Purity as an antidote

The UN Commission on the Status of Women meeting this week had the opportunity to hear Archbishop Celestino Migliore of the Holy See condemn discrimination against women and defend “authentically feminine values“.

Discrimination is one-half of the theme of the commission. The other is the problem of violence against women.

On the eve of International Women’s Day, the U.N. Security Council called Wednesday for an end to the “pervasive violence” against girls and women during armed conflicts and demanded that the perpetrators be punished.

The council reiterated “its utmost condemnation” of the killing, maiming, sexual abuse, abduction and trafficking of girls and women and called on all warring parties to protect them, especially from rape and other forms of sexual violence.

In a presidential statement read at a formal meeting, the council emphasized the responsibility of all 192 U.N. member states “to put an end to impunity and to prosecute those responsible for genocide, crimes against humanity, and war crimes including those relating to sexual and other violence against women and girls.”

This violence is not just within the context of war.

Rachel Mayanja, the special adviser to Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon on gender issues and the advancement of women, told a news conference that girls and women are subjected to violence every day in every country – and the violence “transcends politics, culture and religion, race, class, income and age.”

“In order to eliminate violence against women and girls, we must take swift and concerted action to eradicate all forms of discrimination against them, and ensure women’s equality with men,” she said.

Perhaps the UN Commission could circulate Bishop Robert Finn’s pastoral letter to the Diocese of Kansas City, which examines some of the root causes of that violence here in our culture. It’s called ‘Blessed Are the Pure In Heart’.

To be pure in heart implies that our love is wholly directed toward the good of the other person…

…which requires “a clean and undivided heart”. Then, for the rest of this masterful document, Bishop Finn elaborates on the greatest threat to that in modern times – pornography.

Daily there are challenges to this pure Christian love. For some months, representatives of our Catholic Diocese have been working with leaders of other faith traditions to address the serious dangers represented by the steady increase of pornography in our culture.

Pornography is not new, but it has become a kind of plague in our society, reaching epidemic proportions. It is being propagated more widely than ever. Well beyond magazines, it is widespread on the internet, television, movies and videos, and now on cell phones and other handheld devices, many of which are marketed to children and youth. Pornography has become the secret entertainment of many people of all ages, walks of life, and economic backgrounds. Use of internet pornography is perhaps the fastest growing addiction in the world.

But it’s so seldom confronted directly, as it is in this pastoral letter.

Use of pornography is a serious sin against chastity and the dignity of the human person. It robs us of sanctifying grace, separates us from the vision of God and from the goodness of others, and leaves us spiritually empty.

Attraction to pornography and its gratifications is a false “love” that leads to increasing emotional isolation loneliness and subsequent sexual acting-out with self and others. It depends on the exploitation of other persons: frequently the desperate or poor, or the innocent young. Use of pornography has cost persons their jobs, their marriages and families. Traffickers in Child Pornography may end up in prison. It has often been associated with and has contributed to, acts of sexual violence and abuse.

The problem is epidemic, and Finn doesn’t just issue a warning. He covers the topic like a military commander mapping out a battle plan.

This real and serious problem demands of us a real and serious response.  It is easier to turn away and pretend it does not exist, but it does exist, and we must do what we can.   We should not wait for the abduction, rape or murder of a young girl or boy in our family, another ruined marriage, a job lost, or another child’s life being devastated to get us concerned about this issue.  The stakes are just too high.  

The first step in solving any problem is to point it out, to name it.  While exorcizing the Gerasene demoniac, Jesus asked, “What is your name?’  (Mark 5:9).  In Semitic thought to know the name is to begin to have some power over it.  We find a modern equivalent of this in the Twelve Step Spirituality of such groups as Alcoholics Anonymous.  The first step in this transforming spirituality is to admit that in the face of one’s addiction one is powerless.   People do not address problems that they refuse to admit.

That’s the first step. Bishop Finn’s document lays out the full personal, spiritual, cultural battle plan. It hould be read by everyone who’s somehow wounded by pornography. And that’s everyone.

(Tip to Molly for the reminder — I intended to cover this earlier.)