Sure, but it wasn't until the 7th post that we learned that. My approach to the thread has consistently been with regard to the sense appetite, but I suppose that's a good point.
Yeah, I don't blame you for making the assumption, and sometimes that is what people mean. But sometimes it isn't. I'm pretty familiar with the concept of asexuality, since I did identify with it for a while, but if you don't know the ins and outs of it, it's one of the more obscure and difficult ideas under the LGBT+ banner.
Lol... I think we are differing on the nature of sexual attraction. I see it as more comprehensive than simply an invitation to sex acts. So again, maybe talking about eros rather than sex would be appropriate since it better represents the web of interconnected complexities.
Possibly. It's tricky, though, because asexuality is so difficult to define. Anyone who diverges from the norm in terms of sexual appetite and/or attraction could qualify, but everyone is different.
I think the "disordered" language is a bit dangerous in this context, though. I know what it means in the Catholic context, and I think that I
do have a nasty case of disordered passions related to this, but non-Christians have a lot of trouble with this type of language. When it comes to the question of asexuality, it's already so difficult because the whole secular world is telling you that you have to be sexually active, so I would be cautious of adding to that pressure by using language that people are going to misinterpret.
I think the vast majority of people would say that sexual attraction is an integral part of the human experience. Further, this is one of the single most ubiquitous area of human temptation and sin. That would be a pretty big one for Christ to skip.
Oh, I'm not saying he skipped it. I just think it's a weird argument to say that the lack of significant sexual attraction is disordered because Christ probably had a sexual appetite, both because we have no way to actually verify that, and because as far as I can tell, masculine and feminine sexuality are not really the same thing, so he did skip a full half of the human experience as far as sexuality is concerned.
There is also still the issue alluded to earlier: you can lack significant sexual attraction without lacking sexual appetite, so sexual sin can still apply. I just don't know why it would attach specifically to not feeling sexual attraction to anyone. That seems value neutral to me.
Another point that hasn't been addressed yet: if asexuality is an orientation (and I'm not convinced that this is the right word for it), then it is a very fluid one. I have known people who at certain points considered themselves basically asexual, and at others didn't. That can obviously be a problem in the marital context, but I don't see why the lessening of a sexual appetite would otherwise be considered disordered.
Isn't that like saying you're uncomfortable with promises because some are broken?
I would be uncomfortable if keeping one's word was seen as something that was extraordinarily difficult. It really shouldn't be.
But what I don't see is why someone who struggles with celibacy is somehow better off than someone who doesn't.
Well, really even a primitive sense appetite is necessary for virtue. If you don't have desires and aversion, if you don't seek pleasure and avoid pain, if you don't care about anything or fear anything, then there's simply no possible way that you could be courageous, or temperate, or loving, or prudent, or even just. But to actually achieve virtue requires an
ardent desire for the good, a
visceral distaste for evil. Our e-motions are what move us, and we can never be moved to virtue (or true vice) without affectivity. For Aristotelians the world of sense is the root and introduction to the world, and the sense appetites are the root and introduction to appetite. To take a sheepishly bad example, the child who began life with an extreme and fearful love of Spaghetti-O's is the one who grows up to be St. Teresa of Avila and sets the world on fire with her love of God, not the child who finds all foods perfectly boring.
Hmm. I obviously have some Aristotelian sympathies, but I'm not quite an Aristotelian, so I would balk a bit at just declaring Aristotelian ethics and Christian ethics to be the same thing, without any qualifiers.
I will agree that just about any ethics requires a thirst for
something, though, even if I'm not sure that the connection to sense appetite is more than just analogical. Either way, I don't see why this would specifically be related to sexuality, since having an ardent desire for the good seems pretty distinct from having a desire for sexual intimacy.
I'll have to dust off that biography.
Yeah, haha. I don't think it was quite as scandalous as it sounds, but it makes me scratch my head a bit. If you're in a chaste marriage with one sister, and the other sister cohabitates with you both throughout her entire lifetime, and all of this is going on for religious reasons,
what is that even? A Josephite ménage à trois?