Love is love?

October 29, 2019 techdecisions

“Love wills the good of the other person.” CCC 2514-2533

““Love Is Love.” It’s the new mantra of our culture, the moral wisdom of the age. It’s the battle cry of a movement led by those not so wise as a sage. (Channeling my inner Dr. Seuss.)

Joining the fray, the Coca-Cola Company has launched its “Love Is Love” campaign in Hungary. Peppered throughout train stations, on billboards, and on their Hungarian Facebook page, their ads feature both opposite-sex and same-sex couples with the hashtag #loveislove. The campaign came days before this year’s “Love Revolution”-themed Sziget Festival, a week-long music-and-art event held annually in Budapest.

The message of this slogan is a no-brainer: “Male or female? Who cares? Love is love, and it’s all good!” As Coca-Cola stated in a recent e-mail, the ads “do indeed try to convey a message . . . our belief that everyone has a right to love and that the feeling of love is the same for all” (emphasis added).

Kudos to those who developed the slogan; it has rhetorical force. It appeals to something innate: the desire for romantic love. In particular, it proposes love as the foundation of a sexual relationship, which is noble and worthy of praise (something we can’t say about the motivations behind the “hookup” culture).

But when you think it through, “Love Is Love,” the way it is used in this slogan, simply can’t be true.

Consider, for example, that when the slogan is used, “love” is rarely defined. And when it is defined, it’s usually called a “feeling,” as Coca-Cola Co. did in its defense of the ads. (Not too different from “Taste the feeling!”)

The problem is that it is so easy to hijack the word “love” and justify almost anything. The grotesque North American Man Boy Love Association (NAMBLA), for example, does just that. It seeks to justify sexual acts between adult males and young boys in the name of “love,” stating on its website,

NAMBLA’s goal is to end the extreme oppression of men and boys in mutually consensual relationships by . . . educating the general public on the benevolent nature of man/boy love (emphasis added).

Adopting the same reasoning as the Coca-Cola Co., NAMBLA appeals to the rights of all to express love through their bodies: “We support the rights of youth as well as adults to choose the partners with whom they wish to share and enjoy their bodies.”

Every bit of so-called wisdom that “Love Is Love” embodies—the feeling of love is the same for all and that everyone has a right to express that love—justifies the abuse that NAMBLA promotes.

Now, someone will inevitably respond, “What NAMBLA promotes isn’t true sexual love. Minors aren’t in a position to understand what’s involved in a sexual relationship. Therefore, they can’t really consent. The slogan ‘Love Is Love’ is meant only to express the idea that biological sex is irrelevant to romantic love and its expression in sexual activity among consenting adults.”

A member of NAMBLA, however, could counter and say sexual relationships with minors are consensual, as indicated in the above quote. But that aside, when push comes to shove, those who live by “Love Is Love” don’t really think all sexual love is equal. For these people, some things rob sex of its power to express true love, such as young age.

But if biological age has something to do with determining appropriate or inappropriate expressions of sexual love, perhaps biological sex does as well? Why should we think biological sex is exempt? Perhaps sexual activity among members of the same sex is not a legitimate expression of sexual love.

The only way we can know whether this is true or not is to know whether same-sex sexual activity involves willing what’s good for the beloved concerning his or her sexual powers, since the essence of love is to will the good of another (Summa Theologiae I-II:26:4; II-II:23:1). [Editor: In the natural order, and according natural law, the good, the fruit of sexual intercourse, is children. Sexual intercourse was designed by God to unify a married couple and to further participate in God’s ongoing creation, and for NO other reasons! Using human beings as a means to an end is abuse, not love. The end never justifies the means, ever! Although difficult, there is always a holy option however difficult it may be. Seeking pleasure for the sake of pleasure reduces human existence to a piece of entertainment only to be thrown away when it no longer gives us a thrill.]

If same-sex sexual activity is not a good use—but an abuse—of our sexual powers, as traditional sexual ethics claims, then to engage in it is to reject the order of the good inscribed in the nature of human sexual activity. It would be an expression of contempt to use the good of human sexuality against what is good for the human person, as if the latter is a kind of evil to be supplanted or an obstacle to be removed.

The perversity of such behavior would be akin to a doctor who engages in her activity of healing as a doctor only to make someone ill. In such a scenario, the doctor positively rejects her good as a doctor—namely, healing— as an evil to be avoided. For a doctor to reject the order of a good doctor can only merit the charge of being an evil doctor.

Similarly, if same-sex sexual activity is an abuse of our sexual powers (which this author proves it is), then it entails a rejection of the human good for sex.

But actions that entail a rejection of the order of the human good cannot possibly be expressions of authentic love, even if they are done in the name of love. Such actions would be directly opposed to love, showing disdain for the other rather than appreciation. In the words of Karol Wojtyla (Pope St. John Paul II), such a love could only be called an “evil love.”

In light of this, it becomes evident that the “Love Is Love” slogan is a smokescreen that distracts us from the real question: does same-sex sexual activity will the good of the other?

