Reflection on January 28, 1981

https://www.ewtn.com/library/PAPALDOC/jp2tb53.htm

Does anyone else thing that “abstain from unchastity” sounds like a double negative.

The discussion here is about purity, and specifically purity as an ability or attitude. When discussed in this light, SJPII calls it a virtue. The virtue of purity is the ability to hold “back the impulses of sense-desire”. By doing this we maintain our purity and “abstain from unchastity”. When you think about it that way, it has a negative connotation; purity is the restriction or barrier to doing something. SJPII understands this and moves onto a second way of looking at it, a more positive approach. You not only abstain but you “keep” holiness and reverence. They are two sides to the same coin and interdependent on each other.

I think the reason it is so important to point this out is because we seem to always focus on the negatives, what we cannot do, what is wrong, what we are losing. Sunday was a beautiful day and a beautiful moment for a good friend, but what stuck with me was a comment (inappropriate at the moment) made to me about my parenting. That is all I could focus on. Paul will get 10 things he wants and then throw a fit for the 1 thing he didn’t get. This is the way of the world. We see St. Paul telling us to abstain and we think he is restricting our freedom. SJPII and St. Paul want us to look at what we “keep” when we live a life in the Spirit.

To be perfectly honest, these talks are becoming a bit dense and I am not sure I am pulling the right tidbits from them. I read a little ways ahead to see if I am following correctly or if I am understanding the context, but I don’t know if that helped. The next several go into St. Paul’s explanation of the Body and its importance, which is touched on at the end of this reflection. As I reread this, what I think jumped out at me, when thinking about abstaining vs. keeping, is what do we keep or, in other words, where do we start. I think having this question in mind may help in the future readings. Where do we start, where were we in the beginning, where were we after the fall, where are we after redemption. Before we can understand what we keep by living this life we must understand where we are or what we are keeping. Some of that has been explained through SJPII going through the creation narrative, but there is more to it in digesting St. Paul’s description of the Body and his understanding of the Body as a Temple for the Holy Spirit.