When I talked about obsessing over sexual temptation, I was thinking particularly of something that bothered me during the years I was involved in a Church-sponsored support group for same-sex attracted men (an experience I wrote about a couple of years ago). When I first joined the group in my twenties, I had zero experience with the gay “hook up” culture; even if I had wanted to have casual or anonymous sexual encounters, I wouldn’t have had a clear idea of how to go about it. In the group, however, at the beginning of each meeting, members went around the table confessing their struggles with chastity over the past week. Within a few weeks of joining the group, I had learned of about half a dozen specific locations in the Seattle area where I could have anonymous sex, and also learned a little bit about how to recognize who was looking for sex. No one in the group was trying to offer a how-to guide, of course. Over the course of many confessions, however, specific locations were named, and from discussion of how the person confessing tried to resist or gave in, I learned quite a bit about the dynamics of identifying and seducing possible hook-ups in these locations.
I never fell for that temptation. But it was certainly no aid to chastity to learn exactly where I could go to have sex and how to pick out and seduce potential partners if I went there. And hearing about others’ sins week in and week out tended to desensitize me to the seriousness of sexual sin. “Hooking up” began to seem like something that some people did on Tuesday, confessed on Friday, and moved on.
Here is the link:
Deacon Jim Russell and the Hermeneutic of Suspicion
Posted by Ron Belgau on Spiritual Friendship
http://spiritualfriendship.org/2015/09/17/deacon-jim-russell-and-the-hermeneutic-of-suspicion/
Here is one Biblical, and as far as I know Traditionally Catholic (not meaning typical of today's movement so called), recipe for dealing with it:
Corinthians 7:9 But if they do not contain themselves, let them marry. For it is better to marry than to be burnt.
Challoner Comment: If they do not contain: This is spoken of such as are free, and not of such as, by vow, have given their first faith to God; to whom if they will use proper means to obtain it, God will never refuse the gift of continency. Some translators have corrupted this text, by rendering it, if they cannot contain.
Note that Bishop Challoner:
- a) is not making any explicit exception for Same Sex Attracted people as if they were unable to marry properly;
- b) is actually opposing the idea that some "cannot" be chaste, whether as in his case it means "chaste" as a celibate, or in the case I talk of means "chaste" as in normally married. They differ as 100-fold and 30-fold fruit spoken of as given by the good soil.
Here is a man who was in the particular situation of Ron Belgau, and who followed the advice here given:
Josh Weed : Club Unicorn: In which I come out of the closet on our ten year anniversary
http://www.joshweed.com/2012/06/club-unicorn-in-which-i-come-out-of.html
and:
Josh Weed : Thank You Club Unicorn
http://www.joshweed.com/2012/06/thank-you-club-unicorn.html
And my simple question here is, why was the diocese of Ron Belgau not promoting Club Unicorn instead of the Support Group above mentioned, which seems to function on an AA like basis?
Perhaps because it is not fully Catholic?
Let's look at another man.
Les amis de Calvin lui reprochaient son célibat. Alors, pour bien montrer qu'il approuvait le mariage plus que le célibat, il avait demandé à ses amis de l'aider à trouver une épouse qui fût « modeste, serviable, nullement arrogante, nullement extravagante, patiente et soucieuse de ma santé. » Étrangement, d'abord personne ne remarqua que la calme et modeste Idelette possédait justement ces qualités.
The friends of Calvin reproached him his celibacy. Then, to show well that he approved marriage more than celibacy ... I interrupt the translation to remark, unlike St Paul ... he had asked his friends to help him find a spouse who was to be "modest, servicable, not at all arrogant, not at all extravagant, patient and sollicitous for my health". Strangely enough, at first no one remarked that the calm and modest Idelette ... new interruption: born de Bure and previously married and widowed Storder ... possessed precisely these qualities.
Some have said that Calvin, before joining the reformation, was branded with a lily. Because of sodomy with extenuating circumstances (without these, it would have been death, and death penalty for sodomy was still carried out as late as 1750 in France, which was the latest case). If this is true, Calvin, the diabolic apostle of double predestination, by his life has shown that he was not predestined to a choice of either celibacy or sodomy.
Lengthy digression on whether this be true or not:
And also that the grave and learned Dr. Stapleton*, 12 (adds the same writer in the same place), who had every opportunity of gaining information on this subject, having spent his life in the neighbourhood of Noyon, speaks of this adventure of Calvin's in terms of one who was certain of the fact. The quotation is in Latin...[and] I shall translate it. "The public monuments and records," said he, "of the town of Noyon in Picardy, are to be seen even to this day: in them it is related, that John Calvin, convicted of sodomy, and branded on the back only with a mark of infamy, through the indulgence of the bishop and magistrate, fled from the town; nor could the most respecteble men of his family, hitherto obtain that the registration of this act, which throws a heavy slur upon the whole family, be removed from these public monuments and records.
