Lifestyle and relations between morality and transgressions

The answers to the questions are prepared by the theologian Monsignor Costantino Di Bruno, Central Assistant of the Apostolic Movement.

Theme of the meeting:

Lifestyle and relationships between morality and transgressions: Nightlife, drugs, friendships, internet and social networking

Q. The media should conduct a sincere search for the truth about our truth and our destiny. But what is truth in this world? And what is our destiny?

We did not make us and our life is not ours. This is the truth. We were not born for us, the Lord made us for himself. For us to manifest his glory, his holiness, his mercy, his justice and his immense love. If you pay attention, in whatever we do, many times we do not manifest our truth. Who is man? What must he do? Who governs him? Who guides him? Who leads him? A little while ago we recited the Angel of God. Angel of God, who are my guardian, enlighten, guide, protect and lead me, according to what? According to the will of God which is upon me. You know it and you give it to me. In falsehood and lies, what we do we think that we can do it; but it does not lead us to our supernatural end. Satan was the first journalist. He went to read the newspaper to Eve and said to her: “See that which you know about God is false, change your thought,” and so he shifted the thought to Eve. The God who was the God of love became the jealous God and the God envious of man. A poorly written newspaper, a falsehood of God given to man, produces a world of evil, a world of sin. We must have the conscience that nothing is neutral in relationship to man; on the contrary, everything has to be covered of the truth on man. The first truth about man is that we are in God, we are his. I, in my life, through everything I do, everything I think, everything I write, everything I work, through all means I use that, I must express the truth of God. This is my ministry as a man.

Q. Are we to advise against doing a priori, friendships that start on the internet, through social networks?

Whatever man does must be verified by two fundamental virtues: the virtue of prudence and virtue of justice. The virtue of prudence tells you that what is on the other side, many times, could have a non good end. It could fool you, it could lie to you, deceive you, and it could project you a false truth about yourself. You do not know it, you do not know who it is, you do not see it; and therefore prudence is necessary. When Jesus sent his into the world he said two key words: “Be simple as doves and be wise as serpents.” We must always use all means of communication with great caution. But everything in life must be used with caution. Christian religion does not condemn anything. whatever man invents, whatever man creates, whatever man imagines and then realizes is not a bad thing in itself. What is bad is the bad use that you make of it, any injudicious use could lead to a not good use. Many fall into this imprudence. We must always be cautious at the top, at the best of our possibilities. Prudence is a fundamental rule of life. Nothing is to be rejected a priori, instead everything is to be used with great wisdom. It is important that the truth is there, and who uses these means cannot deceive the brothers. You have to be cautious in receiving the friendship and you have to be true in giving it. You cannot for example play with the feelings of others, because the game produces harm. If I give a friendship, the other person must know that I have no ulterior bad, evil motive; but I just want to get entertained, talk, I want to know, and I am stopping there. The problem does not change when you exit these means of communication and you enter reality. Even when you enter he reality you must be wise, prudent, and cautious.

Q. Why are there schedules to be respected if, anyway, even during the day you can do harm. How can a parent control his children?

The problem is not the schedules to be respected, or the evil that there is in the daytime or at night. This is not a matter of respecting times tables because something happens before or something happens after. What is the truth about man? The Lord made the day and made the night. He made the night so that man rests. In fact, all is quiet at night, everything is made in order to rest. The day is made in order to work, it is made for commitment, it is made for employment. If you bring the body into disorder, then it does not take the strain. We did not make ourselves, we were made, and we have been made in a certain way: balanced. Who breaks the balance breaks his existence, because the body has its own needs. Find out from doctors and see what the hours in which the body rests are. When at night you have not rested the next day you are deranged, you cannot do things right, because your body is not in optimal condition. We do not forbid things, and we do not want that there is an order because there is an evil that might come (even if this is true, because after a certain time at night, in certain places you do not understand anything anymore, and we must be very careful, very sober, very cautious and very virtuous). But there is a law of man that must be respected. This law says that the day is made for work and employment, and the night is made for the rest. Animals observe this law, and observe it well. They know when they need to rest, when they need to work, when they have to wake. Man must do everything through an act of his will. For certain things we need utmost attention. You cannot do certain jobs if you are tired and if you are fatigued. For example, you cannot study if you sleep, because the mind has to be fresh, receptive, and needs a holy rest. This is the law of man and his truth.

Q. Is it moral to manage a nightclub despite being a job and a source of income?

Morality does not come from night clubs, it comes from what you do in the nightclub. It is the doing that makes the thing immoral and not the thing itself. You can do whatever you want, as long as it is holy in the eyes of the Lord and in the eyes of the world. If the thing is immoral in itself, it is immoral and that is it. We cannot collaborate with evil, ever; cooperation with evil is sin. Every one of us needs to know if there is an evil in itself in what he does, and he must not do it, because evil must always be not done, the good must always be done. This is the law of God, not of men, then men will make their own laws. But the law of God tells you that certain things must not be done. Nor you have to collaborate towards the evil of others. You must always say no, for you do not do a certain thing because it is bad in itself.

