The M Word

It seems that “an ejaculation a day” may not only “keep the doctor away,” but may well save a man’s life. Yet what are the implications for Roman Catholic theology?

Well, well, well. . . . It would seem that the regular masturbation (considered a “mortal sin” by the Roman Catholic Church) may actually help men reduce the risk of developing prostate cancer.

Researchers in Australia say that cancer-causing chemicals can build up in the prostrate if men don’t ejaculate regularly.

A BBC news report notes that the researchers found that “those who had ejaculated the most between the ages of 20 and 50 were the least likely to develop the cancer. The protective effect was greatest while the men were in their 20s. Men who ejaculated more than five times a week were a third less likely to develop prostate cancer later in life.”

Graham Giles of the Cancer Council of Victoria in Melbourne, who led the research team, told New Scientist magazine that fewer ejaculations may mean the carcinogens build up. “It’s a prostatic stagnation hypothesis,” he said. “The more you flush the ducts out, the less there is to hang around and damage the cells that line them.” A similar connection has been found between breast cancer and breastfeeding, where lactating appeared to “flush out” carcinogens and reduce a woman’s risk of the disease.

Anthony Smith, deputy director of the Australian Research Centre in Sex, Health and Society at La Trobe University in Melbourne, said the research could affect the kind of lifestyle advice doctors give to patients. “Masturbation is part of people’s sexual repertoire,” he said. “If these findings hold up, then it’s perfectly reasonable that men should be encouraged to masturbate.”

Ah, but there’s the rub, so to speak. The Roman Catholic Church teaches that masturbation is an evil because, like contraceptive sex and homosexual sex, there’s no possibility of biological procreation. Every sex act, after all, must be open to such procreation, according to the Magisterium, the teaching office of the pope and bishops.

Never mind that this teaching is based on a totally outdated and flawed understanding of human anatomy and the procreative process. Remember, in ancient time the male was considered to carry a miniature human being in his “seed.” This seed was to be deposited in the female, who was seen to serve basically as what we’d call now an incubator. Thus for centuries, masturbation was considered a worse sin than incest, as at least in the case of the latter, the little human in the male’s sperm was being deposited into the female as opposed to falling upon the ground and dying.

We’ve moved on in our understanding since then. But the church’s official teaching and overall sexual theology is yet to catch up. Thus a horny teenage boy who furtively does what most horny teenage boys do in the privacy of their bedrooms is damned to hell. As are the vast majority of humans who find both relief and pleasure in masturbation – often as an alternative way of expressing their sexuality when a sexual relationship with another is, for whatever reason, not part of their lives.