Celibacy, Personality, and the Gift of Self

In this booklet, John B. Torello examines what the popularization of the ideas of Sigmund Freud has done to Western culture. Two effects particularly harmful for young people have been the gross overestimation of sex, together with the false image of the “harmful” effects of sexual abstinence. I have chosen the viewpoint of medical psychology for this booklet rather than a theological, moral, or pastoral study of my theme—the relationship between sex and personality, particularly with regard to that genuinely human phenomenon known as celibacy.