My Year Of Everything

Before I dive into Hephzibah Anderson’s “Chastened,” the account of her year without sex, I must point you to this article about the hot, hot Fire Island tea dance that is the Catholic priesthood. (Rather, it’s an article about the article, as the original is in Italian; don’t think I’m not pricing some Rosetta Stone software right now.) Celibacy has never seemed so tantalizing. 

I am, as I have mentioned many times, a Catholic, so my early information about sex came straight from the ostensibly celibate*. The more I learn about what really goes on with Catholic priests, the more I think this is like hiring a bulimic to be your dietician. 

I use this metaphor a lot, because I think it makes sense. Sexual desire, like hunger, is a morally-neutral biological need. Those who aspire to the celibate priesthood, like young girls looking at Seventeen Magazine, start to judge themselves harshly for having a biological need, and so they push it down and try to wish it away. But it doesn’t go away, it just gets warped and twisted. Some eventually make peace with it, some don’t. But in the case of sex, some of those who don’t will then go on to teach children about it, to suggest that their own immature understanding of the subject is God’s Word, to plant seeds of fear, shame, guilt and confusion that continue to bloom for decades.

Which is maybe not the very best thing. 

* The celibacy requirement, draped as all things Catholic are in deep and mystical piety, is really about money and land; in the 12th century, children of priests were starting to inherit too much church property, so along with mandatory celibacy came the decree that all sons of priests- even married ones- were illegitimate. (The daughters couldn’t inherit anyway, so- then as now- they mattered less.)