Human sexuality is the focus of this month’s edition of the 2008 World Youth Day newsletter ePILGRIMAGE, inviting young people to examine the questions raised about sexuality in modern society in the light of Catholic teaching.“This ePILGRIMAGE explores various ways that [the] very positive message about human bodily life and love have been expressed in the Catholic tradition…” wrote Bishop Anthony Fisher, coordinator of World Youth Day 2008. “There are many voices in the modern world that overestimate the importance of sex--as if no-one could be happy who had not had sex in the last few hours--or trivialize or underestimate its power--as if it were no more humanly significant than any other bodily function. “But deep down most people know the body, sexuality and fertility are precious and important things which can be used to express some of the noblest things about human relationships, or which can be used instead to hurt and exploit.”
The edition provides young people with an overview of the foundations of Catholic teaching on the meaning of sexuality and the sacrament of marriage, beginning with the old testament Song of Songs and leading to Pope Benedict XVI‘s encyclical on love, Deus Caritas Est.“This sacrament [of Christian marriage] becomes not only a good relationship, but a deepening and “saving mystery” which reveals to each other, their children, their relatives and their society an intimate and concrete “communion” and God’s unconditional love,” Bishop Fisher writes.
“Their love tells the story of Jesus’ total self-giving to the Church; and Jesus’ fidelity to his bride the Church shows them how to live with generosity, forgiveness, self-satisfaction and intimacy. “All this helps to explain why Christians take sex so seriously and have such high ideals for what they do in their bodily lives.As an example of the vocation of Christian marriage lived out with beauty and grace, the edition highlights Luigi and Maria Beltrame Quattrocchi, the first modern married couple to be beatified together.Successful in their individual work in social reform and involvement in Catholic lay groups, the couple “considered their real vocations began when they found each other” the newsletter states.
“Their family home in Via Depretis in Rome became the centre of deepening faith, their social apostolate and charity work.”Maria’s last pregnancy was a life-threatening one. Her doctors pressured her to have an abortion to save her life. The couple refused and dedicated their daughter, Enrichetta, to God in a vigil of prayer. Both mother and baby survived.The couple’s home became a drop-in centre for people in need during the Second World War. Later, they worked to rebuild Italy in the post-war years, Luigi becoming the deputy attorney general for the nation and Maria helping to found the Sacred Heart Catholic University in Rome.