Q. Who is man? He is said to be an incarnate spirit, or an animated body! According to this anthropological vision of man, is addiction to alcohol or drugs (light and heavy they may be) to be considered a disease that touches a man’s psychophysical sphere, or is it a real disease of the spirit?

The drug is not a disease. The drug produces diseases. What can you give your body? This is the problem. You cannot give it anything that undermines its truth and its operation. In Leviticus, the Lord gives a precise order to priests: “When you yourselves approach to serve the Lord must drink neither wine nor strong drinks.” And this is not because wine itself is a sin, but because priests must discern what is good from what is not good, what is right and what is not right, what is profane from what is not profane , what is holy from what is not is holy. You cannot go to serve the Lord a little tipsy and a little fuddled. It is necessary they preach and say the right word and educate consciences according to the truth. As a drunk, you do not understand anything, you lose the exercise of the mind and the body exercise. The operation must always be perfect, whatever you do, because not only does man live, but he operates. The operation that is not governed by the will and intelligence is an operation that produces damage. And this cannot be. If you get to drive drunk you no longer have the government of yourself, you do not rule your reactions, and what do you produce? You produce death. Whatever prevents at any time the use of your will, your intelligence and your receptivity, even of your eyes and your ears, you cannot use, because then the action you live is an action that produces damage to the other. Man is constantly operating. I, a priest, if I had drunk this evening, what would have my operation been? I could not have the mastery of myself, the government of my thoughts, the pursuit of my ideas. I, for example, when I am tired I do not write because I need to collect my thoughts; and therefore, I have to rest because my body feels the lack of something. And then I must be prudent, wise, shrewd and temperate in all things, because it is the operation the one that counts. Drunkenness is the loss of the government of the own life and then anything you do is no longer controllable. If you hear the news, it happens that so much violence, so many crimes, so many rapes, so many vexations, take place in an advanced stage of drunkenness, or of the loss of the use of reason through drugs. The consequences are that then the next day one cries, despairs, calls for justice; but no one thinks that it is our fault that we lost the government of our lives. That is why Jesus is clear in the Gospel: “Take heed to yourself and that your hearts are not weighed down with dissipation and drunkenness and cares of this life.”

Q. What does remaining in our truth mean? Does our non truth produce a scandal?

The truth always makes you produce a fruit of good. What is your truth? You must always have the government of your actions. There is a deadly sin that makes you lose the government of your actions, which is anger. You must not be angry, for anger makes you lose the government of your gestures, and in an act of rage you can also kill a person. Your truth is that you always have to govern yourself, and you cannot do an action that gets out of hand. A drunk who starts driving a car, no longer has the government of himself. He is in the falsity of his operation, and whatever happens, and anything can happen, he is responsible because he let himself get drunk. Lot, Abraham’s nephew, was in Sodom and had two daughters who were engaged. When Lot went to call the boyfriends of his daughters in order to leave from Sodom, they did not want to go. Lot went away with his daughters and his wife. His wife then became of salt. The daughters saw that they were alone and got their father drunk and then committed incest with him in order to have offspring. St. Augustine commenting on this passage says that Lot is not responsible of incest, because he did it without conscience; however, he is responsible for getting drunk and therefore, he also becomes indirectly responsible for incest, because he lost the use of his truth and the use of his body. Think of how many things happen today under the influence of drugs, alcohol, of all these tablets that are taken. Man loses the truth about himself, he can no longer govern himself, the other person can make of you what he wants. It is not right, it is not holy, it is not good, because you no longer have control of yourself. It is truth that man must always have control and self-control. St. Paul says that the self government, and self-control is a fruit of the Holy Spirit, that always produces good. The mastery means that you must govern the thoughts, the will, the sentiments, the heart and the very body. You have to know where to go and where you cannot go. If you come back home, your son must always see you in your stability. This is the principle of Christian morality.

Q. We are often invited to live soberly. How does one go about living soberly staying happy, and why does the young person always have the desire of transgression?

