January 8, 2022

The word sex literally means “having been cut off.”  Thus, from the onset of puberty, with the awareness of our biological differences, we search for that perfect person who will make us whole again and satisfy our deepest longing for completeness.  We know from life experience, however, that those feelings are short-lived and that our physical and emotional complementarity with another person symbolizes some deeper integrity to which we are called.  Indeed, God has created each of us “male and female” (Gen 1:27), and our relationships are therefore healthiest only when they go beyond the neediness of sex and, instead, provide supportive circumstances for each partner to do the work of self-understanding.  What we discover is our essential dignity, that we are whole and complete and perfect as we are!  Our singular and universal human vocation emerges:  to glory in our identity as children of God and to spend ourselves creating circumstances for others to come to this same awareness.  What, then, is sex for the integrated person?  It is synonymous with the Greatest Commandment:  to love and be loved by God, while at the same time partnering with every one of our neighbors so that they too might have life (Mk 12:29-31).  Let’s never again succumb to those feelings of being cut off by learning how to have the kind of sex that lasts.  Ave Crux, Spes Unica!