Monthly Archives: February 2015

Penance: Guilt, Shame, Self-Loathing as Penitential Pain

Moral Harm and Moral Worth, Moral philosophy, Sexual morality

This post elaborates on my February 16 Post: Penance: Pain as a Scapegoat Which Carries Away Moral Evil in two ways. First, I advocate mental pain as the proper penitential pain. Second, I bring out more of the theory rationalizing inflicting pain on yourself to cleanse yourself from a moral stain or heal yourself of a moral wound.

In my previous post, I suggested interpreting penance as a way of cleansing or healing ourselves for moral damage we inflicted upon ourselves by a wrong such as masturbation which in no clear way does any tangible damage to our bodies or anyone else’s body. My suggestion was that we inflict some tangible damage on ourselves. Penance as cleansing or healing works by linking the moral wrong with a tangible wrong which will heal. The healing tangible wound is taking away the moral harm with which it has been linked. We are morally cleansed because the moral wrong in us has gone away insofar as it was a type of wound in us. However, the moral wrong is still formerly – “on paper” – in our history until it is forgiven.

Forgiveness is another topic. Penance may be necessary for forgiveness but I do not think penance is sufficient for forgiveness

What kind of pain is a suitable penance for victimless sexual immoralities; especially masturbation? As suggested by the Lenten texts from Joel: “Rend your heart; not your garments” the pain should be interior – in the mind. Mental pain is tangible – guilt, shame and self-loathing are felt. Let yourself feel these pains by not giving yourself any excuses. Of course, as in any important endeavor, good judgment is needed to know when to “go one with your life” and let the mental pain and moral wound heal.

Why, though, inflict pain on ourselves so that it can become a wound which is supposed to take away a moral wound? Here I need to sketch out thoughts on the reasons for punishment.

One reason for punishment is restitution. I am not writing of penance as restitution. I am not thinking of penance being the infliction of some tangible damage to ourself as a way of paying back for a satisfaction immorally attained. For instance, the pay back for the pleasure of masturbation might be a cold shower. On this model the pain is paired with the illegitimate pleasure and then the pleasure-pain pair is neutralized. Such a model may be useful for understanding some dimensions of penance. But that is not the dimension which I am trying to understand. Here I am struggling with a belief that penance is appropriate to make myself cleaner or healthier after committing a moral wrong. I try bring myself back to my moral status I had before the immoral act. The restitution model does not seem to me to bring out making myself healthy after committing a moral wrong. It is too impersonal. Restitution brings our making the situation better. What can fairly be labeled a retribution model of penance brings out that penance is supposed to make me better by somehow removing the moral damage I brought upon myself. This is different from a rehabilitation model of penance where penance is to build my character. The retribution model is also different from a deterrence model. On a deterrence model, the masturbator would inflict some pain on himself after masturbating and threaten to inflict that pain on himself every time he masturbated. Cold showers might be his choice of deterrent.

Restitution, rehabilitation and deterrence are all important dimensions of penance. They are forward looking dimensions of penance. They aim at making the person or situation better in the future. Retribution is backward looking. In retribution we go back in our history to clean or heal a wound we suffered. We are trying to bring ourselves status quo ante.

My thoughts about penance, forgiveness etc., come from my emphasis on sexual immorality as producing moral harm in my book Confronting Sexual Nihilism .
My book Confronting Sexual Nihilism: Traditional Sexual Morality as an Antidote to Nihilism was released by Tate Publishing on March 11, 2014. See Book Web Page for information about the book. The publisher’s listed price is $26.99. Printed copies can be purchased here by credit card for $12.99, plus $3.71 for shipping and handling.





To purchase the printed book by check, send check of $16.70 per copy. Send to:
Charles F. Kielkopf
45 W. Kenworth Rd.
Columbus, Ohio 43214
Include your shipping address.

Penance: Pain as a Scapegoat Which Carries Away Moral Evil

Moral Harm and Moral Worth

At the beginning of Lent 2015, it is appropriate to reflect on penance. I hope to clarify my thought that penance is choosing an inclination frustration – pain- to remove or cleanse from oneself a negative feature or stain on oneself which resulted choosing an immoral act.

Since these blog posts are on sexual morality, let us consider the point of doing penance for sexual immorality. The focus is on an act of male masturbation. The act itself has no significant consequences in the world outside the man who masturbated. I do not want to be distracted by consideration of needs to restore some damage done by the act. Also I do not want to consider penance as a either a way of building strength of character or a way of somehow deterring oneself from masturbating again. Penance may strengthen character and be a deterrent. However, I hope to clarify a thought and feeling that somehow penance cleanses a person from a morally evil condition he has produced in himself

An immoral sexual act is bipartite. Both parts are immoralities One part is the act performed. In masturbation this part is the self-stimulation to orgasm. The other part is self inflicted moral damage in the person who chose the wrong act. The moral damage or moral evil is whatever it is in the person which now justifies passing the judgment upon him: He is now a man who chooses to do what is wrong to gain a sexual inclination satisfaction.

This moral damage seems nebulous, intangible and invisible. How can it be removed?

Nothing can be done to remove the past choice to masturbate for an inclination satisfaction. Nothing can remove the fact that he had enjoyed the inclination satisfaction which is now gone. However, the point of penance is to cancel out that wrongly gained inclination satisfaction by inflicting on oneself a greater inclination frustration. Choosing to connect an overriding inclination frustration with the wrongly chosen inclination satisfaction transforms the moral damage into complex condition of moral evil connected with a balancing natural or non-moral evil. This complex of moral and natural evil is not so nebulous. It is certainly tangible if not visible. Because of its natural component this complex can fade away with time as the natural pain of frustration diminishes.

Penance is a “scapegoat.” The penitential pain attaches to the moral evil and as the pain fades way so does the moral evil it carries with it.

I introduce my thoughts on moral evil in my book Confronting Sexual Nihilism

My book Confronting Sexual Nihilism: Traditional Sexual Morality as an Antidote to Nihilism was released by Tate Publishing on March 11, 2014. See Book Web Page for information about the book. The publisher’s listed price is $26.99. Printed copies can be purchased here by credit card for $12.99, plus $3.71 for shipping and handling.





To purchase the printed book by check, send check of $16.70 per copy. Send to:
Charles F. Kielkopf
45 W. Kenworth Rd.
Columbus, Ohio 43214
Include your shipping address.