount Carmel. In the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. (Make the sign of the cross)

At this point the priest said the right words but failed to make that sign of the cross over me (although I did it myself). So how specific is this priestly enrollment prayer? Am I enrolled and being paranoid? Or should I have it re-enrolled?

So, just what is it that makes an enrollment valid?

The brown scapular is a sacramental rather than a sacrament. As a result, it works the way the Church intends it to work. Unlike the sacraments, it does not have an essential form and matter that has been passed down to us from Jesus Christ, so the Church is free to establish whatever requirements for enrollment in it that the Church wants.

If you read the text of the enrollment, it does call for the sign of the cross to be made at three points, but the Church has not said that the sign of the cross is essential for validity. Indeed, the sign of the cross gets made in all kinds of ceremonies without affecting their validity one way or the other. In Mass, for example, the sign of the cross is made several times, but if the priest omits it, it does not serve to invalidate the transubstantiation of the Eucharist in Mass. The sign of the cross is a reverent action that is called for in the Mass, but it is not required for validity. The same is true of the other sacraments. In none of them, even though the sign is called for, is it part of the essential matter or form of the sacrament and so omitting it (e.g., anointing a sick person by just dabbing them rather than signing them) does not affect validity.

If something isn’t essential for validity in the sacraments then, unless the Church specifically indicates otherwise, it isn’t going to be necessary in a sacramental, either. Based on the example that the Church sets with the use of the sign of the cross in the sacraments, we should understand its use in the sacraments in a similar light. Thus unless, in the case of a particular sacramental, the sign of the cross is indicated to be essential then it should be regarded as non-essential.

The Church does not intend the sacramentals to be contingent on the performance of minor details since the Church knows full well that priests and lay people will mess things up, and it doesn’t want people scrupuling about this. As long as the essential core of the rite is performed, that is what counts.

In the case of the brown scapular enrollment, the essential part of the rite for enrollment is the words quoted above: "I admit you to a share in all the spiritual works performed with the
merciful help of Jesus Christ by the religious of Mount Carmel." If the priest says that then the person is enrolled. It’s what’s known linguistically as a performative utterance since the uttering of the words performs the act in question. A more commonplace example of a performative utterance would be "I invite you to my party"–by saying it, you do it, and by saying "I admit you" the priest admits the person.

The added element "In the name of the Father, and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit" (during which the sign of the cross is called for) thus seems to be a qualifier that expresses the spirit in which the admission is done, but it is not essential for the admission itself to take place. What’s essential is the "I admit you" with an indication of what the person is being admitted to.

As long as the priest said those words–or words with equivalent meaning–the person has been admitted and does not need to be re-enrolled.

Hope this helps!

Greek New Testament . . . No Imprimatur

A reader writes:

I’ve been reading your blog occasionally and have noticed that you seem to be knowledgeable in a variety of areas (not just in apologetics),

Naw, I’m just curious about . . . y’know . . . stuff.

so I thought I’d ask you a question I’ve been having trouble getting answered elsewhere.

Okay, shoot!

I’m thinking of studying Greek in order to read the New Testament in its original language.

Good for you! I recommend William Mounce’s Basics of Biblical Greek as a starting point.

However, so far as I know, there are no editions of the Greek New Testament currently available that have ecclesiastical approval.

Yeah, I don’t know of any, either.

What are the Church’s regulations for reading/studying non-approved editions of Holy Scripture? Canon 825, §1 seems to indicate that it’s not permitted, but I’m not sure.

Ah, actually the canon you cite does not prohibit reading or studying such Scriptures. Here’s the canon in question:

Can. 825 §1. Books of the sacred scriptures cannot be published unless the Apostolic See or the conference of bishops has approved them. For the publication of their translations into the vernacular, it is also required that they be approved by the same authority and provided with necessary and sufficient annotations.

§2. With the permission of the conference of bishops, Catholic members of the Christian faithful in collaboration with separated brothers and sisters can prepare and publish translations of the sacred scriptures provided with appropriate annotations.

