What about Quickies?

Are quick lovemaking sessions (less than 20-30 min or so) a good idea in your Catholic marriage, or not? In this episode, Sarah offers some cautionary and probing questions meant to identify if quickies are helping build your unity and connection or if they're reinforcing bad habits in your love life. She draws on quotes from Church documents to identify some principles to help you discern whether they're serving the highest goals of marriage.

While the Catholic Church does not offer specific guidelines or rules about how long lovemaking sessions should be, in most cases, Sarah personally recommends against quickies. God created female sexuality to normally require much more time per lovemaking session in order to operate well and thrive. Some circumstances in which quickies might be a good idea are treated in this episode.

Catholic Church documents referenced in this episode:

Catechism of the Catholic Church, par. 2361

"Sexuality, by means of which man and woman give themselves to one another through the acts which are proper and exclusive to spouses, is not something simply biological, but concerns the innermost being of the human person as such. It is realized in a truly human way only if it is an integral part of the love by which a man and woman commit themselves totally to one another until death."

Humanae Vitae, par. 17

"Another effect that gives cause for alarm is that a man who grows accustomed to the use of contraceptive methods may forget the reverence due to a woman, and, disregarding her physical and emotional equilibrium, reduce her to being a mere instrument for the satisfaction of his own desires, no longer considering her as his partner whom he should surround with care and affection."

Casti Connubi, par. 23

"This conjugal faith, however, which is most aptly called by St. Augustine the "faith of chastity" blooms more freely, more beautifully and more nobly, when it is rooted in that more excellent soil, the love of husband and wife which pervades all the duties of married life and holds pride of place in Christian marriage. For matrimonial faith demands that husband and wife be joined in an especially holy and pure love, not as adulterers love each other, but as Christ loved the Church. This precept the Apostle laid down when he said: "Husbands, love your wives as Christ also loved the Church,"[24] that Church which of a truth He embraced with a boundless love not for the sake of His own advantage, but seeking only the good of His Spouse.[25] The love, then, of which We are speaking is not that based on the passing lust of the moment nor does it consist in pleasing words only, but in the deep attachment of the heart which is expressed in action, since love is proved by deeds.[26] This outward expression of love in the home demands not only mutual help but must go further; must have as its primary purpose that man and wife help each other day by day in forming and perfectin

MORE RESOURCES

Free Enhancing Marital Intimacy Guide for Catholic Women: 9 Skills for Body, Mind, and Spirit (for married and engaged women)

Do you want to know what is allowed for Catholics in the bedroom? The "What's Allowed List" answers 20+ questions about what is licit and illicit. ($10)

Model-free lingerie! Get 10% off with my affiliate link for Mentionables.

