I saw a post on social media that said that St. Thomas Aquinas and St. Augustine both said something along the lines of prostitution being a necessary evil because it helps prevent good women from being molested.
I looked it up and apparently it's true. They said this. I really struggled with this, but I think I understand what they mean because of my own thoughts concerning illicit sexual activity, contraception, sterilization, and abortion.
The idea begins with the understanding that not everyone is Catholic and not everyone is going to behave as Catholics. And Catholics ought to behave as Catholics should. Therefore, in a broken world, we sometimes have to make concession to a lesser evil in order to avoid a greater evil.
When it comes to abortion, I would much rather someone who is determined to live a life of fornication choose to contracept, sterilize, and/or utilize non-intercourse means of obtaining sexual pleasure than get pregnant and kill their baby.
This is where I struggle in politics, too, because as a Catholic I ought not to support the availability of contraception and sterilization. (And there's the argument that the availability of contraceptives hasn't reduced the number of unwanted pregnancies because it gave women the false sense of security to be even more promiscuous.) And yet, I'm kind of happy that women and men are considering sterilization to avoid getting pregnant while they fornicate. Yes, of course I would rather they repent and live lives of virtue, but since they are hell-bent on NOT repenting and NOT giving up their sexual promiscuity, I would much rather than render their own bodies sterile than conceive a child and murder it in cold blood.
In either case, the prostitution or the illicit methods to avoid abortions, we understand as Catholics that it is a slippery slope. The lesser of two evils is still evil and begets evil. But, while I don't want innocent unborn babies to die on the altar of orgasms, neither do I want them to die on the altar of "I'm right, you're wrong."
Let's narrow the prostitution argument down to masturbation, because at least masturbation doesn't have a female victim of sexual assault (unless done to porn, but let's take porn out of the equation for now). Of course we would much prefer our children grow in virtue, but wouldn't you rather your son masturbate than sleep around with girls?
My 2nd son claims he is gay-leaning bisexual. Of course I pray for him to be free of this evil, but he has free-will. What if he chooses to continue in this lifestyle and become active in it? I could speak against it until I'm blue in the face and it not make a difference. Wouldn't it be better to at least help him navigate homosexuality as safely as possible? Maybe encourage monogamy rather than the typical homosexual deviant promiscuous lifestyle?
Currently, he knows I am against his being homosexual/bisexual, and he will tell me, "mom, I know you're against it, but thank you for loving me, anyway." I feel like being his mom and guiding him on a path of basic wisdom while still upholding ultimate wisdom has a better chance of him coming to repentance than shunning him would. I feel like if I shunned him it would only affirm what the world says and give him the freedom to dive into that cesspool.
I think shunning only works when one is part of a greater society of agreement. For example, when I was a kid, most of society, at least where I lived, was Christian and we all agreed on basic behaviors and societal standards. So, when one kid decided to rebel and the vast majority of our society responded with a sort of shunning of that behavior, "you're not welcome if you're going to be like that," it helped bring shame to the person and helped them consider their actions and consequences.
However, today, there's an entire "loud and proud" society that is ready and willing to swallow up an outlier like a hyena hunting on the fringes of the herd. I'm not willing to do that. I'm not willing to let my children be devoured completely by the enemy just to uphold Truth and only offer mercy at their full repentance.
When someone shuns the wisdom of virtue in Christianity, can we at least try to pull them into the lesser of the evils through wisdom of the natural world and philosophy within their parameters of embraced sinfulness?
Maybe they want to swim in Satan's cesspool, but can we at least throw them a life line to keep them from drowning?
What are your thoughts?
