In Summa contra Gentiles 3, Aquinas makes the now infamous argument that the proper end of emission of semen is procreation, so that any sexual act in which semen is not emitted with this purpose is wrong. This is one reason why the church has been against homosexual sex. It’s very tempting to ask, ‘what about lesbian sex?’ No emission of semen there. Of course, it doesn’t work, because the point is procreation rather than the emission of semen.
His whole argument turns on each part of a person having a telos as well as the person as a whole, but this coms from his Aristotelean science and I don’t think it’s a possible option for us any more. The argument is dreadful in so many ways, which, to be fair to him, are much easier to see now than when he wrote. Shame it’s been so influential.
But it does make this rather amusing.
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