“every religion that's ever been is distinguished principally by the idea that we should be disgusted by our own sexuality. Name me a religion that does not play upon that fact.”
I will be glad to name two: biblically based Judaism and Christianity.
Yet, being aware that Mr. Hitchens possesses a rare gift (or curse) for concocting tightly wound combinations of a great number of confused and non-related issues with phantasmagoric results, one can only wonder what he is actually stating or asking.
For instance, what does he mean by “our own sexuality”? If he means do what thou wilt sexually then religion or not, sexuality must be restricted. This as it is self evident.
The Judeo-Christian scripture restricts damaging sexuality but honors and glorifies normative sexuality. God did, after all, invent sexuality.
One can only wonder which, if any, sexual acts Mr. Hitchens opposes.
The Bible is very level headed about sex in the real world and oft describes marital sexual bliss. For example, the entirety of Song of Solomon is, shall we say, “Hot!”
Proverbs 5:18-19 states, “rejoice with the wife of your youth. As a loving deer and a graceful doe, let her breasts satisfy you at all times; and always be enraptured with her love.”
1st Corinthians 7:3-5 seeks to keep both husband and wife sexually fulfilled with each other,
“Let the husband render to his wife the affection due her, and likewise also the wife to her husband…Do not deprive one another except with consent for a time, that you may give yourselves to fasting and prayer; and come together again.”
For more on the New Atheist’s obsession with sex see my essay Too Sexy for My Theology?
2 comments:
Sex is an act that in of itself is void without love. God is love. If we make judgments on religion based on what you physically see then like anything else you will misjudge a book by its cover. God isn't about rules, regulations, fear, punishment, etc. God is about love. If you want labels-I'm Christian. I read the bible. I practice Catholicism. However, more than anything I know it's not about a building I attend on Sunday, not about a secular news/media/article's viewpoint on the negative results of misguided humans abusing a religions purpose for the sake of worldly and not Godly ends thereafter making their religion look bad, it's not about that. Whether Hindu, Buddhist, Muslim, Jewish, Christian---it's about a relationship with God (or it should be) and not about tearing down anything...rather standing up for everything beautiful and right. Personally, I was anti-institution/anti-religion for many years before I got back to where I left off--and what I know now..and continue knowing...is that reading from the source (for me the bible) and actively learning and questioning (seek and you shall find) and processing...is when I began to recognize how ignorant I had been when I objectively unknowingly wrongfully disregarded religion(s) because I much like what it seems you may be saw it as something that tears people apart and classifies things/people as wrong or right. Once you open your eyes, close your mouth, seek & start finding....and start listening (praying is talking to God, meditating is listening) you will see/understand what I mean. Jen~LOTUS
One more thing~ "Abstinence" is sexy! Spirituality and sexuality are fabulously linked/correlated. Economic principles may ring a bell--it's "supply/demand" in your face....the easier it is to get some, the cheaper it is...and ultimately even an atheist can agree--you get what you pay for! One of my first jobs was at home depot in the refunds service area and I would laugh whenever the customer would tell me that he should have known, have gotten the better quality item, and then look me in the face and tell me ---what you think you save for being cheap on quality ends up costing you more!!! So true so true in soo many aspects...and fundamentally the same in real life decisions!!! Chose the fast life, you loose fast! Trying to be a worldly "man" and live the "wild oat sowing" life, then you might end up caught up in an unhealty relationship, have a child with someone you thought you never would have wanted to know of in the long term (or in the alternative, be put in a position of dealing with an abortion which leads to alot of emotional after issues/thoughts), or face diseases (which unlike the ones that you may have no control of) in which BUT FOR your decisions only YOU HAVE yourself to blame for allowing yourself to be put in that position (this is in reference to voluntary consensual sex, not rape of course). Being smarter with your body, your decisions, and most of all being able to make your sexual activity more intimate/special/rare and based on long lasting-life giving (rather than life taking) principles to be shared with that person God has for you is hot! It's sexy! It's beautiful! Why not--if you keep doing what you've always done, then you'll keep getting what you've always got! Jen~LOTUS!
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