"Without fail it brings death to the body and destruction to the soul. It pollutes the flesh, extinguishes the light of the mind, expels the Holy Spirit from the temple of the human heart, and gives entrance to the devil, the stimulator of lust. It leads to error, totally removes truth from the mind. ... It opens up Hell and closes the Gates of Paradise. ... It is this vice that violates temperance, slays modesty, strangles chastity, and slaughters virginity. ... It defiles all things, sullies all things, pollutes all things. ... This vice excludes a man from the assembled choir of the Church. ... it separates the soul from God to associate it with demons. This utterly diseased queen of Sodom renders him who obeys the laws of her tyranny infamous to men and odious to God. ... She strips her knights of the armor of virtue, exposing them to be pierced by the spears of every vice. ... She humiliates her slave in the church and condemns him court; she defiles him in secret and dishonors him in public; she gnaws at his conscience like a worm and consumes his flesh like fire ... this unfortunate man (he) is deprived of all moral sense. his memory fails and mind's vision is darkened. Unmindful of God, he also forgets his own identity. This disease erodes the foundation of faith, saps the vitality of hope, dissolves the bond of love. It makes way with justice, demolishes fortitude, removes temperance, and blunts the edge of prudence."

"The vice of sodomy surpasses the enormity of all others"

- Saint Peter Damian, Doctor of the Church