Christianizing sexuality

This is a very brief sketch of some of the aspects of the reality of sexuality as it appears in human consciousness. The Christian's job as a layman is to use sexuality consistently with what it is, irrespective of his own advantage or lack of advantage: to help his sexual life reach what it contains potentially.

Let me now try to trace what this might mean, from the beginning of having sexual attraction through falling in love, getting married, and so on.

First of all, the Christian would be interested in remaining a virgin before marriage, not simply because sexual activity outside of marriage is self-contradictory for one reason or another (as mentioned in the section on morality), but because the revelation to one's marriage partner that her lover has "saved himself" for her in spite of the strength of the urge is one of the most significant wedding presents one can give.

We are, however, weak, and it is possible for one with a Christian orientation to lose his virginity, and be experienced in sex before marriage. The Christian who has had this happen to him is not going to regard it as a disaster, as if he has "ruined everything"; his sexuality will not be all that it otherwise could have been, now; but what is done is done, and the Christian does what he can with the reality he has, without repining over what could have been.

The Christian will not be afraid of contact with members of the opposite sex, as if they were "occasions of sin." Christianity is not an avoidance of sin--though, of course, one takes reasonable precautions not to court situations in which it is likely that one will lose control. But the generalized sexual attraction is not evil; and in fact, the putting of oneself into proximity with the opposite sex, in situations where the attraction is there, but there is little likelihood of carrying it to the point of sexual intercourse, is a kind of asceticism that is proper to the lay state. I am referring to things like dances, where a body and a girl hold on to each other and are very close to each other, and so on, but where they are in public, and the possibility of having sexual intercourse is remote. The attraction is definitely there, and it can be strong; but it is generally not so strong that it is translated into action. Thus, one realizes that he can control the urge, that the urge itself is not bad, and at the same time he is learning about the opposite sex and not having it some mysterious and dangerous "something" that must be avoided until the last moment.

If there is no reason to believe that either yourself or your partner (and at this stage, there is not only nothing wrong with many partners, but it is consistent with the nature of sexuality here, which is learning about the opposite sex as such) will be led into sexual intercourse, then the Christian can enjoy fully this phase of his sexuality, and can mingle the sexual attraction to others with the ability to be friends with those he is attracted to.

I might point out here that the business of "going steady" at a young age is an attempt, largely through fear, to skip over this generalized aspect of sexuality. One finds a person one can "relate to," and rather than experimenting with the sexual attraction, one attaches one to this friend in a more or less permanent way, because trying to relate to other people is demanding or frightening.

The Christian has nothing to be afraid of from his sexuality; God made it, and God made it that strong; and if you can't control it by yourself, you and God can. And if you should fail, inadvertently go too far, it is not the end of the world. There is an aspect of sexuality that is pre-marital and not directly related to marriage; and while this aspect of sexuality is not all there is to it, to leap over it and to begin walking--so to speak--before you have learned to crawl is not to recognize the whole phenomenon for what it is. It is permitted to have fun with members of the opposite sex, without any thought of marriage--even fun involved in touching and fondling--always supposing that the situation is such that the touching and fondling will remain that.

I suppose this should also be added, since people nowadays are so uninhibited sexually. Sex is not something that is, shall we say, "social," and there are times when the kind of thing I was referring to in the preceding paragraph is inappropriate, however innocent it might be in itself. Kisses and embraces in school corridors may not be such that they lead to sexual intercourse; but they make a display for the public of something (a) that the public is not interested in, and (b) is in its fullness something that is intimate, and therefore excludes others. Sex, after all, does lead to an exclusive commitment between just two people, to the exclusion of all others. Hence, to make a public display of even the early stages is to use something essentially private as if you didn't care whether others were in on it or not. If it's none of their business what you do, why do you force it on their attention?

There is a balance to be struck at this stage, then, between keeping things so private that the caresses are likely to go on to actual sexual intercourse, and making a public show of the generalized attraction. The situations in which this balance occurs should be fairly clear; and given the situation, then enjoy yourself and don't feel guilty.

But as a person gets into a stage of life where it could be reasonable to get married, this kind of sexuality develops into looking for a life-partner.

