Sermons at St. John’s Presbyterian Church

Sexual Intimacy

Transcribed from the sermon preached June 1, 2008

The Reverend Max Lynn, Pastor

Scripture Readings: Song of Songs 7:9-13, Luke 6:37-38, I Cor. 71-9, 32-35

The sexual standards of the Judeo Christian tradition developed in the context of patriarchal society.  The primary concern was to propagate and maintain family holdings.  Purity and pollution also figured into sexual conduct, but primarily as a function of its impact on family propagation, honor and shame.  Freedom, love and pleasure were not primary concerns for a sexual relationship.  In fact, freedom, love and pleasure were regulated so that they would not dishonor or destabilize the family.  The primary concern with sex itself was that sexual energy, semen and the womb were not wasted on things other than propagation of children.  Fornication, the sexual intercourse with a father’s daughter before she was betrothed, would devalue and dishonor the father and the father’s property.  The male fornicator would be making the mistake of planting his seed in a field, which was not his in which to plant.  In other words in the least it would be a waste of seed, and worse, the use of another’s property without permission.  Adultery, can be seen as deceit, lying and stealing the womb of another, and would call the purity of the family line in question.  Sex with multiple wives and concubines was considered appropriate because it was under the control and for the propagation of the patriarch.  Masturbation and homosexuality would be considered a waste of family seed.  For an excellent book on sex in the Bible see William Countryman’s Dirt, Greed and Sex.

          There is also another strain of thought regarding sexual practice that comes from a more mystical point of view and is concerned with attachments, which distract us from our focus on God or the Spirit of Truth.  We find this concern in at least Judaism, Christianity, Hinduism and Buddhism.  Sex, with its powerful pleasures, is one of temptations to distraction and may derail us off the track God would have us on.  Thus within each of these religions, though less so in the clan oriented Judaism, we see groups and teachings recommending if not requiring celibacy.  Then, as a secondary, fallback measure for the weak among us, sexual relations regulated to the purpose of procreation. 

The Dalai Lama, a sort of Tibetan equivalent of the Pope, continues to affirm the Buddhist tradition that body parts have a certain function they were made for and shouldn’t be used for what they were not made for.  As you can imagine, this puts considerable constraint on sexual activity, ruling out hands, mouths, feet, ears, etc., a whole host of body parts from taking a creative role in sexual intimacy.  In the February/ March 1994 issue of OUT Magazine the Dalai Lama was quoted making fairly open comments about homosexual relations and advocated for civil rights but this was within the context of society. He remained conservative with regard to adherents to Buddhism. (Steve Peskind. http://heartlandsg.org/2006/12/30/updated-the-dalai-lama-and-sexual-minorities-a-personal-view/)  Thus the host of folks seeking to escape the apparent legalism of Christianity for the “free” and “spiritual” Buddhism may, after they dig beyond the hip US version of it, find some patriarchal, ascetic traditions that sound both strange and familiar.

Certainly Hinduism seems less patriarchal at first glance, less afraid of the body and the feminine, at least from the snippets we find popular here in the west: yoga with its chakras do a great job of uniting spirituality with the body and its pleasures and of course there is the Kama Sutra with all its helpful suggestions. 

As I was applying for counseling in graduate school I went to meet with the dean of a particular schools psychology department.  She noticed I was a minister and couldn’t help but probe to see how closed minded I was.  In psychology we call that transference.  Anyway, after her worst fears were eased, she mentioned how important she thought spirituality was for mental health.  Encouraged, I inquired about her spiritual journey.  Her parents were Christian but after they moved to India she favored the Hindu spirituality.  She appreciated how they had both female and male deities.  I asked why she left India.  She said she couldn’t stand how horribly women were treated and how rigid the caste system was.  A little ironic, I thought.  Hindu tradition is more open about sexuality but behavior is still strictly regulated to identity within the caste system. 

I take this little diversion into these other traditions to remind us that within the larger historical and global context, the Church, and the Presbyterian Church in particular is not as out of touch as it might seem in the microcosm of a presbytery meeting or the General Assembly floor.  The conversations we are engaged in, and the changes we work to bring about happen over decades if not centuries.  And I say this not to be cynical and depressing, but to say, by the grace of God, hold the line; stand strong; there is more work to do.  But I also point this out so that we are reminded of the need for humility, for the recognition that we do not have full knowledge, that is if the last 10,000 years of history is any indication, that our time and place is not the last stop before Nirvana or Heaven.  Who knows how the future faithful will look back and say, “boy did they make a wrong turn there,” or “Why didn’t they push even further?”  Judge not that we not be judged.  Forgive and we will be forgiven.

I do think that the rise of the Protestant Reformation, and in its wake universal literacy, enlightenment science, democracy, and abolitionist and feminist liberation movements owe much to the explicit tradition of prophecy in the Bible.  That is, there are prophets who see the hypocrisy of the society they live in and call it forward to live out the true meaning of their creed.  Jesus falls in among a long line of such prophets whose teachings, while not fully appreciated in their time, plant a seed that grows into major change. This Judeo Christian tradition of the prophet of God has produced a freedom to think, speak and act, as a minority group or as a mere individual, a freedom which has reverberated down through history and produced great change for truth and justice.

