464 SHAME

YOUCAT Lesson 464

YOUCAT the catechism for Catholic you

464  What good is shame?

Shame safeguards a person’s intimate space: his mystery, his most personal and inmost being, his dignity, but especially his capacity for love and sexual self-giving.  It relates also to that which only love may see.  [2521-2525, 2533]

An example of modest western clothing.  Both women and men, with their tight trousers, ought to reflect carefully about their appearance.--Don L. Bragg ….. 464

Many young Christians live in an environment where it is taken for granted that everything should be on display and people are systematically trained to ignore feelings of shame.  But shamelessness is inhuman.  Animals experience no shame.  In a human being, in contrast, it is an essential feature.  It does not hide something inferior but rather protects something valuable, namely, the dignity of the person in his capacity to love.  The feeling of shame is found in all cultures, although it assumes different forms.  It has nothing to do with prudery or a repressive upbringing.  A person is also ashamed of his sins and other things that would demean him if they were made generally known.  Someone who offends another person’s natural feeling of shame by words, glances, gestures, or action robs him of his dignity.  412-413

“Restore to me the joy of your salvation, and uphold me with a willing spirit.  Then I will teach transgressors your ways and sinners will return to you.  Deliver me from bloodguilt, O God, O God of my salvation, and my tongue will sing aloud of your deliverance.”  Psalm 51:12-14

“Act today in such a way that you do not need to blush tomorrow.”  St. John Bosco (1815-1888)

[2521-2525, 2533]

THE BATTLE FOR PURITY

2521 Purity requires modesty, an integral part of temperance. Modesty protects the intimate center of the person. It means refusing to unveil what should remain hidden. It is ordered to chastity to whose sensitivity it bears witness. It guides how one looks at others and behaves toward them in conformity with the dignity of persons and their solidarity. --Catechism of the Catholic Church, Second Edition

2522 Modesty protects the mystery of persons and their love. It encourages patience and moderation in loving relationships; it requires that the conditions for the definitive giving and commitment of man and woman to one another be fulfilled. Modesty is decency. It inspires one's choice of clothing. It keeps silence or reserve where there is evident risk of unhealthy curiosity. It is discreet. –CCC

2523 There is a modesty of the feelings as well as of the body. It protests, for example, against the voyeuristic explorations of the human body in certain advertisements, or against the solicitations of certain media that go too far in the exhibition of intimate things. Modesty inspires a way of life which makes it possible to resist the allurements of fashion and the pressures of prevailing ideologies. –CCC

2524 The forms taken by modesty vary from one culture to another. Everywhere, however, modesty exists as an intuition of the spiritual dignity proper to man. It is born with the awakening consciousness of being a subject. Teaching modesty to children and adolescents means awakening in them respect for the human person. –CCC

2525 Christian purity requires a purification of the social climate. It requires of the communications media that their presentations show concern for respect and restraint. Purity of heart brings freedom from widespread eroticism and avoids entertainment inclined to voyeurism and illusion. –CCC

IN BRIEF       

2533 Purity of heart requires the modesty which is patience, decency, and discretion. Modesty protects the intimate center of the person. --CCC