Recently I have been prompted to reflect on how our society has arrived at the situation where we have the media and political parties promoting euthanasia, abortion and gender dysmorphia as moral goods and even as ordered realities, that have somehow always existed. Answers to the causation of this bizarre state of affairs can be explained in all sorts of ways but I find a handy resource in St Paul's letter to the Romans. This hopefully gives us a sense of how human nature has not changed and the consequences of a civilization that has repudiated its Creator.
We read:
"For the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and wickedness of those who by their wickedness suppress the truth." (Rm 1: 18)
It is evident from the rest of the Bible that God does not stand idly by as human beings distort His creation. There will be consequences. It is also plain that for individuals for accomplish their design of dominating and twisting created reality to their own ends that they first must suppress the truth. This involves mockery of right authority and a substitution of objective truth with lies and plausible half-truths that set the stage for what is to come.
"For what can be known about God is plain to them. Ever since the creation of the world his eternal power and divine nature, invisible though they are, have been understood and seen through the things he had made. So they are without excuse." (Rm 1: 19-20)
The Catholic Church teaches that human beings can know of God through the use of natural reason (CCC 31-35). It is apparent to everyone that the existence and the order of the Universe is evidence of a Creator. There is also the ability of human beings to know the truth as we read in the encyclical Veritatis Splendor. Therefore, there is no excuse for people to claim that the truth simply does not exist or that it is not possible for us to know it.
"... for though they knew God, they did not honor him as God or give thanks to him, but they became futile in their thinking, and their senseless minds were darkened. Claiming to be wise, they became fools; and they exchanged the glory of the immortal God for images resembling a mortal human being or four-footed animals of reptiles." (Rm 1: 21-23)
The next consequence of this perverse desire not to recognize God's existence is idolatry. St Paul is referring here to the Golden Calf of Exodus or the bronze serpent which also became an idol. We can think of many contemporary examples of objects or people that have become the focus of devotion. The Book of Wisdom puts it this way: "For all people who were ignorant of God were foolish by nature and they were unable from the good things that are seen to know the one who exists, nor did they recognize the artisan while paying heed to his works... Yet again, not even they are to be excused; for they had the power to know so much that they could investigate the world, how did they fail to find sooner the Lord of all things." (Wis 13: 1, 8-9)
"Therefore God gave them up in the lusts of their hearts to impurity, to the degrading of their bodies among themselves, because they exchanged the truth about God for a lie and worshiped and served the creature rather than the Creator, who is blessed forever! Amen!" (Rm 1: 24-25)
In Exodus, after the forging of the Golden Calf, it is said that: "... the people sat down to eat and drink, and rose up to revel." (Ex 32: 6) The word "revel" translates also as "fondling" and has sexual overtones (see also Gen 26: 8). God does not punish idolatry immediately but allows the resulting sexual license and impurity to take place. We can think of these two things as promiscuity and pornography both of which debase human dignity. The advent of the sexual revolution has brought in its train a commodification of sexual activity which alienates men and women from each other.
"For this reason God gave them up to degrading passions. Their women exchanged natural intercourse for unnatural, and in the same way also the men, giving up natural intercourse with women, were consumed with passion for one another. Men committed shameless acts with men and received in their own persons the due penalty for their error." (Rm 1: 26-27)
After being corrupted by promiscuity and pornography the next consequence is same sex attraction, which is an affective disorder. The order decreed in Genesis "male and female he made them" (Gen 1: 27) is overturned. man and women no longer complement each other and are fruitful. St Paul is probably thinking of the destruction of Sodom (Gen 19: 1-26) when speaks of the punishment for this behavior being visited in their own persons but we might think of sexually transmitted diseases and all the mental illnesses of loneliness, depression and suicide.
"And since they did not see fit to acknowledge God, God gave them up to a debased mind and to things that should not be done." (Rm 1: 28)
The evidence of a debased mind is given by gender dysphoria. The mutilation of "trans kids" should not be done. Furries and other disordered paraphilias are evidence of debased minds.
"They were filled with every kind of wickedness, evil, covetousness, malice. Full of envy, murder, strife, deceit, craftiness, they are gossips, slanderers, God-haters, insolent, haughty, boastful, inventors of evil, rebellious towards parents, foolish, faithless, heartless, ruthless." (Rm 1: 29-31)
St Paul may have been thinking here of the court of the emperor Nero. In our time we can see the cultural suicide of reality television especially shows that promote promiscuity and adultery. They have no shame.
"They know God's decree, that those who practice such things deserve to die - yet they not only do them but even applaud others who practice them." (Rm 1: 32)
It is tragic that many people who engage in the above mentioned behavior come from Christian backgrounds and families. They are aware of Jesus and his death on the Cross but they choose to give free rein to their disordered appetites. Not only that they seek to "affirm" others and push them to ever greater extremes of of immorality and disordered behavior. They celebrate self assertion and fulfilment even going so far as to glorify Satan in music and film. Seeing the musician Sam Smith in his satanic costume at an awards ceremony or the opening ceremony of the 2022 Commonwealth Games leads us to see where all of this will end.
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