But if the change is going to take hold, it has to be connected to the truth of the past.  No society is going to exchange even an unjust and repressive peace for chaos and last to celebrate it.  And we know that capitalism thrives off choice and a pluralism of desires.  Capitalism will find a way to bless and make money off every way of life. Child pornography and the arms trade are just two blatant examples. It will play off our attachments and addictions and make them gods, distracting us from the one true God of love, peace and justice.  Just because something is possible, pleasurable, popular, and or profitable doesn’t make it right.

So, if we are going to toss out ancient patriarchal law on sexual intimacy, making room for grace, liberation and scientific truth, what is the new order we replace it with?  And how is it connected to the truth at root of the tradition?

Now I try to turn to some practical advice: five components to intimacy.  These work for sexuality, but also function in most if not all relationships.  Drawing from both scripture and feminism we find five components of intimacy: 1. Choice 2. Mutuality 3. Reciprocity 4. Trust 5. Delight.

As I preached last week, we begin and end with the golden rule: do unto others as you would have them do to you.  We do not like to have no say in a matter that concerns us. Therefore we also want those we relate to to have a choice. 

We also would hope that both we and they are capable of making a rational, conscious adult choice to desire to be in relationship with us.  Therefore, children are off base. 

I also think that the movement from polygamy to monogamy serves equality.  I suspect it served the equality of men first.  Originally we may assume that as humans discovered how their animals and then women got pregnant, the powerful men decided they should be like powerful bulls or roosters, and take control of as many women as they could.   But how fair or just is it that one man gets to choose a bunch of women and a bunch of men are left with few choices, but perhaps to share a prostitute, also owned by the powerful.  But monogamy serves equality of women too, with the opportunity for the development of choice, mutuality and trust that are not available in polygamist societies. Certainly it could be argued that polygamist relationships may provide more mutuality, trust and support for women than a society where sex is completely divorced from responsibility, and pregnant women and their children are left to fend for themselves. And in an unjust society where there is unequal opportunity for men and women alike, it is understandable that more than one woman might choose to be married to a powerful man who can support multiple women and children, rather than have one to herself who can provide little support.  But once again we settle the issue with the golden rule: flip the idea on its head and have men imagine being economically vulnerable and having to share one woman with other men.  No way.  Men, of course, would kill each other  - and the woman.  By the golden rule, monogamy remains a rule. 

So movement toward intimacy requires the choice of both parties.  That is both the pleasure and the responsibility are mutual.  Paul, speaking equally to male and female mentions “mutual consent.”  We maintain our individuality in the relationship; we do not fold or mold our identity into them, losing ourselves.  On the other hand, choosing to give ourselves to and for the pleasure and growth of the other creates joy and growth for both.  In giving we receive. The joy, delight and growth are reciprocal.  Reciprocity develops into trust.

Now trust is a big one.  I wish it were different, but I have not seen that trust can fully develop outside a committed relationship.  Now I know there is lots of talk of the separation of love and sex. Some feminists claim that men have had this attitude for a long time but women are stuck holding this love connection.  And feminists are correct in pointing out that the erotic and sensual are much greater than the penis of the man who we may love.  Growing up in the wake of the sexual revolution I have known a few who have been able to remain emotionally detached after consummating sexual relationships.  But eventually jealously, deceit, feelings of inadequacy and loneliness are the result for most. Disease and the state serving as father for countless poor children have proven to be the result for society. Also, through years of doing premarital counseling, I have never seen one person or couple who was not holding some of themselves back until they had a commitment from the other.  With the invention of birth control, and the increasing age of adulthood due to longer educational needs in our technological society, there is some room for grace and flexibility, but for the long term health of the vast majority of individuals and for society, and for the ideal realization of the joy and intimacy of sex and relationship, monogamous commitment must remain the rule.  So Paul says that it is good that we not marry, so that we can commit our lives to doing God’s work.  But if we can’t handle the celibate life, then the power and responsibility of sexuality demands the respect of commitment.  

Mark that, single folks.  The ideal of the sexual relationship is marriage, but the ideal relationship is with God.  Again we are back to that universal idea that attachments can be distractions.  From the spiritual point of view of the world's great mystics, love and joy do need to be separated from sex, not for the sake of sex, but for the sake of love and true joy.

In its most powerful and beautiful form this commitment is unconditional love.  The others know that you are not going to split when the going gets tough, and they are not just there out of obligation, but because they love you as you are.  We are not Brad Pitt and Angelina; we are not even what we used to be; we’ve got scars and wrinkles, aches and pains, sins and shame, but we love each other anyway, however we can.  For richer for poorer, in sickness and in health, as long as we both shall live. 