So, Thomas Stapledon, a Catholic controversialist who by converting had had to flee from Protestant England either saw evidence or faked evidence in the public records of Noyon. I do not think he was a liar.
In Calvin's own lifetime, a Bolsec charged him with this.
Second, and more significantly, the author relies upon a most jaundiced and historically discredited sixteenth-century source, Jerome Bolsec (d. 1584). Bolsec** was a former Carmelite monk turned physician, who had vacillated between the Reformation and Rome. He attacked Calvin’s doctrine of predestination during a meeting of the congregation. Bolsec, “a poor theologian technically” and “particularly weak on the history doctrines” (T. H. L. Parker) charged Calvin with making God the author of sin. Absent for the first part of Bolsec’s complaint, Calvin arrived unseen and stood to reply ex tempore for one hour. He replied to Bolsec in print in 1552 with De aeterna dei praedestinatione. Thus, Bolsec is hardly an unbiased witness. His account of Calvin’s life (see below) is notorious for its falsehoods.
The earlier site I looked at is discussing Bolsec before turning to Stapledon.
Calvin-admirers* have said that neither Berthelier nor Bolsec were worthy of being credited because, if true, then `why did the Roman Catholics not expose their arch-enemy Calvin with the same evidence?'
The answer could be, that clemency included secrecy. Or indeed, that Calvin's identity in 1534 was disputed. Noyon in 1534 may not have known how in 1533 elsewhere Calvin had supported the already condemned Nicolas Cop.
If this is true, Calvin has shown that he was not predestined for the evil of not being capable of a real marriage, despite having a sodomitic affair. Something which of course the blog Heidelblog is disputing.
Now, as to Bolsec, a comment under Heidelblog entry has this:
From Roman Catholic Apologist Art Sippo:
06/11/2008 : 12:25:50 PM Show Profile Email Poster Reply with Quote
I decided to deal with this issue in its own topic since it is not germain to the justification thread.
The charge of Sodomy was made about Calvin during his career as a religious despot in Geneva, Switzerland. It came from his earlier life in France in what was at that time a PROTESTANT area. It was popularized by Jerome Bolsec, a former Carmelite Monk who had joined the so-called ‘reform’ and gone to live in Geneva. While there Bolsec disagreed with Calvin publicly on a technical issue relating to predestination. Calvin had Bolsec arrested and held in abysmal condition while seeking to have him executed for heresy.
Whereon Scott Clark, author of Heidelblog, answered:
Algo,
I take it that you’re posting this as more evidence that Romanist apologists continue to repeat myths?
Whereupon Algo answered:
Bolsec was intelligent and articulate. He won the sympathy of the ecclesiastical ‘court’ that Calvin convened. While they did not all agree with his position, they did not think that he was a danger to the faith in Geneva. Calvin demanded Bolsec’s death. The Court would not agree. Then Calvin took a poll of the other Protestant pastors in Switzerland. They refused to exact the death penalty either. In fact, Calvin lost some of his closest friends because of his murderous attitude towards Bolsec. After suffering horrible physical and mental abuse, Bolsec was banished from Geneva and advised to leave Switzerland for his own safety.
“He later came to his senses and returned to the Catholic Faith. He then wrote a book on the life of Calvin which frankly repeated every negative comment or charge ever made against the man. The sodomy charge was one of them.
Calvin always harbored murderous intent against those who had the temerity to disagree with him. He had many such people executed with little problem. The most notorious case was that of Michael Servetus. Calvin had him killed to satisfy his own ego and lust for power. Attempts had been made to verify the sodomy charges against Calvin, but since the events allegedly happened in a Protestant area, there have been charges of cover up and collusion to protect Calvin’s ‘good name.’
Nevertheless there are numerous facts about he man which IMHO make the charges credible.
Calvin started out his career to be a priest with an eye to a bishopric. When his father fell afoul of the Bishop of Noyon and was excommunicated, Calvin knew he could not advance into higher ecclesiastical office and changed his studies to law. AT NO TIME WAS CALVIN INVOLVED WITH OR INTERESTED IN WOMEN OR MARRIAGE.
After he joined the ‘reform’ movement CALVIN REMAINED CELIBATE WITH NO INTENTION OF MARRYING.”
Which is of course very atypical of a Reformer.