Transcript

0:50

what about quickies? What about love making sessions that are really fast? Is this a good idea? Should you be doing this in your Catholic marriage or not? I have some thoughts, some concerns, some probing questions and recommendations about this. But I wanna let you know. That there is no official Catholic teaching on the amount of time your love making needs to or should endure. So just know these are my recommendations for you, rooted in my desire for you as a Catholic wife to develop a love life in your marriage that is truly mutual and nourishing and delightful for you. A newlywed wife sent me this question. She said, we're starting to adjust our love making to accommodate my longer women's arousal curve, but it's a process. Things like fatigue, our daughter and my husband's on-call job make it challenging. What are your suggestions for when circumstances don't allow for that much time? For example. Don't come together, do something else, just make it a quickie for him and schedule a longer session later. Other, so this woman has been married two and a half years, and they have a little baby who is under a year old, just to give you an idea. So what I would recommend don't make quickies. A habit, I would say, yeah, life is busy and we are fatigued and we have jobs and kids, but your love life is worth prioritizing and carving out time for, so I would not recommend. Just having a quickie for him. That is not what I recommend. I would say definitely work together, talk together, problem solve together about how you can make time. Maybe once a week for a nice, long lovemaking session that is gonna be truly connecting, truly interpersonal, and give the time to, allow for the woman's longer arousal curve. That is what I would recommend, but for quickies in general, here are some questions that I have for you. If you were to ask me, what about quickies? Should we be having quickies? I would say, well, what happens when you have the quickies? Do you feel used and frustrated, or do you feel relieved that now you've checked off the the obligation sex box and got it over with? If you can say yes to any of those things, then I do not recommend that you continue having quickies because this is a bad pattern, a bad habit in your marriage, and this is not leading to your love life being more equal and mutual and you know, truly honoring what God created it to be. Okay, and that kinda leads into my second question, my concern that I would have if you're going to ask me, what about quickie? Should we be having them? I would say, is this becoming a habit and is this the main way that you make love? Then I would say definitely, no, you need to change that habit. Especially because that really truncates the love making experience to bypass the beautiful, development of the woman's arousal curve that God designed. So I say, no, I don't recommend you do this because. I'm assuming that normally this is not an enjoyable, rewarding, nourishing, satisfying, lovemaking experience for you, the Catholic wife. If it is and you like having quickies and this is good for you as well, then okay, great. I would say, go ahead. Enjoy the quickies, if you want to, you appreciate it, you enjoy it, you find it rewarding and valuable. Even if your full arousal curve isn't being engaged, but maybe you have this sense of fun with your husband, togetherness. You're being playful because you're fitting in some love making, you know, together deciding to do this. In,, in circumstances where you normally wouldn't be able to, and you're both glad about it. You're both glad about it, and, and there's something nice in there for you, you as wife, even if it's not like a significant buildup of pleasure and orgasm, ladies at least take enough time so that. You're not super dry and tight like you, or maybe double up on lube or something. But the way God designed our bodies is normally not for quick love making to be. The full experience, it takes us a while to relax and open up and lubricate. So anyway, that's one thing I would say. But then what about this situation? You as the wife are super desirous. You urgently wanna make love with your husband and you are pretty sure this is going to be good for you too, even if it's quick. Okay. Well, the question I would have, the concern I would have is. Is this just lust? Is this purely biological or is this a true expression of interpersonal love between you and your husband? Because the using can go both ways, right? And maybe your husband's happy to have you aroused and wanting to make love with, with you, and that's great. But make sure this is rooted in your emotional connection and you know, an overall environment in your marriage throughout your days of acts of love, showing love to each other, feeling connected. So it's not like just this, biological, bodily love making that doesn't really fit into an overall environment of of love. So I'm gonna bring some church quotes. To bear on this, here's some quotes from official Magisterial church documents that can kind of illuminate for us whether a quickie is a good idea or not. I'm gonna go in backwards chronological order. Reverse chronological order. So I'm gonna start with the catechism of the Catholic Church, which came out in the 1990s, and here we see that. In paragraph 2, 3, 6, 1 in the section, the love of husband and wife The church tells us sexuality by means of which man and woman give themselves to one another through the acts, which are proper and exclusive to spouses is not something simply biological, but concerns the innermost being of the human person as such. It is realized in a truly human way, only if it's an integral part of the love by which man and women commit themselves totally to one another until death. So we can read this to mean sex has its proper place in marriage, and that is accurate and true, but we can also see a deeper layer here. For your love making in marriage, not to be just biological. It really still needs to be rooted in an atmosphere of love in your marriage. And this interpersonal inner love, inner connection that you have with each other. It should be an expression and a celebration of that. It shouldn't take the place of it, it can't do that on its own. It's not equipped to, that's putting too big a job on, on physical sex to be a substitute or replacement for emotional love and connection, and spiritual connection. But, rather, it should have that emotional connection as a foundation and an environment that, then it becomes an expression of that love. Okay, so that is from the catechism of the Catholic Church. Then I'm going to move back to