If it does, then the slogan is a true bit of moral wisdom. But if it doesn’t, then the slogan’s wisdom just ain’t “the real thing.”

Who wants a mantra that’ll come back to haunt ya?”

Real love,
Matthew

Summa Catechetica, "Neque enim quaero intelligere ut credam, sed credo ut intelligam." – St Anselm, "“Si comprehendus, non est Deus.” -St Augustine, "Let your religion be less of a theory, and more of a love affair." -G.K. Chesterton, “When we pray we speak to God; but when we read, God speaks to us.” -St Jerome, "As the reading of bad books fills the mind with worldly and poisonous sentiments; so, on the other hand, the reading of pious works fills the soul with holy thoughts and good desires." -St. Alphonsus Liguori, "And above all, be on your guard not to want to get anything done by force, because God has given free will to everyone and wants to force no one, but only proposes, invites and counsels." –St. Angela Merici, “Yet such are the pity and compassion of this Lord of ours, so desirous is He that we should seek Him and enjoy His company, that in one way or another He never ceases calling us to Him . . . God here speaks to souls through words uttered by pious people, by sermons or good books, and in many other such ways.” —St. Teresa of Avila, "I want a laity, not arrogant, not rash in speech, not disputatious, but men and women who know their religion, who enter into it, who know just where they stand, who know what they hold and what they do not, and who know their creed so well that they can give an account of it, who know so much of history that they can defend it. I want an intelligent, well-instructed laity… I wish you to enlarge your knowledge, to cultivate your reason, to get an insight into the relation of truth to truth, to learn to view things as they are, to understand how faith and reason stand to each other, what are the bases and principles of Catholicism, and where lie the main inconsistences and absurdities of the Protestant theory.” (St. John Henry Newman, “Duties of Catholics Towards the Protestant View,” Lectures on the Present Position of Catholics in England), "We cannot always have access to a spiritual Father for counsel in our actions and in our doubts, but reading will abundantly supply his place by giving us directions to escape the illusions of the devil and of our own self-love, and at the same time to submit to the divine will.” —St. Alphonsus Ligouri, "The harm that comes to souls from the lack of reading holy books makes me shudder . . . What power spiritual reading has to lead to a change of course, and to make even worldly people enter into the way of perfection." –St. Padre Pio, "Screens may grab our attention, but books change our lives!" – Word on Fire, "Reading has made many saints!" -St Josemaría Escrivá, "Do you pray? You speak to the Bridegroom. Do you read? He speaks to you." —St. Jerome, from his Letter 22 to Eustochium, "Encounter, not confrontation; attraction, not promotion; dialogue, not debate." -cf Pope Francis, "God here speaks to souls through…good books“ – St Teresa of Avila, Interior Castle, "You will not see anyone who is really striving after his advancement who is not given to spiritual reading. And as to him who neglects it, the fact will soon be observed by his progress.” -St Athanasius, "To convert someone, go and take them by the hand and guide them." -St Thomas Aquinas, OP. 1 saint ruins ALL the cynicism in Hell & on Earth. “When we pray we talk to God; when we read God talks to us…All spiritual growth comes from reading and reflection.” -St Isidore of Seville, “Also in some meditations today I earnestly asked our Lord to watch over my compositions that they might do me no harm through the enmity or imprudence of any man or my own; that He would have them as His own and employ or not employ them as He should see fit. And this I believe is heard.” -GM Hopkins, SJ, "Only God knows the good that can come about by reading one good Catholic book." — St. John Bosco, "Why don't you try explaining it to them?" – cf St Peter Canisius, SJ, Doctor of the Church, Doctor of the Catechism, "Already I was coming to appreciate that often apologetics consists of offering theological eye glasses of varying prescriptions to an inquirer. Only one prescription will give him clear sight; all the others will give him at best indistinct sight. What you want him to see—some particular truth of the Faith—will remain fuzzy to him until you come across theological eye glasses that precisely compensate for his particular defect of vision." -Karl Keating, "The more perfectly we know God, the more perfectly we love Him." -St Thomas Aquinas, OP, ST, I-II,67,6 ad 3, “But always when I was without a book, my soul would at once become disturbed, and my thoughts wandered." —St. Teresa of Avila, "Let those who think I have said too little and those who think I have said too much, forgive me; and let those who think I have said just enough thank God with me." –St. Augustine, "Without good books and spiritual reading, it will be morally impossible to save our souls." —St. Alphonsus Liguori "Never read books you aren't sure about. . . even supposing that these bad books are very well written from a literary point of view. Let me ask you this: Would you drink something you knew was poisoned just because it was offered to you in a golden cup?" -St. John Bosco " To teach in order to lead others to faith is the task of every preacher and of each believer." —St. Thomas Aquinas, OP. "Prayer purifies us, reading instructs us. Both are good when both are possible. Otherwise, prayer is better than reading." –St. Isidore of Seville “The aid of spiritual books is for you a necessity.… You, who are in the midst of battle, must protect yourself with the buckler of holy thoughts drawn from good books.” -St. John Chrysostom