As you can see, the canon places the legal burden on the publisher of a book of sacred scripture. It is the publisher of the volume, not the reader, who has the responsibility to make sure that the needed approval is gathered (assuming it’s a Catholic publisher to begin with; Catholics are not bound by canon law).

For a reader, there is no prohibition on reading material that has not been granted ecclesiastical approval. There is a general moral requirement that one not read material that would be damaging to one’s faith or morals, but I am unware of any editions of the Greek New Testament that would do that. Not even the Jehovah’s Witnesses, as far as I know, have had the chutzpah to alter the original Greek text (though they have laced it up with erroneous glosses).

There really isn’t that much difference between different editions of the Greek New Testament, and what differences there are tend not to cut across confessional lines. It’s not like there’s a "Catholic Greek New Testament" versus a "Protestant Greek New Testament." The differences concern mostly minor manuscript variations that are neither Catholic nor Protestant.

For this reason, Catholic scholars tend to use the same editions of the Greek New Testament as Protestant scholars, notably the Nestle-Aland/United Bible Societies text, which is considered one of the better critical editions, though the differences between this and other editions are very small and would not be of concern to a person just learning the language.

The absence of confessional differences in the text of the Greek New Testament is one of the reasons that it’s hard to find an edition that has been given ecclesiastical approval. There may be some, and I did some poking around online looking, but I haven’t found any.

My advice would be to use any edition of the Greek New Testament that comes to hand. As a tool for learning the language, that’s all you really need.

And, as I said, I’d use Mounce if possible as an intro text.

Good luck!

Blog Day Off

I’m sorry, but I’m afraid I’m going to need a blog day off today.

This morning I received word of the unexpected death of a friend (not a person who I’ve mentioned on the blog before; they’re all fine) and when I got home last night I was still absorbing the shock and didn’t have the emotional energy to write blog entries for today.

Blog service should resume tomorrow.

Thanks for understanding.

Mel Gibson

In an e-mail titled "Mel Gibson," a reader writes:

Come on, Jimmy, drop the hammer on this hypocrite!

I don’t drop hammers on people who are displaying signs of contrition, which at the moment Mr. Gibson is doing.

The reason I don’t do so is that Jesus didn’t. The people he verbally "dropped hammers" on were individuals who were convinced of their own righteousness and who thought they had no need of repentence. He invariably showed compassion toward those who acknowledged their sins and sought forgiveness.

Of course, contrition can be feigned, and Jesus would be in a position to look into a person’s heart and see if they were faking it, but I’m not Jesus and I can’t do that. As a result, I am called as a Christian to look charitably on expressions of remorse and–unless I have good evidence of insincerity–to deem them credible and treat the person accordingly.

That does not mean ignoring what the person did. As a rational being I am also called to incorporate what I know about the person into my appraisal of him and his history.

READ GIBSON’S FIRST APOLOGY (SCROLL DOWN).

READ GIBSON’S SECOND APOLOGY.

That said, I can share the following thoughts:

1) I had not known about Mr. Gibson’s battle with alcoholism–which he has apparently had for some time. He also (if you visit the link) is reported to have battled drug abuse, bipolar disorder, and suicidal impulses. According to his own admission, he had a relapse of alcohol abuse and according to some reports he was near suicide on the night of his drunk driving incident. According to the previous link:

A source close to the star told Deadline Hollywood that Mel “felt he was helpless to alcohol and didn’t know what to do about it.”

“No one’s really asking questions about his state of mind. That’s why he was driving around 90 miles an hour. This was a death wish. If that cop hadn’t stopped him, this guy was going to be wrapped around a pole.”

If that is the case, Mr. Gibson has been in a really, really dark place that I wouldn’t wish on anybody. For what it’s worth, his apparent remark that "My life is F’d" is consistent with a suicidal bout since being a Hollywood celebrity who has a DUI does not amount to having one’s life or career ruined. This remark suggests a deeper issue than simply getting caught driving drunk and it could be indicative of a suicidal incident.

Even if the source is wrong, though, I wouldn’t wish a history of alcohol abuse, drug abuse, bipolar disorder, and suicidal tendencies on anybody. The kind of suffering that this complex would involve is enormous, and my heart goes out to anyone who has had to endure that kind of suffering.