First of all, I would say that a Christian ought not to contemplate marriage until he is in a position to have a child immediately. The reason for this is that the act is complete when it results in a child, and to begin your sexual life by saying, "We can't afford a child yet; let's wait before we have one,"--even if the means for postponing a child are morally legitimate--is to learn the language of sexuality as if it did not involve a child; and the child becomes then psychologically a kind of side-effect of the act, not part of the true nature of the act itself. The contraceptive mentality is the carrying of this to its absurd and self-contradictory conclusion. The point here is that if (by getting married) you are going to put yourself into a position of being able to perform the act, then let it be its full self at the beginning, so that you will realize in practice what it really is; and then later when you find that you must limit the number of children you have, you will permit the incompleteness, realizing that you have taken away some of the beauty of a thing that is beautiful in many many dimensions.

Now then, when sexuality becomes serious, the Christian will recognize that falling in love is going to blind him, and the beloved will seem to be perfect. Therefore, the Christian will use his head before he uses his heart and begin associating with the kind of people he could expect will make for a lasting relationship.

That is, it is possible for a king to marry a chorus girl and to be happy; it is possible, but not likely; and if one of the pair is happy, it doesn't follow that the other is going to be. It is possible for a Christian and a Jew to be happy together in a marriage; but if each is devout, this means that the Jew must not consider his partner to be a blasphemer (though that is what the partner is--to him), and the Christian must not consider the partner to be benighted; and so on.

I personally think that the racial problem in our society will not be solved before Blacks and Whites intermarry with the same ease that Italians and Irish do now. But the fact is that interracial marriages are also intercultural marriages; and an interracial couple must be very sure they have very strong interests in common (particularly religion), or they will find, to their shock, that things each took for granted as "perfectly natural" the partner thinks are "perfectly silly." I speak as an American who married a South American. It is a dangerous thing; and one who does it should have his eyes open before he gets too involved.

And this is the point, of course. Knowing of the blinding effect of being in love, one uses one's eyes before falling in love; and then when one falls in love, one need not worry about the blinding.

Again, there is nothing really to worry about. One does what seems to be the reasonable thing, praying for help to the Master; and the Master, who arranges everything to work out to what is good for those who love him, will see to it that no ultimate mistakes are made--that any mistake is better than what would have happened if the mistake had not been committed.

A Christian is not afraid to seek advice about potential partners. Christian love is not "affection," still less letting one's emotions carry one away. Christian love does not seek out difficulties because "the overcoming of them is the cross"; there will be difficulties enough, God knows, who is going to lead you gently into self-forgetfulness. You need not try to force his hand by making things as likely to fail as possible, expecting him to perform a miracle at the last minute.

It is not Christian, in other words, to marry an alcoholic with the idea of "reforming" him, or a homosexual with the idea of "leading him out of his habit." Such marriages are doomed from the start, because the "improvement" of the other (i.e. the imposition of one's own idea of "the good" on the other) is the goal, not the subordination of the self to the other's reality. If a person is an alcoholic or a homosexual, his situation is a sad one; but he cannot, in general, be "led out" of it; and if a person tends to beat on you, avoid him; you cannot cure him, and may die trying.

Does this sound cold and not loving? True love is cold, since it respects the reality for what it is; affectionate love too often just wants to feel good--or worse, feel virtuous.

Having found someone who looks reasonably like a person who could be a lifelong partner, however, the Christian is not afraid to fall in love, to make the leap of faith that he can make his beloved happy, and she can make him happy; that when he marries, the person she will turn into combined with the person he will turn into will be even more compatible--in the long run, even in the very long run--than they are now.

Commitment to another person, who is changing, weak, and fickle, is a dangerous thing. Jean-Paul Sartre was right, when he said that the best thing to do (if you want security) is to have others love you, but not to love anyone else. Even if the beloved really is all you think she is, she won't be this way long, because she's going to have to put up with you, and this is going to transform her; and then you're stuck for the rest of your life (or hers) with someone you didn't bargain on.

And this, of course, is why marriage involves love. You can't buy a lover the way you buy a car; you have to take something unknown, which may be nothing at all like what you expected; and once you take it, you can't turn it back. You have to accept it for what it is.

The divorce mentality denies this, and in fact is calling love "getting what you were looking for." It allows "shopping around" until you find what you really wanted in a partner: the one who fits your needs. But this, of course, is consumerism, not self-subordination. And it does not lead to happiness in marriage, but simply to satisfaction--even when the satisfaction is mutual. It is an economic relationship; I give to you and you give to me; and we're both satisfied.

But the love-relationship is, I care about you, and am not interested in my own satisfaction; you matter to me simply because you exist, whether I get any satisfaction from it or not.

