Preparing Yourself to Discuss the Deep Moral Issues

If you don’t feel knowledgeable or equipped to discuss the deeper moral issues with your child, don’t worry. You are not alone. Several factors make these moral issues challenging to approach:

Catechesis in moral issues has been lacking and even confused since the 1960s.
Fully understanding moral theology requires a bit of philosophical knowledge that most of us don’t learn in school.
Teaching about morality has the stigma of legalism. We feel like we’re laying down an arbitrary law “because God said so” rather than presenting a reasonable path to goodness.
Our culture has rejected much of God’s moral law, making these teachings unpopular.
Our culture has turned moral issues into political issues, seeing them as matters of mere opinion.

But as Catholic parents, we need to realize that leading our children to the fullness of God’s goodness is what it means to be the primary educators of our children. Embrace that role! And don’t worry – it’s not as difficult as you may think!

Foundational Ideas

Successfully guiding our children to the fullness of God’s goodness may require us to examine our ideas about morality, and about God. Here are some of the foundational concepts that the Church has taught about morality throughout the centuries. They are just as true today as they have ever been!

The moral law is not a matter of opinion. It’s a matter of what is good for us based on God’s plan for human life.
The moral law is based on how God created us as human beings. Natural Law bases moral goodness on living a fully human life. When we live according to natural law, we fulfill human nature, live a more fully human life, and are better equipped to embrace the higher goods that God has designed us for (such as truth, goodness, and beauty). When we don’t live according to natural law, we act more like animals and become obsessed with physical goods. Therefore we often miss out on the fullness of higher spiritual goodness.
Other parts of the moral law are about our calling to live in a covenantal relationship with God. These principles are often referred to as the “divine law” (though we are simplifying things a bit here). These moral laws teach us how to love God and how to participate in His Divine Life through grace. In other words, following the moral law leads us to the fulfillment of the purpose and meaning of human life!
As I hope you can see, the purpose of the moral law isn’t primarily to keep us from enjoying the goods of life. The primary purpose of the moral law is to keep us from getting trapped by our fallen physical desires so that we can enjoy the spiritual goods and the material goods in their proper place. For example, the moral teachings about sex outside of marriage isn’t meant to stifle our sexuality. God’s law about sexuality allows us to enjoy the physical pleasures of sex in their proper place without turning it into an act of selfishness. His law also empowers us to enjoy the more fulfilling goods of married love, family love and the Sacramental reality of marriage. God adds these spiritual goods to the physical pleasure of sexual union. The moral law leads us to the greater good, not to less good.
When we “disagree” with moral teachings that come from God through the Church (Sacred Scripture and Sacred Tradition), we should see our “disagreement” in terms of trust in God’s goodness. Do we trust that God speaks through Divine Revelation? Do we believe that God has planned for our ultimate happiness? If we can hang onto this trust, it can lead us to obedience (based on trust) even when we don’t fully understand. Then we can work on understanding.
Even though following the moral law ultimately leads us to our happiness, it is not often easy. We live in a fallen world that actively acts against God’s goodness. Sometimes doing the right thing calls us to sacrifice. Sometimes following God’s law will lead to suffering. Following the moral law through these difficulties is part of our striving to love God with our whole heart, mind, soul, and strength.
To sin does not mean to “tick God off.” It means first to “miss the mark” – to miss out on the goodness that God has planned for us. It also means to “offend God” in the sense that we betray our trust in Him, and we choose selfishness rather than choosing His love. But God wants us to embrace goodness, which is why He will always forgive us through the grace won on the Cross by Jesus for our sakes.

I hope that for the most part, you see these foundational ideas about morality as good news. The moral law is given to us by a loving Father who wants to lead us to true goodness. His children (even grown-up children), we may not always understand how He is leading us. But when we trust in Him and persevere through His strength, we will find fulfillment and true happiness in the end.

If we can present these foundational truths and attitudes to our children through our conversations, we will be much more successful in helping our children see the wisdom, beauty, and goodness in God’s moral law.

Approaching the Specific Issues

Sex and Marriage

God has a beautiful plan for the sexual act within marriage. Sex bonds a couple together, creating an environment of love and then cooperates with God to bring new life into that loving environment. Marriage and family life are a vocation because they are a call to learn to love selflessly within the family relationship. Marriage is a Sacrament because parents are called to form a community of love and to bring their children to the love of God through the love of the family. Learn as much as you can about God’s plan for sex, marriage and family life and share the good news with your children!

