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The Splendor of the Human Person:
A Catholic Vision of the Person and Sexuality
E
very state of life calls for chastity, understood as "the successful integration
of sexuality within the person and thus the inner unity of man in his bodily
and spiritual being" (CCC 2337). By calling all people to this integration, the
Church serves the happiness and full flourishing of every human being which
can only come to fruition by respecting the language the Creator has impressed
within human nature. The virtue of chastity has become increasingly difficult to
form and maintain considering many cultural challenges. The Church contin-
ues to point all people to chastity's crucial importance, as it helps us come to
appreciate the mystery of our humanity. including our sexuality, and to come to
a maturity that, guided by God's law, will lead to fulfillment and peace.
The Church's vision enables us to understand the nature of sexual desire and
its proper order to communion within family life. Sexual desire is now de-
scribed as an orientation that has been separated from the integrated vision of
the human person rooted in a Christian anthropology that honors the dignity of
the body-soul unity and the foundational understanding of the complementary
of male and female. Yet it is important to understand how modern culture de-
fines sexual orientation. According to the American Psychological Association,
"Sexual orientation is an enduring emotional, romantic, or sexual attraction
that one feels toward men, toward women, or toward both. Although sexual
orientation ranges along a continuum, it is generally discussed in terms of
heterosexual—attraction to the other sex—homosexual—attraction to the same
3
Sexual Attraction
