Priest today said lusting for someone (thoughts) is just as bad as actually cheating (sex)?

[Anonymous]

Today's homily stressed keeping your vows. I feel like people have gotten so casual with marrying for the status and social media content and normalizing divorce and even joking about so-called starter marriages. Good to hear a priest who doesn't find divorce humorous in any way.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Did anyone else's priest discuss similar today in the reading and homily?

Fantasizing about cheating is "adultery in your heart..." i.e. just as bad as the actual act of sleeping with someone. Is that genuine Catholic doctrine? He also segued into something about viewing pornography is essentially cheating too.

I think porn is disgusting, exploitative, and should be outlawed but I had never heard the argument that you shouldn't watch it because it's literally cheating on your spouse.

The priest did a poor job of explaining an important concept.

As someone else also pointed out, the entire structure of the Sermon on the Mount was Jesus challenging very legalistic religious interpretations being offered by the Pharisees and other religious leaders and showing them that the problem was a deeper one of the heart, not the legalism they were adhering to.

So when it comes to sex — there can be instances where you are not physically cheating on your spouse but your heart is filled with lust for other people. And, yes, Jesus was saying — that sort of life is just as bad as if you were cheating.

Especially as men, we have all encountered people like this over the years — those who make crude sexual jokes, who comment on females all the time, who talk about women crassly — the point is that these people are not really following God even if they refrain from an actual physical affair.

That makes complete sense when you think about it.

Now, as to how I believe the sermon may have been presented or interpreted by the OP — I wasn’t there of course so I don’t know — but — this doctrine of lust in the heart is not the same thing as saying that we will never have a stray sexual thought and anytime we do we are committing adultery in the same way as physical cheating.

Martin Luther famously said "You cannot keep birds from flying over your head, but you can keep them from building a nest in your hair.”

When it comes to lust, we all know what that means. There may be beautiful people that you see and your mind may wander for an instance — the bird flying over your head — but if your mind is wandering every hour — then the bird has built a nest in your hair.

And for the times when our minds do wander — that’s why we have the cross. Living a perfect life like the one described in the Sermon on the Mount is impossible. But Jesus took the penalty that we deserved for not living such a life and we now have his perfect record before God. And when I truly believe that in my heart — guess what I am a lot less likely to do, not because it is a rule, but as a way to reflect my love back to him?

Lust after others.

It’s the beautiful way that the Gospel actually works in changing your life.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Did anyone else's priest discuss similar today in the reading and homily?

Fantasizing about cheating is "adultery in your heart..." i.e. just as bad as the actual act of sleeping with someone. Is that genuine Catholic doctrine? He also segued into something about viewing pornography is essentially cheating too.

I think porn is disgusting, exploitative, and should be outlawed but I had never heard the argument that you shouldn't watch it because it's literally cheating on your spouse.

I know plenty of non-religious middle aged women who believe their husband viewing porn is akin to cheating. One of my best friends from college broke up with her fiancée because she discovered his twisted porn habits on a shared iPad. There’s a very visceral response to porn; sense of betrayal, your partner masterbating to other women, the porn stars being trafficked desperate young women. It’s reprehensible on so many levels.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Ok this is MY interpretation. Throughout the Gospel Jesus has conversations with people who are very very deep into the legalism of the Jewish law. So these men felt that as long as they didn't literally have sex with a woman they were absolutely sinless and Godly.

And in this verse Jesus is trying to communicate that being sinless isn't about just following the rule to the letter. If you're daydreaming about having sex with every woman you see, you're not some holy celibate guy. Having some control over your thoughts and having a good heart is just AS important as controlling your actions. And this is very basic and common sense because your thoughts WILL eventually guide your actions.

I don't think that Jesus was being literal here. We all know that adultery is much more serious than wayward thoughts. But it's rare that Jesus was absolutely literal, or the verse about plucking your eye out if it causes you to sin would be a problem.

Also, sin as understood in the ancient Greek means "missing the mark." So when you sin you are falling short of God's best. Lusting after someone who isn't your spouse is falling short.

Thank you. I love seeing well-stated arguments in this forum. It's rare.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Ok this is MY interpretation. Throughout the Gospel Jesus has conversations with people who are very very deep into the legalism of the Jewish law. So these men felt that as long as they didn't literally have sex with a woman they were absolutely sinless and Godly.

And in this verse Jesus is trying to communicate that being sinless isn't about just following the rule to the letter. If you're daydreaming about having sex with every woman you see, you're not some holy celibate guy. Having some control over your thoughts and having a good heart is just AS important as controlling your actions. And this is very basic and common sense because your thoughts WILL eventually guide your actions.

I don't think that Jesus was being literal here. We all know that adultery is much more serious than wayward thoughts. But it's rare that Jesus was absolutely literal, or the verse about plucking your eye out if it causes you to sin would be a problem.

Also, sin as understood in the ancient Greek means "missing the mark." So when you sin you are falling short of God's best. Lusting after someone who isn't your spouse is falling short.

Thank you. I love seeing well-stated arguments in this forum. It's rare.