Recommended Resources:

Contraception

Talk about a hot-button issue! But the Church’s teaching has never wavered on this issue, and science backs the Church up. Contraception acts directly against God’s plan for married love and sexual union. God calls married couples to a radical, selfless, generous love when it comes to planning their family. But when that unselfish love needs to be balanced by responsibility, couples have recourse to Natural Family Planning, which cooperates with God’s plan for married love and sexual union rather than acting contrary to it.

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Homosexuality

When the Catechism of the Catholic Church (2357-2359) calls homosexuality “disordered,” it’s not mean or prejudicial. This term goes back to a philosophical understanding of human actions. God has ordered many human actions toward a specific “end” – a good that He wants us to have. If a certain act mimics the good that God intended, but doesn’t achieve the fullness of that good, the act is said to be “disordered” or not ordered to the fullness of the good that God intended. The sexual act is oriented toward the union of spouses and reproduction, which together form family love. While people with homosexual attraction are certainly capable of love and commitment, the homosexual act is not capable of reproduction, and therefore it misses the full meaning and purpose of the act. That is what makes it “disordered.” The Catechism points out that while homosexual attraction is disordered, it is not a sin. Sin only occurs when someone acts on those disordered desires. Catholics are also asked to recall that we all have disordered sexuality to one degree or another. Lust (the tendency to use others as objects rather than loving them as people), masturbation, and pornography are all disordered acts.

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Pornography

Lust does not just mean sexual attraction. The sin of lust is treating a person as a thing to be used rather than a person to be loved. Treating persons like objects to be used is what pornography is all about. Pornography reduces people to mere body parts and treats them as pleasure toys. Additionally, studies have shown that pornography works on the human brain the same way that hard drugs do. That means that porn is addicting and that it damages the brain.

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Problem With Pornography

Abortion

While our political culture has framed abortion as a “right” of “women’s health,” morally abortion is an act that opposes the natural law and the fifth Commandment. Natural Law tells us that life is the most fundamental human good. It should be nurtured and protected. Natural Law also tells us that family life is a basic human good that forms the foundation of society. Abortion attacks both of these basic human goods. The Fifth Commandment opposes the taking of innocent human life (the sin of murder). We define an”innocent” life in opposition to a “dangerous aggressor,” which is someone who is acting with malicious intent (in other words, intentionally posing a threat). Even when a pregnancy is dangerous for the woman, the baby is not acting with malicious intent. So an unborn baby is always an innocent life protected by the Fifth Commandment. Some cultural arguments question whether or not an unborn baby is a human person. However, philosophically the term “person” is always defined ontologically. In other words, personhood is not a condition that an organism can develop in and out of. It’s a classification that is inherent in the organism’s identity no matter the stage of development or level of health. If an unborn baby is going to “become” a person eventually, it is already a person by definition. So both Natural Law and the Fifth Commandment protect unborn babies.

Resources:

The United States Conference of Catholic Bishops has compiled some excellent resources that can help you discuss abortion with your child.
There are many pro-life groups out there with great information. Two of our favorites are Human Life International and Priests for Life.

Self-Control and Balance

Not every issue we need to talk with our kids about has to do with sex, marriage or reproduction. Ultimately the goal of these conversations with our children is to help them become better people, to grow in virtue. One of the most common challenges that young people face as they gain more freedom is unbalanced desire. They need to learn the virtue of self-control (Temperance). As young people test the boundaries of their freedom, it is not uncommon for them to overindulge in pleasures they see as luxuries. Sometimes these indulgences are relatively harmless – sugar, favorite foods, watching videos and movies, enjoying music. Sometimes the pleasures they seek can be risky – alcohol, dangerous thrills, sexual satisfaction, illegal drugs. Either way, we can temper our children’s indulgences by helping them practice self-control now. But how do we convince them that restraint is a worthwhile goal?

It’s important to teach our children why self-control is so necessary. We need to be talking to our children about the dangers of drugs, sex outside of marriage, and alcohol. But the virtue of self-control is essential for reasons other than safety. Practicing self-control is essential to living a fully human life. Animals act mindlessly on their desires. Self-control also helps us to embrace deeper spiritual goodness that we miss by becoming too obsessed with our desires. But temperance always works toward balance. It’s not just a matter of denying ourselves. It actually helps us to appreciate and enjoy physical goods more than we would by overindulging.