That is up to this episode when his friends urge him to marry and he then asks them for advice, leading to his marriage with Idelette de Bure. Their urging is missing from the English wiki version of Idelette:
Calvin was so caught up in his labors that he did not seem to consider marriage until age 30 or so. He asked friends to help him find a woman who was "chaste, obliging, not fastidious, economical, patient, and careful for (his) health". His fellow laborer Martin Bucer had known Idelette and recommended her to Calvin in confidence that she would fit the bill. They married in August 1540.
All there - except the fact that his friends had to push him into considering marriage.
If you want to discredit Bolsec, you should of course also discredit his story about having been prisoner under Calvin and badly treated. Which in principle is a bit like the crime in France called negationism.
Scott Clark now pretends that (yes, Scott Clark on Heidelblog) that Catholics had discredited this "myth" since 16th C. Jean Papire Masson, a Catholic and ex-Jesuit, writing in year ?? is cited by Irena Dorota Backus (2008) as having this quality:
The Latin life of John Calvin attributed to Masson had a reputation in its time as fair-minded. (P. 220).
It is missing in the French wikiversion of Jean Papire Masson. Which gives a bibliography. Another Catholic cited here is Le Vasseur. He has no article, but is cited here:
Jacques Le Vasseur, chanoine de Noyon, lui a dédié en 1633 son Histoire des évêques de Noyon.
This man is then Henri de Baradat.
I note that Jean Papire Masson is an ex-Jesuit, and perhaps as much of a controversialist as Stapledon and Bolsec.
Ad Franc. Hotomani Franco-galliam Antonii Matharelli...responsio. Lutetiae: Ex off. Fédéric Morel, 1575. Controverse à la suite de la publication du traité Francogallia de François Hotman. Quelques autorités déclarent que Masson pourrait avoir écrit celui-ci sous le pseudonyme d’Antoine Matharel, autres disent que Matharel (1537–1586) était l’auteur seul, et encore autres disent que le travail était une collaboration entre Masson et Matharel.
So, we do not know if Papire Masson was a completely non-controversial author, and we also - at least those who like me are restricted to the wikipedian article - do not know he wrote the reputedly fair-minded Latin biography on Calvin.
I then note that Jacques Le Vasseur who gives another date than 1534 for when a Iean Chauvin was branded, is writing later than Stapledon, and that archives in Noyon could have been fiddled with during the Guerres de Religion or at behest of ex-Calvinist King Henri IV.
So, no, we cannot definitely say that this story is a myth.
And this means Calvin could be, along Josh Weed, a document of the fact that SSA people are not excluded from the recipe or ordination given by St Paul in Corinthians 7:9. If a Catholic, or so called such, was to deny this, he would be out-Calvining Calvin in the evil doctrine of Predestinationism.
I will not hide from you certain misgivings, cited by Catholic Apologist Art Sippo and quoted in comment section under Heidelblog, Algo is commenting again:
more ridiculous ranting of Dr. Art Sippo on this topic:
“Calvin was in Geneva for several years when some of his fellow ‘reformed pastors’ WHO HAD ALL MARRIED came to him and showed concern for the fact that he hadn’t. They arranged a marriage for him to the widow of another pastor who was older than Calvin. This was a marriage of convenience for both parties.
They had only one son at which point most of Calvin’s biographers agree that he had very little to do with his wife. Calvin took no interest in his son who recedes into historical obscurity and is never heard from again. The relationship between Calvin and his wife was described as more like that that of a priest with his housekeeper or of an UNMARRIED MAN LIVING WITH HIS MOTHER.”
This Rabid Anti-Protestant has been posting on Patrick Madrid’s various discussion boards for years giving us all a lesson in Bombastic Behavior.
And Heidelblogger Scott:
Thanks Algo,
It’s hard to tell whether you are quoting Sippo at each point.
At which Algo replies:
Sorry Dr. Clark.
I interacted with Dr. Sippo for over a year and saved most of what he posted.
The ridiculous claims he made were almost unbelievable.
The Moderator had to edit about 80% of his posts because he was so insulting.
Some people take offense easily and oversolicit the moderators, I would say. Debate becomes impossible.
Back to subject:
My own misgiving about Josh Weed is that he seemed to have only three daughters after ten years' or even eleven years' marriage. But they are alive, he is cherishing them and he is cherishing his wife.
Hans Georg Lundahl
Nanterre UL
Our Lady of Mercy
24-IX-2015
* Quoted from:
standfordrives : Calvin's Crime of 1534
https://sites.google.com/site/standfordrives/legal-decisions/calvin-crime-1534
** Quoted from:
Heidelblog : Was Calvin A Homosexual Convict?
http://heidelblog.net/2012/11/was-calvin-a-homosexual-convict/
Not cited:
Catholic Encyclopedia : Thomas Stapleton
http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/14249b.htm
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