What is sobriety? In the Scripture one reads: “See what harms you and do not indulge in it “. Because what injures you is not a good for you, it is an evil in itself. When scripture speaks of wine, it says that if you drink a glass of wine it gives joy to the heart, if you drink more it is a viper that you put into your lap. It is a viper that you swallow, and then it bites you and you die. This is because everything that God created is a good for man, if it is lived according to the law of necessity, according to whatever is needed by you. St. Paul tells Timothy not to drink only water, but also to drink half a glass of wine, because it was good for him, due to the stomach that was faltering. God does not condemn anything of what he created, of what has been made. It is always the use that can become a problem, for the good use of things helps you realize yourself, helps you grow, gives you life, while abuse is a poison. Even food, if you take it according to the measure of what you need it is a benefit; if abuse it is a poison, because your body no longer tolerates it and turns it into something bad. Scripture does not condemn the use of things, but it condemns the abuse of things, because the abuse is a sin, you are using something that harms, does not do good. Young people love transgression because they think that there is life in transgression. They do not have the light of the Holy Spirit, because they do not walk according to God, they have no self-control, they lack in this education to life. Watch how much evil abuses produce every day. Then we complain that this or that other thing has happened, but the problem is always one, that we abuse of everything. And then we must have this wise prudence, this wise forethought and this wise temperance. We cannot have it all, we cannot want it all and we cannot enjoy it all. We must limit ourselves, the limit is the essence of man. But in the limit man lives. If you are unruly you do not live anymore. So we must have a rule of life, and everything you need, use it; what you do not need keep it far, otherwise it becomes an evil, it becomes sin. That is why the Church teaches the holy cardinal virtues: fortitude, temperance, prudence, justice, fundamental virtues that govern our lives and if you live them you orient your whole life well.

Q. About soft drugs we hear that one tries them for he is able then to control himself. And that is why these as well as other vices are acquired. I wanted to have some explanation.

There are some things that are bad in themselves, because they produce a change in the body, they also change it physically, they upset it. We are not talking about soft or hard drugs, we are talking about putting in the body of a disturbing element, an element that revolutionizes your own life. And we must be firm in saying no and that is it, because everything that disturbs your existence you cannot give it to yourself. No man is responsible only for himself. We have a variety of relationships. You are a married woman, you cannot smoke, and not for yourself, for you can also smoke yourself out if you want; but you have a relationship tomorrow with the creature that God wants to donate to you. And you out of love for that life that is already in you, you cannot cause damage to it, because you have a relationship with the other, with your future. We are not islands that we can do what we want, we are a circuit of relationships, and if this circuit is interrupted, and it takes a nothing to stop, then damages happen. Not only to you but to all those who depend on you in some way. Nobody lives for himself. Relationships are fundamental to our lives. The priest is called by God not to drink wine, because he does not live for himself, he lives for others. I priest must always have control of my mind and my thoughts, in connection with you. Tonight I could go home and get drunk. After a while, they call me, because there is need of my presence, and I cannot go, or I go and carry out my ministry badly. Relationships are important, because we live for others, for everyone. I priest must study not for myself, but because I have a relationship with the faithful who have the right to know the truth and I cannot but answer well. Who puts questions has the right to have a perfect answer from me. Therefore, there are no soft drugs or hard drugs, but there is the drug that prevents you from using your powers, and using your body, tomorrow, when you need to.

Q. I wanted to know. Mass media affect profoundly in shaping the personality of young people. What is the role of parents?

The problem is knowing what our role is, and the use we have to do with it. If the means of social communications become a pastime, a game, then we must them as a game. For games a break is allowed. You study, you want to have fun for a while, you have fun. However, you cannot make a game of your life, because if you have to study you cannot make a game of life. You can also spend half an hour, but then you must commit yourself and do whatever you need to do, because if life becomes all a game, life itself looses points. But there are commitments that require my presence. If I must do an urgent thing, I cannot do anything else, and if the thing is urgent I am obliged to what is my truth. What is the truth of my life? What does the Lord want from me? What does he call me to? Once you know what your mission is this has priority over everything. Then comes playing, comes friendship, comes knowledge and comes everything else. What is the primary purpose of your life, what must you accomplish? I need to know it. What I, a priest, must realize tonight? If I have to achieve something urgent, necessary and pressing in my life, that deserves my attention, I certainly cannot go out to play, nor can I get out, nor can I do anything else. I have this ministry that I have to fulfill and absolve with joy and love. Let us start from the end, and once we figured out the end of our lives, once we know what our vocation is, then we can take even a moment of leisure, of relaxation, a moment in which you break free. It is right that there is this detachment, and you can grant yourself what you want to cultivate other things. But then, soon after, you have to go back again to the work you were entrusted with. In the life of every man there is a time for rest, a time for recreation, a time to think seriously about doing what you have to accomplish. If we started from the end we have to achieve in life, from our vocation, from what the Lord wants from us, things would be much more beautiful and holy.