Resources:

The Sixth and Ninth Commandments – Teaching Respect
The Tenth Commandment – Self-Control and Contentment
Physical Maturity – Setting Standards and Boundaries
See how Temperance is defined in the Catholic Dictionary
Breakpoint has written a thought-provoking reflection on the Capital Sin of gluttony that borrows ideas from C.S. Lewis’ Screwtape Letters.

Justice

Another area in which we want to have frequent conversations with our children is the area of relationships. The cardinal virtue of justice governs the foundations of human relationships. Justice is the virtue of giving to each person what is due. Traditionally the virtue was divided into three types of justice. Commutative justice is justice between individuals. It covers basic justice, like paying what you owe. It also covers more general forms of justice, like giving to each person the respect you owe him or her as a human person created in the image of God. Legal justice describes the virtue of giving what you owe as an individual to the society in which you live. Fulfilling obligations like paying taxes, voting, jury service, and military service exercises legal justice. Finally, distributive justice refers to the responsibility of those in public office to ensure the individuals of society are served by the government. This form of justice would require integrity in the spending of public funds, honestly representing public issues, and serving the common good rather than personal gain.

Other expressions of justice speak to very specific areas in which justice is exercised. For example, restorative justice refers specifically to requiring those who have offended the common good (i.e. criminals) to restore the debt to society created by their offense (often called restitution). Procedural justice refers to fair dealings within public discourse. This type of justice is most prevalent in the court system and the idea of “due process of the law.” It is also part of any process that ensures people get fair hearings – Roberts Rules of Order used in public committee meetings, rules that govern public debate in Congress or during presidential debates, etc.

Notice that one thing not mentioned in the traditional sense of justice is “social justice.” Social justice is a fairly modern construction that actually mistreats the virtue of justice. Social justice is often defined as the changing of political and social structures to ensure a fairer distribution of social goods (usually referring to government aid). It actually conflates distributive justice and legal justice in a very ambiguous way. Another danger of “social justice” is that it is allied too closely to specific political ideologies. Catholic virtue transcends specific political ideologies, seeking what is universally good rather than what one political party or group seeks to promote. Despite its popularity in the Church today, the concept of social justice is an ambiguous and often erroneous concept. However, many of the issues we often discuss under the umbrella of social justice are things Catholics are called to do: care for the poor, fight for the unborn and the culture of life, help the homeless and jobless, care for the elderly. These things fall under legal justice, or often more properly under the exercise of the virtue of charity.

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Charity

Charity is the goal of all moral life. Charity is one of the theological virtues. It is given to us as a grace – an action of God that empowers us to go beyond human ability. Specifically, charity is the grace that empowers us to love with the inexhaustible love of Jesus. Charity is first and foremost the ability to love God with our whole heart, mind, and soul. Through charity, we actually participate in Jesus’ love for the Father and the Holy Spirit. We participate in the very life of the Holy Trinity! Secondly, the virtue of charity helps us to love others with the love of Jesus. This means that we can love others with self-sacrificing love, pouring ourselves out for others so they may have the greatest good.

The theological virtues are gifts of grace, but I liken them to muscles. Your muscles are gifts from God in the sense that you didn’t have to do anything to get them. They’re just part of your body. Likewise, the theological virtues are gifts of Baptism. But what happens if you don’t use your muscles? They become weak and flabby. If you don’t use them at all, they atrophy and you all but lose them. On the other hand, if you exercise them they get stronger, more flexible, and larger. Likewise, the theological virtues need to be exercised. If you use them, grace moves through you and the virtues grow. If you don’t use them, the virtues weaken and even atrophy. So in your discussions with your child, talk about ways to exercise charity.

The first place to exercise charity is in the family. Saint Pope John II called the family the “school of love.” It’s a training ground for selflessness. The second place to exercise charity is within friendships. Most children understand a “friend” as someone they enjoy being with. There’s certainly nothing wrong with that at first, but it’s not true friendship. True friendship matures into selfless love. Talk with your child about ways they can serve their friends and lead them to true goodness. The third place to practice charity is in our community. This is where serving the poor, disadvantaged, and defenseless comes in. These activities are always good to do, but they gain eternal value when they are done with charity (rather than just as a social duty or an act of justice).

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