Chapter 25 #2
Passing the library, Joseph bid good-night to Bishop England and Father Baker. The bulging envelope felt like a heated brick in his coat pocket. Joseph retired to his chamber and set the letter on his desk. He resolved not to read it.
He finished reciting the prayers for the day. He reviewed his notes for his homily tomorrow. He undressed for bed and washed his face and hands. He leaned over to blow out his lamp.
But the envelope beckoned to him from his desk. Much like the Serpent in the Garden, promising forbidden knowledge. Things other men already knew.
It was the mention of God and the Psalms in the first lines that lured him in.
Dearest daughter—for I shall speak to you as I have my own daughters—God has given you a remarkable gift.
“I praise Thee for my wondrous fashioning,” the Psalmist cries, “marvelous are Thy works.” None of God’s works is more marvelous than your body, my daughter.
You know already its capacity to nurture and bear life.
God has also fashioned your body for limitless pleasure.
A woman’s body is as capable of experiencing pleasure and pleasure’s climax as a man’s. In fact, your pleasure will be more complex and of longer duration than your husband’s—if you continue to read this letter.
A woman’s climaxes do require more skill and patience than a man’s.
For this reason, they are more rare. Women cannot climax through penetration alone—but this is all husbands think they must do.
When his climax is complete, the man believes the act successful.
He is only half right. He is entirely wrong to leave you incomplete.
“But his seed in my womb is all that is necessary for conception,” you say.
“That is the purpose of sexual intercourse. To do more simply for the pleasure of it is sin.” I may not be a catechist, but I know the female body.
And I return to your “wondrous fashioning.” God has given you a unique organ called a clitoris.
He created it for one purpose only: to transmit pleasure from the crown of your head to the tips of your toes.
But you must give yourself permission to experience this pleasure.
You do not yet believe that God wishes you to do so? Open a Bible. Find the Canticle of Canticles. Do not tell me it is only an allegory of Christ’s love for the Church. Would an allegory make us blush? Would it stir our blood and make us desire our mates?
The Canticles do use poetic symbolism. The woman’s body is a garden.
The man’s genitals are fruit. Her arousal is honey and wine.
Pay particular attention to the first verse of the fifth chapter.
The couple has consummated their love—and God definitely approves: “Eat, O friends, and drink, and be inebriated!” These lovers do far more than penile-vaginal intercourse.
Experiment! Discover one another fully! “Everything created by God is good, and nothing is to be rejected if it is received with thanksgiving” (Saint Paul to Saint Timothy).
Do you think me too Protestant, to quote only from Scripture?
Then I shall add the wisdom of Blessed Alphonsus Liguori.
Rome has decreed his writings “free from error.” Liguori concludes that the female climax has a purpose because “nature does nothing in vain.” If their husbands are unable or unwilling to do so, wives “may excite themselves before copulation” or stimulate themselves afterwards in order to achieve climax—without sinning.
Spouses may engage in sexual acts not only to conceive children but also “for reason of health” and “to foster mutual love.”
His father went on like this, page after page.
He described in shameless detail how to locate the clitoris and stimulate it—not only with the penis but also with fingers and mouth!
How to caress the breasts. The signs by which a husband might recognize his wife’s excitement and when she “came.” How she might heighten his excitement.
“A true lover will find his greatest joy not in pursuing his own pleasure but in pleasing his beloved.”
How could this be the same man who had raped a deaf girl, who had forced her to marry him and abused her for years afterward?
Joseph had realized long ago what his father must have been doing with his head between his mother’s thighs—but the fact remained that he had been doing it against her will.
Her bonds and her tears proved she had not consented.
The man himself admitted here: “Not all women enjoy all kinds of stimulation.”
His father also explained that when a woman was excited, her “glands of Bartholin” should produce a mucus (hardly honey and wine!) to facilitate penetration. If this mucus was insufficient, intercourse would be painful, so he recommended…!
Olive oil was the matter of Sacraments. It had anointed Joseph’s forehead at Confirmation and his hands at Ordination.
Joseph himself used it to cleanse the five senses of sin when he administered Extreme Unction.
But the application his father suggested…
The olive oil could hardly be called virgin after that.
If their father had told Cathy half of what was in this letter, no wonder she had thrown herself beneath the first man to flatter her.
The Devil could certainly quote Scripture—out of context—to serve his own ends.
Joseph’s father blithely ignored most of Liguori, such as his condemnation of “imperfect acts” that served no purpose, like kissing.
This letter was a prescription for sin. A manual of lust. A carnal catechism. Joseph should burn it immediately. He stood up abruptly, gripping the vile pages. The indecent state of his own body was proof these obscene words must be destroyed.
Then his father’s plea returned to him: “Promise me you will deliver it tomorrow… This woman is in pain—unjust, utterly unnecessary pain.” But pain was part of God’s plan. It taught you humility and—
Tessa was in pain. Even now, at this very moment…
Ashamed at last, his arousal subsided, and Joseph sank back into his chair.
How could he face Tessa again empty-handed? How could he see the desperation and hope in her eyes and crush her with a platitude? She was a pious woman as well as an intelligent one. She would take what she needed from this letter and discard the rest.
His lamp was sputtering. Instead of extinguishing it, Joseph replenished the oil and read his father’s manual a second time before he sealed the envelope.
When he slipped Tessa the letter after Mass, she clutched it to her breast and thanked him as if it were the pardon from a death sentence.
Two weeks later, Joseph called on her at home. Her husband was at his law office. Tessa showed Joseph around the garden they had planned together, and he recommended a few more plants to fill the gaps.
Before he left her, Joseph managed to ask: “Was my father’s letter a help to you?”
Tessa blushed and averted her eyes. At last she nodded and whispered: “’Tis not so painful now.” The words were grim, not joyous, as if she meant: “’Tis still painful, but less so.”
Joseph frowned. As Tessa walked beside him, he allowed himself to read in her posture and her countenance what he’d been trying to deny. Very little had changed since the day he’d found Tessa slumped in the pews beneath the weight of her marriage.
“You must give yourself permission to experience this pleasure,” his father had written. Joseph had feared Tessa would embrace too much of his father’s advice. Now he feared she had embraced too little.