When my wife died, I went through enormous personal suffering, but I never wanted to kill myself, and so I can only think of what a suicidal person is going through as orders of magnitude greater than what I went through, which is enough to make me cringe.

Upon learning all this about Mr. Gibson, I find myself moved to compassion and prayer.

At the same time,

2) His apparent anti-Semitic remarks are revolting and I find them utterly despicable.

The question is how they are to be viewed in light of his medical condition and past history.

I don’t know enough about bipolar disorder to understand what kinds of thoughts it may put into a person’s head when they’re in a depressive phase. I know in a manic phase it can cause a person to think bizarrely paranoid things that he would not think when in his right mind, but I don’t know if that happens in the depressive phase of the illness, nor do I know what the severity of the illness may be for Mr. Gibson. I therefore have a question mark in my mind regarding what role his reported bipolar disorder may have played in generating his anti-Semitic remarks.

PRE-PUBLICATION UPDATE 1: LEARN MORE ABOUT BIPOLAR DISORDER (I HAVEN’T HAD A CHANCE TO THOROUGHLY READ THIS ONE YET, BUT I ASSUME IT’S USEFUL).

PRE-PUBLICATION UPDATE 2: According to Wikipedia’s article on bipolar disorder (EXCERPTS):

Severe depression [due to bipolar disorder] may be accompanied by symptoms of psychosis. These symptoms include hallucinations (hearing, seeing, or otherwise sensing the presence of stimuli that are not there) and delusions (false personal beliefs that are not subject to reason or contradictory evidence and are not explained by a person’s cultural concepts). They may also suffer from paranoid thoughts of being persecuted or monitored by some powerful entity such as the government or a hostile force. Intense and unusual religious beliefs may also be present, such as patients’ strong insistence that they have a God-given role to play in the world, a great and historic mission to accomplish, or even that they possess supernatural powers. Delusions in a depression may be far more distressing, sometimes taking the form of intense guilt for supposed wrongs that the patient believes he or she has inflicted on others.

By the same token, research by Kay Redfield Jamison of Johns Hopkins University and others has attributed high rates of creativity and productivity to certain individuals with bipolar disorder.

People with bipolar disorder are about twice as likely to commit suicide as those suffering from major depression (12% to 20%).^{[citation needed]} Individuals with bipolar disorder tend to become suicidal, especially during mixed states such as dysphoric hypomania and agitated depression. Suicidal symptoms include:

Feeling hopeless, [e.g., the "My life is F’d" quotation–ja] that nothing will ever change or get better

Putting oneself in harm’s way, or in situations where there is a danger of being killed [e.g., driving 90 in a 45mph zone–ja]

Abusing alcohol or drugs

If Wikipedia’s article is accurate and if Mr. Gibson has a significant case of bipolar disorder then the above complex of symptoms could significantly explain his recent behavior, as well as his demonstrable cinematic creativity.

When it comes to the role alcohol may have played, my impression is that when intoxicated people say strange things, the strange things generally fall into one of two classes: (1) things they really believe but self-censor when not intoxicated and (2) things they are inclined to believe but don’t fully endorse when non-intoxicated.

Mr. Gibson’s two apologies are meant to convey the impression that it was not (1). In his first apology, Gibson said that "I . . . said things that I do not believe to be true and which are despicable." In his second apology, Gibson said that "The tenets of what I profess to believe necessitate that I exercise charity and tolerance as a way of life. Every human being is God’s child, and if I wish to honor my God I have to honor his children. But please know from my heart that I am not an anti-Semite. I am not a bigot. Hatred of any kind goes against my faith. . . . I am in the process of understanding where those vicious words came from during that drunken display, and I am asking the Jewish community, whom I have personally offended, to help me on my journey through recovery."

If Mr. Gibson is being honest in these statements, then (1) would not be the case. However, he may be dishonest.

At a minimum, I would be inclined to regard his statements as stemming from the kind of situation described in (2): that he at least has anti-Semitic tendencies that–under the influence of alcohol or bipolar disorder–can turn into at least temporary anti-Semitic convictions.

