To the clergy, religious, lay faithful of the Diocese of Kansas City-St. Joseph and to all people of good will:
Blessed are the pure in heart, for they shall see God (Matt 5:8).
A Way of Discipleship
In the Beatitudes Christ offers us a perfect model for true Christian living. Even more than the Ten Commandments themselves, they are a charter for the high moral calling Christ sets for His disciples.
Blessed are the pure in heart, for they shall see God. This one line from the Beatitudes offers a most sublime beginning point to our reflection. It tells us about God, ourselves and our ultimate goal. A pure heart is "blessed" or "happy." Seeing God and being with Him forever in heaven is God's plan for our eternal well-being. The Old Testament teaches that this purity is required if we are to approach God. "Who shall ascend the mountain of the Lord? And who shall stand in His holy place? He who has clean hands and a pure heart, who does not lift up his soul to what is false" (Psalm 24, 3-4).
To be pure in heart implies that our love is wholly directed toward the good of the other person. We are "single-hearted," and not divided in our love. Israel's first and most important commandment is to love God with our whole heart, soul, mind and strength (Deut 6: 4-5). Jesus added definitively that we must also love our neighbor as our self (Mk 12: 29 -31). This pure love — as demanding as it may be — is the high destiny to which we are called as children of the Father. Is it possible to fulfill such a love? Yes. It is possible because God has first loved us (1 Jn 4:10 ). As disciples of Jesus Christ, we are called to the happiness that comes from a clean and undivided heart.
Pornography: Epidemic Attacking Human Dignity
Daily there are challenges to this pure Christian love. For some months, representatives of our Catholic Diocese have been working with leaders of other faith traditions to address the serious dangers represented by the steady increase of pornography in our culture. Pornography is not new, but it has become a kind of plague in our society, reaching epidemic proportions. It is being propagated more widely than ever. Well beyond magazines, it is widespread on the internet, television, movies and videos, and now on cell phones and other handheld devices, many of which are marketed to children and youth. Pornography has become the secret entertainment of many people of all ages, walks of life, and economic backgrounds. Use of internet pornography is perhaps the fastest growing addiction in the world.
Pornography perverts the beauty of intimate love proper to marriage, presenting images of the body and sexual acts for base pleasure — regarding other persons as objects to be used, manipulated, and sold. It is a multi-billion dollar industry, eclipsing the amount of money generated by professional sports (cf. Chapter II, below). In this way pornography distorts the proper meaning and purpose of our sexuality and does grave injury to the dignity of its participants (actors, vendors, consumers).
Use of pornography is a serious sin against chastity and the dignity of the human person. It robs us of sanctifying grace, separates us from the vision of God and from the goodness of others, and leaves us spiritually empty. Attraction to pornography and its gratifications is a false "love" that leads to increasing emotional isolation loneliness and subsequent sexual acting-out with self and others. It depends on the exploitation of other persons: frequently the desperate or poor, or the innocent young. Use of pornography has cost persons their jobs, their marriages and families. Traffickers in Child Pornography may end up in prison. It has often been associated with and has contributed to, acts of sexual violence and abuse.
In this pastoral letter, I wish to appeal to you all as members of the Body of Christ redeemed by His love, to reflect on the dangers of pornography in our society. We will see how pornography is a serious affront to our human dignity. I will share some strategies in response to this problem. I ask you to join with me in the Diocesan effort to combat this plague by recommitting ourselves and our families to purity and chastity. In this way we will live more completely as Christ's disciples, growing each day in the freedom of the children of God. Blessed are the pure in heart, for they shall see God.
To read the rest of Bishop Finn's pastoral letter "Blessed Are the Pure in Heart."
