The Christian Vanguard

 When one looks around the world, we see that animals are sexed. Dogs, cats, chickens, and humans. And we are able to pick out what it means to be sexed, which is basically the mode of reproduction. Male dogs, cats, and humans are all male in a univocal way. But need this be so? Could it be that an animal could be of no sex whatsoever? This is difficult to maintain for the simple reason that to be non-sexed is to be able to reproduce. And to be of the kind that does not reproduce means you will not exist. So, it seems like all animals must be sexed.  I mention this because I've come across an interesting passage from St. Thomas on whether Christ needed to be sexed. He says, "Yes." In Volume 3 of his commentary on the Sentences , distinction 12, question 3, he writes, "Christ came to restore (or redeem) human nature by his very assumption; and for this reason it was necessary that he assume everything following upon human nature, namely, all the properties and parts o...

In just about every talk I hear on transgenderism, talks that try to normalize the disorder, there is a preemptive argument that genitals don't determine who or what you are. I heard it recently here , and the way he phrased it, as "genitalifying", makes me want to say something about this very common argument.  The most important point to be made is that this is a straw-man. We do not say that because you have a penis, you are a man, or because you have a vagina, you are a female. And I would press any critic to actually cite a philosopher who argues this. You probably won't find it in those terms. This is what you probably will find, and is what has been said for a very long time and is not criticized by those who want to normalize madness, which is, a male is that which has the power to reproduce actively, and a female is that which has the power to reproduce passively.  This is a better definition because it helps classify what things are, not just in hum...

It used to be my biggest fear, up until recently, that my spouse (not that I'm married) would be unfaithful. I would wonder if I would be able to forgive them or be separated, or go to counseling, or whatever. There is a form of infidelity though that seems to be a degree worse than I previously imagined. I imagined that my spouse would be unfaithful for some typical reason. There is some more attractive guy she met, or she was didn't feel loved by me anymore, or maybe she just didn't love me anymore. But when I had a woman tell me that she would tell me about her attraction to another man, knowing I desired a relationship with her, not just to reject me, but to further hurt me, I imagined what that would look like if we were married. It would look like infidelity, which is intrinsically wrong, and wrong like these other types of infidelity that I previously mentioned, but infidelity so that I would be hurt. This seems much worse, but anyways, this has a strange consequenc...

1st Corinthians 6:16 says that when we are united with a prostitute, we are one body with her. I'm not exactly sure what this means, or rather, what this assumes. So, we know that sex is a unitive act. However, when you use contraceptives, that unity isn't consummated. If you were to use contraceptives, are you not really united with the prostitute and hence not one body? I wonder if there were contraceptives in Paul's day for him to consider this. I don't know if there were or if there were not. Another thing that makes me wonder is the language of one body, which is used to communicate marriage. Is Paul saying that in sex with a prostitute (assume the union, contraceptives or not, is real) we are therefore married to that prostitute? That doesn't seem correct. Then one prostitute has multiple husbands, and so does anyone who is not faithful to their spouse. I dunno. 

What does it mean to objectify women? Ever since that ridiculous video of a gorgeous woman walking down the streets of New York, this has been a more pressing question, in my mind at least. The tone delivered with the phrase, "objectification of women" is usually negative, with a prescription to not do so usually following. So, what is this thing I'm not supposed to do?

There is this story about this young man who dresses and looks like a woman, and got into some trouble at the DMV.  It occurs to me that there is a contradiction or a hypocrisy among the LGBT people, and liberals in general, about what it means to be a male and female. See, on one hand, they want to deny that there is no right or wrong way to be a man or a woman. It's not like they have real differences , right? However, on the other hand, to appease those who want to change themselves from male to female or vice-versa, they must assume that these differences do exist and are real, or else the change is meaningless. So which is it? Are there real differences between men and women, or are there not?

Converts tend to observe things that natives usually don't or take for granted. For example, an all-American boy may realize some of the formal subtleties in the Spanish language that a native Spanish speaker may have subconsciously forgotten. Or an immigrant can appreciate the virtues the USA better than what an American born citizen may have gotten accustomed to. I think the same can be said about religion. In this case, as I have come from Protestantism to Catholicism, I do want to point out some things about sex that I realize now as a Catholic is totally false about Protestantism, though at the time I didn't realize it.

You’ve heard the term “safe-sex” before, most likely with the verb “practice” preceding it. What does that even mean? “Practice safe-sex” as if sex were intrinsically dangerous. Isn’t that what this assumes? So, what is so dangerous about sex? Well, as far as I know, there are three possible outcomes of sex (which are not mutually exclusive), which are children, diseases, and a emotional charge.