This is further corroborated by the fact that his father is a known anti-Semite and that anti-Semitic views are common in the Rad Trad circles in which Mr. Gibson apparently moves.

The strength of his anti-Semitic tendencies are apparently not so extreme that they would prevent him from casting a Jewish woman as the Mother of Christ in The Passion of the Christ, but the remarks he made are utterly despicable and are the apparent product of anti-Semitic tendencies that I am very dismayed to have confirmed.

This leads me to . . .

3) How I’ll have to view his work in the future.

I’ve never been a Mel Gibson fan, and I don’t follow his work closely. The movie of his that stands out most in my mind, of course, is The Passion of the Christ, which was subject to numerous charges of anti-Semitism when (and especially before) it came out. After seeing the movie, I felt that many of these charges were unfounded, which was a view affirmed by many in the Jewish community, including Michael Medved.

Nevertheless, I also felt that there was one element in the film in particular that was subject to criticism on this score: the film’s treatment of the high priest Caiaphas.

Gibson created a portrait of Pontius Pilate that was sympathetic and nuanced, and the film cried out for him to do the same thing for Caiaphas. Indeed, the Gospel of John gives one all the fodder one would need to portray Caiaphas in a sympathetic light, given his fear (chronicled in John 11) that if Jesus wasn’t put to death that he would become a revolutionary Messianic leader that would start a war with the Romans and cause the Romans to invade and kill massive numbers of Jewish people.

Given the fact that the gospels also portray Pilate as having ambivalent feelings about the crucifixion, the blindingly obvious artistic choice was to portray them both sympathetically, with both feeling that they had to do what they did regarding Jesus for reasons that the viewer could understand. In other words, the tragedy should have been one of "Father, forgive them for the know not what they do" in the cases of both men.

Gibson delivered that for Pilate and utterly ignored it for Caiaphas, who simply comes across as a fanatic in the film.

At the time I said (in conversations with film critic Steven Greydanus) that this artistic blindspot on Gibson’s part could be due either to an anti-Semitic tendency or due to the random blindspots that all artists suffer from. Given Gibson’s disavowals of anti-Semitism and his involvement of Jewish individuals in the project (casting a Jewish woman as the Mother of God is no small thing if you’re an anti-Semite), I hoped to be able to give him the benefit of the doubt on this one, but in light of his recent anti-Semitic tirade, I have to re-evaluate.

It now looks probable to me that the blindspot was due to his anti-Semitic tendencies.

While I still consider The Passion of the Christ to be an extraordinary film, I now find it tainted in this respect.

I also will have to view Gibson’s future projects in light of what is now known.

All of which makes me sad.

I am glad to see, though, that in his apologies Mr. Gibson has acknowledged personal culpability and is seeking to make amends to the Jewish community. I hope he is sincere.

I cannot offer him forgiveness for what he said, however. There is a principle in Jewish thought–which I think is theologically valid if properly understood–that to the extent a sin is against another person, only that person can forgive it.

All sins also contain an offense against God, and only God can forgive that, but to the extent a sin is committed against another person, only that person can extend forgiveness for what was done.

Since I am not a member of the Jewish community, I therefore have no forgiveness to offer Mr. Gibson.

I am glad that he is seeking forgiveness and to make what amends he can. I hope he is sincere, and I hope that he takes this incident to heart and reforms his life and his views.

What he did was vile–it was a dramatic exposure of the face of evil–and I hope that he can find the personal conversion and redemption and healing that he–and we all–need.

Mental Reservation And Same-Sex Attraction

A reader writes:

I’m a college-age guy and, though I’m same-sex attracted, I haven’t "come out" to anyone besides my confessor and a few other older mentors. This is so for various reasons:

1. I’m not attracted exclusively to other males, but the nuances would be hard to convey accurately.

2. I don’t want people to think of me predominantly in terms of my sexuality: "So-and-so, who’s gay, …."

3. Late adolescence is a time of tremendous flux and anyway I consider SSA somewhat curable, but even were I changed people’s ability to forget or take me at my word wouldn’t keep pace.

4. I don’t want (especially male) friends to feel even the slightest discomfort or awkwardness or pity, or wonder whether I have fallen for them.