It is wonderful that the legal privileges and opportunities that come with state authorized marriage have been given to gays and lesbians.  But the commitment of unconditional love is not something the state has the power or authority to authorize or not.  Unconditional love between two people mirrors Christ’s love for us.  This love is of God and has nothing to do with the state. Our relationship may be recognized by the state and fail to realize the ideal of love.  Unconditional love is unconditional.  I John 4 says, “God is love.” “If we love one another, God lives in us and his love is made complete in us.”  In Christian faith agape encompasses eros.  The unconditional love of God is not erotic love, but it does encompass erotic love.  When agape is present in relationship, then the erotic portion of that relationship also becomes agape.  It is swallowed up or explodes, the temporal bursts into the eternal.  The penis and the vagina, the nose and the elbow, the prancing deer and the blossoming pomegranate all participate the erotic dance of the creator's agape.  

Trust develops when we can count on the others responsiveness, and when we know they share the responsibility of the relationship.  In the erotic love poems of the Song of Songs we hear, “I belong to my beloved and his desire is for me, come my lover let us go to the countryside.”  Here we see the responsiveness of romantic love.  Paul is more practical.  He is thinking of when things are less romantic, when someone is so committed to their vocational service that they start neglecting the romance. 

In particular there were some women and slaves in Corinth who, having found freedom and liberation in Christ, and heard from Paul that it is better to remain celibate, went home to inform their husbands and slave masters that they were finished having sex.  In Corinthian society husbands deprived of sex by their wives, and wives too for that matter, would have had ample opportunity elsewhere, with full religious sanction. 

In a report by the Greek geographer Strabo, around 20 AD we hear of the prostitutes at the temple of Aphrodite:

The temple of Aphrodite was once so rich that it had acquired more than a thousand prostitutes, donated by both men and women to the service of the goddess. And because of them, the city used to be jam-packed and became wealthy. The ship-captains would spend fortunes there, and so the proverb says: "The voyage to Corinth isn’t for just any man."

Modern historians have found that image needs some serious qualification.

"Aphrodite’s servants, who may or may not have been attractive, were not exactly willing volunteers. In fact, Corinth’s many cosmopolitan pornai, or prostitutes, were slaves purchased by wealthy Greeks and dedicated to the temple as a form of religious offering. (Once, a victorious athlete at the Olympic games donated 100 women in a lump sum). Also, recent excavations at the Corinth fortress have found the temple too small for 100 women to be working, let alone 1,000, so few — if any — carnal rites were conducted at the goddess’ feet. More likely, the sex slaves received their clients in charmless brothels around the temple, huddled on lumpy straw mattresses in small, dark, airless stalls rather like the ones preserved in Pompeii, with illustrations painted above the booths demonstrating each girl’s specialty." (Ancient Greek Temples of Sex  by Tony Perrottet http://www.thesmartset.com/article/article11210701.aspx)

Here in the shadow of the great temple filled with prostituted slaves, Paul is trying to develop a little cult in which love and equality are sustainable for the long run.  Women and young boys are being used and abused at will by men with money and power.  Thus it is certainly understandable that he would preach against fornication and homosexuality.  In that context not only does it not fit within the rules of patriarchy, it doesn’t fit within the confines of equality and justice, and therefore cannot be of the One God who created humanity, both male and female, in his image. 

So Paul backs off a bit on the freedom we find in Christ, both to preserve the Church for the long haul, and to preserve marriage.  It is better not to be married he says, but if you are married, there is some obligation.  Here Paul gives immediate individual choice low priority to the mutuality of the long-term commitment.  There may be times when one or the other of you will say, “not tonight honey.”  That is your choice and your right.  But it was also your choice and hence your responsibility to be married, you have mutually given yourselves and your bodies to one another.  And so, there are also times when, to do a modern paraphrase of Paul, you’ve got to give it up for the benefit of your partner.  But the opposite is also true.

It is often the case that women want to do it after the things they are stressed and anxious about are taken care of, where men want to do it for relief from the things they are stressed and anxious about.  In the mutuality of a relationship, under the golden rule again, both will need to accommodate the other, one at one time, another at another.  In fifteen years of marriage counseling, I have never met a couple whose frequency of desire is equal.  The tendency is for men to want greater frequency but that is definitely not always the case.  Also, the balance can completely switch over time.  And gay couples are the same in not being the same.  The solution, mutually sharing the golden rule, is to meet half way.  And be a cheerful giver.

But if the marriage gets to a point where it becomes one obligation after another, then nobody will be having fun or getting relief.  The relief and obligation Paul is talking about is one thing, the joy and delight of the Song of Songs is another. You may need to take a time out from the kids and the work and say like the poet, come my lover, let us go out into the country…Let us go out early to the vineyards to see if the vines have budded, if their blossoms have opened, and if the pomegranates are in bloom – there I will give you my love.

  God told us to be fruitful and multiply, but in 2008 with over 6 billion people on the planet, this is one commandment we have actually managed to accomplish and it is safe to say that the enjoyment of sex need not be for the sole purpose of procreation.  God created us sexual beings and therefore we can and should enjoy this gift.  At the same time there is great responsibility that comes with it. It is a gift of great power, and with power comes the potential for abuse. and the responsibility to use it with justice and agape love.