Morals of the Church
Library › Wouters, Manual of Moral Theology › Volume III. On the Virtue of Chastity (1928) › Book I. On Chastity Generally › Part II. On Chastity Insofar as It Regards Acts which Are Ordered to Venereal Things, or on Pudicity › Section II. On the Opposite Vice, or Immodesty › Chapter II. Applications

Article — Wouters, Manual of Moral Theology

Article II. On Touches

74.
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I. Commonly it will be mortal:

  1. To touch, over the nude body, the immodest parts of a person of diverse sex, with the exception of nurses and maids who care for infants entrusted to them, unless they touch lingeringly; likewise to touch the said parts over clothing, although this, if it is done in jest and in passing, can sometimes be excused from grave fault (St. Alphonsus III, 420).

  2. To touch on purpose or with delay, even over clothing, the immodest parts of a person of the same sex; if it is done in jest and in passing, grave sin will often be absent (St. Alphonsus, loc. cit.).

  3. To touch with delay either the naked breasts or the less honorable parts of a woman (St. Alphonsus III, 430). Indeed Benedict XIV condemned a book which said that touching the breasts of an honorable woman, with wicked affection and intention excluded, was in itself only venial. Likewise a young man sins gravely who holds a girl sitting on his lap; and the girl who allows this. But to touch the breasts in passing, or the honorable parts of a woman with delay, is venial.

  4. To touch lingeringly or rather often the immodest parts of one's own body will be mortal for some, venial for others; otherwise it is held as venial (St. Alphonsus III, 419).

  5. To touch the genitals of brute animals up to the pollution of the beast; otherwise it will in itself be venial (St. Alphonsus III, 420).

II. One who, for example a girl, permits herself to be touched is to be said to sin in this way:

  1. If the touch, kiss, etc., is indecent or immodest in itself, she sins by permitting it, and indeed gravely or lightly according as the touch is gravely or lightly immodest.

  2. If the touch, kiss, etc., is decent in itself, but by the intention of the one touching is libidinous, she does not sin: 1. if the touch is done in public, for example in dances, because both modesty and the avoiding of the infamy of the one touching involve a sufficient cause for permitting the sin of one's neighbor; 2. if the touch is done secretly and the wicked affection is not established. If it is established, she sins (St. Alphonsus III, 430).

Immodest touches