[Question:]{.underline} Is it permissible to have a tattoo?
[Answer]{.underline}: The sporting of tattoos is not something new in the history of humanity. The defacing of one’s bodies is seen in many primitive societies as a mark of bravery and achievement, a real sign of honor. Is the modern practice of tattoos comparable?
Tattoos come under the category of self-mutilation. Self-mutilation is certainly permissible when performed for the good of the entire body, according to the principle of totality, that the part is for the whole. This common sense understanding underlies these words of Our Lord: “If thy right eye is an occasion of sin to thee, pluck it out and cast it from thee; for it is better for thee that one of thy members should perish than that thy whole body should be thrown into hell” (Mt 5:29). Consequently, nobody disputes the excising of organs or mutilation of external appearance that comes from the treatment of serious and life-threatening illnesses, such as cancers.
But tattoos are a defacing of the body that is not directed to any good, either of the body or of the soul. Is it permissible to perform such a cosmetic deformity without any objective purpose, simply because one wants to?
The morality depends upon what authority a man has over his body. According to the modern way of thinking, a man has absolute authority over his body, to do with it as he wills. However, such is not the teaching of the Church. We are but stewards of our bodies, for we belong to Almighty God. Our domain over our body is limited to using it for the end for which it was created. This was clearly taught by Pope Pius XI in his encyclical on Christian marriage, condemning the self-mutilation of sterilization: “Christian doctrine has established, and it is entirely evident by the light of human reason, that man has no right to destroy or mutilate his members or make them in any way incapable of attaining their natural purpose.” To the objection that tattoos do no harm to the functioning of the body must be responded that every human action has to have a purpose, upon which its morality is based. There is no such thing as an indifferent action in practice. An action that is not good is necessarily bad. If there is no purpose for a tattoo, then it is at the very least vanity or human respect, the desire to draw attention to oneself or shock others. But these are all disordered motives. If a tattoo is not virtuous and reasonable, then it is wrong, offensive, and sinful. This sin can be venial, if the tattoo is not an attack upon God or religion nor immoral in its symbolism, and if it is done out of vanity, in itself a venial disorder. However, it can be mortal, if the tattoo is blasphemous or irreligious, or applied as a direct attack on God’s dominion over the body.
It is sometimes objected that some fervent Catholics have tattooed themselves with crosses and holy symbols. In such a case a tattoo could have as a purpose to profess the Faith, and to demonstrate exteriorly the sacredness of the body, consecrated to Almighty God through baptism. Thus we read in the life of St. Jane Frances Fremiot de Chantal that she carved the most holy name of Jesus Christ on her chest with a red hot iron. However, this is the exceptional inspiration of a saint. In our time, more often than not such symbols are applied mockingly, and are more a sign of the desecration of the temple of God, that we are (I Cor 3:16 & 17), than the contrary. They refer to a sub-culture that is atheistic, and sometimes pagan. They are a degrading of man to the level of the animals which are branded, for their bodies have a purely utilitarian purpose.
Here lies the real morality of tattoos. They are applied in a spirit of rebellion and generally depict one or other aspect of that rebellion, often impure, crude, violent, ugly, frightening, repulsive, if not frankly blasphemous and diabolical. It is precisely that rebellion against the natural order, that rejection of man’s submission to his Creator, that is symbolized by tattooes, by which man pretends to have full power over his body, defacing the body that God in His goodness has given to him. It is a rebellion against protocol, against decency, a rebellion against all social expectations, against man’s social character. It is on account of this opposition to the natural order that tattoos were forbidden in the judicial precepts of the old law: “You shall not make any cuttings in your flesh, for the dead, neither shall you make in yourselves any figures or marks: I am the Lord” (Lev 19:28). Although these precepts certainly do not in themselves bind in conscience, nevertheless they were not in general entirely arbitrary, and the commandment not to cut one’s flesh is listed along with those forbidding the consultation of wizards and soothsayers, the divining of dreams, and of making one’s daughter “a common strumpet.”
It is likewise a rebellion against the supernatural order, for tattooing symbolizes a man insisting on his right to do as he pleases, without rendering an account to His Redeemer, even to self-mutilation and self-desecration. It symbolizes the rejection of the sacredness of the human body. It is a sign of the ultimate despair that is so characteristic of modern society: that our bodily life is an end in itself and there is nothing beyond it.
Answered by Father Peter Scott, SSPX.