The Anatomy of Virile Chastity

Virile chastity is different from feminine virginity. The later is like a sacred, precious, beautiful garden that is tended, admired, protected, aromatic, flowering, fruitful, clean and wholesome. This applies even to secondary virginity (like that of St. Mary Magdallen) where there has been a violation or loss but then a restoration to pristine integrity and purity. Masculine chastity is entirely different: it is more like a raging fire that needs to be channeled and disciplined so that it provide powerful heat and energy and light and lest it destroy everything in its path like a forest fire. Consider the contrasting physical markers: the maiden virgin has a clear physical barrier which is preserved intact until it is pierced and this physical integrity has deep, significant even sacramental meaning for all traditional cultures. The young man, even if he has the purity of a saint, is visited unexpectedly at puberty by passionate, overwhelming desires and eruptive, non-deliberate, explosive physical erections and effusions. Clearly, the task for this young man is not to maintain some lily-white cleanliness; but to (gradually, painstakingly) discipline and channel all his libidinal and aggressive energies that they become wholesome and fruitful.  Chastity is usually understood as mere abstinence from sexual intimacy outside of marriage or as a permanent state for the religious but neither of these is the heart of the matter. Our culture finds "chastity" to be unintelligible. Some time ago I was speaking with some men on a corner here in Jersey City and I mentioned a friend who came regularly to speak to our confirmation youth about "being chaste." One, who had more of a street than a church background, was interested:  "That's cool! You mean...what do you mean...being chased? Like being chased by the po...lice?" Chastity is sexual purity and a subset of the broader concept of purity of heart. But what is purity? Purity likewise is poorly understood in the negative as "not dirty" in the sense of free of greed, avarice, lust, envy and so forth. "Blessed are the pure of heart, they shall see God" we are told by our Lord so clearly purity, like chastity, cannot be primarily a "lack of something bad" but a positivity: something surpassingly good, alive, overflowing. Purity is love: love of God and of others in God. Purity is the blazing fire of the Holy Spirit, by which we are inflamed with holy desire, reverence, tenderness and honor. And so, the first thing about chastity, as purity in the sexual arena, is that it is the fire of noble, generous, tender and compassionate love. The second most important aspect of manly chastity is that it is strength: it is the power to love...faithfully, tenderly, courageously. The Latin word for man, vir, is the root for our word virtue and was originally associated with heroic strength and courage. So, chastity, far from being a deprivation or abstinence from something, is the very power to love clearly and generously. So, the chastity of the married man is not essentially a question of abstinence (though that too pays a role at times) but of loyalty, steadfastness, and generosity. Chastity then is not a lack (of intimacy) but a plenitude of gentle, fecund strength. The Evil One, then, grooms his target for lust by whispering quiet lies: "You are no man! You are a wimp, a failure, a nothing!" A third dimension of virile chastity is that it is affectionate. Chastity is the opposite of a sterile, distant coldness; it is the warmth of tender, nurturing and appreciative affection. So, the path to chastity is the path of affection: the young man needs to receive affection, including lots of wholesome, sober affection from other men including mentors, friends, partners and relatives. A lack of affection is another cause for lust and covetousness as the lonely, isolated one seeks surrogate, false intimacy in superficial physical pleasure. A fourth dimension is closely related to affection: heroic virile chastity is elicited as care and reverence in the face of stark goodness in three distinct enfleshments. First, the young man must encounter and then emulate strong, heroic, saintly older men as role models. Secondly he must encounter the poor, the suffering, and the small including children and the elderly and be filled with compassion. Thirdly, and most significantly, he must encounter feminine loveliness in all its splendor, attractiveness, nobility and fragility in order to bow in veneration, tender care, and humble service. Virile heroism in all its dimensions of courage, humility and chastity is inconceivable and impossible until the young man meets, in some manner, his Beatrice as God's Masterpiece of Feminine Loveliness. Fifth and lastly, chastity is a form of temperance, of balance and moderation, and so related to justice and moderation in all aspects of life. It is sobriety as inner harmony; it is freedom from intoxication of fear, insecurity, anger, self-doubt, fanatacism, greed and discouragement. So, the path to chastity is prudence and proper order in all areas of life: work, sleep, food, money, family, relationships and, above all, prayer. To conclude: virile chastity is the gentle,confident strength to love; it is fidelity, integrity, steadfastness; it is tender affection; it is reverence and care for women and those who are frail; it is the fire of the Holy Spirit purifying, deepening, strengthening and sanctifying masculine desire and passion with holiness and nobility.