Sunday, February 18, 2018

Youcat commented through CCC – Question n. 411.



YOUCAT Question n. 411 - Why is prostitution a form of fornication?


(Youcat answer) In prostitution “love” becomes a commodity and the person is degraded to an object of pleasure. That is why prostitution is a serious offense against human dignity and a serious sin against charity.

A deepening through CCC

(CCC 2355) Prostitution does injury to the dignity of the person who engages in it, reducing the person to an instrument of sexual pleasure. The one who pays sins gravely against himself: he violates the chastity to which his Baptism pledged him and defiles his body, the temple of the Holy Spirit (Cf. 1 Cor 6:15-20). Prostitution is a social scourge. It usually involves women, but also men, children, and adolescents (The latter two cases involve the added sin of scandal.). While it is always gravely sinful to engage in prostitution, the imputability of the offense can be attenuated by destitution, blackmail, or social pressure. 2355

Reflecting and meditating 

(Youcat comment) Certainly those who profit from prostitution human traffickers, pimps, clients burden themselves with greater guilt than the women, men, children, and young people who sell their bodies, often under duress or in situations of dependence.

(CCC Comment)

(CCC 2339) Chastity includes an apprenticeship in self-mastery which is a training in human freedom. The alternative is clear: either man governs his passions and finds peace, or he lets himself be dominated by them and becomes unhappy (Cf. Sir 1:22). "Man's dignity therefore requires him to act out of conscious and free choice, as moved and drawn in a personal way from within, and not by blind impulses in himself or by mere external constraint. Man gains such dignity when, ridding himself of all slavery to the passions, he presses forward to his goal by freely choosing what is good and, by his diligence and skill, effectively secures for himself the means suited to this end" (GS 17).

(The next question is: Why is the production and consumption of pornography a sin against charity?)

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