5. Charity seems to require it: my parents would be devastated to learn of this — especially my robustly masculine father, who would consider himself to have failed his son.

6. I don’t want people, poisoned by modern thought on the matter, to expect of, or reinforce in, me stereotypically gay behavior, views, etc.

For these reasons, I’ve considered myself justified in concealing my orientation from others. But this doesn’t involve only silence on the matter, which itself seems morally unproblematic. It also involves equivocation, implicit denial of my same-sex attractions in certain conversations, and sometimes outright denial (when I’m asked more or less pointedly about my orientation).

Do my above concerns justify mental reservation? And granting so, what is the morally legitimate and prudent response when I’m asked directly? I currently feel dishonest and deceptive keeping this from my closest friends, but I still consider it highly imprudent to tell anyone, even them. I don’t want to lie, but neither do I want to share the truth.

First of all, let me say that the attitude you are taking toward your SSA is very commendable. It sounds like you have a good theological and practical handle on your situation, and you should be proud of yourself.

In particular, not allowing yourself to be defined by your SSA is healthy. If people say to themselves "I’m gay" or "I’m a homosexual" or similar things, it tends to reinforce the problem. What you are is a man. The more you make that central to your identity, the easier it will be to deal with temptations to act contrary to your nature (which is what all temptations are). It is better to say, "I’m a man who happens to have temptations in this area, but I refuse to be defined by my temptations. I can manage and master them and diminish them, likely to the point of being mere annoyances."

For all of the reasons you numbered, and others, I would say that you are justified in keeping the fact of your SSA to yourself.

In particular, I would say you are warranted in keeping it from your current friends, no matter how close they are. The college years being a turbulent time of change, it is highly likely that many of your current friends will not be friends five, ten, twenty, or thirty years from now. You may even have a falling out with some that would cause them to be hostile toward you in the future. For that reason, keeping the matter to yourself would definitely be prudent.

I would also pursue reparative therapy to help moderate or cure your SSA. The folks at Narth.Org would be a good starting place.

As far as the means by which you can keep the information to yourself, silence is certainly an option but when it is not possible, mental reservation is as well. The Catechism states:

2489 Charity and respect for the truth should dictate the response to every request for information or communication. The good and safety of others, respect for privacy, and the common good are sufficient reasons for being silent about what ought not be known or for making use of a discreet language. the duty to avoid scandal often commands strict discretion. No one is bound to reveal the truth to someone who does not have the right to know it.

Here the Catechism is focused on respecting the good and privacy of others, but the same thing applies to our own good and privacy. Nobody has a right to know this about you (unless you are applying for a position where disclosure is warranted, such as discerning a vocation to the priesthood) and the use of "a discreet language" (i.e., mental reservation) would be warranted.

As to what kind of mental reservation would be the best to use . . . I dunno. . . . I guess it would depend on the circumstance.

Much of the time you could probably simply say, "I’m not gay," which is true given that "gay" is an ideologically loaded word that commonly implies not just SSA but also a whole set of additional things, like actively engaging in homosexual behavior and morally approving the "gay lifestyle."

It also strikes me that in appropriate occasions you could simply say, "I like girls" and leave it at that since, as you mention above, you do are in fact attracted to women.

In some cases simply giving a person a disapproving look and refusing to dignify the question with an answer might be the best thing.

These responses are likely to suffice for anything other than a direct question asking if you have any degree of SSA–which is an extremely intrusive question for a friend to ask. For the latter, I would recommend simply refusing to answer the question in one way or another. Giving a disapproving look might work (for the question is to be disapproved of) or, if you feel the need to say something, I know that many people, if asked a lot of personal questions about their sex life, would be inclined to simply respond "Are you crazy?" or even "Go to hades" (it being understood that you are not literally wishing damnation upon somone but that you find the question offensive and have no intention of answering it).

I’m sure that there are better ways of getting around the question (which shouldn’t come up that often; I’d make a point of not getting into conversations where it is likely to come up, though some of that may be unavoidable with college-age people these days). The above responses are ones that occur to me off the top of my head, but perhaps others can provide better ones in the combox.