A reader writes:
I was struck by your reader’s correlation between fantasy and lying. If that is the case, I live a constant lie. Like everyone, I fantasize all the time. I fantasize that I am a striker for Arsenal and am scoring an important goal at Highbury. I fantasize that I can punch Karl Rove in the nose. I read the travel section of the New York Times and fantasize that I am getting on a plane and going to these places. And yes, I fantasize about sex.
Am I lying to myself? I don’t think so. I know very well that I can barely kick a ball, have not hit someone since the second grade, don’t really enjoy air travel, and am pretty sexually satisfied with my wife. But when I am out walking the dog or taking a shower, should I be thinking all the time about Jesus? Who can do that?
This is one of those moments where the Catholic Church demands that we behave in a way that, I believe, is against human nature and is simply not achievable. I do not think God will judge us by the exploits we live in our fantasy life – he will judge us by the acts we performed in our actual life. As long as we are conscious of the difference, I think we will all be fine.
But again, my point is that the new natural law position is that it is more natural never to wank than to do so from time to time, that human beings can see this as a self-evident proposition from observing the world. At the very least, it is not self-evident. At the very most, it is preposterous.
The Dish 