(To start at the beginning of this series, see *Why Chastity, or see the previous post of this series, see Why Chastity IV). Neal A. Maxwell wrote:
From the previous post: Our whole selfish society tends to travel light, pushing away from anyone who might be an obligation—jettisoning “used” friends, relatives, and even marriage partners. Disavowal and disposability are characteristic of the final stages of selfishness in which the individual is not willing to risk a commitment of any enduring nature nor be depended upon for anything except for the assertion of his appetites. Those souls whom sensuality have shrunken into ciphers constantly seek to erase their loneliness by sensations. But in the arithmetic of appetite, anything multiplied by zero still totals zero!
Failure to keep the seventh commandment also lowers self-esteem, because we are actually sinning against our divine nature and who we really are. (see 1 Corinthians 6:18-19.) And we are breeching promises made in the premortal world before we came here, promises that are imprinted, subtly but indelibly, on our soul.
Continuing. . . . Unchastity impacts severely on others in various ways. First, it suggests wrongly that everyone is, after all, the same; appetites will prevail and, therefore, one might as well join the march of the lustful lemmings now as later. It is too bad that those who are sexually immoral are not required to submit in advance an environmental impact statement before proceeding.
Second, just as our basic values are interactive, so are our basic institutions. We can not corrupt our families and expect to have good governments! Once, for instance, we suggest by our behavior that commandments do not really matter, then it is “open season.” A parent may wink at embezzlement, his child at adultery, and his grandchild at treason.
Thus, these and other concerns about the seventh commandment go far beyond the world’s concerns over disease and pregnancy.
The Church is constantly concerned with one of the ultimate dimensions of freedom that is the freedom from sin. We share the world’s concerns with political and economic freedom, the more visible and traditional dimensions of freedom. Paul said, however,“Where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is liberty.” (2 Corinthians 3:17.) Jesus said, “The truth shall make you free.” It’s so easy to become imprisoned in the single well-lit cell of one impulse and one appetite. When we think of this constellation of reasons, we can understand why it is not just recurring rhetoric when prophets like Mormon observe that the loss of chastity is the loss of that which is precious above all things.(see Moroni 9:9) And why, so many times, the writers of scriptures, observing their own people’s decadence, have equated ripening in iniquity with the spread of fornication and adultery. (see Helaman 8:26.)
There is a last irony—but only for those who need it: The great apostle of love, John, reminded us that this world will pass away “and the lust thereof.” (see John 2:17) This means, quite frankly, that not only can lust ruin this life, but it is also pandering to an appetite that will have no existence at all in the next world!
~Neal A. Maxwell, Not Withstanding My Weakness (Salt Lake City: Deseret Book, 1981), 99-100
continued. . . .See Why Chastity VI.