Q. What is the relationship between friendship and confidence?

Friendship, confidence, knowledge are specific relations. There is an initial friendship, there is a deep friendship and there is an involving friendship. You must know what kind of friendship you have with a person. If friendship is not deep, you cannot be confident, because if friendship disappears then the other knows your heart and your heart cannot be fed to anyone. Confiding in somebody means revealing the heart, and who can you reveal your heart to? You have to know who you can wait a comfort, a consolation and a return of good from. We must be very careful, know how to verify the degree of friendship. Friendship is feeling the same way, thinking the same way, wanting the same things and it is almost feeling in communion of life. However, many times friendship is only superficial. As soon as you meet a person you do not know who he is, what he wants, what he thinks, and you cannot entrust yourself, you cannot confide in somebody, you have to put him to the test. The ancient scripture says, “Let your friends be a lot, but your counselor one in a thousand,” that is, the one to whom you manifest your heart, you trust cannot be all, because you do not know whether the other person wants your good or wants your harm. You do not know if that friend betrays you tomorrow and will sell you to the first comer. In the Gospel of John at the end of the second chapter we find that Jesus did not trust himself to anyone but he knew the hearts of all. Jesus knew that tomorrow someone would have betrayed him, and someone sold him, and someone renegade him; so he was always prudent in his relationships. Christ did not reveal his heart easily, because he was prudent and wise.

Q. Is it lawful to doctors to use drugs for therapeutic purposes?

The problem is not the therapeutic goal. The problem is, whether we are faced with a medicine or not. All that is needed for the good of man can be used. The physician must always be in control of what he does, of what he orders, of what he teaches and what he does. All that is needed for the good of a man, and all that is needed to prevent a greater evil you can always use it.

Q. Does a drug addict or an alcoholic, to get out of the addiction, need only medical aid or also spiritual aid, and what we can do to help these people?

There are several ways to help the other person. The other person is made of soul, spirit and body. He needs three specific supports. The doctor takes care of the body and must indicate him the right way to be able to get out of a problem. For the help of the spirit, feeling and will strong, competent and prepared persons are necessary; as amateurs you cannot help, because it would be a waste of time. If we are experts, if we are able people, if we are professionals we can do it. Then, there is the soul, and the soul must be cured with grace. Many times the body is surrendered to evil because the soul is not there. Many men and women have no souls, not because they do not have it in themselves, but because they do not take care of it. A man without a soul is like a car uphill without a motor and brakes. You can no longer govern it and you ruin yourself, because you do not have the control of your body and of your spirit. The soul is the fundamental part of a man. If you govern your soul, and you have a good soul, a holy and perfect soul, the whole body will be governed. That is why, the spiritual help is also needed. A good confession, the weekly Eucharist, the prayer, helping the other to insert himself into a community where we grow spiritually, this is also a good medicine. The aids of the spirit, soul and body must be thought. These aids must be thought all three of them together, because there is always the danger of relapse. Today, it is difficult because people want to work on a man without a soul. The sad thing of today’s society is that it has no soul, and it does not even think about it. We are the ones who have to give the soul to all, because it is our specific task.

Q. The pastors have the responsibility of the writings and use of the media: you have to keep an eye so that no harm is caused to the faith and customs of the Church. Does not this contrast with the right to be informed and the need of the truth of the news?

The supervision does not mean taking the use of things away, supervision tells you the good use of things. You must understand that not everything can enter into your heart. You do not have the freedom to do what you want, because once something gets into your heart, then it stays there. For example: if I write an anonymous letter about a person, once you read it, even if later you tear it and say you do not take it into account, the doubt remains in your heart. Nobody removes it from there, because you have it in your heart. Supervising means, preventing the poison to enter into our spirits, our bodies and our souls. Once the Church had books index. They were books against the faith of the church, against morality, they were books that disturbed the faith of the Christian people. The Church said not to read them, because they were not a good, but an evil. Now there is no more index, and you can read all the books you want. But can you always read what you want? Or must you not rather be careful not to put into your heart certain ideas, certain principles and certain distortions? You can watch all the movie you want, but what do you do once evil entered into your heart? The most terrible sin, in the gospel, is the scandal. The scandal in ushering in the heart of a simple person a sin, a non good action. It enters that heart and remains for life, and you no longer take it off. Supervision is not against man, but it is helping man not to put a poison in his body. Supervision is making sure that evil does not enter even inadvertently in the heart of a child, of a simple person. This is right that we do it. A discernment and prudence are necessary. But today we want to see everything, we want to read it all, we want to hear everything, we want to taste everything and we want to try everything. But once the body has tasted sin you do not wash it any more, because it is soaked with that sin, and that evil smell remains for life. So there is no prohibition, but prudence. There are many things that must be avoided, as a precaution.

Directions for the preparation of the meeting given by Monsignor Costantino Di Bruno:

– Benedict XVI: “Address to Representatives of the means of social communication” (In Annex PPD).
– John Paul II: “Proclaiming Christ in the means of social communication (In Annex PDF).
– The Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith: “Aspects of the use of social media” (In PDF Attachment)
– Pontifical Council for the Pastoral Care and Health: “Church, Drugs and Drug Addiction” (attached PDF)