The Problem with ‘Recreational’ Sex, by Anthony Esolen

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*Image: La Surprise by Jean-Antoine Watteau, about 1718-1719 [The Getty, Los Angeles]

By Anthony Esolen, The Catholic Thing, Nov. 5, 2022

Anthony Esolen is a lecturer, translator, and writer. Among his books are Out of the Ashes: Rebuilding American Culture, and Nostalgia: Going Home in a Homeless World, and most recently The Hundredfold: Songs for the Lord. He is a professor and writer in residence at Magdalen College of the Liberal Arts, in Warner, New Hampshire. Be sure to visit his new website, Word and Song.

I am grateful to the Catholic faith that has led me, often despite my hesitation, deeper into reality, when so much about us is aimed at our abstraction, our losing what slender grip we have on real things and not ideas about things, or worse, words passing for ideas about things.

Recently, I was lectured by a woman defending the right to have an abortion, because, she said, “some people like to have recreational sex,” and they should not have to worry about pregnancy and childbirth in case the synthetic hormones fail, as they often do. …

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