Kind of like following the Jewish laws on keeping the sabbath holy but then having all those loopholes to use electricity and what-not.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Ok this is MY interpretation. Throughout the Gospel Jesus has conversations with people who are very very deep into the legalism of the Jewish law. So these men felt that as long as they didn't literally have sex with a woman they were absolutely sinless and Godly.

And in this verse Jesus is trying to communicate that being sinless isn't about just following the rule to the letter. If you're daydreaming about having sex with every woman you see, you're not some holy celibate guy. Having some control over your thoughts and having a good heart is just AS important as controlling your actions. And this is very basic and common sense because your thoughts WILL eventually guide your actions.

I don't think that Jesus was being literal here. We all know that adultery is much more serious than wayward thoughts. But it's rare that Jesus was absolutely literal, or the verse about plucking your eye out if it causes you to sin would be a problem.

Also, sin as understood in the ancient Greek means "missing the mark." So when you sin you are falling short of God's best. Lusting after someone who isn't your spouse is falling short.

Thank you. I love seeing well-stated arguments in this forum. It's rare.

Kind of like following the Jewish laws on keeping the sabbath holy but then having all those loopholes to use electricity and what-not.

My grandma, who was born in 1919, worked for a family as a teen to turn on their electricity on the sabbath. She said it was the best job she ever had.

[Anonymous]

I am talking not from a religious point of view. Emotional affairs can be pretty damaging. At some point my spouse got emotionally very close to a coworker, there were times I was wishing they just had s&x and get over with it instead of fantasizing how much of a better partner the coworker could have been

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Ok this is MY interpretation. Throughout the Gospel Jesus has conversations with people who are very very deep into the legalism of the Jewish law. So these men felt that as long as they didn't literally have sex with a woman they were absolutely sinless and Godly.

And in this verse Jesus is trying to communicate that being sinless isn't about just following the rule to the letter. If you're daydreaming about having sex with every woman you see, you're not some holy celibate guy. Having some control over your thoughts and having a good heart is just AS important as controlling your actions. And this is very basic and common sense because your thoughts WILL eventually guide your actions.

I don't think that Jesus was being literal here. We all know that adultery is much more serious than wayward thoughts. But it's rare that Jesus was absolutely literal, or the verse about plucking your eye out if it causes you to sin would be a problem.

Also, sin as understood in the ancient Greek means "missing the mark." So when you sin you are falling short of God's best. Lusting after someone who isn't your spouse is falling short.

Thank you. I love seeing well-stated arguments in this forum. It's rare.

Thank you! My reading of the Bible is that Jesus did not pathologize regular human behavior the way the Church has over the centuries. This is obviously not a literal verse. Jesus knows that men and women check each other out. He just advocates self awareness. I also believe we take commentary from “celibate” priests and bishops way too seriously.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I am talking not from a religious point of view. Emotional affairs can be pretty damaging. At some point my spouse got emotionally very close to a coworker, there were times I was wishing they just had s&x and get over with it instead of fantasizing how much of a better partner the coworker could have been

Religion aside, from a practical standpoint, emotional affairs eat up a lot of time and mental effort that could have been spent on improving oneself, one's family, and society. A lot of physical affairs and betrayals actually take up far less time and mental effort that could realistically be spent elsewhere.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I am talking not from a religious point of view. Emotional affairs can be pretty damaging. At some point my spouse got emotionally very close to a coworker, there were times I was wishing they just had s&x and get over with it instead of fantasizing how much of a better partner the coworker could have been

Religion aside, from a practical standpoint, emotional affairs eat up a lot of time and mental effort that could have been spent on improving oneself, one's family, and society. A lot of physical affairs and betrayals actually take up far less time and mental effort that could realistically be spent elsewhere.

I guess you could argue they take up a lot of time and effort where you could be working on the question of "How do I Serve God?" vs. "How do I serve this person?"

[Anonymous]

Back it up a minute. This is basically arguing that God acts as a thought police.

If that is the case, no one is ever making it to heaven.

Our thoughts are not our actions.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Did anyone else's priest discuss similar today in the reading and homily?

Fantasizing about cheating is "adultery in your heart..." i.e. just as bad as the actual act of sleeping with someone. Is that genuine Catholic doctrine? He also segued into something about viewing pornography is essentially cheating too.

I think porn is disgusting, exploitative, and should be outlawed but I had never heard the argument that you shouldn't watch it because it's literally cheating on your spouse.

I think thinking of something by yourself without the aid of someone else’s likeness (thoughts) is different from using another person to help you along- especially when the entire industry is exploitative.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:This is why I don't listen to sermons. Priests aren't more intelligent or wiser than average. This particular gem was very stupid.

And no, it's not Catholic doctrine. He's just incredibly insecure in his vows, that one

I don't think I'll ever understand whole groups of people that take advice on topics presumably from a person with zero points of reference.

[Anonymous]

You sound only have eyes for your spouse.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I'd guess at least 50% of all married American men view porn? Lot of de facto cheating going on.

Women view porn too…. Probably more than you’d care to know.

How do you know?