Love is sacrifice; it is sacrifice of the self. If it is mutual, then there is gain; but for the lover, the gain is a bonus at which he rejoices, but is really not the point; if it were not there at all, he would still do what he did.

The Christianization of the act of sexual intercourse recognizes, first of all, that it is a kind of language between the two people. The very awkwardness and pain of the first act of sex between two virgins says, "I give you the gift of not knowing what to do, so that we can learn the language together." Neither is embarrassed, because each sees the other as awkward; neither need feel inferior. This, as I said, is a very great gift; far greater than the gift the experienced lover can give his beloved, because the satisfaction he shows her also says to her, "See how I can please you, even if you can't please me." If this is the only gift you are capable of giving because you have lost your inexperience, then so be it; but virginity is a greater gift.

And of course, sex is an act of love in that one learns the kinds of things that please the partner; one learns by experimenting and noting breathing, body heat, heartbeat, and so on; and one adjusts one's own activity to the kind of thing that gives greater satisfaction to the partner.

Human sex cannot be "natural," the way animal sex is; we can't just "let it happen" and it will turn out to be its full self. We must study. Even sex manuals to discover techniques one would not have thought of; but mainly, one must study one's partner's body language, to try to find what pleases.

Let me end this section by remarking that I realize I might have shaken some people by an apparently cavalier attitude toward sexual sin, as if I didn't consider it serious. Certainly it is serious; any sexual sin is serious, because it is acting frivolously with a faculty one of whose functions is to enable a new embodied spirit to come into existence. But the point is this: there is no sin, however grave in itself, which is the end of the world when committed, and which demands, after being committed, an attitude of horror at oneself and anguish before it can "really" be forgiven. Once it is done, then all that is needed is a change of heart away from it, and forget it.

In this connection, a little-stressed point of the story of the Prodigal Son is instructive. The father did not require the son to "make up" in any sense for his crime of spending all his inheritance in sinful living; there was no "atonement" before the rings were put on his fingers, the best cloak on his back, and the calf slaughtered. The father did not care what he had done with the money, and did not ask him to "right the wrong" in any sense.

Hence, the Christian change of heart is not in itself something that involves "restoring the balance" disrupted by sin. (If one has done damage to another person, of course, the moral law says that one must do what one can to restore the other person to his previous state.) But restoring the balance disrupted by sin is, if we knew it, impossible, because (a) the sin does not consist in the actual damage done, but in the self-contradictory and self-frustrating goal it implies in the sinner, and (b) as an eternal act, nothing we can do can remove it anyway and render us sinless. The act as a self-contradiction must simply taken out of our lives by God--and so as such it is not something to get excited about, because God doesn't get excited about it.

Besides, this notion of the "horror" of serious sin, which is supposed to motivate us to avoid it has, in addition to its not being God's attitude, but the serpent's, the following interesting effect. If we consider the sin as "terrible" and to be avoided at all costs, then when we do fall, we tend to say, "But I am a decent person, and so the sin mustn't have been really a sin after all. Could I--I--have done a thing that the very angels shrink from contemplating? Of course not. So that kind of thing is not really bad."

And the result is that we redefine the sin into a kind of virtue. No the sin is what it is; but if we commit it, as we might, then let us admit that the sin is a sin, beg forgiveness, and go on with our renewed lives and enjoy ourselves again.

The second thing to remark is that Christianity is not a state of moral virtue, still less a means toward being more morally virtuous. The Christian is in favor of moral virtue, which is, of course, acting consistently with what one is; since the Christian loves reality with God's love, he is interested in acting consistently with it--of course. But this does not make the Christian "stronger," necessarily, than others, so that moral virtue is a sign that one is a good Christian, and Christianity is a help toward "holiness," meaning moral perfection.

The Christian is imperfect, sinful, and forgiven; the sin and the imperfection does not matter. Sexual sins are easy to commit, because the urge is so strong; because of this, of course, the sin, serious in itself, is less serious because of lack of control. But what difference does it make whether the sin was "very deliberate" and therefore more serious, or "less deliberate" and therefore not really serious. This is interesting in theory, but God simply does not care about the degree of turning your back on him, or how many times you do so. His miracle of removing the sin from your life is available to you every time you want it; and if you need it once or a hundred times a year is of no consequence whatever to him. You are a sinner. You are rotten. If you think these statements are false, you are mistaken. If you realize they are true, so what? You are loved.