the 1968 document, humane Vita by St. Pope Paul, the six. And this of course is the document. In which the Catholic Church reaffirms her consistent moral prohibition against birth control if you haven't read it yet, please do. It's free online. Just Google humane vitae, H-U-M-A-N-A-E, space V-I-T-A-E. Just Google that. Read it. It won't take you that long. So much truth and beauty and goodness in there, including this quote, which I'm going to bring to bear on the current topic of quickies. So in paragraph 17. St. Paul, the six is warning humanity about what could happen if artificial birth control became widely accepted, which we now, you know, in the next century it is. And his warnings have all come true, sadly. But one of the things he warns against in paragraph 17 is. Another effect that gives cause for alarm is that a man who grows accustomed to the use of contraceptive methods may forget the reverence due to a woman, and disregarding her physical and emotional equilibrium reduce her to being a mere instrument for the satisfaction of his own desire. No longer considering her as his partner whom he should surround with care and affection. So I understand, of course, we're talking about a wrong attitude that can develop in a husband or in men with women being on birth control and thereby being constantly sexually available. But we can see here an indication of the type of attitude. A man, a husband should have sexually for his wife. It should be an attitude of reverence for her and regard for her physical and emotional equilibrium, and he should not see her as the mere instrument for the satisfaction of his own desires. Even if they're in marriage, right? And so this is one of the quotes I pull out often when I am rebuking or rebutting or debunking the idea of marital debt and obligation sex being church teaching. It's not. And here we can see, you know, wives in marriage are not there just to satisfy their husband's sexual urges and desires and inclinations. So. I think this also applies to the question of quickies. Are we having the quickie just so the husband can satisfy his desire and his wife then becoming a mere instrument? If so, this is not a right use of sex and marriage because it's not surrounded with care and affection. And it's not regarding her physical and emotional equilibrium. So right is the quickie. Treating the wife with reverence is her physical and emotional equilibrium being really taken into account and considered here. And is the husband surrounding his wife with care and affection? You know, if so then, and then that could be okay and you can have the quickie. But I just think this is an important. Caution to keep in mind. And then going further back, I'm gonna pull up Costi Canobie,, the church's document on marriage from the 1920s and Free love and,, the, just a lot of, let's delete this part out actually. Okay, now I'm going further back in time. To the church's document, COSTI Canobie her document on marriage from the 1920s. In paragraph 23, there's a description here, or discussion of conjugal love and chastity. And here the church is saying that matrimonial faith demands the husband and wife be joined in an especially holy and pure love, as Christ loved the church. The love then of which we are speaking is not that based on the passing lust of the moment, nor does it consist in pleasing words only, but in the deep attachment of the heart, which is expressed in action. Since love is proceeded by deeds, this outward expression of love in the home demands not only mutual help but must go further. Must have is its primary purpose that man and wife help each other day by day forming and perfecting themselves in the interior life, so that through their partnership in life, they may advance ever more and more. In virtue and above all, that they may grow in true love toward God and their neighbor. So I think this is very significant that in this discussion of conjugal love of marital love, we have the contrast between the passing lust of the moment and then this interior emotional acts of service type love that's proved by deeds that should. Should be at work in the day-to-day life of husband and wife for each other. I think this just underscores what I was saying earlier in the podcast that I think this underscores what I was saying earlier in this episode that the sexual expression, the sexual connection between the husband and wife in Catholic marriage, it really needs to be rooted in a day-to-day,, attitude of love that's born out through actions and also touches the innermost person. Because here in Costi Canobe there's discussion here of, you know, helping each other form and perfect themselves in the interior life. The husband and wife are helping each other day by day. So again, this is. Paragraph 23 of Costi Canobie And I, I do think this helps us understand what goods we should be considering when we're thinking about this question of what about quickies? I think that we can see if the quickie is just based on the passing lust of the moment, but not in the deep attachment of heart, which is expressed in action. Is and is proved by deeds, then no. This is, quickie shouldn't be done just to satisfy lustful urges. But you know, you could, as I've mentioned earlier, you could both really be full of affection for each other, really feel connected and united and, you know, really feel like you both want to do this. It's a mutual thing. You both want to. You know, it's, it's an expression of your love and it's enjoyable for both of you. I think that's really important. It's an expression of love for both of you, and not just martyrdom love on the part of the wife. Like, well just hand over my body for my husband's use. I don't really feel like this. I don't feel up for it. I'm not, you know. Entering into this very deeply, personally, I'm just making a sacrifice'cause he wants it. I, I don't think that's what the church is recommending here. I don't think that's the direction of the type of love we're supposed to be building up in marriage. That really sounds a lot more like a pattern of use. So that's why I just recommend caution. So there you go. Some church quotes that may help illuminate whether quickies are a good idea in your marriage. Some important questions and concerns. You know, of course you're free to do what you discern. Using the virtue of prudence will help you both grow in love. And help you both grow more in your unity in your union with each other and with God. But I just, I hope these questions are helpful and I also hope that you'll find true Joy and delight today, and I'll catch you in the next episode.